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US military shoots down Chinese spy balloon over Atlantic Ocean
Fox News ^ | February 4, 2023 2:39pm EST | Adam Sabes

Posted on 02/04/2023 11:47:11 AM PST by conservative98

The U.S. military has shot down the Chinese spy balloon over the Atlantic Ocean.

While the balloon was off the coast of South Carolina, the balloon was shot down by the U.S. military on Saturday afternoon, according to Fox News sources

(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...


TOPICS: Breaking News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: atlantic; balloon; china; chinese; goooh; letsgobrandon; q; r; russia; shot; spartansixdelta; spy; spyballoon; usmilitary
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To: Drew68
The space-based satellites can read the side numbers on aircraft. I suppose putting those same cameras on a balloon might be able to tell if I shaved in the morning or not. Other than that, I'm not quite sure what additional intelligence it can gather.

Side numbers on aircraft are 12 inches. There is plenty of intelligence of interest that is smaller than that.

181 posted on 02/04/2023 3:17:15 PM PST by FreeReign
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To: Drew68
Still, what intelligence did it gather that the spy satellites missed?

Well, now that Biden shot it down over the ocean - where the digital and hardware and software components and sensors are destroyed and damaged, we will never know!

182 posted on 02/04/2023 3:18:01 PM PST by Robert A Cook PE (Method, motive, and opportunity: No morals, shear madness and hatred by those who cheat.)
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To: lizma2

“Should have shot it when it was approaching the Aleutians.”

If Trump had been in office the PRC never would have launched the dang thing because he would have had it shot down, equipment recovered and analyzed.

“This is America gone incompetent.”

Absofreakinglutely correct.

“Ain’t gonna end well.”

We’ll be lucky to live through it.


183 posted on 02/04/2023 3:19:57 PM PST by oldvirginian (A friend helps you move furniture. A Real friend helps you move bodies. )
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To: conservative98

How do we know that’s not a decoy balloon we released and then shot down? Just askin’...


184 posted on 02/04/2023 3:23:56 PM PST by Irenic
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To: ladyjane

I remember every word you said as it happened but doesn’t that still mean it was a bust? The withdrawal of air support, the deaths of many add up to that in my opinion. And the CIA shooter from the front who killed JFK was part of it, I agree.


185 posted on 02/04/2023 3:25:10 PM PST by frank ballenger (You have summoned up a thundercloud. You're gonna hear from me. Anthem by Leonard Cohen)
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To: oldvirginian
If Trump had been in office the PRC never would have launched the dang thing because he would have had it shot down, equipment recovered and analyzed.

China has been flying these things over us for years, including when Trump was president.

186 posted on 02/04/2023 3:25:35 PM PST by Drew68 (Ron DeSantis for President 2024)
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To: Drew68

Why are you asking me what intelligence the “weather balloon” gathered? It wasn’t my balloon. Are you implying that if I don’t know what intelligence it gathered then it must not have gathered any? I don’t understand why you’re going to such lengths to promote the CCP’s narrative.


187 posted on 02/04/2023 3:26:02 PM PST by BykrBayb (Lung cancer free since 11/9/07. Colon cancer free since 7/7/15. PTL ~ Þ)
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To: Drew68

From what I’ve read, they’ve had the technology since 2017, and has been flying it in places like Japan and Taiwan since 2019, I think using it over the US is much more reach possibly only started in 2021.


188 posted on 02/04/2023 3:27:02 PM PST by Truthsearcher
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To: Drew68

From what I’ve read, at the altitude the balloon is flying it can intercept all cell phone signals and listen in on all cell phone communications, which the satellites cannot do.


189 posted on 02/04/2023 3:28:36 PM PST by Truthsearcher
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To: Drew68

“China has been flying these things over us for years, including when Trump was president.”

Well that I didn’t know.
It’s never been publicized that I know until now.


190 posted on 02/04/2023 3:36:49 PM PST by oldvirginian (A friend helps you move furniture. A Real friend helps you move bodies. )
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To: conservative98

Joe missed an opportunity to surrender? He’s slipping.


191 posted on 02/04/2023 3:39:13 PM PST by TChad (Progressives are in favor of removing healthy sex organs from children. Conservatives oppose this.)
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To: conservative98

As soon as the ChiComs let Joey know they got all the sensitive info they needed they let him shoot it down.


192 posted on 02/04/2023 3:45:57 PM PST by Georgia Girl 2 (The only purpose of a pistol is to fight your way back to the rifle you should never have dropped)
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To: Drew68

Or it could have been filled with insect or bird sized drones, let out all along the way to complete some other task. Intelligence gathering, leaving some sort of tiny homing signals, even a biohazard payload such as some agricultural disease.

Of course a payload wouldn’t be dropped from 60000 ft. But a multiprocessing dispersal by tiny drones, very possible. Maybe created to complete their task then self destruct while still miles up.

Again, drones are quite sophisticated these days.


193 posted on 02/04/2023 3:56:17 PM PST by boxlunch (Red State governors, kick the fednazis OUT of red states! BTW, We are a REPUBLIC not a democracy!)
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To: All

I don’t think it was a regular weather balloon, but China claims it was part of a weather research project. I would reserve judgment on that and assume it was perhaps a trial run for a balloon that could produce a military result next time. I don’t know enough about EMP technology to venture a guess as to whether this type of balloon could release that kind of weapon. Also you have to wonder, why take the chance of sending an EMP on something that could be detected and shot down before the release?

Maybe it was just a psy-op event, China sending a message that they have stuff we don’t know about or understand.

Like egg rolls.


194 posted on 02/04/2023 3:57:47 PM PST by Peter ODonnell (If Arizona held the Olympic Games, Usain Bolt would lose to Joe Biden)
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To: FreeReign; Drew68

I don’t know why people don’t readily grasp this. The very lowest Earth orbit is it about 525,000 ft above the surface. You take the same cameras and bring them down to 60,000 ft and you have vastly increased image resolution, with no atmospheric distortion.

Furthermore, with a balloon system, instruments that do not presently exist aboard any orbiting satellite can be far more readily deployed. Instruments capable of detecting radiation — Hello, inverse Square law? Sources of radiation that would be entirely below the threshold of detection for orbiting instruments would seem amplified exponentially for the same detector deployed 460,000ft nearer.

More elemental than any of this, though, US airspace should be inviolable. The least threat needs to be met with an iron rebuke, and Biden choked.

Expect more balloons bearing less and less benign payloads.


195 posted on 02/04/2023 4:05:15 PM PST by HKMk23 (https://youtu.be/LTseTg48568)
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To: BusterDog

“This is the dumbest place on the internet.”

Sort of a broad brush. But like all chat sites we do have some posters who try to get attention with some lame remarks. God bless ‘em.


196 posted on 02/04/2023 4:07:00 PM PST by plain talk
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To: BykrBayb; Drew68

I don’t understand why you’re going to such lengths to promote the CCP’s narrative

————
I don’t either.

No one is saying they know for sure what it was, but why do we have a couple of posters who are adamantly defending the idea that it’s only a weather balloon. Why is it ok to push that theory, but not ok to discuss other possibilities?


197 posted on 02/04/2023 4:07:26 PM PST by boxlunch (Red State governors, kick the fednazis OUT of red states! BTW, We are a REPUBLIC not a democracy!)
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To: Peter ODonnell
Maybe it was just a psy-op event,

For sophisticated psychology to work Brandon would have to have a working brain to trick. No dice. Same with the laughably named "brain trust" of military and political jerks in his circle.

198 posted on 02/04/2023 4:10:56 PM PST by frank ballenger (You have summoned up a thundercloud. You're gonna hear from me. Anthem by Leonard Cohen)
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To: boxlunch; BykrBayb
but why do we have a couple of posters who are adamantly defending the idea that it’s only a weather balloon.

I am not adamantly defending that it's only a weather balloon. I am merely suggesting that it's not out of the realm of possibilities. Not everything is a conspiracy.

Honestly, I don't know WTF it was. But I do know that China has a fleet of spy satellites watching us constantly so I do question what additional info an unguided balloon can gather. Maybe something? I don't know.

Or, maybe it was just a weather balloon.

I'm not dying on this hill though because I don't know what it was. Could be sinister. But it could just as easily be benign.

199 posted on 02/04/2023 4:20:47 PM PST by Drew68 (Ron DeSantis for President 2024)
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To: Drew68
maybe it was just a weather balloon

For my cats it was a day much more welcoming than the previous twenty-four.

200 posted on 02/04/2023 4:27:41 PM PST by Fightin Whitey
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