A wartime plea to Western satellite companies: “We need this data, please” | Hacker News Reader

A wartime plea to Western satellite companies: “We need this data, please”

arstechnica.com

43 pointsAnkaios14 comments

Isn't there a very high chance that western militaries are sharing high resolution satellite photos with the Ukrainian military?

I understand these pictures not being public.

With the nature of the conflict, I assume that some third letters agencies have 24/7 coverage of the entire country.

https://www.euronews.com/2022/02/28/uk-ukraine-crisis-eu-bor...

This is being openly done by the EU already. I can't imagine that the CIA would lag the EU.

It seems like pictures would come before weapons in what nations would be willing to give.

Nah.

One gives away capabilities.

The other one is a parachute and a box.

I sincerely doubt anyone doubts the capabilities of western nations to take high res pictures with some of the thousands of satellites they have access to.

Providing Intel might leak information about it's sources yes, which is always a consideration. In the case of satellite pictures this could be, which satellites were in the correct positions in orbit and were used... but honestly I doubt the russian government is not aware of "most" of those satellites and "most" of their capabilities. I don't quite see your argument. The ties of those satellites to certain companies etc might make them targets for hacking and all that... so it's not risk free but I doubt it's a large risk.

Sure, but there are lots of irregular/reservist fighters that could use the kind of high quality imagery a provider like Maxar can deliver, who are not necessarily plugged into the military information ecosystem. Conversely, the military (or western governments supplying them with satellite intelligence) may not want to reveal the extent of their capabilities to as to keep the Russian army guessing.

Same thought here. I’ve heard that the strength of the Ukrainian response is highly based on high quality intelligence. Ukraine is a big big country, without precise information finding the enemy is supposedly like seeking a needle in a haystack.

Is it? These are not individual Russian platoons hiking through the woods, Vietnam-style - we are seeing "traditional logistics warfare" that follows major roads towards large cities and infrastructure chokepoints. I - armchair general - would have expected finding the enemy would be relatively easy in that case: Just get a street map and trace major roads back to the (belo)russian borders...

Yes, Ukraine is very flat yet the Russians seem to stick to the roads rather than fan out. Probably due to some combination of time pressure from commanders and fear of running out of fuel. Sure makes the job easier for drones.

It is spring/winter in Ukraine, going offroad means getting stuck in mud. Already there have been photos and videos of Russian vehicles abandoned after attempting to cross fields and such.

The pictures I see are mostly snow & cold, but yes, General Mud is friend of all forces defending against mechanized forces.

Aren’t the skys of Ukraine bumper to bumper with U2s, global hawks, etc

No. The US and it's NATO allies aren't going to fly many reconnaissance aircraft in Ukrainian airspace. Especially not manned aircraft like the U-2. If one gets shot down by Russia that would escalate the conflict. At most the Air Force and/or CIA might be operating a small number of low -observable UAVs like the RQ-170 or similar well away from Russian controlled areas.

Satellites will be the primary reconnaissance platform, supplemented by manned EW aircraft flying near the edges of Ukrainian airspace.

No, they do shimmy up to the border, but never cross it. To do so would be to risk WWIII.

It’s actually pretty interesting to watch because they are obviously keeping their civilian transponders on and are super obvious on flight tracking maps, exactly for this reason, they want the entire world to know they are not crossing the border, even if they are conducting military operations that would normally be sensitive enough they have transponders off at the moment is a “transponders on” environment for everyone who isn’t fighting.

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