Re: The Spy Above Us.....

[a425couple]

On 2/3/23 22:03, Walt In Seattle wrote:
> On Friday, February 3, 2023 at 12:06:39 AM UTC-8, Walt In Seattle wrote:
>> Apparently, this is not the first time we've seen this occur..We do't know for certain why China launched this spy balloon. But we do know that China is probably preparing for the possibility of conflict with the U.S. over Taiwan. The value of any gathered intelligence may be less important or not not mportant at all to China while the implied message it possibly sends could be its main purpose.That message might be that we should not expect a conflict over Taiwan would not necessarily be limited to areas in or near Taiwan if China moves to invade Taiwan and the U.S. responds to defend Taiwan. Of course, there may be another purpose or purposes. Yet, I think it likely that sending such message is at least a part of what China is doing.
>>
>> https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/chinese-spy-balloon-surveilling-us-senior-official/story?id=96860718
>
> As of Friday afternoon, there are reports of a second balloon, that one flying over South America. What that means and WHY China is sending a spy balloon there, I don't know But I have an uneasy feeling about all of this. If we can somehow capture the one over America, we should. To the extent we can, we need to know China's true intentions.
>
> https://abcnews.go.com/US/live-updates/china-spy-balloon/?id=96874279

I agree.

[patrick]

A couple of aspects of this incurison strike me as strange- some of it may be from my mistaken understanding of meteorological balloons (or surveillance balloons for that matter). I saw a projected path based on the prevailing conditions of the estimated launch time out of western central China and the balloon would have followed high altitude wind direction over South Korea, over the Southern Japan islands, then turn northeasterly, pretty much following the flight path of most commercial aviation heading for the west coast of North America- plenty of time for witnesses, a large target dragging a bunch of hardware at 60K feet would show on any number of eyeballs let alone search radar. I presume many mil intel guys would light up with something at that altitude moving at 20 mph might be something to examine. Then there's the aspect of China and the persons responsible for the "weather balloon ". Once it proceeded further than they expected, wouldn't they have either a cut away for the harness or a release valve for the descent to keep it from falling somewhere it might cause a problem? Did the Chinese government notify Canada/US they might have an unexpected visitor? I'm giving China the benefit of the doubt here.... anyone care to weight in? Regards, Pat