Between ~1996 and 2005, most FMTV trucks accepted by DCMA for the US Army had my signature on the truck property forms along with my DSN phone number.
I got three or four calls in Sealy Texas from NCO's in Iraq trying to score ballistic composite glass armor because they stopped these EFP attacks⬇️
1/
DCMA Sealy was getting photos from contractor relatives of bombed FMTV's with sheet metal armor and receiving IED damaged trucks to get rebuilt.
You could tell the blast damage from how the windows were missing and the roofs were bowed at the top.
2/
When you pulled out the stowage boxes in the cabs there were usually spent 5.56mm or 7.62mm brass casings...
...and occasionally a lot of dried blood.
3/
The first low signature armored cabs build and fielded with the 82nd Airborne Division in Mosul (pictured) were accepted on New Year's Eve 2004-2005 by me, my DCMA supervisor and my office's commanding Colonel.
Bush Administration policy was the military went to the war and everyone else went to the mall.
I was single then & volunteered.
4/
The three of us started at 8:30am and worked until 10:45 pm getting the first batch of cabs inspected, properly packaged & onto trucks for highway shipment to an airport for direct cargo flights to Iraq.
The three troopers in this LSAC cab all lived with minor injuries.⬇️ 5/
I didn't go to a New Year's Eve West Coast Swing Dance that I had planned for weeks to attend that night at the Melody Club to chase skirts...
...I knew I was too tired to kick up my heals and then drive back safely.
But it was time meaningfully well spent.
6/6
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Electronic warfare is always a "saving throw" with an expiration date for the defense.
Plus no one in the world, since 1989, has invested in enough mobile guns for robust AA-combined arms to screw up the simple arithmetic of a saturation drone/missile attacks.
2/
Russia burned out Ukraine's considerable stocks of 5V55 SAMs (~3,300 rounds), 9M83 SAMs (~1,000) and 9M38 SAMs (~800) by repeat saturation attacks.
Ukraine returns the favor. This is not that difficult to grasp.
Saturation attacks were central to legacy Soviet doctrine.
3/
We have just seen over Moscow today - with Ukrainian drones - the Russo-Ukrainian War's version of the RAF’s first 1,000-bomber raid of World War II, codenamed Operation Millennium, which took place on the night of May 30–31, 1942.
Operation Millennium, marked the first tactical deployment of the RAF "bomber stream".
That is, the tactic of flying a dense, tightly timed formation along a narrow corridor to overwhelm German radar networks and anti-aircraft defenses of the Kammhuber line. 2/3
When I look at the design of the air defense rings around Moscow.🧐⬇️
I can't help but think Ukraine used a 2026 "Drone Stream' to saturate one sector of these ring defenses like the RAF did to the Kammhuber line.
The Soviets built their industrial plants to minimize transportation impact on its railway system, and later, it's trucking.
This 2013 time stamped Jon Parshall presentation on WW2 US vs German Vs Soviet tank industries underlines this Soviet reality
2/
In the 1950's and 1960's the CIA and Strategic Air Command (SAC) Single Integrated Operational Plan (SIOP) targeting planners discovered this quirk of the Soviet centralized economy.
Via a question to @grok of Cities of 500K(+) in OWA Drone range:
"Distances are approximate great-circle (straight-line/air) from Havana or central Cuba; actual drone paths could vary due to routing, wind, altitude, & launch site (e.g., closer to Florida from western Cuba) 2/
All listed cities are well under 2,700 km.Florida and Southeast (easiest reach)
Miami, FL (~370 km / 230 miles) — Well within range.
Jacksonville, FL (~1,000–1,100 km) — Within range.
Tampa/St. Petersburg area (metro >500k in cities/urban) — ~400–500 km.
Fearless prediction: N. Ireland will be 90%(+) migrant free in 3 months.
It is now clear to me that what we are seeing in N. Ireland is a sectarian pogrom.
One which will in 3 months be utterly successful in driving out 90%(+)...
N.I. "Troubles Pogrom"🧵
1/
...of the migrants the UK government has placed there. Then Liverpool will be next.
The UK government utterly failed to stop mutual Catholic/Protestant pogroms in the late 1960's early 1970's troubles. When half N. Irish population was nominally...
2/
...on-side with UK/N.I. law enforcement. The situation is far worse now.
Currently the vast majority of white middle and working classes in Northern Ireland are on-side with the anti-migrant pogrom...
The ability of Taiwan to operate it's HIMARS is tied directly to it's ability to deny China drone air superiority inside Taiwanese air space.
China can throw 1 million OWA drones to suppress Taiwanese air defenses to take those off shore islands.
2/
The PLA holding the Pescadores, Green and Orchard islands as launch platforms for HQ-9 SAM's, heavy MLRS rockets and Hornet class truck hunting drones means it can overwatch & reduce Taiwanese beach defenses, all while denying air space to ROCAF fighters.