Rumor has it that instead of the PLA follows order of CCP, the real power lies in the PLA and they "elect" the top members of the CCP.
"The balloon" shot down
- Thread starter Hall
- Start date
- Status
Rumor has it that instead of the PLA follows order of CCP, the real power lies in the PLA and they "elect" the top members of the CCP.
edyvw
$50 site donor 2025
I would say it is a rumor
But, PLA has a history of doing things independently.
My take is this is more political from the Chinese side than actually having any spying purpose.
The task should have been done while it was over Montana and this shouldn't be taken lightly. The damage is already done and the Chinese got the information they were looking for. That balloon traveled slower and closer to the ground than any satellite. My bet is the balloon provided the Chinese with more information than a satellite would have. There will be more, count on it.
Last edited:
LoL, have you never been to Montana or South Dakota?
As a genuine pience o'info, though, an F-15 pilot friend of mine clued me in, the Callsign on the intercept flight was Frank 01 and Frank 02. Conscious allusion to Frank Luke (aka, Luke AFF in AZ "Home of the Fighter Pilot), who was #2 ace in WWI and particularly known for -wait for it- busting balloons.
Commission was Navy, but I am gonna go out on a limb here and say our AF guys do not suck...
That's cruise.
A leaned out F-4 in 1960 could zoom climb to 100,000. That took some planning. A vastly more aerodynamic lifting body like the F-22 can do that with any pilot, any day.
I'm thinking the government waited to shoot it down over water so that it would be more intact to study it vs crashing down on hard land.
And another reality is that we are entertained about this Chinese balloon incidence.
IBTL!!!
They were surveying our woefully inadequate freight and high speed rail networks and trying to figure out where we're hiding the rest of it
My thought as well. While a landing in water from that altitude isn’t “soft” it’s better than slamming into the earth. Bet they were intercepting any signals it was sending out as well.
All you armchair generals are cracking me up.
Get a life.
Get a life.
We were able to watch the fighter planes 
circling it from the front of our soon to be new home in NC. It was wild. Photos don’t do justice to the “scale” of it.
My brother and sister in law were able to put their lawn chairs on their front driveway and watch it get shot down, including the deep boom of the missile explosion which they described as a few seconds later.
I was close by but distracted at the time and missed that part
The bottom photo where the two jet trails intersect, if you can expand the photo you will see a white dot to the top right of that intersection which is the balloon.
I wish I had my Nikon with me, I almost took it because we were checking on our home construction, but had to do with the cell phone camera. I’ll go through my photos later see if I come up with a better one, once I get out of bed LOL
circling it from the front of our soon to be new home in NC. It was wild. Photos don’t do justice to the “scale” of it.My brother and sister in law were able to put their lawn chairs on their front driveway and watch it get shot down, including the deep boom of the missile explosion which they described as a few seconds later.
I was close by but distracted at the time and missed that part
The bottom photo where the two jet trails intersect, if you can expand the photo you will see a white dot to the top right of that intersection which is the balloon.
I wish I had my Nikon with me, I almost took it because we were checking on our home construction, but had to do with the cell phone camera. I’ll go through my photos later see if I come up with a better one, once I get out of bed LOL
I think it was explained earlier, it was used due to the altitude of the balloon. Apparently it was greater than 60k feet in altitude.
Last edited:
If the F-22 can easily reach say 55,000 to 60,000 feet and when the pilot engages a burst from the cannons, how many additional feet can the ordnance travel to engage the target?
A couple points -
First - shooting it down over the US has a risk of it hitting something important on the ground. House, child, school, whatever. You can’t control the trajectory after hitting it and there is a chance of fragmentation, yielding more objects hitting the ground. Sure, odds over Montana are low, but they are not zero. And they need to be zero in this case.
So, shooting it down over water was the right thing to do.
Next - a fighter gun was never going to work. A fighter gun has a practical rebate of about a mile. Beyond that, bullet dispersion and projectile deceleration reduce the gun to minimally effective.
You simply can’t get an airplane with gun to a mile away from something at 90,000-100,000 feet. Even the “zoom climb”, if it worked, leaves the fighter as a ballistic object - without the fine control needed to aim a gun at a target a mile away. You aim the gun by flying the airplane. A few feet of aiming correction at a mile is about 1/100th of a degree in pitch or yaw. The airplane has to be responsive and flying for that to work - not on a ballistic trajectory.
So - a missile is the best option. But which one?
It wasn’t a sidewinder. The AIM-9X tracks on heat. The ballon may, or may not, have a heat signature. Likely not, as it has cooled to ambient temperature of about -40 degrees. It’s warmer than the cold sky above it, but not by much. Further, the range on the AIM-9 isn’t that far. The fighter has to get the missile close enough, and with enough velocity at launch, to intercept. Low chance of success with an AIM-9.
The AIM-120 AMRAAM is my guess. Long range. Radar guided. The fighter would be able to see the balloon on radar, allowing a lock and a missile launch.
The launch window would be brief.
Because shooting too early means the missile runs out of energy before intercept. The rocket motor has a small, finite, burn time, after which the missile decelerates. The missile needs to be going fast enough for the fins to be able to adjust its flight path so that it intercepts.
Shooting too late requires the missile to make a steep climb, where the air is very thin. It is limited in maneuverability in that thin air, and a late shot won’t be able to make the intercept because of the missile’s limited ability to turn at that altitude.
At the speed of the fighter, over Mach 1 to be up above 60,000 feet, the launch window, between too early and too late, will be brief. It might require a pitch up to give the missile an initial vector in the right direction.
So, Raptor, AMRAAM, over the ocean.
First - shooting it down over the US has a risk of it hitting something important on the ground. House, child, school, whatever. You can’t control the trajectory after hitting it and there is a chance of fragmentation, yielding more objects hitting the ground. Sure, odds over Montana are low, but they are not zero. And they need to be zero in this case.
So, shooting it down over water was the right thing to do.
Next - a fighter gun was never going to work. A fighter gun has a practical rebate of about a mile. Beyond that, bullet dispersion and projectile deceleration reduce the gun to minimally effective.
You simply can’t get an airplane with gun to a mile away from something at 90,000-100,000 feet. Even the “zoom climb”, if it worked, leaves the fighter as a ballistic object - without the fine control needed to aim a gun at a target a mile away. You aim the gun by flying the airplane. A few feet of aiming correction at a mile is about 1/100th of a degree in pitch or yaw. The airplane has to be responsive and flying for that to work - not on a ballistic trajectory.
So - a missile is the best option. But which one?
It wasn’t a sidewinder. The AIM-9X tracks on heat. The ballon may, or may not, have a heat signature. Likely not, as it has cooled to ambient temperature of about -40 degrees. It’s warmer than the cold sky above it, but not by much. Further, the range on the AIM-9 isn’t that far. The fighter has to get the missile close enough, and with enough velocity at launch, to intercept. Low chance of success with an AIM-9.
The AIM-120 AMRAAM is my guess. Long range. Radar guided. The fighter would be able to see the balloon on radar, allowing a lock and a missile launch.
The launch window would be brief.
Because shooting too early means the missile runs out of energy before intercept. The rocket motor has a small, finite, burn time, after which the missile decelerates. The missile needs to be going fast enough for the fins to be able to adjust its flight path so that it intercepts.
Shooting too late requires the missile to make a steep climb, where the air is very thin. It is limited in maneuverability in that thin air, and a late shot won’t be able to make the intercept because of the missile’s limited ability to turn at that altitude.
At the speed of the fighter, over Mach 1 to be up above 60,000 feet, the launch window, between too early and too late, will be brief. It might require a pitch up to give the missile an initial vector in the right direction.
So, Raptor, AMRAAM, over the ocean.
Not nearly enough. The bullets have about 6,000 feet of effective travel. I explained this, but there’s no way to get the Raptor close enough, with enough fine control, for the gun to work.If the F-22 can easily reach say 55,000 to 60,000 feet and when the pilot engages a burst from the cannons, how many additional feet can the ordnance travel to engage the target?
Last edited:
I would have to say the plane people and pilot come to a solution of what will work . They just don't smoke a joint then get in the plane and try to shoot the missile.
Last edited:
I assure you, this was modeled and planned in great detail. The missile hasn’t been used in that way before, so there had to be some serious analysis to get the shot right.
Folks, please keep the political commentary out of this. I’ve had to moderate several posts.
- Status
