Chinese Spy Balloon Flying Over the U.S.

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Interesting that there was no attempt to shoot it down.
The Pentagon claims that would have been a hazard to people in Montana. But I wonder if it might have been too high for an antiaircraft missile. Or maybe an untargetable radar signature.
 
NoHeat said:
Interesting that there was no attempt to shoot it down.
The Pentagon claims that would have been a hazard to people in Montana.
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Oh, it would be a hazard to someone alright... but methinks Montana is an excuse.

This is why money ties make people suspicious.
 
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See, this is what happens. So many people have moved to Montana in the last couple of years that the population density as gone up so much that we can't defend ourselves from the Chinese. I blame Kevin Costner, the State of California and of course the Illuminati.
 
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Trivia: Did anyone die in the domestic US from a Japanese WWII bombing mission? Given this crowd, I'm sure several people here know the answer. Thread subject is a gigantic hint.

No asking ChatAPT!
 
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So we have a Secretary of State hanging out in China, a Chinese spy ballon flying over Montana, and secdef decides he’ll just let it fly?

How kind of all of them- including POTUS. We are nothing if not welcoming, right?


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Mahneuvers said:
Trivia: Did anyone die in the domestic US from a Japanese WWII bombing mission? Given this crowd, I'm sure several people here know the answer. Thread subject is a gigantic hint.

No asking ChatAPT!
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Yep. In Oregon, as I recall. Maybe Washington state.
 
Llk said:
So we have a Secretary of State hanging out in China, a Chinese spy ballon flying over Montana, and secdef decides he’ll just let it fly?

How kind of all of them- including POTUS. We are nothing if not welcoming, right?
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Well, first let's look at the capabilities of the balloon.

Is it going to get better imagery than a low-Earth-orbit recon satellite? Probably not, but it'll let a relatively cheap camera get some pretty good images.

Is it going to be able to image a particular area? No, no way to steer.

Odds are that its mission is not imagery. Could be SIGINT, could be COMINT. Still, though, its horizon is limited (compared to a satellite)...and it's not steerable, nor does it have any way to loiter over an area for a given length of time. Once it's known, too, people can just turn off the radios, etc. that it might be wanting collect...and/or we just want to leave running the ones we want to them to THINK we're using. Denial and Deception, the linchpins of counter-space-espionage.

A covert ground station ("tourist") will probably collect more data, and attract far less attention, can operate much longer, and the probable targets won't know they're there. They can rent a plane fly over most places they might want to get a picture of.

Second, there's the physical threat level poised by the balloon itself. It might pop and drop on someone...at which point, the Chinese are going to be looking bad. If we *do* shoot it down, it might STILL drop on someone. Still the Red's fault, but they can say it's ours.

Finally, can we claim some sort of moral high ground here. No...we did the same thing in the '50s....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Genetrix

The Russians actually captured some of out balloons and used hardware and film on some of their space programs.

Ron Wanttaja
 
kyleb said:
Yep. In Oregon, as I recall. Maybe Washington state.
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I could be wrong, but, I thought California by a farmer years after the war.
 
kyleb said:
Family, during the war, IIRC.
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Yes, there's a memorial in Oregon where it happened.

Oregon also came under direct artillery bombardment during the war, too.

Ron Wanttaja
 
There was a ground stop at the Billings airport. While options to shoot it down were considered.

That would be surprising, if you just wanted to go fly, to be told that you can’t because of China.
 
At the rate the world is going, I'm going to be surprised if being told you can't do things "because of China" doesn't become the norm eventually!
 
wanttaja said:
Yes, there's a memorial in Oregon where it happened.

Oregon also came under direct artillery bombardment during the war, too.

Ron Wanttaja
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And got bombed by a sub launched seaplane.
 
wanttaja said:
A covert ground station ("tourist") will probably collect more data, and attract far less attention, can operate much longer, and the probable targets won't know they're there. They can rent a plane fly over most places they might want to get a picture of.
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It's hard to fathom the benefit of a balloon in that part of the country. There are no R or P areas in Montana, and airplanes fly over there all the time. Maybe they were aiming for someplace like central Nevada and misjudged the winds aloft?
 
Pilawt said:
It's hard to fathom the benefit of a balloon in that part of the country. There are no R or P areas in Montana, and airplanes fly over there all the time. Maybe they were aiming for someplace like central Nevada and misjudged the winds aloft?
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There are lots and lots of missile silos in Montana. Not that they can't find them on Google Earth if they wanted to.
 
So at what minimum altitude is it considered wrong or dangerous for another country to fly something over our land without permission? Satellite is one extreme. The concern to me is that the balloon got here and contains who knows what. Intercept the dang thing and get violent with it to make a point. What do we think China would do if they found a US balloon flying in their airspace? Just dismiss it I guess. WTF?
 
Aurora photo missions.
U2s … altho those were USSR.
All the satellites.

Really? Why worry about a balloon.

Update because some folks didn’t understand…Ron does.

The list above are well known current and historical surveillance programs, and there are LOTS of them, so why only worry about balloons.
 
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murphey said:
Aurora photo missions.
U2s … altho those were USSR.
All the satellites.

Really? Why worry about a balloon.
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International law has established that nations don't own the orbital space above their countries. So satellites can overfly without violating national sovereignty.

BELOW the bounds of space, we're in the same situation as the three-mile limit off the coasts, which was established based on the maximum range of the artillery at the time. You can fly an Aurora, SR-71, or U-2 over another country, but you've got no leverage if they manage to shoot you down.

The old Open Skies treaty allowed nations to fly unarmed surveillance flights over the signatory nations' territories, but the US has withdrawn from it, as have the Russians. China never was a member.

The balloon does have one advantage; it gives the user long-duration access to the target area. A country might roll its new aircraft into the hangar when a satellite is due to pass over, but it's not as simple if you've got a balloon taking days to go from horizon to horizon.

Still, if the Chinese balloon is in the jet stream, it doesn't hang that long over a particular target area.

To get the conspiracy theorists wound up, a balloon would be a perfect vehicle for sowing disease over a target area.....

Ron Wanttaja
 
5QK said:
Hey.hey.hey.
There's a million of us......
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Well we found one of them... hey could you let the other guy know for us? :D
 
wanttaja said:
Still, if the Chinese balloon is in the jet stream, it doesn't hang that long over a particular target area.
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I didn't see a reference to the balloon's altitude, but (in general) the jetstream peters out in the '40's, so if the balloon is above that, it will be moving pretty slowly.
 
kyleb said:
I didn't see a reference to the balloon's altitude, but (in general) the jetstream peters out in the '40's, so if the balloon is above that, it will be moving pretty slowly.
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I read somewhere it’s at 60,000 ft.
 
As long as it doesn't come down in a field somewhere....

Would hate to have another Roswell incident.
 
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