Trent Telenko Profile picture
May 9, 2022 41 tweets 13 min read Read on X
This is going to be a long thread🧵 on Ukraine's unique 21st century fighting style based on Uber style C3I software, why Western intelligence is plug ignorant of it due to CROWDSTRIKE cybersecurity firm, & the implications of SpaceX's Starlink satcom for the future...

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...of warfare & politics. This is going to be a wild thread, so buckle up.

First we need to talk about Ukraine's "GIS Art for Artillery" software package written by Yaroslav Sherstyuk.

web.archive.org/web/2020110811…
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Sherstyuk's software package is reminiscent Uber or Lyft's taxi software in that assigns targets to the nearest gun, mortar, rocket launcher, Aerosvidzka drone or SF team.

This is nothing like the US Military's Tactical Fire Direction System (TACFIRE)
sciencedirect.com/science/articl…
3/ 'GIS Art for Artillery' app...'GIS Art for Artillery' app...'GIS Art for Artillery' app...TACFIRE Infographic
...or Advanced Field Artillery Tactical Data System (AFATDS).

The 2009 AFATDS transitioned from a Sun Microsystems SPARC computer running the Linux kernel to a version based on laptop computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system.

4/ ImageAFTADS windows laptop computer
GIS Art for Artillery, or "GIS Art" for short, isn't the 1950's "Star" style Mainframe-terminal (TACFIRE) or Mainframe-Minicomputer-terminal (AFTADS) ported over to laptops.

It is a true distributed software environment that reduced request for fire to trigger pull from
5/ 'GIS Art for Artillery' app...'GIS Art for Artillery' app...'GIS Art for Artillery' app...'GIS Art for Artillery' app...
...20 minutes to 30 seconds.

By comparison, the US Army did that call to trigger pull in 5 minutes in WW2, 15 minutes in Vietnam and one hour currently.

No, that isn't a typo.

6/
The increased US Army time 'from call to trigger pull' has to do trying to prevent friendly fire plus the inclusion of JAG officers in Division artillery fire control centers doing rules of engagement/collateral damage vetting of calls for fire.

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In 2006, when US Army Special Forces task force hunting high value targets was given direct access to an MLRS battery with GMLRS rockets - without a JAG officer poisoned chain of command - got it back down to Vietnam 15-minute levels in Iraq, thanks to the Blue Force Tracker.
8/ Blue Force Tracker terminal...Infantry Blue Force Tracker...Blue Force Tracker infographic
This didn't last long with the Obama Administration thanks to Taliban high value targets using their own kids as human shields followed by cellphone photos of dead kids.

Then everything went back to the JAG officer game & the Special Forces started buying loitering drones.

9/ Switchblade 300 Lointerin M...
Returning to the "GIS Arta" app, (GIS meaning geospatial) it has evolved into a multi-profile command and control system that can process data from drones, smartphones, rangefinders and commercial satellite images.

This has a lot of implications.



10/
The biggest being that with a good SATCOM link Ukrainian high command could nominate targets in the the "GIS Arta" app to the nearest fire support, drone or convoy hunter killer teams throughout the entire Ukrainian battle space without tipping local units

11/
...to intelligence sources & methods.

Western Intelligence is either ignorant or discounts the "GIS Arta" app because of a CROWDSTRIKE cybersecurity firm December 22, 2016 article claiming the Russians hacked "GIS Arta."
12/
docs.voanews.eu/en-US/2017/03/…
And that the "Fancy Bear" group used the same hacking method to to get into the DNC.

The problem is that hacking of the "GIS Arta" app CROWDSTRIKE claimed never happened.

The VOA did a takedown here:
voanews.com/a/crowdstrike-…
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I knew that CrowdStrike co-founder Dimiti Alperovitc was lying at the time because of a summer 2015 OSINT investigation I did of the strange Ukrainian artillery concentrations hitting DNR forces in Donbas.

14/
The Ukrainian Army seemed to be using older Soviet-era ground surveillance radars to guide its deep artillery strikes.

Russian video's sent by the Donbas War list-admin showed a UA artillery strike missing a Russian convoy in a classic centroid error of an older radar
15/ 1RL-239 ARK-1 "Rys&quo...1RL-239 ARK-1 "Rys&quo...
...that has two targets close together at extreme range and sees them as a single target.

The video showed a large convoy on the right and UA artillery strikes to the left of them.

[Note: The infographic shows chaff pulling a 'radar centroid' off of a jet]

16/ Image
The video then pans a little and shows a second road further left with a convoy of vehicles on it.

Both roads seemed to be approaching a fork out of camera view.

17/
I asked the list-admin about it & specifically if a ARK-1 RICE BAG radar could pull that off.

I was told 'No, the most likely Ukrainian sensor directing the artillery fire was a Su-24MR FENCER E M-101 Shtik side looking aerial radar (SLAR)'

18/ Image
The radar centroid error I described was spot-on for 1985 Soviet era kit.

The Su-24MR FENCER E had long range air to ground data links, but directing artillery with it implied some distinctly non-Soviet era command and control doctrine.

There was also the fact the barrage
19/
...looked wrong. And by looked wrong I mean it was all landing in one spot with explosions indicating shells from radically different azimuths.

It was kinda, sorta, a time on target (TOT) from lots of individual guns.
20/
Usually Russian doctrine artillery batteries fire a "battery solution" and the barrage lands in the pattern of the ground formation of the firing guns.

A TOT from several Russian gun batteries would cover a significant area.

So the Ukrainians were doing something else.

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I systematically searched through Donbas artillery videos of UA artillery strikes & photos of UA artillery positions (single guns).

The thing that stood out was the timing of the barrages, the tightness of the barrages and the variability of the shell bursts.
22/
UA artillery were not firing as batteries. They were firing as individual guns and launchers, then displacing immediately.

Multiple individual guns & mortars of different calibers were shooting dispersed across a large area at the same target in the TOT manner.

23/
Given the following:

1. A radar or laser range finder equipped forward observer with a GPS unit,

2. A gun with a digital radio, digital artillery fire control computer and a GPS unit, and

3. A digital internet data link radio communications tying them together.
24/
It then becomes relatively easy to program a multi-gun, multi-ammunition caliber time on target from whatever guns are in range. You can even call down multiple TOT barrages in a short amount of time using different guns for each barrage-strike on the same target.

25/
That meant Russian counter-battery radars were not seeing battery shoots.

They were seeing lots of individual guns across the front, with multiple trajectories, shooting less than three shells, at the same or different targets, across a whole front.

26/
That was why the Russians were not killing a lot of UA towed artillery with counter-battery in the Summer of 2015 onward.

Russian counter-battery radars were not seeing "worthwhile" battery sized targets for MLRS shoots.

27/
It also made Russian airpower much less effective in the counterbattery role when it showed up.

What cost Ukraine it's towed 122mm guns wasn't destruction by counter battery. It was abandonment when the Debaltsevo pocket fell.

radiosvoboda.org/a/27555492.html

28/
The Ukrainians had multiple dug in positions per 122mm towed gun. They didn't have the resources to do the same with their truck prime movers.

They could camouflage them, but not get them into cover.

The sheer weight of fragmentation damage over time disabled them

29/
...beyond the local ability to repair the day the Debaltsevo pull out came.

The Ukrainian Army chose to save its troops over its heavy weapons and disabled heavy weapons as best they could at short notice.

30/
A lot of DNR & LNR 122mm guns firing at Ukrainians today came from the fall of the Debaltsevo pocket.

The other thing that informed me CROWDSTRIKE was lying happened in the first couple of days post-invasion.

31/
Russia opened the war with a "Zero-day exploit"aimed like a dagger at GIS Art for Artillery app.

Russia took down all of Ukraine's SATCOM terminals and quite a few in Europe besides.

32/
This is where @elonmusk SpaceX Starlink constellation comes in.

Ukraine turned to @elonmusk to replace it's pre-war SATCOM links for 'GIS Art for Artillery' with Starlink.

To date, not only have those SATCOM been replaced, SpaceX has impressed

33/
cnet.com/science/space/…
...the DoD and Western three letter intelligence agencies generally.

SpaceX has handily defeated the strongest cyber & jamming attacks the Russian Federation can assemble.

34/
In addition, one of the lesser known features of SpaceX's Starlink internet service, point to point email service for Starlink users encrypted and not using any ground infrastructure whatsoever, has aided Ukrainian military units behind Russian lines to communicate

35/
...with minimal electronic signature for Russian direction finding to exploit.

Effectively Starlink gave Ukraine the military space telecommunications bandwidth of the United States with zero investment in satellite infrastructure before the war.

36/
Ukraine's 'GIS Art for Artillery' app combined with Starlink actually gives the Ukrainian military measurably better than US Military standard artillery command and control.

The Ukraine War is the first Starlink War & the side with Starlink is beating the side without.
37/
There are a lot of implications in that thought.

Now comes the kicker. When the lasercom equipped SpaceX Gen 1.5 & 2.0 satellites come on-line.
38/
The ability to move huge amounts of bandwidth with zero ground based infrastructure will utterly subvert the ability of national governments & corporations to block or surveil Starlink communications.

39/
The only way the US Government will be able to monitor Starlink communications is with @elonmusk active cooperation.

The power shift involved in that fact is...profound...and something for another thread

40/
Meanwhile, a whole lot of very powerful people are going to have to rethink their place in the world as the Starlink juggernaut remakes the world by helping Ukraine win "The 1st Starlink War."

41/End

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More from @TrentTelenko

May 6
This is Grok analysis of one of my X threads is a good example of why farming out your thinking/analysis to AI is a really bad idea.

Grok accurately reflects a highly flawed US National Security consensus about small drones.😱

A Grok vs Drone Reality🧵

x.com/i/grok/share/B…
Grok focused on Ukrainian drone capabilities to the exclusion of actual fielded Chinese drone capability and literally eight decades old aviation technology like conformal fuel tanks which have also been applied to cruise missiles in the Chinese technological base for 20 years
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The Chinese Sunflower-200 is it's clone of the Iranian Shahed-136. It appeared at Russia's Armiya-2023 show and in 2025 combat in Sudan.

The China Defense website says it has a 3.2-meter length, 2.5-meter wingspan, a flight speed of 160-220 km per hour with a maximum take-off weight of 175 kilograms, a combat payload of 40 kilograms and can fly up to 2000 kilometers.
x.com/clashreport/st…
3/Image
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Read 18 tweets
May 4
I cannot begin to tell you how heartened I am by this development in Ukrainian combat barrier doctrine.

1/
Compare the picture above to my complaints about Ukrainian fighting doctrine in the Summer of 2024.

2/
Or my B*tching about its lack in the Summer of 2023 for the Russian Army

3/
Read 7 tweets
May 1
1560 dead Russian mortars and artillery tubes was 2/3 done by drones per ISW.

Drones are the primary counter-battery system on 21st century battlefields.

US Army field artillery branch OTOH is showing up to the counter-battery indirect firefight with knives, AKA the M109A6.

1/
The M109A6 Paladin 155mm/L39 caliber self-propelled gun is the T-62MV obr. 2022 of the artillery world.

The gun is inferior to every other major power's fielded SPG world wide.

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The computerized fire direction system of the US Army Artillery is a overly centralized, decades old Star/mini-computer architecture, which has an electromagnetic signature so bright that it can be detected bouncing off the surface of the moon

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Image
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Read 17 tweets
Apr 27
Just...Reapers are not flying "Deep ISR" over Yemen.

They are dying due to a lack of electronic warfare equipment over Yemen.

I believe @noclador is overlooking the event @RyanO_ChosenCoy is calling out - The fall of Assad's Syria.

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Ukraine's HUR sent two drone teams with 150 drones to Syria in in June 2024 to support the Turkish supported Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.

2/3
By December 2024, Assad's regime fell because it could not counter Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) small drone airpower that Ukraine provided.

@RyanO_ChosenCoy is saying 25 such HUR teams with 80K drones would do in the Houthi from its lack of counter UAS capability.

See Grok⬇️
3/3 Image
Read 4 tweets
Apr 26
I see this F-35 procurement problems post is getting traction thanks to @elonmusk .

Let's add the F-35 problem list with bolts AKA fasteners.

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F-35 Fastener Corruption🧵 Image
I cannot begin to tell you all how fishy this passage from that article is:

"In addition to the F-35 production line at Ft. Worth, Texas, the commingling of the two types of bolts was also discovered at the Italian F-35

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... Final Assembly and Check-Out (FACO) facility, but not the one in Japan, the DCMA reported."

Spot checking of aircraft production and depot level maintenance facilities fastener bins is a standard operating procedure for DCMA everywhere it has quality personnel.

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Read 19 tweets
Apr 26
Well designed Cope cages work against FPVs.

Why the West, and particularly the US Army, is in deep denial over that reality is rooted in the US Army's denial that the FPV anti-tank drone is replacing the ATGM for cost/performance reasons.

1/
The Ukrainian missile crews salvaging brand new $20K Stugna ATGM to make more FPV drones underlines the battlefield kinematic superiority of multi-copter drones to boost-glide ATGM.

2/
The ability of FPV's to operate in the dead ground makes them 2x as effective as ATGM at a lower cost:

1st Gen. FPV Drone =(π)5 km^2 78,539,816 sq m w-100% of coverage of targets

Tow Missile = (π)4.5 km^2 = 63,617,251.23 sq m at ~50% coverage 32.1 Sq km

3/3 Image
Read 4 tweets

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