Thread by @HeliosRunner

1/ Article tres intéressant du NY times qui revient sur qq récents gros succès des Ukrainiens contre les Ru notamment sur la base aérienne de #Saki en #Crimea
nytimes.com/2022/08/28/us/…

2/ American official later briefed on the attacks said #Ukrainian commandos & partisan fighters had used an "improvised array of weapons, explosives and tactics in the strikes. 'It’s all homegrown,' the official said, 'We did not get any advance notice.”
& also :

3/ so at the end of the day, we had from US officials (not just CIA director that would say whatever he thinks is the best to say), that it was all Ukrainians, we had Ukr officials who said so, several times, and even #arestovych gave 2 very important tiny details about it.

4/ he said it was smaller than a missile like ATACMS and more "nimble" !
than we had report from Russians saying no missiles like Grim 2 or equivalent hit the tarmac, and even local population (ex mil on TG channels) explained no sounds before of incoming missiles.
also & very

5/ important, if it would have been an ATACMS missile, Russia would have collected all the pieces and frags they can find (so for 4 explosions) and presented them as the "proof" (like they love to do with GMLRS ones), that US is indeed hiting Russia interest and take that for pro

6/ propaganda purpose.
see, that' s all the points here. and it's solid. there is no room for interpretation.
the blast is very consistent within a range of 250 to 500 kg of explosive hard to be sure/terrain), and i still have no exact idea what hit the base back then, but

7/ to this day, we have no proof, none, zero, whatsoever that an ATACMS (4 of them) would have hit the tarmac.
even if in theory it could have "fit" 100% with observations...
But when we observe the impact and the hit, we do know for sure, that it was not some simple ground

8/explosions made only by SOF (helped by some "partisans") because first you don't bring from 1t to 2t of explosives on your shoulders entering a Russian base at war...nand the explosions were not from the ground. explosions happened higher in the air at least 5 to 10m above.

9/ an SOF action would have take only few small charges (2x100grs is enough on a shallow structure like a jet) and put one under the cockpit (or radome) and one under engines. and that would do the trick for good. so of course it was not that.
and also not SOF putting explosives

10/ on top of jet fighter missiles on the ground... (which is so ridiculous to even think about that when you see the picture

11/ so this is the assessment of the explosions you can make after really observing the effects on the grounds and surroundings (you might want to zoom in as i did it with thin details in order to not "pollute" the image) :
so the first obvious thing is that there is a "pattern"

12/ of strikes, and even an almost "orthogonal" scheme here. all the explosions are of the same intensity and almost for the upper "line" at the same distance.
and it was above the ground it was an air burst effect
so contrary to some claims, no what you see is not direct impact

13/ on the ground, but the result of quite some big explosions far above it and for a good reason! because when you want to hit as much materials (planes and others) and you have "only" 4 missiles, you want to make them count..

14/ so what you clearly see is a pattern that was optimized for the best of what they had. Also trying to exploded above some small warehouses, where some missiles/jet fuel could have been partly stocked, in order to increase the blast effect = more damages.

15/ so..;as i showed in the previous pic showing a Cruise missile doing an airburst above the ground
it would totally fit with at least 4 things we know of : could be fast and nimble Ukr missile, with a lots of guidances/precisions within it's hardware. and no one "heard" lots

16/ supersonic missiles incoming, nor there is any traces of missiles coming in the videos 'direct videos' that where taken that same day :
also double explosions happening at the same time on the base. could be consistent with "cruise" missiles.

17/ if we take the example of the Neptune, he Neptun have an inertial navigation system with active radar homing on the terminal stage of its flight. The missile will travels 10-15 meters above the surface but can go as low as 2/3m above ground to evade radars.

18/ also what few people know is that according to what US said about mc gyver thing it could have received a brand new radar and inertial systems that could allow some models to have even better results. the only "problem" i see here is the warhead of 150kg

19/ because it is almost consistent with the explosion we have witnessed, but it seems a bit "short" of what has generated such an impact on the ground.
This down below is more consistent with at least a 250-500 kgs of explosives.

20/ what we do see above is the result of enough explosives (at least 5 m above the ground) to create a A blast wave reflecting from a surface and forming a mach stem that raised the ground like well known effect when a drop goes into water.
(left graph is for nuke and only ref)

21/ except you don't need to touch the water. almost every one have seen this movie (hurt locker) where you get to "understand" the blast effect and the fact that a "force" don't need to be "seen" to be effective on a person. imdb.com/video/vi408505…

22/ the only thing we can't really tell because we don't have the exact radius of blast with precise time frame is the "charge" of explosives that was used there.

23/ so at the end of the day yes it could fit very well the
#Hrim2 Grim-2 (Grom) or Sapsan - whatever you want to call it. it would be a direct match.
Ukrainians have stopped it just before the war because of funds and results where hard to achieve, also

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hrim-2

24/ the main factory producing some essentials components closed.
but what if as Ukr knew war was coming back they started to reassemble secretly some models, and asked for better electronics (hence the Mc gyver reference from US officials). that would allow such a strike.

25/ Also why the need then for SOF close to the base ? (as all this can be aimed and prepared almost exclusively by sat images and intel analysis about schedules of the air base & jets on the taxiway etc).
also how can air defense all have been "blind" if it was such missiles..

26/ so there is still no direct answers to all of that and it"s good for Ukr that we still don't know everything as it keeps an advantage for their future attacks.
just "sad" that Ru did not show any "evidence" back then ;)

27/ additional: for some ppl asking in DM
this is what the explosion could have looked -lower enough to do extreme damages but high enough to go over the raised soil protecting jet fighters. and it's consistent with all traces of impacts.

28/ and here the results. and even if some jets don't "seems" hit, they were quite like swiss cheese after the blast... believe you me!!
and that's it.

29/ The Ukrainian Air Force just posted a video that clearly shows a Ukrainian MiG-29 fighter armed with an AGM-88 HARM missile.
i put it here in my thread as these specific missiles were used prior to the famous attack on #saki air base.
facebook.com/watch/?v=46263…

30/ here an amazing view within the cockpit
and don't forget that the Teddy bear is mandatory!
(side note 1: thanks to Garmin to for the reliable material in order to complete the Soviet-era-like hardware..
side note 2: not bidding the datas... is... quite "mind-boggling" to me)

31/ The Ukrainian pilot here made this footage to
dedicates this video to major Yevhen Lysenko, his fallen brother in arms, who heroically died in an aerial fight against the russian invaders on March 9.
So i guess #Saki was a very polite way of Karma to say F-off Orcs!

32/ basically from 07 to 08 of August
this was recorded & shown by the Ru : Fragments of American-made AGM-88 HARM guided aircraft missile, which used to destroy enemy radars, found. This is first documented evidence of the use of such weapon by Ukr. Washington acknowledged it

33/

https://twitter.com/HeliosRunner/status/1557102658456002567