Politics Chinese balloon Over the US

It is reported that a Sidewinder AIM-9X shot the balloon down. But doesn't the Sidewinder require a heat signature?
 
Someone(s) in the Chinese leadership circles having a bit of fun with President "Pooh"?

Seems rather clumsy to me, but China now seems intent on tempting major conflict bereft of any significant allies inter alia, so it might well be either internal duplicity, incompetence and/or overconfidence.

Wouldn't be the first time for any of the above. China's initial reaction to the take down is quite bellicose as opposed to the earlier relatively conciliatory statements.
 
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While China has been playing with Uncle Joe, they have proved they can deploy a potential weapon that can travel the entire breadth of the US without any repercussions. Kinda ballsy for a country that allegedly infected the entire world & has probably gotten away with it. The US has shown their leadership is pretty tame when attacked......or it's just a weather balloon that got off course, because China needs to study the weather patterns in the Pacific, because why?...........We have heard some chatter that the latest variant of Covid is burning thru China & will kill millions because their vaccines don't work. Karma?
 
I'm not especially convinced - it's a balloon, how do you steer it towards "sensitive locations"? At best you have to trust that the upper atmospheric winds will take it to where you want and not end up (for example) flying over the tundra of Canada gathering nothing (or ending up over Latin America spying on their "tippy top secret military stuff").
Doesn’t Google float them over areas that need temporary internet service, such as disaster zones or areas with expected heavy services loads in areas that otherwise don’t have such services?
 
Google's are tethered in place from recollection.
 
Wow! I thought they are way, way up there! that’s a long tether. I will trust you on that.

Anyhoooo…. I am reading now that China is upset about us shooting down the balloon.

Boo hoo….

Forty years ago, they might have gotten an F-106 taking the balloon out with a Falcon or even a Genie…And hopefully before it got as far as Montana.

I cannot imagine that the Air Forve was not watching this balloon very carefully the whole time it approached our ICBM regions.
 
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Nice hi res video of impact and deflation.
 
Another interesting thread about something else being shot down...
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The suspected Chinese spy balloon drifts to the ocean after being shot down off the coast of Surfside Beach, South Carolina. More photos: https://reut.rs/3HYinSc ? Randall Hill
FB_IMG_16755844487390923.jpg
 
I think he used the solar panels & transmitters to target. The whole payload seemed to detach & drop off right after impact. Hope the US Navy finds it intact so they can study it.
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Based on all this information, It is highly improbable that a 9X which acquires target on rail and is supplemented by target's Line Of Sight (LOS) data from the Radar, misses a target that is within intercept range, non-maneuvering and not deploying any decoys. Only a malfunction in the missile can cause it to miss the target......

 
Here is the radio coverage of yesterday's balloon hunt. There are some interesting things in it, there were several pairs of planes there, including an AIM-9X hanging on an F-15, which saw the balloon from 30 miles (55 km), the Eagles were given a lesson in altitude and fuel, and the Raptors arrived, minutes before the shot, already at 64 000 (!) feet.
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Many airports on the east closed were closed during the shot. Charleston, Myrtle beach etc...
 
I wonder what the next course would have been. I suspect it would have flown over West Africa and for some mysterious reason would have lost altitude and given back to the Chinese by the local "independent" authorities.
 
The Day US Air Superiority died
I think it died under Trump then. Wonder why they didn't shoot them down before.

"The balloon spotted this week over Montana was not the first time the US has detected Chinese balloons over their territory – with previous incursions occurring during the Trump Administration."

 
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