Balloon games
 

Now its two of them already.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64521570

Supersoft reaction, though this could be far more dangerous. Intel damage. Spreading of chemcial or biological agents. Even a warhead.

Maybe damage on the ground, if shooting them down? That is as good reason to accept all the above risks, I'm sure.

Weather balloon. Not one, but two. Yeah, sure.

SIGINT sweep

...fitting a SIGINT (SIGnals INTelligence) system on a light balloon offers two advantages. Placed at altitude, electromagnetic sensors are less constrained by the effects of terrain- masking (trees, buildings and the roundness of the Earth). They thus gain in detection capabilities. A balloon also offers a very long endurance at altitude, at a lower cost than a fleet of aircraft or drones.

http://www.dmitryshulgin.com/2019/11...gint-aerostat/

The Pentagon’s next big weapon: Really big balloons
https://fortune.com/2022/07/05/the-p...-big-balloons/
(sorry paywall)

Why These Badass Balloons Are the Pentagon's New Secret Weapon
https://www.popularmechanics.com/mil...s-strattolite/

History of military ballooning
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histor...g#cite_note-26

Well we had our "weather balloons" that were "off course" over the Soviet Union in the 50's, so I guess fair play. :D

Unfortunately our military misread that as needing really big "buffoons", and now they're all woke. :D

^ :har:

would be funny if not so worrisome

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fpu5a0Bl8eY

Ahem

I presume once the balloon reaches the Atlantic, the "safety to people on the ground debris-field" excuse for not shooting it down will be negated and we can practise how to destroy objects at 60,000 feet. I still recall the WWII Japanese Fu-Go high altitude firebomb balloon(9,000 made) that killed 6 people in Bly, Oregan in 1945. Clearly, there is a chink in our defensive aerial arrangements that needs to be immediately corrected. If nothing else, we should launch one of our own balloons and see if the Chinese "remain calm" as they are urging us to do...:x:hmph::nope::oops::dead: Methinks our Secretary of State is "Blinkin' first" in the global game of pre-WWIII poker...:hmmm: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fu-Go_balloon_bomb https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...on_Moffett.jpg

That’s not a Chinese spy balloon. It’s Phineas Fogg trying to break his old record.

Congratulations to the F-22 on its first confirmed air to air kill! :salute:

Tis no longer a balloon.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-64524105

https://youtu.be/KdYDqACxCec

Perhaps we will have another Ospery book soon "Modern Balloon Busters"

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/918Up13CUkL.jpg

Indeed! somebody reads my posts! Jeeze though! the debris field might have landed on a boatload of Haitian or Cuban refugees struggling to make it to the Florida Keys...I hope the USAF checked first...it wouldn't do to appear insensitive to the world's "huddled masses" striving for freedom and pissing off Florida governor Santos who'd already declared a national refugee 'state of emergency'! :O:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/us-...atlantic-ocean No doubt the F22 pilot's squadron mates will dub him "Luke"! Shooting anything at 60,000 feet ain't easy. :doh: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped.../Frankluke.jpg

I vote this answer. Needs more Red Baron intro music though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoABC6B8oG0

Shooting it down after the spying has been done and completed, and the last bits and bytes of info was broadcasted home.

Clever.