"The Balloon !"

[TheVat]

There will be a Quiz, no?  

[Moontanman]

A friend on "facebook" is sure the scenario from Independence Day is being played out and soon we'll be in a full scale alien invasion... an air force general who recently said at this point we can't rule out aliens isn't really helping.  

[exchemist]

8 minutes ago, Moontanman said:

A friend on "facebook" is sure the scenario from Independence Day is being played out and soon we'll be in a full scale alien invasion... an air force general who recently said at this point we can't rule out aliens isn't really helping.  

Haha. However I don't think this general quite meant that. I think he was trying to stop being dragged into speculation by the line of questioning of a reporter  and tried to close it down by saying he would not rule anything out until he had the intelligence reports.

Unfortunately that included not ruling out little green men. So now everyone has jumped - either stupidly or disingenuously - on that, to claim "Aha, he thinks it could be little green men!" 

[Moontanman]

1 hour ago, exchemist said:

Haha. However I don't think this general quite meant that. I think he was trying to stop being dragged into speculation by the line of questioning of a reporter  and tried to close it down by saying he would not rule anything out until he had the intelligence reports.

Unfortunately that included not ruling out little green men. So now everyone has jumped - either stupidly or disingenuously - on that, to claim "Aha, he thinks it could be little green men!" 

Finally!

 

[geordief]

1 hour ago, Moontanman said:

Finally!

 

Didn't realise the Deep State was that deep

[toucana]

A report in the NYT apparently mentions that US agencies had been tracking the large Chinese balloon shot down almost a week ago from the moment it was launched from a site on Hainan island.

If correct this is an interesting nugget of information, because Hainan  - as its name 海南  (South of the Sea) suggests - is a tropical island located at the very southernmost tip of mainland China, and was once connected to Vietnam in geological times. It is the largest inhabited island under PRC control (absent Taiwan), and is home to around 10 million people.

Hainan island is one of the largest and most important PLA Navy bases in the whole of China. The principal PLA nuclear submarine harbour is located in Yalong Bay right on the very southern tip of the island. Pens capable of holding up to 20 nuclear submarines are built into the hills around the harbour to conceal them from US spy satellites. The harbour itself is designed to handle the largest aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships in the Chinese fleet.

It seems curious that the Chinese would launch a large spy balloon from such a closely observed location, and send their dirigibles off on such a long journey, drifting from the South China Sea all the way over to Alaska, Canada and Montana.

[exchemist]

3 minutes ago, toucana said:

A report in the NYT apparently mentions that US agencies had been tracking the large Chinese balloon shot down almost a week ago from the moment it was launched from a site on Hainan island.

If correct this is an interesting nugget of information, because Hainan  - as its name 海南  (South of the Sea) suggests - is a tropical island located at the very southernmost tip of mainland China, and was once connected to Vietnam in geological times. It is the largest inhabited island under PRC control (absent Taiwan), and is home to around 10 million people.

Hainan island is one of the largest and most important PLA Navy bases in the whole of China. The principal PLA nuclear submarine harbour is located in Yalong Bay right on the very southern tip of the island. Pens capable of holding up to 20 nuclear submarines are built into the hills around the harbour to conceal them from US spy satellites. The harbour itself is designed to handle the largest aircraft carriers and amphibious assault ships in the Chinese fleet.

It seems curious that the Chinese would launch a large spy balloon from such a closely observed location, and send their dirigibles off on such a long journey, drifting from the South China Sea all the way over to Alaska, Canada and Montana.

Could be worth considering the territories it passed over on its way. Taiwan? Japan? N/S Korea? Perhaps there could have been other motives besides spying on the USA.

[iNow]

2 minutes ago, toucana said:

A report in the NYT apparently mentions that US agencies had been tracking the large Chinese balloon shot down almost a week ago from the moment it was launched from a site on Hainan island.

What specifically did they say? How do they define “tracking?”

Did it appear in radar logs only to be noticed retrospectively after the incident, or did intelligence groups alert the Pentagon the moment of launch?

What evidence do they have to support any of this? Was the story framed more as a “what-if?” hypothetical, or something that really happened with time stamped communications to confirm?

Apparently links and citations aren’t as common these days on this topic. 

[toucana]

2 hours ago, iNow said:

What specifically did they say? How do they define “tracking?”

Did it appear in radar logs only to be noticed retrospectively after the incident, or did intelligence groups alert the Pentagon the moment of launch?

What evidence do they have to support any of this? Was the story framed more as a “what-if?” hypothetical, or something that really happened with time stamped communications to confirm?

Apparently links and citations aren’t as common these days on this topic. 

The original reference came via a link on the Sky News website

https://news.sky.com/story/us-recovers-key-sensors-from-suspected-chinese-spy-balloon-12810536

That link led to an article behind a subscription wall on the NYT which I couldn't initially access. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/13/us/politics/ufo-spy-balloon-china.html

I don't normally cite articles behind pay/subscription walls as many readers don't want to sign-up for them  just to read an article that may be of only limited relevance to them. As this one seems to be of interest however, I did create a log-in on the NYT site, and quote from it here:

The U.S. intelligence community has linked the Chinese spy balloon shot down on Saturday to a vast surveillance program run by the People’s Liberation Army, and U.S. officials have begun to brief allies and partners who have been similarly targeted.

The surveillance balloon effort, which has operated for several years partly out of Hainan province off China’s south coast, has collected information on military assets in countries and areas of emerging strategic interest to China including Japan, India, Vietnam, Taiwan and the Philippines, according to several U.S. officials, who, like others interviewed for this story, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the matter’s sensitivity.

------

Hainan, one of the locations where officials said the balloons are based, is an island off the southern coast of China that has long been a PLA command and control location. Though known more for its naval facility, it features an airfield that was the home base for the Chinese J-8 interceptor fighter jet that collided with an American EP-3 spy plane in 2001.

In January, the U.S. military disclosed what it characterized as an unsafe maneuver in December by a Chinese fighter jet that U.S. military officials said flew too close to an American reconnaissance aircraft in international airspace near the island. The Chinese J-11 fighter pulled within 20 feet of the American plane’s nose, “forcing the RC-135 to take evasive maneuvers to avoid a collision,” U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said in a statement.

--------------

Those are the two specific references to Hainan in that lengthy article I could find, and they indicate  US intelligence agencies routinely fly Lockheed  EP-3 and  Boeing RC-135  electronic spy planes in that area.

The article also confirms as you suggest that the balloons are overflying  Korea and Japan en route as well e.g.

 

Officials have said these surveillance airships, operated in part by the PLA air force, have been spotted over five continents.

In Japan in 2020, an aerial orb drew speculation. “Some people thought this was a UFO,” said a Japanese official. “In hindsight people are realizing that was a Chinese espionage balloon. But at that time it was purely novel — nobody had seen this. … So there’s a lot of heightened attention at this time.”

 

Some of the balloons have been launched from China on flight paths that took them around the entire globe, officials said.

etc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 14, 2023 by toucana
corrected RC-135

[iNow]

Thank you for the helpful context and follow-up

[toucana]

6 hours ago, iNow said:

Thank you for the helpful context and follow-up

The article does imply that other locations in China are involved in launching these balloons as well. I was just surprised that somewhere as far south as Hainan was being described as the focal source of them. I would have thought that somewhere much further north would have made better operational sense. The coastal city of Qingdao 青岛 (Azure Island) on the Shantung peninsula for example, would have provided a much simpler drifting route on the prevailing easterly winds across Korea and Japan, and then over the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands into Alaska. Qingdao also happens to be another important PLA naval  base.

[geordief]

I saw Bolton on CNN  about an hour ago  attacking the administration  for allowing it to pass over US territory on the basis that it may have  had a nuclear bomb in its payload.

 

Seems a bit of a fanciful argument.Was he scraping the dregs of his powers of argumentation?

Edited February 15, 2023 by geordief

[StringJunky]

1 hour ago, geordief said:

I saw Bolton on CNN  about an hour ago  attacking the administration  for allowing it to pass over US territory on the basis that it may have  had a nuclear bomb in its payload.

 

Seems a bit of a fanciful argument.Was he scraping the dregs of his powers of argumentation?

It's a good job he's not doing it now. Sounds like a purely political stab with no justification... cheap shot.

Edited February 15, 2023 by StringJunky

[exchemist]

6 hours ago, geordief said:

I saw Bolton on CNN  about an hour ago  attacking the administration  for allowing it to pass over US territory on the basis that it may have  had a nuclear bomb in its payload.

 

Seems a bit of a fanciful argument.Was he scraping the dregs of his powers of argumentation?

That old walrus again? I thought he had disappeared along with the Project for the New American Century. (What a laugh that has turned out be.)

[iNow]

6 hours ago, exchemist said:

That old walrus again? I thought he had disappeared along with the Project for the New American Century.

He's selling a book

[exchemist]

9 minutes ago, iNow said:

He's selling a book

Alles klar.

[TheVat]

14 hours ago, geordief said:

I saw Bolton on CNN  about an hour ago  attacking the administration  for allowing it to pass over US territory on the basis that it may have  had a nuclear bomb in its payload.

 

Seems a bit of a fanciful argument.Was he scraping the dregs of his powers of argumentation?

Licking at a dried residue, perhaps.  Bolton is a superhawk, who doesn't believe in international law, the UN, treaties, or much of anything that doesn't involve America annihilating any nation that might get in our way.  He is dangerously stupid.  And a rabidly anti-Muslim bigot.  No wonder Trump appointed him as National Security Advisor.  

 

 

 

 

1 hour ago, iNow said:

He's selling a book

And maybe running for president.  LoL!

[Janus]

14 hours ago, geordief said:

I saw Bolton on CNN  about an hour ago  attacking the administration  for allowing it to pass over US territory on the basis that it may have  had a nuclear bomb in its payload.

 

Seems a bit of a fanciful argument.Was he scraping the dregs of his powers of argumentation?

Riiight.  What would be the point of China putting a nuclear bomb on it?  What good would have dropping a single nuclear bomb have done?  It would be of no significant strategic value, and would only risk starting a full nuclear exchange, and if such an exchange was their goal, they would have just done a full scale nuclear strike.

[iNow]

9 hours ago, TheVat said:

And maybe running for president. 

I’m sure I’ll see him at the Iowa State Fair this summer glad handing and flipping pork chops on the grill.

In fact, Nikki Haley is already gonna be just up the road from me this coming Monday… VP Pence and Mike Pompeo (who shockingly also both have books) surely aren’t far behind, either. 

Edited February 16, 2023 by iNow

[geordief]

29 minutes ago, iNow said:

I’m sure I’ll see him at the Iowa State Fair this summer glad handing and flipping pork chops on the grill.

In fact, Nikki Haley is already gonna be just up the road from me this coming Monday… VP Pence and Mike Pompeo (who shockingly also both have books) surely aren’t far behind, either. 

Will Nikki Haley be in John Bolton's best books seeing that he will be 75   in November and so  will have to pass her  proposed Senior's mental competence  test  if he wants to be President?

[iNow]

11 minutes ago, geordief said:

Will Nikki Haley be in John Bolton's best books

Unsure, but since neither will be campaigning in a Chinese or similar spy balloon, I reckon it’s even farther off-topic here than we already are

[geordief]

1 minute ago, iNow said:

Unsure, but since neither will be campaigning in a Chinese or similar spy balloon, I reckon it’s even farther off-topic here than we already are

A bit off course.

 

[studiot]

An amusing history of spy balloons from the French Revolution on

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-us-canada-64639407

Quote

In an age of drones, satellites and hi-tech spy planes, why would any world power still be using balloons for surveillance?

An expert explains the reasons a technology first used during the French Revolutionary Wars remains so in demand today.

 

[TheVat]

This is going to get expensive.  Sidewinder missiles are not cheap.

 

https://www.npr.org/2023/02/18/1158048921/pico-balloon-k9yo

 

Did a superpower showdown provoke the U.S. into using a fighter jet to shoot down a hobbyist group's research balloon in Canada? That's the question the public — and the FBI — wants to answer, after the U.S. military shot down several unidentified airborne objects last weekend.

A military spokesperson tells NPR it's their understanding that the FBI has spoken to the hobbyist group in question — the Northern Illinois Bottlecap Balloon Brigade, based just north of Chicago — in an apparent attempt to determine whether their small balloon might have inadvertently caused a big ruckus....

 

 

[swansont]

4 hours ago, TheVat said:

This is going to get expensive.  Sidewinder missiles are not cheap.

$400k for a missile, but $200k for the training version, so cost without explosive payload somewhere in between.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIM-9_Sidewinder

That’s cheap in comparison to US military budgets. The Air Force alone has bought more than 10,000 of them. Raytheon has hundreds-of-million-dollar contracts to supply them. 

https://www.airforce-technology.com/news/usaf-receives-10000th-aim-9x-sidewinder-missile/

This is peanuts, relatively speaking. And might tick off something on the training requirements for a pilot or two, so these might be in lieu of other missiles that would be fired.