Ideas please for the Chinese Spy Balloon

[Krzysztof]

Being far from the scene I can only tell it might be an exception for China to shut down e.g. US Satellite just because they will feel uncomfortable.

It does not mean I would not shoot it down as F22 has done it, but just looks to me like looking for the opportunities outside well known and agreed methods by violating them "by accident" first (what China did).

By the way...
Russia was doing that tens of time each year before they've attached Ukraine by braking the air border with EU by their bombers or jet fighters (over Poland, Latvia or Finland). I'm fine EU hasn't shoot them down that time...

 

[Gransin]

By the way...
Russia was doing that tens of time each year before they've attached Ukraine by braking the air border with EU by their bombers or jet fighters (over Poland, Latvia or Finland). I'm fine EU hasn't shoot them down that time...

Yes, we're just watching it happen, but Turkey doesn't play that game

2015 Russian Sukhoi Su-24 shootdown - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[WALTER]

Nice to hear from career military amongst a sea of armchair quarterbacks.

I’m an armchair QB too now that I am newly retired, but during my 22 years in uniform I was “in the room” for a few meetings with General Officers and civilIan agencies on homeland security. The contingencies that have to be planned for are staggering, it would keep you up at night. I‘m am happy I don’t have to contemplate them anymore, but I rest easy knowing that there are professionals that do.

 

[Arde]

I guess in the end it was just a gender reveal.

That was the most creative answer!

 

[Dan Wood]

 

[Arde]

Believe it or not, the “chain of command” is made up of outstanding patriots that think more about the safety of the American homeland than you can imagine. Aside from running the risk of collateral damage, shooting the spy ballon down over land could have risked destroying it and losing intel that we could collect from it. Politicians and military leaders make mistakes (as do we all), but I am confident that the decision to shoot it down when they did was the right choice.

Walter my Uber drivers also ensure my safety on every trip. Both are professionals and I am no position to compare which one is more patriotic. For one Uber drivers have no pensions. The Pentagon has been non-transparent in their decisions and even political when they said It already happened three times during the previous administration. When you double click you realize it was a retrospective conclusion, the previous president never had to make that decision. I think the citizens deserve to know the details, for example, I hear the balloon had propellers, which debunks the Chinese excuse that they had no control. If it had control the safest path would have been to DEMAND from the Chinese that they bring it down here and now, leading to examination of the contents without damage. Somehow they could not even pull that off, and the brave statement now is, verbatim: The United States has “no intention” of returning any of the debris to China, Kirby added.

Respectfully, I think there is little to be proud of here.

 

[Arde]

Nice to hear from career military amongst a sea of armchair quarterbacks.

Yet the jury is in on Afghanistan pullout predictions, on whether Ukranians can use US and other non-Soviet gear, etc., and armchairs are proving a very good vantage point when combined with common sense.

 

[Markos]

If it had control the safest path would have been to DEMAND from the Chinese that they bring it down here and now, leading to examination of the contents without damage. Somehow they could not even pull that off, and the brave statement now is, verbatim: The United States has “no intention” of returning any of the debris to China, Kirby added.

Respectfully, I think there is little to be proud of here.

You say this with such confidence that they didn’t weigh the different options before arriving at a decision. We all know that Pentagon is expedient in their decision making right? Do you acknowledge that for national security reasons you and I don’t have the full story?

Would you like to have it shot down immediately? That was the speaking point for many until the previous balloons came to light. Pivot! Pivot!

We have 250 years of military missteps and you are mad at a low physical/intel risk balloon that lasted 4 days over US soil. I was patiently waiting for you to turn your attempt at a “funny” post on to a political rant. Congratulations you succeeded once again. Your response is more predictable than the PRC.

FWIW - This thread was reported as offensive and unnecessary a mere 4 minutes after it started, but we decided to see where it went. My tone is not just my own, it is representative of others on this board that are tired of the rants wrapped up into witty little packages.

For all those that like to argue on the internet, ask yourself when you last said to yourself “Hmm, that is a good point”. If you can’t answer that, you are likely seeking an audience, not a community. I recommend a new private startup called “Twitter”.

 

[dang]

You say this with such confidence that they didn’t weigh the different options before arriving at a decision. We all know that Pentagon is expedient in their decision making right? Do you acknowledge that for national security reasons you and I don’t have the full story?

Would you like to have it shot down immediately? That was the speaking point for many until the previous balloons came to light. Pivot! Pivot!

We have 250 years of military missteps and you are mad at a low physical/intel risk balloon that lasted 4 days over US soil. I was patiently waiting for you to turn your attempt at a “funny” post on to a political rant. Congratulations you succeeded once again. Your response is more predictable than the PRC.

FWIW - This thread was reported as offensive and unnecessary a mere 4 minutes after it started, but we decided to see where it went. My tone is not just my own, it is representative of others on this board that are tired of the rants wrapped up into witty little packages.

For all those that like to argue on the internet, ask yourself when you last said to yourself “Hmm, that is a good point”. If you can’t answer that, you are likely seeking an audience, not a community. I recommend a new private startup called “Twitter”.

Speaking of rants. An event like this will always be polarizing, politically for sure, and then becomes personal when left to fester. What gets ignored, or forgotten, is the fact that we always have just one side of the story, the events that actually happened, and the rest is opinion. A balloon floats across the U.S. with the current administration and we saw how it was handled. The "other side" has the freedom to say whatever they want about how it would've been handled because it's just words. It can't be proven. It happens every time a politically related event takes place, on either side. We should expect it now.

I'm fine with everyone talking about this stuff, even with a little politics thrown in, but you need to keep it from becoming personal.

In my opinion, @Arde's comment was directed at a political party and nothing more. If someone wants to connect a political party to those who support it, that's on you.

 

[Markos]

Speaking of rants. An event like this will always be polarizing, politically for sure, and then becomes personal when left to fester. What gets ignored, or forgotten, is the fact that we always have just one side of the story, the events that actually happened, and the rest is opinion. A balloon floats across the U.S. with the current administration and we saw how it was handled. The "other side" has the freedom to say whatever they want about how it would've been handled because it's just words. It can't be proven. It happens every time a politically related event takes place, on either side. We should expect it now.

I'm fine with everyone talking about this stuff, even with a little politics thrown in, but you need to keep it from becoming personal.

In my opinion, @Arde's comment was directed at a political party and nothing more. If someone wants to connect a political party to those who support it, that's on you.

Hmm, that is a good point.

@Arde,

My apologies for getting too personal. I will recuse myself from moderating OT and commenting on these threads. I don’t align with @dang on what should live in OT, but I am a guest on this site just like everyone else.

 

[dang]

I will recuse myself from moderating OT and commenting on these threads.

I always need help moderating and I appreciate all your time and effort. Along with those who report things they think should be looked into. I can't keep up with all the posts.

 

[Markos]

I always need help moderating and I appreciate all your time and effort. Along with those who report things they think should be looked into. I can't keep up with all the posts.

We will have plenty of double posts and misplaced threads elsewhere on the site to keep me busy.

 

[WALTER]

Walter my Uber drivers also ensure my safety on every trip. Both are professionals and I am no position to compare which one is more patriotic. For one Uber drivers have no pensions. The Pentagon has been non-transparent in their decisions and even political when they said It already happened three times during the previous administration. When you double click you realize it was a retrospective conclusion, the previous president never had to make that decision. I think the citizens deserve to know the details, for example, I hear the balloon had propellers, which debunks the Chinese excuse that they had no control. If it had control the safest path would have been to DEMAND from the Chinese that they bring it down here and now, leading to examination of the contents without damage. Somehow they could not even pull that off, and the brave statement now is, verbatim: The United States has “no intention” of returning any of the debris to China, Kirby added.

Respectfully, I think there is little to be proud of here.

I brought up patriots and professionals only to say that there really are good Americans who’s oath it is to protect you and I; none are perfect, but they are committed to keeping you and I safe so that we can enjoy our coupes and have conversations like this. As civilians, we should absolutely demand accountability of our military, I’m just saying, in this case, the military probably made a rational decision to shoot it down when they did to maximize the intelligence value we could gain from it. I doubt that once it was discovered in our airspace that the balloon was allowed to transmit any type of intelligence (there’s stuff to prevent that) and even if it was transmitting, the military was likely taking counter measures to deny their collection efforts. Now, that probably doesn’t make you feel better that there was a Chinese balloon floating over your backyard, but blowing it out of the sky as soon as it hit our airspace (my first reaction too) or asking the Chinese to land it were not the right moves. And no, I wouldn’t give it back either!

I feel no sense of pride in this situation; I only feel like our system (Political, Military, Diplomatic) worked as it should have in reaction to this event. We are under surveillance by China, and others, constantly by means both big and small. We were taught that “our enemy has a vote,” that is to say you are not going be right 100% of the time, so we have to be vigilant and flexible to deal the threats we face, I believe that happened.

 

[Mike Goble]

Here's an audio recording of the mission.

FRANK01 is the lead F-22 that took the kill shot. FRANK02 is its wingman. As we reported Saturday, those call signs were an homage to World War One flying ace and U.S. Army Air Service First Lieutenant Frank Luke Jr, a Medal of Honor recipient better known as the "Arizona Balloon Buster" who destroyed 14 German balloons and four aircraft.

HUNTRESS is the U.S. Air Force's Eastern Air Defense Sector, or EADS, part of the U.S.-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), which was controlling the operation from the ground in Rome, New York.

EAGLE01 is an F-15C and EAGLE02 is its wingman. The Eagles backed-up the F-22s and used their SNIPER targeting pods to record the shoot down and mark areas of debris for recovery.

TIGER09 is a Navy P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft.

TOI is Target Of Interest, in this case the Chinese spy balloon.

The Shooting Down Of China's Spy Balloon In Moment-By-Moment Audio

Audio of the complex aerial ballet that downed the Chinese spy balloon at just the right time and place adds new detail to the operation.

www.thedrive.com

 

[WALTER]

Here's an audio recording of the mission.

FRANK01 is the lead F-22 that took the kill shot. FRANK02 is its wingman. As we reported Saturday, those call signs were an homage to World War One flying ace and U.S. Army Air Service First Lieutenant Frank Luke Jr, a Medal of Honor recipient better known as the "Arizona Balloon Buster" who destroyed 14 German balloons and four aircraft.

HUNTRESS is the U.S. Air Force's Eastern Air Defense Sector, or EADS, part of the U.S.-Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), which was controlling the operation from the ground in Rome, New York.

EAGLE01 is an F-15C and EAGLE02 is its wingman. The Eagles backed-up the F-22s and used their SNIPER targeting pods to record the shoot down and mark areas of debris for recovery.

TIGER09 is a Navy P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft.

TOI is Target Of Interest, in this case the Chinese spy balloon.

The Shooting Down Of China's Spy Balloon In Moment-By-Moment Audio

Audio of the complex aerial ballet that downed the Chinese spy balloon at just the right time and place adds new detail to the operation.

www.thedrive.com

Thanks for positing. I take back my comment above about not taking pride in this situation. I am indeed proud of coordination and effort this took. No, the ballon was not shooting back, but there are likely 10+ departments and agencies (military and civilian) that I can think of that collaborated to bring this successful outcome to bear. Authoritarian regimes can’t do this and it is why they inevitably fail.

 

[Mike Goble]

Thanks for positing. I take back my comment above about not taking pride in this situation. I am indeed proud of coordination and effort this took. No, the ballon was not shooting back, but there are likely 10+ departments and agencies (military and civilian) that I can think of that collaborated to bring this successful outcome to bear. Authoritarian regimes can’t do this and it is why they inevitably fail.

You can imagine the pressure these men were under. It's not like some anonymous air combat over a far-away land, it's right here and folks are recording the event. You have to get it exactly right the first time.

 

[craterface]

I am just glad it's gone and we recovered it so we can get an excellent sense of their capabilites. The Chinese were testing us. Next time, the second they detect one over Alaska, it will be shot down I am sure. So there likely won't be a next time. Their AI bots are probably monitoring this thread on E9Coupe.com! Gonna go out and buy a Buick Envision or a Polestar so they can track me and my boring life....

 

[Dick Steinkamp]

Thanks, Mike. Following along with the written version of the communication helps. I'm both a pilot and ex military, but not a military aviator. Often the shorthand and code was way above my ability to understand. It sounds like a parachute deployed when the balloon was popped. That should make more of the payload recoverable.

 

[Arde]

You say this with such confidence that they didn’t weigh the different options before arriving at a decision. We all know that Pentagon is expedient in their decision making right? Do you acknowledge that for national security reasons you and I don’t have the full story?

Would you like to have it shot down immediately? That was the speaking point for many until the previous balloons came to light. Pivot! Pivot!

We have 250 years of military missteps and you are mad at a low physical/intel risk balloon that lasted 4 days over US soil. I was patiently waiting for you to turn your attempt at a “funny” post on to a political rant. Congratulations you succeeded once again. Your response is more predictable than the PRC.

FWIW - This thread was reported as offensive and unnecessary a mere 4 minutes after it started, but we decided to see where it went. My tone is not just my own, it is representative of others on this board that are tired of the rants wrapped up into witty little packages.

For all those that like to argue on the internet, ask yourself when you last said to yourself “Hmm, that is a good point”. If you can’t answer that, you are likely seeking an audience, not a community. I recommend a new private startup called “Twitter”.

Your question has been answered. Two more car sizes objects shot down immediately over Canada and Alaska...
Apologies if I offended anybody.
I will sit it out while I listen to the awesome Jeff Wayne music: