Page 1 of 1

99 Red Balloons

Posted: Sat Feb 04, 2023 7:13 am
by Octavious
So China has floated the least subtle spying device in modern history over mainland USA and the Yanks have publicly grumbled very loudly but taken no real action to speak of.

Any thoughts on what's going on? And why the US haven't taken it down and have a sniff at Chinese surveillance tech?

Re: 99 Red Balloons

Posted: Sat Feb 04, 2023 11:02 pm
by Randomizer
The Air Force shot it down after it cleared the Carolina coast. They are now recovering the debris.

https://www.aol.com/news/chinese-spy-ba ... 02956.html

Re: 99 Red Balloons

Posted: Mon Feb 06, 2023 4:49 am
by Randomizer
An unnamed Pentagon official released that this was the 5th balloon with three during the Trump years and one earlier in Biden's term. Trump and Republicans are denying this.

Re: 99 Red Balloons

Posted: Mon Feb 06, 2023 9:42 am
by Octavious
Randomizer wrote:
Mon Feb 06, 2023 4:49 am
An unnamed Pentagon official released that this was the 5th balloon with three during the Trump years and one earlier in Biden's term. Trump and Republicans are denying this.
By specifying that Trump and the Republicans are denying it, I assume that means that Biden has confirmed the earlier one in his term?

In all honesty this makes things look pretty bad for Biden if true. A policy of allowing the balloons to pass by makes sense from some perspectives (they spy on us, we spy on them, the game was ever thus sort of thing). A policy of letting one past and blowing one out of the sky because it happens to be in the media looks extremely weak.

So was this particular balloon suffering a malfunction that made it easier to see? Just happened to be spotted by civilians by dumb luck? Was it flown deliberately by the Chinese so it would be spotted, hoping that Biden would shoot it down and thus giving them a chance to move against suspected US spies in a tit for tat operation?

Re: 99 Red Balloons

Posted: Fri Feb 10, 2023 5:14 pm
by flash2015
Octavious wrote:
Mon Feb 06, 2023 9:42 am
In all honesty this makes things look pretty bad for Biden if true. A policy of allowing the balloons to pass by makes sense from some perspectives (they spy on us, we spy on them, the game was ever thus sort of thing). A policy of letting one past and blowing one out of the sky because it happens to be in the media looks extremely weak.
What should he have done instead then? Let it go?

Re: 99 Red Balloons

Posted: Fri Feb 10, 2023 6:29 pm
by Octavious
Literally anything? If you have a policy of letting them go say you're letting it go and defend the policy. If you have a policy of shooting them down then shoot them down before they fly over the US carrying out their spying mission. Shooting it down after it has passed by is ridiculous. It suggests that Biden is led by the media and that shows political weakness. Or worse, it suggests that the US military can't reliably spot a massive foreign balloon which shows military weakness.

Re: 99 Red Balloons

Posted: Fri Feb 10, 2023 6:38 pm
by flash2015
I don't see the problem with shooting it down over water. They knew exactly where it was. They could monitor where it was going. They could jam any signals it tries to send home so it couldn't gather information. There was no rush to get rid of it so they might as well shoot it down only when there was absolutely no risk to anyone.

The public interest perhaps forced the shooting down...but it also created opportunity. Now they can study the remains of the balloon.

Re: 99 Red Balloons

Posted: Fri Feb 10, 2023 8:50 pm
by Octavious
flash2015 wrote:
Fri Feb 10, 2023 6:38 pm
but it also created opportunity
How did it create an opportunity?
flash2015 wrote:
Fri Feb 10, 2023 6:38 pm
I don't see the problem with shooting it down over water
Indeed not, but surely the preferred water would be the water shortly before it travels across the USA rather than afterwards?
flash2015 wrote:
Fri Feb 10, 2023 6:38 pm
They could jam any signals it tries to send home
How certain are you that the Chinese don't have a way of bypassing US jamming? They are a spacefaring nation, after all. They could set up a line of sight communication with a satellite and the Yanks could do feck all about it. Hitting it with an EMP might have been a decent solution, without any of the unfortunate optics that come with shooting down a Chinese craft... but they decided against it

Re: 99 Red Balloons

Posted: Tue Feb 14, 2023 6:22 pm
by orathaic
Just for some additional context. According to this US based military vlogger the point of the balloon may have been to see what capabilities the US had in terms of detection and responce time for shooting it down.

If that is the case, not shooting it down actually denies China the information they may have actually wanted. Cf: https://youtu.be/r5Ip7oIMcwQ