Up up and away

[Honda]

In my beautiful balloon. I'm pretty sure everybody has seen the reports about the Chinese spy balloon flying over The United States. Was wondering if anybody had any opinion about this. To me it seems like a pretty bold move to enter our air space. I don't have enough knowledge of American intelligence to know what a proper response would be. Apparently the administration's ruled out, at least as we speak, any type of a military response to disable the balloon. Personally, I can't help but think this is an aggressive move by the Chinese.

[Truckman]

Bring it down and examine it......Ben

[Mike]

From what I've read, they are saying it probably can't learn anything their satellites haven't already discovered. They are also claiming a fear of collateral damage when it falls to the ground. I don't know if either of these government issued statements are true, but if they are true, I say leave it alone. Although it would be have been very satisfying to have shot it down at the border.

Just another fine example of not trusting our government to tell us the truth.

[Kevin]

Shoot it down. The idea that shooting it down over Montana, one of our least populated states, is dangerous to people on the ground is silly. I've heard that this is partly to test how much the Chinese think they can get away with. Shooting it down answers that nicely.

[TriGuy]

hit it with a Jewish Space Laser

[Honda]

For the sake of argument, I wonder if the response would have been different if the balloon was Russian?

[Mike]

For the sake of argument, I wonder if the response would have been different if the balloon was Russian?

I think it probably would have been on the ground as soon as we detected it in our airspace.

[TriGuy]

I wonder if we have cracked their telemetry and are feeding them computer generated BS instead of shooting it own

[Truckman]

I wonder if we have cracked their telemetry and are feeding them computer generated BS instead of shooting it own

Known in the trade as deception intel...They do the same to us...It's a game to see who has the best BS detector......Ben

[Honda]

I just heard on the news that the size of this thing is very large. They described it as being as large as 2 to 3 school buses. Interesting point raised by tri Guy. I would hope we do have those kinds of technologies.

[Kevin]

Population density of Montana per square mile - 7.

And most of them are clustered in a few cities. You can travel a long way in Montana and never see anything but gophers and wheat fields.

The explanation being given to us just doesn't make sense to me.

[Mike]

That thing is so freakin' high it might not land for a long time depending on the winds. Might not be Montana where it comes down.

[Truckman]

I did a search and I can't find any reference to the actual altitude of the gasbag...Has anyone seen it?......Ben

[Mike]

I did a search and I can't find any reference to the actual altitude of the gasbag...Has anyone seen it?......Ben

All I've seen is that it is well above any altitude commercial airlines use and posed no danger to them.

[Mike]

Ah Ha! 66,000'