Balloons?

[NeuroTypical]

1 hour ago, Traveler said:

It appears from current reports that the following 3 balloons shot down had unknown origins and were shot down

Yep.  From the WSJ:

[Just_A_Guy]

8 hours ago, Vort said:

Yes, indeed. Satellites are constrained to their orbits, and that orbit can change at will only by drastically shortening the satellite's life—that is, at great expense. Much cheaper to put a few tens of thousands of dollars into a balloon to get decent-res pics.

As to why the Biden Administration allowed the balloon to travel the width of the US before intercepting it: The idea that we just didn't notice it is, of course, absurd. The alarmist conspiracy theory (which I do not totally discount) would be that elements within the Biden Administration are working for the overthrow of the US by aiding and abetting a geopolitical enemy in China. I think a more realistic possibility is that the US wanted China to gather whatever surveillance they were looking for and thus tacitly allowed it. For example, perhaps China was concerned about missile deployment in Kansas and the US gov't wanted to assuage those fears. I would not be surprised if the Biden Administration and military top brass knew this was happening and danced the dance to maintain credible deniability. This is spook territory, which I know next to nothing about, other than having watched Burn Notice.

So, I have a co-worker who worked at the Pentagon (technically Army Reserve, but did some Space Forcey stuff) on his last deployment.  We chatted about this today (to the extent that he’s allowed to talk about what he did at all), and my basic takeaways from the conversation were:

1). This happens relatively frequency; there’s probably a political reason that this incident leaked now.

2). We do have the ability to do electronic jamming, spoofing, and take other measures against this kind of thing.

3).  Contra other pieces I have read online, it apparently is technologically possible to somehow shoot down balloons even at very high altitudes above the theoretical operational ceiling of our fighter aircraft.

4). There’s a good chance we left the thing alone because we wanted the Chinese to think they were getting useful data.  

[Traveler]

16 hours ago, NeuroTypical said:

Yep.  From the WSJ:

This is troubling to me because our president talks about threats to safety and security but also admits that what is a threat currently is not known or understood.  His final statement makes no sense and does not define or even attempt to define - what constitutes a threat.

 

The Traveler

Edited February 17, 2023 by Traveler

[Traveler]

12 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

.....

3).  Contra other pieces I have read online, it apparently is technologically possible to somehow shoot down balloons even at very high altitudes above the theoretical operational ceiling of our fighter aircraft.

......

40 years ago “certain” F15’s were capable of destroying a satellite in orbit or a craft in excess of 90,000 feet traveling at hypersonic speeds.  

 

Quote

4). There’s a good chance we left the thing alone because we wanted the Chinese to think they were getting useful data.  

In the world of intelligence there is no such thing as data that is not useful.  What is most dangerous is to underestimate one’s opponent.

 

The Traveler

[Guest Godless]

Speculation, obviously, but definitely seems plausible. 

 

[Ironhold]

22 hours ago, Godless said:

Speculation, obviously, but definitely seems plausible. 

 

The FAA, FCC, and other groups should be monitoring these. They shouldn't be unknown. 

[Just_A_Guy]

Perhaps of some interest:

 

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/u-2-spy-planes-snooped-on-chinese-surveillance-balloon

[Vort]

1 hour ago, Just_A_Guy said:

Perhaps of some interest:

 

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/u-2-spy-planes-snooped-on-chinese-surveillance-balloon

U-2? No kidding? Did they encrypt the data with an Enigma machine, too?

[Carborendum]

On 2/16/2023 at 1:17 PM, Just_A_Guy said:

I wonder, tactically, what a balloon in the stratosphere could do that a satellite in low-earth orbit couldn’t do.  

Balloons cost a couple hundred dollars?  Maybe $1000?  (I'm guessing).  And I understood them to be really high altitude balloons.

How much does a SAM cost?  For higher altitude ones, they could be over $250k.

Launching a fighter into the sky? 

Ironically, I believe this to be less of an issue.  Fighters need to be used for practice all the time.  So, if they're launched for an actual seek and destroy mission, then all the better.  Just my personal musing.  But there is a limit to when this overwhelms our air fleet.

Air-to-Air Missiles themselves cost in the neighborhood of $100k to $200k.

China could severely hit our finances by launching a million balloons each year across all the US and outlying territories.

It's a way of waging war without waging war.

[Vort]

1 hour ago, Carborendum said:

It's a way of waging war without waging war.

Pretty sure that infringing on sovereign territory is itself an act of war.