BALLOON INVASION
I am troubled by the Biden’s administration’s lack of communication with U.S. citizens and media regarding an approaching balloon, if in fact they knew about it when it left China. Did the military have such great confidence that the balloon represented no danger, that they didn’t even inform the President? Did the President regard it as no problem as it floated over Alaska, Canada and then the United States pausing over military facilities? Why wait to shoot it down? Is the back country of Alaska or the wild wilderness of northern Canada so over populated that shooting it down would compromise the safety of humans?
I still have a lot of questions about the safety of our country and the policies of our liberal government. I get the feeling that most of the administration are rookies who have little experience in the field they are assigned and little knowledge or understanding of the history of this country or the American citizens that they supposedly serve. |
Balloons have been used as early as 1794 by France to spy on Dutch and Austrian troops during the Battle of Fleurus which the French won with the aid this new technology. During the Civil War, the U.S. used hot air balloons to track Confederate troops’ movements.
U.S. Citizens Killed by Balloon Bombs
As time went on, balloon warfare only escalated. During WWII, Japan used bomb-carrying balloons as a sort of proto-drone warfare, floating them across the Pacific Ocean and eventually to the U.S. where they dropped their payload on unsuspecting civilians.
In the months leading up to the spring day in 1944 when a pregnant pastor’s wife and 5 children from their youth group were killed, there had been some warning signs, apparitions scattered around the western United States that were largely unexplained—at least to the general public. Flashes of light, the sound of explosion, the discovery of mysterious fragments—all amounted to little concrete information to go on. Pastor Mitchell and his pregnant wife and the youth group scrambled out of the car to enjoy a day in the Oregon forest. While Mitchell parked the car the rest of the group started exploring. They eventually saw something unusual in the trees. Before Mitchell could stop them, an explosion by a bomb connected to a balloon took their lives. They were told by the federal government to be silent about the incident. |
First, the discovery of a large balloon miles off the California coast by the Navy on November 4, 1944. A month later, on December 6, 1944, witnesses reported an explosion and flame near Thermopolis, Wyoming. Reports of fallen balloons began to trickle in to local law enforcement with enough frequency that it was clear something unprecedented in the war had emerged that demanded explanation. Military officials began to piece together that a strange new weapon, with markings indicating it had been manufactured in Japan, had reached American shores. They did not yet know the extent or capability or scale of these balloon bombs.
Japanese Fu-Go Balloon Bombs
As the story goes, Hyde received a call in the morning from a local rancher who spotted something he couldn’t quite explain other than it looked like some sort of parachute floating in one of his pastures. Hyde knew what it was, though … a “Fu-Go” bomb.
“Fu-Go” bombs were used by Japan from 1944-1945. They were balloons, rigged with bombs, and Japan’s military reportedly launched around 9,300 of them with the intent of them traveling overseas and into the United States. And many did. Only one, though, resulted in the fatalities with the six people in Oregon. So, while they weren’t overly successful, they were still plenty dangerous. But that didn’t matter to Warren Hyde. He drove out to that pasture, chased the balloon down and saw the bomb attached to it. Hyde reportedly knew that if he touched the bomb or if it touched the ground, it would go off. |
Still, he grabbed ahold to a shroud line, and as the wind picked up the balloon rose, and the Sheriff went with it. He reportedly went as high as 30-feet in the air holding onto the balloon, and the U.S. Naval Institute said he was dragged through barbed wire, too. It all played out over about an hour before he was able to fully secure it.
The FBI was then called in, and thanks to the Sheriff, they had their first, fully intact, captured “Fu-Go” bomb.
The FBI was then called in, and thanks to the Sheriff, they had their first, fully intact, captured “Fu-Go” bomb.
More about balloons
When the Cold War emerged, balloons such as Project Moby Dick were utilized by the U.S. Air Force in order to snap pics of Soviet military sites. In the 1950s the U.S. Air Force set in motion the first “large-scale, unmanned, high altitude balloon intelligence operation” – Project Genetrix, during which reconnaissance balloons photographed “Soviet land mass.”
In 2019, the U.S. launched the Covert Long-Dwell Stratospheric Architecture (COLD STAR) program, which included spy balloons used to track hypersonic missiles in light of increased risks of launch by Russia and China. Balloon usage lingered into the new millennium when the U.S. sent them into Iraq and Afghanistan to keep an eye on activities on the ground.
Spy balloons, used by Japan to drop bombs during World War II, are now far more sophisticated, can fly at up to 200,000 feet, evade detection, and can carry a small nuclear bomb that, if exploded in the atmosphere, would shut down the grid and wipe out electronics in a many-state-wide area.
In 2019, the U.S. launched the Covert Long-Dwell Stratospheric Architecture (COLD STAR) program, which included spy balloons used to track hypersonic missiles in light of increased risks of launch by Russia and China. Balloon usage lingered into the new millennium when the U.S. sent them into Iraq and Afghanistan to keep an eye on activities on the ground.
Spy balloons, used by Japan to drop bombs during World War II, are now far more sophisticated, can fly at up to 200,000 feet, evade detection, and can carry a small nuclear bomb that, if exploded in the atmosphere, would shut down the grid and wipe out electronics in a many-state-wide area.
Why would China use a spy balloon now?
China has deployed balloons to monitor residents in the western region of Xinjiang, support security for the Shanghai Expo and patrol for terrorist activity in remote mountainous regions of the country. The use of balloons for “social stability maintenance,” or preventing dissent, demonstrates how Chinese firms and research institutions are honing these monitoring tools at home for potential use abroad and in the case of war.
But why risk problems with the U.S. by flying balloons over our military bases? Was it a test to see if the U.S. would notice the surveillance? Was it a message to the U.S. not to increase influence in the Philippines and Taiwan? Was it just a power move before planned meetings with U.S. Secretary of State? Was it a practice run for EMP bomb? No one can know for sure, but we should understand that this is a threat to our security. |
Balloons can provide more specific information than satellites which have predictable orbits and can’t be moved over specific sites. Balloons can survive extreme conditions at more than 68,000 feet. The high-altitude balloon has a long endurance time. They are cheaper to develop and deploy than the $300 million for a spy satellite. High-altitude balloons can also be “trucks for any number of platforms, whether it be communication and data link nodes, ISR(intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance), tracking air and missile threats. Probably the most important aspect of the danger of balloons is the fact that they are more difficult to be spotted by radar.
We do know that the Chinese balloon that flew over the U.S. was definitely a spy balloon. Officials examining the balloon stated that the balloon “was clearly for intelligence surveillance and inconsistent with the equipment on board weather balloons.” So, we have problems and decisions that must be taken in order to keep our country safe.
General Glen VanHerck, commander of U.S. Northern Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), confirmed that the Chinese government had previously sent surveillance balloons above the U.S. that went undetected. “Every day as a NORAD commander, it’s my responsibility to detect threats to North America,” he said at a briefing. “I will tell you that we did not detect those threats. And that’s a domain awareness gap that we have to figure out.” |
KLN