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Playing in the Sandbox Group Build Sept 1, 2024 - Jn 1, 2025

Just like from Japan 80 years ago...


GazzaS

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3 minutes ago, ScottsGT said:

Saw the one they just shot down from my front yard earlier today. 
 

EDIT:  I had to convince my neighbor that his .50 BMG would not reach it.  But hey, he was ready! 

Glad they shot it down.  I wonder how much intel it gathered.  They waited for it to reach the Atlantic first, I'm guessing so that there's no collateral damage.

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We were joking around earlier today that we were surprised our governor didn’t send up the SCANG’s F-16’s to shoot it down.  Just imagine Foghorn Leghorn telling the world that he was protecting the sovereignty of the great state of South Carolina.  Yea, his nickname is Governor Foghorn.  
Told my buddy he’s on his last term as governor and can’t run again so he didn’t need the free press.  

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So a million dollar missile to drop a plastic Chinese balloon?  You think the gun might have been a bit less messy?

No matter, the Chinese won BIG with this one as our people in charge dithered and wrung their hands for days on end while they sat there, wondering what to do.  This could have been easily dropped over the Aleutians.  The US looks positively stupid and weak, here. 

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6 hours ago, Clunkmeister said:

So a million dollar missile to drop a plastic Chinese balloon?  You think the gun might have been a bit less messy?

No matter, the Chinese won BIG with this one as our people in charge dithered and wrung their hands for days on end while they sat there, wondering what to do.  This could have been easily dropped over the Aleutians.  The US looks positively stupid and weak, here. 

Couldn’t have said it better myself.  For the life of me, cannot figure out why not a few holes punched in it from the mini-gun and let it slowly descend where it could have been recovered intact.  

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Ernie is so right - what in the world were we waiting for? Someone should have woken up and shot it down the second it crossed into our air space. Gee, Russia and China had no issues on shooting down a U2 and trying to do the same to the SR71. All this shows is how slow we are to react and who knows how much data and information was collected and sent back to China.  

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Pentagon might have thought shooting it down after it had done some it's mission , and then examining the remains to see what it was up might be worth the loss of prestige. Also might have depended on what it was flying over . TBH we spy on China with satellites , this balloon looks low tech response to me , bit like all the Russian drones that are nothing more than an old Canon SLR wedged into an RC aircraft. Shite in other words . 

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2 hours ago, ScottsGT said:

Couldn’t have said it better myself.  For the life of me, cannot figure out why not a few holes punched in it from the mini-gun and let it slowly descend where it could have been recovered intact.  

The gun door on the F-22 opens automatically when the trigger is pulled. Apparently it's not designed/able to function properly at that altitude (58,000 ft). Besides, it's way more cool to use a high tech, expensive AIM 9/X to bring down a balloon. 

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