02-15-2023, 09:03 AM
(02-15-2023, 03:45 AM)NATI BENGALS Wrote: First missile missed. Good thing it was over a big ass lake.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/unidentified-object-shot-down-lake-huron-missile-missed-general-mark-milley/
Do we have anything cheaper than $400,000 we can pop a balloon with?
These balloons aren't as flimsy as the word would lead you to believe. I was listening to one of the million news stories about this and the question was asked about why they don't just shoot them down with the machine guns typically on these jets? The answer was several fold. The first is that because of the speed of these things being so slow and the jets being so much faster, it is actually difficult to get an aim on them which is why something that can be target locked like a missile is better.
The other answer was that they tried that on a balloon like these years ago and it took multiple jets thousands of rounds to destroy it (which is more dangerous to have falling to the ground over a civilian population). Unlike unstructured balloons that pop, the bullets just pass through these and don't really affect them. Eventually, it will start to impact the ability to stay aloft, but what would happen would be a slow, uncontrolled descent. That's not what they want. They want a rapid descent over the area where they shoot it down so that it can be recovered.
"A great democracy has got to be progressive, or it will soon cease to be either great or a democracy..." - TR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
