Gonna miss you IaWB.

quote:

Originally posted by stoic-one:
Gonna miss you IaWB.

Can't be too soon!

flashguy

something is not right here.

how can the balloon keep posting after it was torn apart ?

Haha, it's too much. I've found myself walking around saying "Hello!" to my shipmates now after a conversation. And then laughing a bit hysterically.

And thankfully I don't use condoms.

quote:

Originally posted by flashguy:

quote:

Originally posted by stoic-one:
Gonna miss you IaWB.

Can't be too soon!

Hey, you got problem? I spirit, you know? Maybe I come to your house, haunt engine of your car, make you drive through front of CVS pharmacy! Then you try to tell police a dead weather balloon did it! They lock you up for crazy!

You need condom? I send you some later on!

OK, my friends! Bye for now! Hello!

Hi IaWB ... you blew me away with the great timing for you to 'appear' over the 48 ... and right before the SOTU address as well ... all that hot air you missed ...


</chris>

I'm posting this for you in memoriam, IAWB...

IaWB - Hello! Glad to hear you're doing well despite all you've been through. Asking for a friend, how was Kamala? And was it Kamala our current Veep or Kamala the Ugandan giant, former professional wrestler of WWWF fame?

China is still an infant when it comes to international diplomacy

Won't see such a interview on US networks

Hey Mister Weather Balloon Guy, come back and visit anytime you can.

However, could you tell Mr Water Ballon guy to stay the heck away from me? I've been ambushed a few times lately, and that's not ok at all in the wintertime. August might be ok.

See ya!

quote:

Originally posted by I am Weather Balloon!:

quote:

Originally posted by flashguy:

quote:

Originally posted by stoic-one:
Gonna miss you IaWB.

Can't be too soon!

Hey, you got problem? I spirit, you know? Maybe I come to your house, haunt engine of your car, make you drive through front of CVS pharmacy! Then you try to tell police a dead weather balloon did it! They lock you up for crazy!

You need condom? I send you some later on!

OK, my friends! Bye for now! Hello!

Mr Weather Balloon; I hear this song in the background every time I read one of your insightful posts!

https://youtu.be/5akEgsZSfhg

You Numba one most funky man!

^^^Funny, I hear the Winnie the Pooh song in mine.

quote:

Originally posted by corsair:
China is still an infant when it comes to international diplomacy

Won't see such a interview on US networks.
...

Wow. Now that is how to conduct a respectful but hardball interview. Not really anything new in regards to information about the Chinese spy balloon incident, but it was still an interesting interview in regards to China's views on Ukraine, in which General Bo made a poor attempt at staying neutral while still blaming NATO for the war, and also his statements about Taiwan and re-unification. It was particularly telling in his statement about how there are different types of democracy and China's version is different than the Western version.

I've read and posted DW articles before, but this is the first time I've watched Conflict Zone or Tim Sebastian before, and I gotta say I'm impressed with his hardball style of interview. Thanks for posting that.

So this thing traversed Canadian airspace also.
This means Canada allowed it through.
I suppose Trudeau is helping the Chinese now like Beijing Biden.

China Balloon – A Layered Scandal

https://www.realclearwire.com/...scandal__148823.html

A Chinese surveillance balloon floats over the United States for a week. No action is taken, until the outcry makes taking it down necessary. A second is over South America, a third was over Hawaii. President Biden says it happened under President Trump. After former Trump administration officials said that didn’t happen, Biden countered they were “discovered” after Trump left. What explains all this?

To start with, China just tested Joe Biden, and he failed. China had put a spy balloon over Hawaii, and the president – we now learn – did nothing about a device about a dozen miles in the air leisurely traversing the United States and presumably sending images in real-time back to the Chinese military. U.S. airspace goes to 62 miles up.

Why was it not shot down? We’re told only that “debris” might hurt someone, or that it was innocuous, and hence no need for action. These were tenuous, if not false, excuses for inaction. Debris would have been minimal and could be engineered into empty spaces. Satellites see things, but a spy balloon 100 times closer sees more.

As for “no need,” well, only if you want more spy balloons next month and see no danger in the precedent, which is to say, the possibility of one day facing a possible chem, bio, radioactive, or EMP threat. Otherwise, you shoot it down fast, as you would a Chinese fighter or bomber.

We did not do that. Why not? The explanation apparently is that the Biden team is timid, afraid to upset China, and believes this provocation will be viewed as a mere “incremental” violation, one they can let slip if not noticed.

Except that Americans saw it with their own eyes, so we were treated to predictably partisan and self-serving crisis management: Biden’s team quickly said they had “discovered” it, were “monitoring” it, would decide what to do next. Meantime, the secretary of state immediately waffled on postponing his planned trip to China.

Biden’s team wrung their hands, said little, did less, and hoped this would just drift away. The outcry was significant, so they finally decided to shoot the offending balloon down over the ocean, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken bravely delayed his trip.

The courage quotient in this White House, Biden’s Pentagon, Department of Homeland Security, and State Department, is stunning – for its absence. Are we to imagine no one thought of the possibilities here? Are we to imagine we only consider planes or missiles a threat?

So, the Biden team finally shoots the Chinese spy balloon down over the ocean, while China mumbles, lies, and carries on. But this is where the “scandal within scandal” begins. Under the gun to explain themselves, Biden and his team belatedly says “three Chinese balloons” were over the U.S. under Trump. Almost every highly cleared Trump intelligence and national security appointee (more than a dozen) flatly deny that.

This leads to the next hard-to-believe deflection. Biden’s team says the Chinese balloons Trump did not shoot down were only discovered after he left office. What?

Yes, they say it happened then but was only “discovered after” Trump left, which is probably why no one had heard about it. This is hard to credit. Are we to believe that NORAD’s 24/7 operations center was asleep – that China dared cross Trump, and we only saw the spy balloons after reviewing the tape?

All this sounds increasingly absurd, throws water on solid facts, damning, indefensible, and which should require – in an accountable republic – high level resignations. Here are the big, real questions.

First, if any spy balloon from China really floated over the United States during Trump’s time and not one appointee was briefed, do we have an “intelligence deep state” – which is either pro-China or which so feared Trump’s penchant for action that they withheld that? Exactly who knew what, when, and said nothing?

Second, if the balloons were over the U.S. under Trump, and NORAD or the intelligence community did not see them in real time, why not? That is a major intelligence failure. How did that happen? Third, either way – and regardless of which scandal is worse – the Chinese spy balloon in U.S. airspace should have immediately been brought down. Would we wait on a fighter, and say debris worried us?

China has learned a key lesson, and it cannot be unlearned. Biden will hesitate, deflect, do almost anything to avoid confrontation with China, even allow penetration of U.S. airspace. None of this will make Taiwan feel good, or Japan, Australia, the Philippines – or any U.S. ally.

Communist China’s deliberate penetration of U.S. airspace is not a non-event, not inconsequential, not something to pretend did not happen. And it should have instantly triggered a shootdown.

Who will be held accountable for this fiasco? What will China do next? This is not a small error, passing oversight, or victory – nor was the disastrous U.S. exit from Afghanistan. This is another layered scandal.

When "The Balloon" Comes South

So according to Newsweek the reason why Trump may have not given the knowledge of the Chinese Spy Balloon incursion into USA airspace is that the Pentagon thought he would be too provocative or too aggressive. WOW !!! If this is true what other items were they hiding from Trump while he was President ??? God Bless

Newsweek Trump response may be too provocative or aggressive

Pentagon May Have Purposefully Hidden Spy Balloon From Trump: Republican



Florida Republican Representative Mike Waltz claimed Monday that the Pentagon may have previously hidden information about a Chinese spy balloon from former President Donald Trump.

During a recent interview with Fox Business News's Varney & Co., Waltz was asked about reports that spy balloons flew over the United States during Trump's administration.

"My office has been briefed by the office of the Secretary of Defense of the current Pentagon that it happened over Florida, it happened over Texas and that it's happened before. We have more detailed questions but what is unclear...did the Pentagon under the Trump administration brief the Trump White House and give them the option to take action or did they decide not to brief them for whatever reason?" Waltz said.

"And there is some speculation, I talked to Trump White House officials over the weekend, that the Pentagon deliberately did it because they thought Trump would be too provocative and too aggressive," he said.

On Saturday, President Joe Biden announced that members of the U.S. military had shot down a Chinese balloon after it flew over several parts of the country. Biden initially faced criticism from many Republicans for not acting quicker in combatting the balloon, including from Trump.However, shortly after the balloon was shot down, reports revealed that similar Chinese spy balloons flew over the U.S. on different occasions during the time Trump was in office.

On Saturday, a senior U.S. defense official told reporters that "PRC [People's Republic of China] government surveillance balloons transited the continental United States briefly at least three times during the prior administration and once that we know of at the beginning of this administration, but never for this duration of time.

"We spoke directly with Chinese officials through multiple channels, but rather than address their intrusion into our airspace, the PRC put out an explanation that lacked any credibility," the official said.
While speaking with Fox News over the weekend, Trump denied the claims and said, "It never happened with us under the Trump administration and if it did, we would have shot it down immediately."

"It's disinformation," the former president added.

China has denied that the aircraft was being used for surveillance purposes, with Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning saying on Monday that the balloon was a "civilian airship."
"China will resolutely uphold the relevant company's legitimate rights and interests, and at the same time reserving the right to take further actions in response," China's Foreign Ministry said in a statement over the weekend.

When reached for comment, a spokesperson for Waltz's office told Newsweek that the Republican representative was sharing concerns he learned from Trump administration officials.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/02/0...ese-spy-balloon.html

The FBI is analyzing the remains of a Chinese spy balloon that was downed by a U.S. military jet last weekend, but said that much of the evidence remains underwater in the Atlantic Ocean.

“It’s very early for us to assess what the intent was and how the device was operating,” a senior FBI official told reporters in a briefing Thursday, according to NBC News.

“ We have literally not seen the payload , which is where we would expect to see the lion’s share of the electronics,” the official said.

A senior State Department official on Thursday said that the balloon, which flew over the U.S. for eight days, had multiple antennas that were capable of collecting so-called signals intelligence. The balloon’s maker also has ties to the Chinese military, the official said.

You mean they lost it?