US government testing space alien technology again?

[BeBMan]

There are reports spy baloons over the US and Canada, like this one:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64507225

However, haven't we all seen enough X-Files episodes to realize that this may just be a cover-up?!? Remember Roswell!

[Egbert]

It could be a kid in Wisconsin had a party and one of his balloons escaped.

[BeBMan]

China appologized for the weather baloon. Balooney?

IMO they should hire a Longbowman to harpoon it and bring down the thing to look if any space aliens are in there, or what the equipment inside is being used for.

None of this would have happened if we still had an active China Watch Thread

[Egbert]

The children could shoot it down with JR15's.

[BeBMan]

In the other thread there were totally justified complaints about Biden not doing anything/lying/whatever. We should dedicate this thread to complaints about Biden and the CIA just launching an intergalactic war against space aliens!

[PLATO]

boom boom...out go the lights.

[pchang]

The whole episode shows a lack of decisiveness and how a lot of this is really just theater (Kabuki if you ask me). If Biden had been more decisive, they could have easily shot down the balloon over the mountains and forests of a sparsely populated western state like Idaho or Montana. It was only the political outcry from Republicans and the public in general that caused the administration to decide to shoot down the balloon. But, by that time, it was over much more populated areas and they had to wait until it was over the ocean. Having to use Navy divers to recover the debris was a lot more difficult than collecting the pieces from a forest floor. In addition, it is much more likely that significant pieces will be missed and end up at the bottom of the ocean.

There was really no need to scramble multiple F22s to shoot down a simple balloon. In addition, using an Air to Air missile would ensure fragmentation and a greater chance to destroy the balloon's components. If they really wanted to recover the balloon's electronics intact, they would have used a burst from the guns. Clearly, the whole "shoot down" was a show to demonstrate:
1) our F22s are completely operational and we use them for pretty much everything now
2) therefore, any air comparisons you have made between your planes and F15s or F16s are obsolete and cannot be relied on at all
3) we don't really care that much about recovering your spying equipment because we either already know what they are made of, we know they cannot really do that much, or both

[Geronimo]

They knocked it down over shallow coastal water. Maybe that actually makes recovery a bit easier as somewhat less pulverization may have occurred at impact?

[pchang]

A slow leak from few 20mm holes would have had less impact.

[Geronimo]

That was tried with the Canadian "rogue" balloon and it stayed aloft long enough afterwards to cross the Atlantic. It does make me wonder why that wasn't tried as soon as it was detected in Alaska. Do they really think the odds of mid air collision as it drifted to lower altitudes would be more than negligible?

[PLATO]

Same post I posted in "liberal hypocracies" but worth repeating here:

Okay...not a Biden fan, but I will say that I think this was handled brilliantly. For days U.S. Military planes were able to get up close observations of the type of equipment the balloon was using and intercept any electronic emissions for study. U.S. military officials have said that they were able to "mitigate" any transmission of the collected data. Once the balloon's work was done over the U.S. it was shot down in U.S. waters to prevent any recovery attempt by the Chinese further out to sea. Now we get to physically examine the equipment and review any data stored on the balloon. This will help us identify Chinese capabilities as well as determine exactly what information they were trying to gather and what exactly they were able to gather. This is a nice "win" for the U.S. Biden made the right call and the military made it happen in the best way. Credit where credit is due.

[pchang]

In your experience, what happens to electronics after they have been dunked in salt water for a while?

[BeBMan]

There were reps that a second balloon is over Latin America. Let's see if this one "mistakenly" finds its way into US/Canadian airspace too...

Overall though I'm wondering more what the Chinese hope to gain from this. During the early cold war both US and USSR used balloons IIRC. But nowadays, there's sats.

So was it arrogant bragging /hey look we can get a balloon across), or some kind of public messaging (not sure what that would be good for)? Maybe someone wanting to torpedo the planned Blinken visit?

(yes, obvsly that's all speculation from my side).

[PLATO]

There were reps that a second balloon is over Latin America. Let's see if this one "mistakenly" finds its way into US/Canadian airspace too...

Overall though I'm wondering more what the Chinese hope to gain from this. During the early cold war both US and USSR used balloons IIRC. But nowadays, there's sats.

So was it arrogant bragging /hey look we can get a balloon across), or some kind of public messaging (not sure what that would be good for)? Maybe someone wanting to torpedo the planned Blinken visit?

(yes, obvsly that's all speculation from my side).

My guess is nuclear material "sniffers" to determine which silos had ICBMs in them and how much nuclear material was stored at Whitman.

[Dauphin]

Sniffers are usually used to detect open air materials (from leaks to meltdowns to detonations). Are nuclear weapons (in storage or transport, not when exploding) liable to release measurable quantities into the atmosphere?

[pchang]

Answer = No

[Dauphin]

Agreed, but I wanted to say it without telling Plato he's wrong.

[PLATO]

Sniffers are usually used to detect open air materials (from leaks to meltdowns to detonations). Are nuclear weapons (in storage or transport, not when exploding) liable to release measurable quantities into the atmosphere?

Good question. I don't really know. From what I have read over the years though, they can be quite sensitive. It was just my best guess as to why to use a balloon.

[Buster Crabbe's Uncle]

...Could this really be the Aliens using China as a patsy? ...

[pchang]

Aliens capable of traveling hundreds of light years would easily be capable of moving around undetected by us.