Pentagon Tracking Suspected Chinese Spy Balloon Over the US

[Sylvain]

Any intel on the other balloon that was over South America?

 

[1DOWN4UP]

This is mine from the old days.

 

[BigMoose]

You should quote them and correct the record…

Id rather take the high road, and let my post stand on its alone own merit. Rather then calling people by handle on the internet.

 

[JettaKnight]

Cuius est solum, eius est usque ad coelum et ad inferos

I wasn't referring the law aspect, but that it's above FAA class A airspace, which stops at FL600.

 

[bwframe]

Let me see if I've got this straight. The guy who took off for 4 months during the California sea-ports debacle... and no one noticed... says the balloon Charlie Foxtrot was handled appropriately. No that does not increase my confidence in this administration.

Pete Buttigieg says Biden handled Chinese spy balloon 'appropriately' amid backlash from Republicans​

Pete Buttigieg says Biden handled Chinese spy balloon 'appropriately' amid backlash from Republicans

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg came to President Biden's defense on Sunday when asked about the Chinese spy balloon, saying it was "handled appropriately."

www.foxnews.com

 

[ditcherman]

This is mine from the old days.
View attachment 253171

I'm hoping to go back there this summer to prairie dog hunt!

 

[Tombs]

That's pretty speculative. How do you know "it's completely under control via EW measures"?

The military is not congress, and this is a trivial measure for them to take with current hardware.

All I can say is, if you overwhelm a radio receiver, it's not going to be doing much. It doesn't matter what it transmits at that point because it's just going to be noise.

 

[oze]

Here is the -real- non partisan scoop on the shootdown.



Here are the cliffs notes.

They used an AIM-9X with the warhead inert or removed.

The AIM-9X can track the balloon, not through heat (as the old Vietnam and 80s ones did), but through IR cameras and designation in the cockpit, the sensor is basically an IR camera now, you use the designator to mark the target and it goes and hits it. No more growl in the pilots ear.

Elint assets were jamming the thing so it could not "ET phone home" to China. ALL THE WAY. ELINT was also listening to the thing talk RF wise.

The intel gathered by the US on this thing is valuable.

The US Navy is going to pick up the remnants.

Biden is an idiot, but the USAF knows what the hell they are doing.

Sorry to rain on the parade of the Tin Foil Hatter crew here.

That was excellent and fascinating. Thanks for posting it!

 

[BigMoose]

The military is not congress, and this is a trivial measure for them to take with current hardware.

All I can say is, if you overwhelm a radio receiver, it's not going to be doing much. It doesn't matter what it transmits at that point because it's just going to be noise.

Its been done so many times. One of the things they figured out they could do in the war on terror, was to take the Radar jamming EA-6B prowler and use it to jam cell phones, or other RF devices used to set off remote bombs.

Its a brute force method, fill the RF spectrum with enough emissions to drown out your target. Started with radars, but later it became radios and GPS..

And yes, it is possible to.. well somewhat steer a balloon. Winds at different altitudes blow in different directions, and it is possible by changing altitudes, to steer the thing somewhat.

 

[KG1]

If it was rendered harmless then shooting it down was for pure optics.

 

[oze]

If it was rendered harmless then shooting it down was for pure optics.

Except maybe to recover and study the payload.

 

[BigMoose]

Except maybe to recover and study the payload.

Probably for both Optics and to poke around at it.

 

[KG1]

I would be more inclined to believe that Biden's order to shoot it down was a political decision primarily for the optics.

 

[Hawkeye]

Id rather take the high road, and let my post stand on its alone own merit. Rather then calling people by handle on the internet.

In other words you just want to snidely throw shade without any specifics.

 

[Hawkeye]

The military is not congress, and this is a trivial measure for them to take with current hardware.

All I can say is, if you overwhelm a radio receiver, it's not going to be doing much. It doesn't matter what it transmits at that point because it's just going to be noise.

In other words, you got nuttin.

 

[jamil]

The right response to china should be: "Send all of them you like, they'll be at the bottom of the ocean, and if you don't like it, you should remember that you are pissing off a nation of veterans who just got back from fighting a 20 year war, who has the most advanced military equipment on the planet actively in the hands of our veterans."

Yeah but then they can respond with photos of

omg she got YUGE! Does she change the tide when she walks on the beach?

 

[BugI02]

In other words, you got nuttin.

Indeed. I wonder if he has heard of frequency hopping or if he believes it is a simple matter to blanket the entire electromagnetic spectrum all the time, never mind the many things such an effort would disrupt even if it were possible

 

[Tombs]

Indeed. I wonder if he has heard of frequency hopping or if he believes it is a simple matter to blanket the entire electromagnetic spectrum all the time, never mind the many things such an effort would disrupt even if it were possible

You only have to prevent it from hearing your communications.

And they can be made relatively directional.

 

[GodFearinGunTotin]

 

[actaeon277]

Sigh.

Radio and laser jamming.

Laser would require LOS, or at least close enough to be a point source.
Radio doesn't.

Frequency hopping.
Sigh.
Right. Nobody figured that out. Since WWII radars had freq hopping, I find it difficult to believe the Growler couldn't handle it from a single 'aircraft'.
Especially when they are able to handle... let's say dozens.. of sources, of different freqs, at the same time.
And it has, in real environs, for a while