Surprise!

[Sigwolf]

Meanwhile Xi is mocking Biden for using fighter jets to shoot down balloons. 

Fighter jets are the aerial platform we have for weapons delivery.  What would Xi suggest would be a better alternative?  Passenger jets with slingshots?  Launch an anti-balloon balloon fleet?  Sharks, with freaking laser beams on their heads?  Just an odd thing to focus on.   

[FarAway Sooner]

The FBI's formal mandate includes counterintelligence.  Theoretically, they have "first jurisdiction" over that sort of thing.  Before the intelligence tech got so... technical, there was a very clearly drawn line there.

The CIA spies on the world outside our border, but not inside our border.  From a checks-and-balances standpoint, that makes sense.  That's the domain of the FBI.  It's not something they ever talk about.  Even inside the FBI, nobody in the rank and file really knew anything about that group or what they're doing back when I was a peon walking in the halls of power several decades ago.

In reality, as was alluded to above, the technical competencies required for espionage and counter-espionage create a lot of overlap.  So everybody gets involved.  But if it was a spy satellite floating over the US, that's very correctly FBI jurisdiction.

[FarAway Sooner]

Meanwhile Xi is mocking Biden for using fighter jets to shoot down balloons. 

Fighter jets are the aerial platform we have for weapons delivery.  What would Xi suggest would be a better alternative?  Passenger jets with slingshots?  Launch an anti-balloon balloon fleet?  Sharks, with freaking laser beams on their heads?  Just an odd thing to focus on.   

Good God!  Does this mean we have... a balloon gap?

[Staggerwing]

Maybe Xi thinks the USAF has Panzer Dragoons.

[W8taminute]

Meanwhile Xi is mocking Biden for using fighter jets to shoot down balloons. 

Fighter jets are the aerial platform we have for weapons delivery.  What would Xi suggest would be a better alternative?  Passenger jets with slingshots?  Launch an anti-balloon balloon fleet?  Sharks, with freaking laser beams on their heads?  Just an odd thing to focus on.   

Good God!  Does this mean we have... a balloon gap?

Just don't let him in the war room.  He'll see the big board!

[GDS_Starfury]

a long thread with links about balloons, drones and ufos.

https://twitter.com/Aviation_Intel/status/1624149864178401282

[GDS_Starfury]

do you see a balloon?

[Sir Slash]

Better NOT call her that. She probably won't like it. But hell...at closing time???

[GDS_Starfury]

seems another balloon got shot down over Lake Huron in the last hour.

[ArizonaTank]

This is where our rating goes from "harmless" to "mostly harmless." 

All apologies to "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy."

[Crossroads]

dont worry we are still some 90something  ballons short of a war ;-)

Four down, 95 to go 

[steve58]

do you see a balloon?

Hhhhmmm, looks like a Kardashian to me.

[JasonPratt]

a long thread with links about balloons, drones and ufos.

"We now live in an age where long-range precision-guided weaponry is democratized. Barrier to entry is very low. We are still not prepared to deal with it. So, call all this a big trial balloon." -- heh, well played!

[JasonPratt]

The full (most recent) article from Tyler Rogoway at the War Zone:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/40054/adversary-drones-are-spying-on-the-u-s-and-the-pentagon-acts-like-theyre-ufos

Correction: from April 16, 2021, nearly two years ago! Still highly relevant.

[JasonPratt]

Ad/mods: shouldn't the overall title of this thread be updated for clarity? e.g. "Balloons, UAPs, and whatnot recently".


Meanwhile, the actual most recent article from Tyler Rogoway (and Howard Altman) at The War Zone, focusing on the "octagonal" craft shot down over Lake Huron.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/fighters-shoot-down-object-over-lake-huron

Edited to add: the comments are amusing in that they're more about bad calls last night at the Super Bowl than the incursions and shootdowns! {g}