and a bit about BM-27 Uragan and BM-30 Smerch too.
Angry, because every M270 and M142 thread I have seen on twitter so far is FULL OF MIND BOGGLING ERRORS... because all of them (!) use as source of their "knowledge" the
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error-filled M270 wikipedia article... 🤦♂️🤦♂️
Let's dive in. First: M270 and M142 are technologically decades ahead of their Soviet-era counterparts: BM-27 Uragan and BM-30 Smerch. See the red arrows I painted? Yes, those are optical sights...
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Uragan and Smerch have to be sighted optically... and in the case of the Uragan soldiers have to adjust elevation and deflection by turning wheels.
Even Uragan's two outriggers have to be lowered and emplaced by muscle power. 3/n
Optical sights means that it takes the 10-12 minutes to measure and prepare a launch sites and sight a launchers.
Firing dumb rockets with optical sight also means that the Uragan and Smerch's accuracy is atrocious... i.e. when a Smerch fires its 12 rockets, 4/n
then the circular error probable (CEP) is 170 meter. This means only 50% of rockets fall within a 170 meter radius of the actual target... the other 50% will come down even further away than 170 meter from the target.
Meanwhile US GLMRS missiles have a CEP of 5 meters. 5/n
This is the reason russian forces fire mostly rockets with cluster munitions. They know they can't hit a target, so they saturate the area around a target with cluster munitions, hoping that at least something will hit...
Photo: remnants of Uragan cluster munition rockets.
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And reloading the Uragan and Smerch is a time-consuming drag... It takes 20 minutes to reload a Uragan and it takes 5x russians 40 minutes to load 12x rusty rockets into a Smerch.
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Ukraine also uses Uragan and Smerch, but russia has bombed Ukraine's rocket factories and as no allied nation produces Uragan or Smerch rockets, Ukraine desperately needs M270 and/or M142 launchers with their more accurate missiles.
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Besides the accuracy of their missiles, what else makes the M270 and M142 so much better?
For starters: the speed of reloading. Both use rocket pods pre-loaded at the factory with either six GMLRS missiles of the same type or one ATACMS missile. Trucks bring the pods to
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predesignated ammo supply points, where M270/M142 exchange their used pods for new ones in 5 minutes thanks to their built in cranes.
Meanwhile the truck is already on its way to get more pods.
And if you're in a hurry - the M270 can reload its pods simultaneously.ously. 10/n
And how do the M270 and M142 aim their missiles?
Well, with a top-secret tool called "keyboard". This must sound like magic to russian soldiers with their sights and collimators.
All M270s in US/NATO service and all M142 fire GPS-guided missiles, which are aimed via the
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M270A1's Improved Fire Control System (IFCS - left photo) or the M142's Universal Fire Control System (UFCS - right photo).
Since 4QFY21 the M270A1's IFCS is being replaced by the Common Fire Control System (CFCS), which will allow upgraded M270A2 to fire the
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future Precision Strike Missile (PrSM). Which brings us to the types of missiles that exist (or existed or will exist) for the two systems:
• M26
• M28
• M30/M31
• M39/M48/M57
• PrSM
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The M26 series were unguided, cluster munitions rockets. The US Army acquired 506,718 and used around 17,000.
The M26 and the extended range M26A2 were carrying M77 submunitions, which had a fail rate of more than 5%. The M26A1 was an extended range version of the M26
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carrying the more advanced M85 submunitions with a dud rate of about 4% (pictured).
However in 2008 the Bush administration instituted a policy to retain and use only cluster munitions with a dud rate of less than 1% or less after 2018.
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Already in 2007 the US Army had begun a program to dismantle its M26 rockets by 2019 and by 2012 98,904 M26s had been dismantled.
In 2017 the Trump administration canceled the Bush administration's cluster munitions policy and as of 2022 it is unknown if - and if yes,
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how many - M26 rockets are are still in US possession. However the US Army (and all NATO allies) have no M26 rockets in their active stockpiles for at least the last 10 years.
The M28 series are a reduced range practice rounds of no interest to us.
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The M30 series consists of two GPS-guided missiles (GMLRS) with different warheads:
• M30 - with M101 cluster munitions (2% duds)
• M30A1 - Alternative Warhead, with 160,000+ Tungsten balls - it is like a giant shotgun
From 2004 to 2009 the Army bought 2,475 M30,
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but because of the 2% fail rate of the M101 cluster munitions the army stopped buying the M30 in 2009 and focused on developing the M30A1.
All M30s cluster warheads were scheduled to be replaced by M30A1 Alternative Warheads by 2019.
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As of 2022 it is unclear if, and if yes how many, M30 missiles are still in the US arsenal.
The M31 and M31A1 are variants of the M30 GMLRS missile with unitary high-explosive warheads.
Lockheed Martin produces about 11,000 M30A1 and M31A1 GMLRS missiles per year, and the
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US military has as of 2022 at least 60,000 GMLRS in its arsenal.
In 2022 the M30A2 (aka XM403) and M31A2 (aka XM404) will replace the two A1 variants in production.
As the US does not plan to give Ukraine the longer range ATACMS missiles I will dicuss them only in brief:
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• M39 - with M74 cluster munitions (the "steel rain" of Desert Storm) - only non GPS-guided ATACMS
• M39A1 - longer range, GPS-guided M39 variant with reduced M74 payload
The Army planned to have both either dismantled or rebuilt as M57 by 2020.
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• M48 - with unitary warhead, 176 produced in 2001-04, of which 58 were used during OEF/OIF
• M57 - with unitary warhead, improved CEP, and new fuze, 513 produced 2004-13, 47 used
It is likely only the M57 (new and rebuilt M39/M39A1) remain in the US military's arsenal.
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As of 2022 Lockheed is in the process of modernizing the ATACMS missiles to extend their service life until the Precision Strike Missile (PrSM) enters service in 2027.
All of this tells us that Ukraine will receive M30A1, M31, and M31A1 missiles.
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People tweeting that Ukraine will get M26 rockets, M30 missiles, XM403/404 missiles, GMLRS ER missiles, etc. don't know what they are talking about.
And yes, the arrival of M270 or M142 will be a turning point, as my next thread will show.
russian troops are doomed.
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Part II of this thread - including maps about how the situation at the front will change with the arrival of M270A1 or M142 systems - begins with this tweet:
Of course russia can quickly seize the Suwałki Gap and cut of the Baltics from the rest of NATO... but have you had a look at Kaliningrad's border and the flat dry country beyond?
There are 9 Polish brigades in that area (and 11 in reserve, with 4 more forming). Sure russia 1/5
could move 50,000+ men to Kaliningrad to secure the border or build a defence line along the Pregoła river... but those need to be supplied from Belarus, which also is easily invaded unless russia sends 50,000+ troops to secure its flank there. A buildup of 200,000+ russian
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troops in Belarus would be noticed by NATO (and ordinary people in Belarus, who would upload 100s of videos of the arriving russians).
In summary the main risk isn't that russia suddenly seizes and fortifies the Suwałki Gap... the main risk is that russia starts building up
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The North Atlantic - one of the key battles in a russia-Europe war.
If Europe is defeated here, which with Europe's current forces and capabilities, is almost certain to happen... then russia can nuke the UK without fear of retaliation.
This will be a unsettling thread:
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This battle will be very different from the battles in the Black Sea and Baltic Sea, which I discussed in an early thread, which is linked below.
To understand the North Atlantic Battle we need to look at Imperial Germany's WWI submarine campaign,
2 days ago I did a thread about the reasons russia can't defeat Ukraine and yet is still a deadly threat to Europe and NATO (link to the thread the next tweet).
Today I will talk about three of the fronts of a russia-Europe war: 1) Black Sea 2) Baltic Sea 3) North Atlantic
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These three fronts will be air and sea battles, while Finland and the Baltics will be air and land battles; about which I will talk in another thread in the coming days.
I do not believe the US under control of Trump or Vance would come to the aid 2/n
• russia has no chance to defeat Ukraine
• russia is a deadly threat to NATO and the EU
Both of these are true... because as of 2025 Ukraine fields a far more capable military than NATO's 30 European members combined (!).
Let me explain.
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As of August 2025 russia fields more than 1,3 million troops; at least half of which are fighting in or against Ukraine.
Ukraine has an estimated 1 million troops... maybe even 1,1 million troops. NATO's European members have double that: some 2.2 million troops, but 2/n
(there is always a "but" with European militaries):
• with more than double the personnel European NATO members manage to field only 20% more combat brigades than Ukraine. Partly because Western navies and air forces are bigger, but mostly because in all European militaries 3/n
People forget that for most if its history Europe was much, much more militarized than even during the Cold War.
Italy, from the end of the Third War of Independence in 1866 to 1939 fielded always 360-400 battalions, which fell to 110-115 during the Cold War, as the US
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backed its European allies with the its massive air force. Today Italy fields 41 battalions (infantry, tanks, recon, special forces, rangers).
Likewise the British Army fielded for most of its history (especially after the 1908 Haldane reforms) 450-480 battalions, which came 2/n
in three types: 150-160 regular battalions (of which a third was always in India), around 100 reserve battalions to provide replacements for the regular battalions, and 200-220 territorial battalions, which (at least on paper) could not be deployed overseas. The British Army
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And this is how Berlin would look like 3 days after putin attacks Europe... because Germany doesn't have the air defence ammo to defend any of its city for more than 2 days.
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This is Copenhagen.
And this is how Copenhagen would look like the morning after putin attacks Europe... because Denmark doesn't have any air defence to defend itself.
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This is Paris.
And this is how Paris would look like a day after putin attacks Europe... because France only has SAMP/T air defence systems, which is as of now has very limited capabilities against ballistic missiles.
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