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U.S. Only Recently Developed Secret Balloon Tracking Tech, Explaining Why Trump Had No Idea Flights Occurred During His Tenure
Red State. ^ | February 11, 2023 | Bob Hoge

Posted on 02/12/2023 7:01:14 AM PST by george76

The US intelligence community developed a secret technology to track China’s fleet of surveillance balloons only in the last year

...

Although they won’t say how we’re doing it, the sources claim that the US can now even track past balloon flights—which is why the news only recently came out that the lighter-than-air craft crossed American airspace during the Trump administration. Like a scene out of “Back to the Future,” the Pentagon only recently realized that these intrusions had occurred.

Despite the Biden administration’s insinuation that somehow Trump knew about these flights and did nothing about them, the truth is that our intel community did not know about them at the time, and so could not have informed the former president.

...

Shouldn’t it inflame everybody that Biden allowed our number one geopolitical and economic foe to fly a surveillance aircraft over our sovereign territory for over a week? But I digress.

...

Biden let a Chinese spy balloon fly over our sensitive military sites before shooting it down after it completed its mission.

And then tried to claim last night that he protected our sovereignty from China.

What a joke.

No serious American is falling for that.

~Steve Scalise

...

The new methods indicate that Chinese balloons crossed US airspace at least three times during Trump’s tenure. As I’ve previously written, balloons are cute at birthday parties, and can be effective information gatherers about the weather—but military balloons could also be used to drop munitions, conduct high-level surveillance, and even launch drone armies and EMP attacks. They’re no joke.

You’d think they wouldn’t be that hard to track—but they’re flying at heights well above the altitude of commercial aircraft.

...

the balloons are extremely difficult to track .. the National Weather Service indicates the highest we can go is 20 miles], and can evade the more traditional radars that are oriented toward detecting fast-moving missiles and counterterrorism threats…

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China has developed an entire fleet of these military balloons—which have been seen in other countries besides the United States—and hopefully, the autopsy of the one the US recently shot down will help us understand just what the heck the CCP is up to.

None of this excuses Biden for his failure to take out the balloon much sooner than he did, but it could explain why Trump and members of his administration basically said, “what the hell are you talking about?” when news broke that flights had occurred under his command.


TOPICS: Canada; Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; US: Alaska; US: District of Columbia; US: North Dakota; US: South Carolina
KEYWORDS: balloon; balloons; china; surveillance
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To: george76
FTA;

Despite the Biden administration’s insinuation that somehow Trump knew about these flights and did nothing about them, the truth is that our intel community did not know about them at the time, and so could not have informed the former president

Not that they *would* have considering how invested the IC was in bringing him down.

21 posted on 02/12/2023 7:23:18 AM PST by Roccus (Veritas, non verba magistri)
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To: Skywise
There’s this thing we’ve had since before WW2 called.. RADAR

Wots that?

22 posted on 02/12/2023 7:24:15 AM PST by Lazamataz (The firearms I own today, are the firearms I will die with. How I die will be up to them.)
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To: Skywise

These days, there’s a computer between the human operator and the raw radar signal, processing the signal and filtering out noise and birds, and highlighting stuff that corresponds to what we’re interested in (conventional aircraft).

It could be that balloons were not making it through the computer filtering, and examination of old recordings of the raw radar signals turned them up.

It could also be that Chinese students or H1Bs in the US got access to the software and noticed what might get missed by the filtering.


23 posted on 02/12/2023 7:24:54 AM PST by SauronOfMordor (The rot of all principle begins with a single compromise.)
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To: texas booster

>>The software that controls modern military radars will throw out the slow movers as not important.

Since we are so tied to massive signal processing to find the blips among the background noise, a rewrite of the code is in order to find this new threat<<

Exactly.


24 posted on 02/12/2023 7:26:56 AM PST by SauronOfMordor (The rot of all principle begins with a single compromise.)
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To: george76

I only recently realized the Pentagon is incompetent.

Assume we have Satellites that see every inch of US territory, certainly all but Alaska.

Assume we have triage camera and basic AI capability to recognize every plane, every balloon larger than a 4 inch mini drone. Assume the computer connected to the cameras routinely produces reports: X number of large planes on regular flight paths. Y number not on regular flight paths. Z number of balloons and other objects (from meteriorids to Ufo). Plus weather patterns.

If we don’t have this routine, the deficiency goes back as far as Jimmy Carter era.


25 posted on 02/12/2023 7:27:04 AM PST by spintreebob (ki .h )
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To: george76

It sounds like they must have developed a Time Machine so they can go back in history and track balloon flights from years ago.


26 posted on 02/12/2023 7:28:17 AM PST by euram (allALL)
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To: george76

Is this a joke? Has to be a joke.


27 posted on 02/12/2023 7:33:17 AM PST by dforest
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To: george76

Misdirection to defend the PedoPres. Just like everyone suddenly finding classified docs.

A piece of paper bearing a “classified” stamp means nothing. Such can be declassified at will — and it is not like anyone is going to go around erasing the stamp.
Show the docs’ contents — is it still classified? If you refuse to do this, you are on the payroll.


28 posted on 02/12/2023 7:35:14 AM PST by bobbo666 (Baizuo)
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To: fr_freak

That guy in Montana was a secret agent. Top notch tech. /s


29 posted on 02/12/2023 7:35:30 AM PST by dforest
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To: SauronOfMordor

I realized in reading your posts that we DID have a lot of signal processing back in WWII.

Only it was between the ears of the radar operators, who had to be very highly trained to know what to look for.

Only today, someone will write a ChatCPT to FFT a signal to let an intern know to wake up a real radar tech to come take a look.


30 posted on 02/12/2023 7:37:06 AM PST by texas booster (Join FreeRepublic's Folding@Home team (Team # 36120) Cure Alzheimer's!)
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To: george76

That is complete nonsense. The historical records reveal that in the sixties spy satellites could detect a golf ball at one hundred miles. They are a bit better today.

These people must think Americans are completely stupid.


31 posted on 02/12/2023 7:37:36 AM PST by odawg
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To: george76

The US Space Force has for years been tracking objects in earth orbit as small as an astronaut’s errant glove. I believe we have had the capability to track these balloons for many years. The assertion of the Biden administration that such technology is only very recent is hogwash. If this were true then how did Biden end retroactively know about supposed Chinese balloon incursions during Trump’s presidency? The Biden administration has lied so frequently they cannot keep their lies consistent.


32 posted on 02/12/2023 7:41:06 AM PST by The Great RJ
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To: george76

Tracking?

Like being put on one of those Watch Lists where peeps are never really watched closely enough to intervene in time?


33 posted on 02/12/2023 7:43:08 AM PST by Paladin2
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To: george76

The surveillance balloons can’t be much if a risk when the feds won’t say what they found.
At least it takes some of the heat of Hunter and Joey for now.


34 posted on 02/12/2023 7:43:45 AM PST by Vaduz (LAWYERS )
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To: george76

It is known as the radar notch. Used when looking down but not up. Used to remove road traffic. Adjustable.


35 posted on 02/12/2023 7:46:14 AM PST by Revolutionary ("Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition!")
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To: Vaduz

“...balloons can’t be much if a risk when the feds won’t say what they found.”

And transparently ordinary enough that there is no point in releasing pictures of same.


36 posted on 02/12/2023 7:47:41 AM PST by Paladin2
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To: george76
There were actually 75 secret Chinese balloons that traversed the US during Trump's rein. Super secret undetectable spy balloons. Sure.


37 posted on 02/12/2023 7:57:22 AM PST by Delta 21 (MAGA Republican is my pronoun.)
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To: george76

People could SEE the balloon.


38 posted on 02/12/2023 8:00:37 AM PST by laxcoach (The secret to happiness is a bait pen full of pinfish.)
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To: george76

Checking out our new technology. Seeing how we react. Finding out lots of info


39 posted on 02/12/2023 8:05:54 AM PST by Nifster ( EI see puppy dogs in the clouds )
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To: george76

Yeh, sure. 🙄


40 posted on 02/12/2023 8:09:12 AM 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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