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I wonder if Russia and/or China will start launching a bunch of relatively cheap stratospheric balloons with foil-covered cardboard boxes to imitate payloads to
by fuoqi 4y ago
I wonder if Russia and/or China will start launching a bunch of relatively cheap stratospheric balloons with foil-covered cardboard boxes to imitate payloads to troll the US and make it spend millions on shooting them down. To make the trolling a bit less obvious they even may add some innocent recording devices to claim that they are "scientific experiments".
- pipeline_peak 4y ago[flagged]
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- mauvehaus 4y agoThe Russians are already doing it in Ukraine: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-64661145 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-64661145
- throwaway67743 4y agoNo, they "started" doing it the day after a fake spy balloon was shot down, it's narrative not truth (and actually soviet balloons predate everyone else by about 60 years)
- pixelesque 4y agoThe US was doing it on the Soviets and Chinese in the 50s: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/cold-war-balloon-surveillance https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/cold-war-balloon-surve...
- throwaway67743 4y agoYeah, but actually the Soviets started before then even, pioneers really - just like the Nazis pioneered a lot, but we can't possibly acknowledge that because they're evil
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y agoPeople talk about the millions of dollars of missiles like it is even a little significant to the USAF. They'll just write it off as live fire training.
- boomboomsubban 4y agoFiring these four missiles isn't a significant use of their budget. If they start firing four missiles to destroy every three balloons out there it very quickly will be a massive cost.
- wongarsu 4y agoAt that point they might remember they have 20mm gatling cannons on the F16 and F22. Not as cool or long range as missiles, but I imagine significantly cheaper to fire in short bursts.
- throwaway67743 4y agoRequires being able to aim, fighter or politics both shit out of luck ;)
- asdff 4y agothese balloons are too high up sometimes to get in cannon range. then there's the question of where the bullets fall after they rip through the balloon, hopefully not on anyones house.
- rootusrootus 4y agoAssuming they're using exploding shells, there ought not to be pieces heavy enough to be a serious threat.
- shagie 4y agoBullets fired still land somewhere and are difficult to stop once they leave the gun. The F16 and F22 are somewhere in the 110 to 160 knot range for stall speed. The balloon, for all practical purposes, is 0 knots. Shooting at something straight ahead that isn't moving while you're moving at 160 knots may pose some more challenges than locking into it with a missile. A zero pressure balloon ( https://www.nasa.gov/scientific-balloons/types-of-balloons https://www.nasa.gov/scientific-balloons/types-of-balloons ) is roughly equal pressure on the inside and outside. These balloons do not "pop" as such when punctured and may cause additional hazards as they descend uncontrolled.
- guluarte 4y agousing ballons as a ddos attack, making the usaf spend 500k per each
- asdff 4y agoSounds like you are just making your adversary fund a jobs program you probably can't afford to keep up with. Bomber gap all over again.
- arcticfox 4y agoEveryone acting like the USAF has never scrambled jets and fired AIM9Xs before for practice... the 3 so far have been a more fun (and probably more effective) training program. If somebody starts sending thousands...the retaliation clearly isn't going to be against the balloons, but against the sender.
- sundvor 4y agoFive AIM-9Xs, to be precise. Four targets destroyed in total; one of the F-16 launched ones missed.
- someweirdperson 4y agoAt that scale, a change to true mass production of ordnance would occur, significantly reducing the price per piece.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- fma 4y agoI'd simply retaliate by doing the same. I don't think Russia can afford to waste resources and if China is building up for a Taiwan invasion - the same for them.