Thomas C. Theiner Profile picture
Nov 21, 2022 19 tweets 7 min read Read on X
Were the russians in Makiivka executed?

No. And I will explain all the facts in this thread 🧵:

Yesterday the @nytimes published an article about the dead russians in Makiivka... and didn't bother to ask a single military expert, officer, weapons expert, or Ukrainian.
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Instead they went to an Assistant Adjunct Professor for Epidemiology at UC Berkeley, who is quoted: “It looks like most of them were shot in the head,” Dr. Rohini Haar, medical adviser at Physicians for Human Rights, said in an interview.

Wrong. And a military expert would
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have told the NY Times that this is nonsense.

First: here are the videos of the before and after of the incident. Video 2 in the linked tweet is before and Video 3 is after.

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Here is a screenshot from Video 2.
There is a Ukrainian machine gunner on the ground (red circle). I added his line of fire in yellow.
We can also spot a toy car and a tree trunk. Those are important later.
There are two additional Ukrainian soldiers in this video, but they
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will move before the next video so I did not mark them. Here is a video taken by a Ukrainian soldier that participated in the events.

Now let's analyze this video.
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Here is the machine gunner from earlier. He uses a PKM machine gun. The machine gun is level with the heads of the dead russians later. His job is to keep the surrendering russians in check.

And again we see the toy car.
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The toy car, a children's swing and to the right another Ukrainian soldier (which the NY Times forgot to count).

And this Ukrainian soldier doesn't have his rifle up. He is not expecting any resistance.
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Two more Ukrainian troops. One with his foot on the aforementioned trunk, the other to the side behind the machine gunner. Both with their rifles pointing down. They too aren't ready for any shootout.

So we have five Ukrainian soldiers, with one filming, three having their
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rifles down, and only the machine gunner ready to fire.

If we add those four Ukrainian soldiers to the overhead shot we see that only one had a clear shot of the russian (green circle) that came out last and attacked the Ukrainians. And that the filming soldier (blue circle)
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was the attackers target (he is the injured soldier at the end of his video).

This is the approximate view of the machine gunner and his line of fire in yellow. Also note the wall section, the position of the 10th russian soldiers, & the hands of the first russian soldiers.
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If we add the position of the Ukrainian troops and their lines of fire over a screenshot of the aftermath video, you can see that two Ukrainian troops and the machine gunner had the russians on the ground in their line of fire. Only one Ukrainian soldier had a clear shot of
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attacking russian. Once this russian attacks, the soldier filming drops to the ground injured and the soldier, who had his foot on the trunk moves forward to engage. And you can hear the machine gun starting to fire - but more of that later.
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After the shooting.

Bullet holes have appeared on the wall behind the dead russians. How did these get there if the russians were "shot in the head"??
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And if the russians were shot were they lay, how come that the 10th did move behind the wall?

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"shot in the head", but the helmets didn't move? I can show you videos from the war in Syria and the Armenia-Azerbaijan war: a headshot with a Kalashnikov at that range and the helmet flies off with half the skull and most of the brain.
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These russian were hit by the much more powerful bullets of the PKM machine gun. How powerful?
Well, the first russian soldier's left hand got hit by one of the machine guns' 7.62×54mm bullets...

The destructive power and rate of fire of the PKM machine gun alone was enough
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to kill all these russians. It was not an execution, it was not a war crime.
It was a team of 5 Ukrainian troops, four of which weren't doing their job but fooling around, who tried to take 11 russian prisoner. One russian decided to rather die than surrender, and the only
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Ukrainian soldier ready to fire did as is expected in such a situation. The soldier filming goes down = the machine gunner fires to neutralize any threat. That's it.

If the NY Times had asked a military or weapons expert instead of epidemiologists and lawyers, they wouldn't
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have provided the russian propaganda with this gift.

If you still have doubts: here is a PKM machine gun being fired, and after that I added three times the audio from the last second of the Ukrainian soldier's video.

You be the judge what we hear in that last second.
19/end

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More from @noclador

Sep 1
• 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
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(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
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Read 39 tweets
Aug 18
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
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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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Read 14 tweets
Jul 4
This is Berlin.

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.
1/12 Image
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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.
2/12 Image
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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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Read 12 tweets
Jul 3
Are the American M142 HIMARS and the M270A2 MLRS the best rocket/missile launchers... yes, they are.

Should Europe buy them? No.

Not as long as @LockheedMartin doesn't have a production line IN EUROPE for GMLRS, GMLRS-ER, ATACMS and PrSM missiles... but as long as Europe
1/9 Image
Image
is ordering only itsy-bitsy amounts of missiles, there is no incentive for Lockheed Martin to produce missiles in Europe... which means at any given moment MAGA can deny Europe the needed missiles to defend itself against a russian attack.
So... Europe can either order 10,000
2/n
missiles per year,... or have a look at the second best rocket/missile launcher: Israel's PULS.

Should Europe buy it? No.

Because the missile production line in Israel is too small to support Europe's missile needs... again, Europe would have to either commit to buy 10,000
3/n Image
Read 9 tweets
Jun 1
Let's run some numbers on Ukraine's brilliant operation to take out russia's strategic aviation deep in russia and Siberia.

8× containers are visible in this image

As Ukraine sent 2× containers to each of the 5× air bases they attacked, another 2× must be out of sight.
1/6 Image
Each container roof seems to have housed 9 compartments. Here we can see that at 3× per compartments, but they might have even had space for 4× drones.
Quick math: that's 27× or 36× drones.
Two containers per air base: 54× or 72× drones

But (!) not all compartments likely
2/6 Image
held drones.

As we saw in this video from on of the containers launching drones, the roof of the containers slid to the side and fell down... so one compartment might have housed the motor and system to slide the roof off.

Also all the containers self-destructed once they
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Read 6 tweets
Apr 3
Italy's 61º Stormo received enough of the new T-345A basic jet trainers to begin pilot training this June.

As everyone knows, I am all for growing European militaries and adding capabilities... but why does EVERYTHING have to be with US engines?

Europe must stop buying US
1/22 Image
made kit, components and weapon systems.

The Italian T-345A (left) and the Czech L-39 Skyfox (right) are the only two basic jet trainers currently in production in Europe... and both use a Williams International FJ44-4M turbofan made in Ogden, Utah.

Yes, there are more
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American components than just the engines in both, but as aircraft are designed around their engines Europe needs to stop buying American and start building engines again.

Both planes the T-345A and L-39 Skyfox replace used European engines: the Italian MB-339 (pic)
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Read 23 tweets

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