In fairness though, weather balloons fly over the US fairly consistently. Seen quite a few of them over the years....and you wouldn't know whose they were unless someone told you. In this case, I believe the Canadians spilled the beans to the public.....outside of that, people would probably think it was a typical weather balloon.
The only thing that was informative in this discussion is that both extremes believe the absolute worst of the other. THAT is where our country is today....sadly. And don't anyone start pointing fingers at the other placing blame on the other for starting it....y'all are both at fault.
That's not necessarly bad I guess. It means they cant defend the actions of the leadership so let's divert. That may be progressmy Biden voter friends are so insecure about the current Govt’s handling of the situation- that all they are obsessively posting about is several Chinese balloons entering US airspace when Trump was POTUS.
I knew Biden would be a mostly inactive Potus. The guy is an 80y/o man who looks more like 100y/o!
Been a gamecock fan since the middle 80s..I’ll go away when i pass away.
Born and raised in sc since 71…I’m just opened minded and not biased..Both sides make it look like the other is bad.most of the time the truth lies in the middle.
I’ve been around extremist,wacky before(coworkers,family),best not to associate with them and wish them the best.no point in arguing with them.I'm not sure he has a "mind"set.
But I assure you, he's serious as a heart attack
I'd love to hear how they are able to decide with certainty what an aircraft is carrying as a payload.
It's a, "Hey, we did what you wanted this time, Hope you're appeased and stop talking about the other one".
The Alaska Nat Guard scrambled jets to it when it was over the pacific ocean. Could have done it then, but they were told no. They probably could have escorted it to the ground with a couple of Chanooks or something.
The USAF flies F-16 C and D models in Alaska. These have a service ceiling of 50,000 Ft. The only USAF plane capable of doing the job is the F-22 Raptor, which can fly up to 60,000 Ft.. The Chinese balloon was flying at 60,000+ Ft. This is why Langley based F-22 fighters were vectored to Myrtle Beach instead of a Shaw or McEntire based F-16's or, even a Seymour Johnson based F-15E Strike Eagle. We even had a Mississippi based KC-135 orbiting the zone and both F-22's that were deployed had to hit it at least once, if not twice.
Interesting. Pretty surprising given our dust ups that occur with Russia out there. Not saying you’re wrong, but even the norad commander was saying they could have shot it down but chose not to bc he didn’t view it as a threat. Maybe he meant they could have come from Langley to do it. Sounds like they had ample time to address it, but chose not to.
The Alaska National Guard does not fly fighters, only the USAF and the F-16's based out there. I don't know the altitude of the balloon over Alaska but I do know what it was over the continental US. As a civilian, I have flown with the Navy, Marines and the USAF twice, including an F-16 out of Shaw (79th FS, tail 91-468, a Block50) and a KCC-135 out of Seymour Johnson refueling F15E Strike Eagles. It was my business to keep up with this stuff jobwise. By the way, a Canadian based F-18 Hornet, actually fired on one of these balloons several years, thus, from experience, why we used an AIM-9X Sidewinder the other day. That was $400,000.00 worth of missile for that shot.
Wrong……u watch way too much cnn and believe joe way too much. They back tracked on the Trump thing cause he and no one in command was made aware of it. They now say it was logged but never relayed to anyone up the chain or to Trump. He and his generals said they would have taken it down without hesitation. I worry more about how sick our military must be to not report these things and decide it’s no big deal.
Dude...Vipers, Eagles, Raptors & F-35s can all hit 60k' AGL. F-15 is the fastest jet we have.
The f-15 might could have done it, and there is a slew of them at Seymour Johnson just north of Myrtle Beach, but at the end of the day, the USAF wanted to get a kill for the F-22, as it is the most expensive jet we have. It was basically a political move.Dude...Vipers, Eagles, Raptors & F-35s can all hit 60k' AGL. F-15 is the fastest jet we have.
Not disagreeing with you, but you really didn't say anything that was not obvious.
Once again, you're wrong.
Wishful thinking on my part. If our representatives cant get answers to questions like that, fat chance I will.They could tell you, but then they would have to kill you.
I should have said the most expensive fighter jet, and no, I am not wrong. It was all about altitude and getting an F-22 kill. You like to throw terms around, like NORAD. The facts are, the balloon didn't get shot down over Alaska. Days later, when the call came in to take it out, many things were considered. At the end of the day, the Langley based F-22's were vectored to the scene despite our having lethal assets within a hundred miles of the target. Read this: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zo...ver-the-u-s-is-more-complicated-than-it-seems
