Thread by @MassDara

Regarding drones entering Poland last night: the event is serious and requires a muscular response, otherwise Russian carelessness and provocations will continue. A brief thread on flight paths+ the behavior of Russia/Belarus since this event and what it reveals /1

Flight path: after the pink line (mine), Gerbera and other drones from two northern routes veer in multiple directions into Poland. Launch routes to the south continue to their targets. /2

This is what typical Russian launch patterns look like lately: drones skim the border of Belarus and drop in sometimes, and often they loop around cities. Compared to last night, the drones got choppy up top and some try to complete a loop but went wide into Poland /3

The next question to address is: do these patterns mean mean deliberate Russian targeting of Poland? Programming error among 2-4 Russian launch sites that cause divergence in or around the same place of their route? or encoutering a jamming nudge from Ukraine? I unpack below:/4

Keeping in mind I don't have the technical data or launch plans: with that caveat in mind - do drone operators have the capacity to deliberately program 1-2 dozen drones to split off from the group? yes. Can they reroute in air, sometimes yes. /5

Are Russian drone planners under pressure with larger and more frequent salvos every night, leading to possibility of mistakes? yes. But mistakes coming from 2-4 different launch sites, and making ~20 mistakes? that becomes less likely unless it's the same central targeteer. /6

What about jamming? one could look at this like i did and consider, ok maybe need consider jamming from Ukraine or Belarus. Ukraine does suppress drones, but do they have the capacity to jam so many in one place, @sambendett ?

(Aside: this is what Ukraine hopes to build this year and next - a wall of jammers.) I hope they have such a capability but i am not yet aware of something so powerful fielded. /8
spectrum.ieee.org/electronic-war…

Belarus forces and Russian forces creating EW friendly fire from inside Belarus seems implausible also, but people do dumb things sometimes, the Belarusian military is not known for high readiness, and preps for Zapad are happening so then we have to look at behaviors: /8

Last night, Belarus contacted Poland and immediately put out two statements, in Russian and English, about this event and how they coordinated with Poland to track. they claim they were drones knocked off track. Moscow at this time was silent./9

https://x.com/krakek1/status/1965684992975274086

Belarus got in front of Moscow on this, and is eager to deflect blame and avoid drawing NATO's heat for this, while they try to manage Russia using their territory for these strikes. I think that Belarus was not prepared for this event. /10

Russian behavior is interesting. Officially they were silent as the grave for hours --suggesting a surprise, and the controlled media and mil bloggers were silent also and they had not received their approved talking points. Silent, for such a serious event? /11

When the Russians did react hours later, first the MOD nonchalantly buried in a social media post "No targets on the territory of Poland were planned for striking" and they remain ready to talk with Poland. This could be admission of mistake, but it is complete carelessness /12

Peskov then referred questions back to the Ministry of Defense, the MFA is denying that these Gerbera drones in Poland are Russian, so the usual bag of tricks. At BEST - it is careless mistake and they don't care. At WORST - its deliberate and they also don't care /13

So, where do I land on the intentionality of it? The picture is a bit confusing. 10-19 drones going off course is not the result of a minor mistake, given they were launched from different locations and diverged in a similar area. would have to be a giant mistake. /14

Was it jamming from Ukraine? Again i hope the Ukrainians can jam that many at one time and place but i'm not aware that they can. Did something happen in Belarus? Technically that seems hard to plot out, but I can't verify. /15

Regardless of combing through it - policy response now must be the same: increased air or air defense vigilance for the next week of ZAPAD, and shifts to consistent monitoring from Poland and other borders of Russia who have experienced this already, AND, /16

The Russians *will not learn* unless NATO shoots down wayward drones. Russian carelessness and provocations will get worse unless this starts getting done. My advice: do it quietly let the actions speak; it is a message that they understand. /17

Moscow's nonchalant nonapology /attitude is unacceptable, and hopefully diplomats behind the scenes are conveying through appropriate channels that this is unacceptable behavior for which there will be consequences and a response for any future behaviors. / 18

I'll update my thinking as more becomes clear in the days ahead. Russia has learned already from this event and others about NATO response capabilities. The choice now is with NATO how to respond. / end