This seems like a worse idea than just collecting the thing and putting it in a faraday cage.
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U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
111–120 of 1001 posts
Re: U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
#112>"... size of three school busses..."
Size of school bus in the US range anywhere from 20 to 45 feet. I surprised they did not measure it in anacondas.
Re: U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not sure where your info is from, but this balloon was seen by the naked eye and all over social media. As someone who lives in Montana, many many people could see it. The idea that the USG prompted the publicity is unlikely to be accurate (would suggest a calculated social media psyop). Not impossible, but not likely.
How big was it? I don't mean your well thought out estimate, I mean your gut impression. Smaller than the end of your pinkie at arm's length? I gather that it gave the impression of being somewhat normal sized and much closer than it actually was, gauging by the number of people who thought they could shoot it down with their firearm.
Not the commenter, but my gut impression was that it looked a lot lower than normal commercial air traffic that I see around here. The circling fighter jets were very hard to see (other than their vapor trails) but the balloon was extremely visible.
Re: U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
#114So they waited until the balloon was over sea.
This raises the question: why didn't the military see it coming and destroy it before it crossed the border?
Re: U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
#115In previous times, the US would ignore these balloons and quietly take them down. Instead they made a big deal out of it and milked it. Brilliant and opposite of what china expected
The US state apparatus did not make a big deal of this. The media and the public did, and the US state apparatus answered to the media and the public, as is their duty.
>"The US state apparatus did not make a big deal of this."
Cancelling / postponing (whatever it will be) Blinken's visit to China does seem like a big deal.
Re: U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
#116This seems like a worse idea than just collecting the thing and putting it in a faraday cage.
The video of the shoot-down shows flashes from the detached-and-falling payload, probably explosive self-destruct devices detonating.
(It'd be shocking if the Chinese didn't include a self-destruct capability.)
Re: U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
#117In previous times, the US would ignore these balloons and quietly take them down. Instead they made a big deal out of it and milked it. Brilliant and opposite of what china expected
Not sure where your info is from, but this balloon was seen by the naked eye and all over social media. As someone who lives in Montana, many many people could see it. The idea that the USG prompted the publicity is unlikely to be accurate (would suggest a calculated social media psyop). Not impossible, but not likely.
there’s a bit of difference between it being spread as a meme online and then quietly fading into the background v.s. the President of the country ordering it to be shot down by a jet and then announcing said order to the public.
just how close/far is this from “business as usual”? if this balloon were no big deal, i wouldn’t expect it to be escalated to the Commander in Chief. which tells me either (a) there’s (suspected to be) some real serious shit aboard that balloon or (b) Whitehouse is making a show of this for political reasons (e.g. to justify upcoming action against China, another surveillance bill, etc) or (c) top officials are clueless and don’t understand the signals they’re giving to the public here.
none of those explanations i find reassuring.
Re: U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
#118The video of the shoot-down shows flashes from the detached-and-falling payload, probably explosive self-destruct devices detonating.
(It'd be shocking if the Chinese didn't include a self-destruct capability.)
Re: U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
Given that it was visible to the naked eye and people were talking about it, it's silly to blame this on the government.
>Given that it was visible to the naked eye But why did this garner so much attention compared to the weather ballons that the US launches on a regular basis?
It has a big equipment platform hanging off it, and it allowed the right wing people to blabber about POTUS being soft on China or whatever for a news cycle.
Re: U.S. military shoots down suspected Chinese surveillance balloon
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
Given that it was visible to the naked eye and people were talking about it, it's silly to blame this on the government.
>Given that it was visible to the naked eye But why did this garner so much attention compared to the weather ballons that the US launches on a regular basis?
Not even just weather balloons. Launching balloons using ham radio by amateurs is also pretty popular thing to do by ham radio operators around the world.