Trent Telenko Profile picture
Mar 23, 2024 19 tweets 6 min read Read on X
We are seeing a lot of posts and articles on X about Ukraine's OWA drone strategic bombing campaign against Russian refineries .

People, including Jake Sullivan over at the Biden Adm. NSC think this is about AFU cutting off Russian oil.

They're wrong. It's about explosives.
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The Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries are less about POL than reduction of nitrogen,ammonia and methanol feed stocks for Russian explosives and propellants for it's artillery and missile production.

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Ukrainian OWA drones are engaged in strategic counter battery fire against the Russian artillery supply chain providing the explosive fillings & propellent for shells, rockets and missiles.

[This also has knock on effects for Russian fertilizer production.]

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Nitrogen, ammonia and methanol are the bell book and candle of chemical feedstocks that Russian refineries supply to it's war machine.

Fixing nitrogen is especially key in making high explosives.

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When the US EPA talks about crude oil refining, it mentions nitrogen thusly:

"Undesirable elements such as sulfur, nitrogen, and oxygen are removed by hydrodesulfurization, hydrotreating, chemical sweetening, and acid gas removal."

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epa.gov/sites/default/…
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When you look up Russian Methanol production on Statistica, it reflects Russia's huge petrochemical refinery infrastructure.


6/statista.com/statistics/126…
The International Energy Agency's "Ammonia Technology Roadmap" says Russia is about 8% of the world Ammonia production capability.


7/iea.org/reports/ammoni…
When you look at modern explosives and artillery shell/rocket propellent on Wikipedia, a lot falls out that shows what Ukraine is up to with it's campaign against Russian refineries.

1. RDX and HMX are made from Formaldehyde that is made from Methanol and ammonia (both of

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1. Con't ...which are oil refinery products) via Hexamethylenetetramine.

2. TNT is made from Toluene, which is a refinery by product of gasoline.

3. Nitroglycerine is a made from Nitrogen, is a biodiesel by product, and is used to make #2 TNT.

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4. Ammonium perchlorate for rocket fuel comes from ammonia, for which see #1.

So, we have a lot of evidence here that Ukraine's anti-refinery campaign is more about removing oil refinery made chemical feedstocks for Russia's artillery supply chain than cutting off oil money

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...or fuel to the Russian Army. Yet, before I posted this, no one seems to have noticed any of that.

And everyone, especially the Jake Sullivan lead Biden Adm. National Security Council is screaming oil.

What's going on?

11/ft.com/content/98f15b…
Two things are happening here.

First, Illia Ponomarenko (@IAPonomarenko) is exactly right as to how Russian Reflexive Control Information Warfare has captured Jake Sullivan's crowd at the Biden Administration National Security Council.

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The second thing is US intelligence on Russia's artillery logistics and associated economic supply chain has sucked rocks for more than 80 years.

The CIA based all of it's Soviet artillery logistics projections on pilfered Warsaw Pact documents...

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...and mirror imaging pallets & forklifts on the Soviets without ever giving any collection priority to the problem or actually looking at chemical feedstocks.

The 80 year feedstock & forklift miss points to the intelligence validation step as a threat to career promotion

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...inside intelligence agencies.

It won't let senior intelligence analysts feed to senior politicians what they want to hear.

Their poor 1980's Iran-Iraq War intelligence product reflected this careertist patron-client defect.

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When the Lockheed Martin WARSIM software development team went to US Army TMs/FMs, the OPFOR World Equipment Guide and AMSAA for Russian log-data, it was INA (Item not Available) because "mirror imaging was good enough."


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What we are seeing with the combination of 80(+) years of intelligence dysfunction & the JD degree spin doctor run NSC is the ultimate American Government expression of the Dunning - Kruger Effect.


17/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E…
We have people running the US Russo-Ukrainian War security policy at the NSC that have absolute confidence in bad intelligence product, while knowing absolutely nothing.

And who are too lazy to do a flipping internet search on Russian refineries chemical feedstocks.

18/18 End
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More from @TrentTelenko

Jun 18
Iran has been at war with the USA since 1979.

Every time the USA has fought back, like Operation Praying Mantis or killing IRGC chief Qasem Soleimani, it has won.

The Iranians last killed American servicemen on January 28, 2024.

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They were
- Sgt. William Jerome Rivers,
- Spc. Kennedy Ladon Sander and
- Spc. Breonna Alexsondria Moffett
of the 718th Eng. Co., 926th Eng. Bat.

2/3 Image
I spent several years of my DCMA career inspecting Caiman MRAP and visiting subcontractors making armor kits to beat Iranian EFP roadside bombs.

There is a 46 year American blood price to be collected from the Mullah's.

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Read 4 tweets
Jun 17
A lot of Western military officers at all levels have been vociferously denying the systematic Russian use of Chemical weapons since the siege of Mariupol in 2022.

I expect this Western military delusion to continue.

1/3
This is because acknowledging it was happening would require

1. Pronouncing the Chemical weapons convention is as dead as the London Naval treaty, and

2/3
2. Spending money to do something about it, starting with the idea Chinese bug spraying drones will also be used to deliver nerve gas.

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Read 4 tweets
May 31
This is not new.⬇️

Enemies of the West have been using cellphone networks against Western militaries since the 2006 Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

The Houthi are currently targeting ships in the Red Sea using the cell network they control to ping smart phones of ship crews.
1/
I did a thread on the exploitation of cell networks for drone targeting on December 2023.

2/
David Axe was talking about an early version of the Russian Drone cell phone navigation Serhii "Flash" is discussing in 2023.

3/
Read 9 tweets
May 30
I have been beating up on the Field Artillery crowd on X for literally years over the rapid firepower growth curve of drones compared to tube artillery.

Drones do cluster munitions far more accurately than tube artillery.

1/
Drones have more bang than a 155mm shell for a couple of years.

2/
And the shortages of Ukrainian artillery shells through out the Russo-Ukrainian War has meant drone surveillance was the prerequisite for shooting any tube artillery at all, be it cluster munition or unitary.

3/
Read 5 tweets
May 23
We have seen an evolution from 7-inch to 10-inch and now to 15-inch propeller drone designs for FPV's since 2023 in the Russo-Ukrainian War.

The question going forward is the choice of fiber optic guided or radio links.

Drone CRPA🧵
1/
The cost of putting serious radio link electronic counter-countermeasures (ECCM) on an FPV drone using a CRPA is way high.

Grok has an adequate estimate on what Chinese CRPA's cost.

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grok.com/share/c2hhcmQt…Image
Even basic Russian Kometa 4-channel design CRPAs are hundreds of dollars apiece.

To beat intensive ECM/Jamming at the front lines with 8, 12, or 16 element CRPA will cost hundreds to thousands per drone.

Plus CRPA weight & power drain impacts the drone w/bigger batteries.

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Read 6 tweets
May 22
Guns rule in the age of drones, but the "muffin top" Burke class DDG's are so top heavy with the SLQ-32(V)7 Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement Program (SEWIP) installation that the idea of adding 76mm or 57mm autocannons is insane from the metacentric height POV.

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What to do?

You can proliferate light precision guided weapon mounts. Which can be the 21st century version of the 20mm oerlikon.

A Burke needs multiple Hydra and APKWS 70mm semi-active laser guided rocket mounts on the centerline and both broadsides.

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The US Navy is already slapping deck crew operated 25mm autocannons and .50 caliber HMG all over Burke class DDG's already.

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Read 5 tweets

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