Since there is so much sensationalism & little sense around the "Chinese Spy Balloon."
I'll address WW2 historical WW2 "Balloon Warfare" by Britain & Japan for context.
Then I'll address whether such a balloon can be safely downed without hitting US citizens
Balloon War🧵
1/
There were two major strategic balloon bombing campaigns in World War 2.
The first was Britain's "Operation Outward."
This was an attack on German occupied Europe's power grid using barrage balloons dangling cables to ground out powerlines.
2/
The 2nd strategic balloon bombing campaign was the Japanese Fusen Bakudan, or “Fu-Go” balloon bombs during November 1944 – April 1945.
I did a blog post about it 21 Feb 2014 using this National Geographic map⬇️
3/
chicagoboyz.net/archives/41791…
The “Fu-Go” balloons took advantage of the transpacific upper atmosphere jet stream that Japanese weather balloons had discovered shortly before Pearl Harbor. This same jet stream that delivered “Fu-Go” balloon bombs also heavily disrupted attempts at precision bombing from...
4/
...USAAF B-29s that were based in the Marianas in the winter of 1944-45.
The jet stream that delivered the Fu-Go bombs to North America is what caused General Curtis LeMay to switch to low level night time firebombing.
National Geographic on Fu-Go⬇️
5/
In the years since I wrote that blog post I've run into a number of primary source documents on US military countermeasures to the Fu-Go balloons.
This explains how the Japanese then & the Chinese now got balloons over the USA.
BBC reports to the contrary, no A.I. required.
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When it came to destroying the Fu-Go hydrogen balloons. All that was required war .50 caliber tracer machine gun bullets.
The problem with standard .50 cal tracer ammo at the time is it was too short ranged.
See the photo clips from the same document.
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As these Critical Past digitized gun camera films of WW2 USAAF Fighters attacking Japanese Fu-Go balloons, posted on Youtube, make clear.
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Given that this Chinese Balloon uses hydrogen. as its lifting gas.
Any 20mm tracer round available for firing out of the 20mm Vulcan cannon common to the F-22 and Phalanx CIWS can ignite the Chinese balloon.
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And since the Centurion counter rocket and mortar (C-RAM) version of Phalanx uses a special self-detonating high explosive version of the 20mm shell by the tens of thousands over the densely populated areas around Baghdad's Green zone for 1.5 decades.
10/
militaryleak.com/2020/09/05/cen…
The idea being propagated on Twitter that a USAF F-22 can't risk shooting down the Chinese balloon for fear of 20mm collateral damage is so much horse manure.
What is lacking here isn't military capability.
It is a lack of political will on the part of the Biden Admin.
11/
And this isn't an issue of spy games & hiding sources and methods.
Shooting down the balloon and technically examining the captured wreckage will shield any other sources & methods.
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The collateral damage issue the Biden Administration is worried about with this Chinese balloon isn't either physical or to intelligence sources and methods.
It is the political collateral damage it might cause if unambiguous proof of Chinese spy gear or or an EMP...
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...device were found.
Non-nuclear electromagnetic pulse technology like Explosively Pumped Flux Compression Generator (FCG) is readily available, easily exploitable and utterly identifiable.
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The US government's EMP task force warned specifically about this threat.
If an FCG device were found in the downed Chinese balloon.
It would be an undeniable act of war by the Chinese against the USA.
15/
Not shooting the balloon down removed the proof of such a thing...
...but the decision to not shoot the balloon down does far more damage to the Biden Administration's leadership credibility with China versus Taiwan & more importantly, with the American people on Ukraine.
16/
Military power is a function of military capability times the economy times political will.
And anything times zero is zero.
The American people can and have dumped US governments that show weak leadership in a war.
See the LBJ Presidency & Vietnam.
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I fear that future historians are going to look back on a Biden Administration decision not to down this Chinese balloon invading US airspace as the first domino is a series of political-military events to another failed US Presidency.
18/18 End
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