I am in Warsaw and was quite busy the last two weeks with the preparation for and then networking at the Heart of Europe International TV Festival... so I only found the time to work through two #Pentagon Ukraine Realignment papers.
So many new weapons for 🇺🇦 Ukraine 😃😃
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So let's begin with the coolest stuff - there is a classified Army emergency missile procurement for $187.4m... which it seems isn't GMLRS, as that is under another classified section: $71.3m of GMLRS are being acquired. So: if it isn't GMLRS... what could it be 😉 2/n
Let's stay with missiles: $389.9m for Javelins - $148.5m for Javelins for Ukraine, and the rest to replace USMC TOW 2A/2B missiles delivered with the Bradleys.
Speaking of Bradleys: $681.6m for new M2A4 Bradleys, to free up additional M2A2 ODS and M113 for Ukraine, and also 3/n
$61.9m Bradley ERA tiles to improve the armor of Ukraine's Bradleys and $9.8m spare parts. Also $215.7m for 25 × 137mm ammo for the Bradley's gun. This order doubles US 25mm ammo production for 2023.
Let's stay with ammo, as there is one amazing round on the way to Ukraine:
4/n
Ammo:
• $146.3m small arms ammo (5.56mm, 7.62mm, 0.50)
• $28.5m 40mm M433 high-explosive dual-purpose grenades
• $29.2m M67 fragmentation, M18 colored smoke & M106 obscurant grenades
• $12.9m for a variety of USMC grenades
• $12.7m M112 and other demolition munitions, 5/n
incl. 40 pound cratering demolition charges.
But the most amazing ammo on the way to Ukraine are a whoping $134.5m in M1147 rounds for Abrams tanks!
The M1147 is the US Army's most modern (!) round and specifically designed to ruthlessly butcher enemy infantry in trenches! 6/n
Ukraine is also receiving M4A1 carbines, M240B machine guns, M2HB machine guns, M2A1 machine guns, 40mm Mk19 machine gun grenade launchers and M249 machine guns for $30.2m.
And $35.1m in night vision viewers and weapon night sights, as well as $16.5m thermal sights.
7/n
Before I come to a huge air defense surprise, a look at artillery ammo:
• $72.2m charges, fuzes, primers
• $357.4m M795 155mm rounds
• $59.5m M982A1 Excalibur rounds
• $19.2m 60mm, 81mm, 120mm mortar rounds
• $13.4m for M326A1 to replace M25A1 mortars sent to Ukraine 8/n
This is a Patriot battery's AN/MPQ-65 radar. It covers +/- 120 degrees; which is ok if you have a Patriot belt to protect your forces.
But Ukraine needs to cover 360 degrees around its cities and - surprise- the US delivered a whole bunch of extra AN/MPQ-65 radars to Ukraine, 9/n
tripling the number of radars per battery! Now the Army is spending $130.4m to buy AN/MPQ-65A radars as replacement.
This explains why all russians attacks on Kyiv failed. Also the US sent Ukraine an extra $53m in AN/MPQ-64F1 Sentinel air defense radars for the NASAMS 2. 10/n
The Pentagon also buys:
• $41.3 M88A2 Hercules ARVs
• $9.9m Special Operations Riverine Craft and $12.2 Light Tactical All-Terrain Vehicles (L-ATV), which were sent to Ukraine's Special Forces
• $10m M1132 Stryker mine rollers
• $16.7m M978A4 HEMTT fuel tankers 11/n
• $0.5m M261 Hydra rocket pods
• $14.2m Hydra rockets
• $34.3m Mk 153 Shoulder-Launched Multipurpose Assault Weapon
• $14.8m AT-4 launchers and ammo
• $14.1m Mk 13 sniper rifles
• $104.9m JLTVs are being acquired to replace the armored Humvees sent to Ukraine 12/n
And last but not least one more classified section: the US Navy has provided Ukraine with $80m worth of RIM-7 Sea Sparrow missiles for Ukraine's Buk air-defense missile launchers.
The legendary FrankenSAM is alive!!
I have seen it and it works :-)
In the next days I will 13/n
try to find the time to work through the other three Pentagon Realignment files, with the weapons the Pentagon acquired in September.
So: stay tuned and Slava Ukraini!
14/end
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As people wonder why I have only scorn for the Karabakh Armenian leaders:
Armenia's 1993 invasion of Azerbaijan was even more brutal than russia's invasion of Ukraine: massacres, expulsion of 300,000 civilians, every (!) building was burned down, war crimes upon war crimes. 1/4
The Karabakh Armenians then annexed the occupied areas and demanded the world recognize these as theirs, which would retroactively ok all their war crimes. This would also violate the UN Charter, the Helsinki Accords and the Paris Charter. In 2020 the Karabakh Armenians lost
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a war and Azerbaijan liberated these areas. To this day the Karabakh Armenians insist these lands are theirs and Azerbaijan has to hand them over. War crimes must NEVER be rewarded. The Karabakh Armenian war crimes are on par with what the Serbs did in Bosnia. Armenia's
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Ukraine is pursuing 7 aims with its unabated drone strike campaign deep inside russia:
1) Degradation of russian military assets & defense capabilities. 2) Dissuasion of russian strikes on Ukraine's energy and heating infrastructure in the coming winter through deterrence. 1/4
3) Demoralization of the russian people as the war finally exacts a toll from them too. 4) Humiliation of the kremlin, as it is unable to shoot down the drones or destroy Ukraine's drone production facilities. 5) Relocation of russian air assets further away from Ukraine to
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reduce the number of sorties they can fly. 6) Relocation of russian air defense assets from the front in Ukraine to russia, to protect russian military and defense production sites and thus opening gaps in russia's air defense belt. 7) Gratification - it's fucking wonderful
3/4
The russians keep moving troops to the center of the Southern Front. Thus they thin out their lines everywhere else. This is opening gaps in the russian front, which the Ukrainians will exploit, when they feel the time is right. 1/7
Until then the Ukrainians are destroying russian forces in the center of the Southern Front with superior Western donated artillery: precision guided munitions like GMLRS, Excalibur, SMArt 155, Bonus to destroy russian equipment and DPICM to annihilate russian personnel. 2/7
It's a meat grinder and the russians are feeding in forces from front sectors they deem "safe". This is why I believe the main Ukrainian advance will not occur, where we have seen fighting over the last two months. In the center of the Southern Front the russians are
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Ukrainian troops I spoke to say that russia's Lancet kamikaze drones are currently the biggest problem they face on the battlefield... and that they have no solution to the problem yet.
First: No (!) NATO army has a solution to this problem, as all NATO armies lack a system
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like i.e. the Skyranger capable to shoot down kamikaze drones... and the ridiculously low numbers of systems being ordered aren't gonna do any good.
If NATO militaries would have taken the drone threat serious, 60+ Skyranger would come of the production lines monthly now. 2/n
Only the US Army has gone on an emergency shopping spree to buy Stryker M-SHORAD vehicles, but 12x batteries of 12x vehicles is far too little.
So how can we help Ukraine? There are four ways:
1) Taurus 2) Harop 3) 🚀tech transfer 4) get off our asses and start building 60+ 3/n
I have been very, very critical of the German government's slow response to russia's invasion and lack of weapon deliveries in 2022, BUT now I have to defend Germany: saying "only half of what Germany promised has been delivered" is bullshit.
Germany's military is out of 1/2
materiel to give to Ukraine. Almost all that has been pledged now comes from Germany's defense industry, which means it has to be produced first.
Germany never said everything would come right away - it has always said that everything pledged will arrive right after it has 2/4
been produced. All of it will go directly from factory to the front. If you visit the German government's website, that lists all of the equipment delivered to Ukraine - everything marked with a * comes from industry. Of 178 items listed - 119 come 3/4 bundesregierung.de/breg-de/schwer…
As news from Karabakh become more shrill, a short thread about what led to the standoff:
• Armenian weapon smuggling
Karabakh can be supplied by two roads, which both end in Karabakh's capital Stepanakert/Xankəndi (green):
• from Goris in Armenia via Lachin (purple)
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• from Barda in Azerbaijan via Aghdam (blue)
For the last few years the Armenians have been using the newly built Lachin road, which crosses through Azerbaijan before reaching Armenian held Karabakh, which is recognized by all nations (including by Armenia) to be part of
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Azerbaijan. For years Azerbaijan did not interfere with Armenian traffic on the Lachin road; but with the mandate of the russian "peacekeepers" running out in November 2025, the Karabakh Armenians, aided by the russian "peacekeepers", began to smuggle weapons and ammo
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