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U.S. tracked China spy balloon from launch on Hainan Island along unusual path
The Washington Post ^ | February 14, 2023 | Ellen Nakashima , Shane Harris and Jason Samenow

Posted on 02/14/2023 11:20:29 PM PST by McGruff

By the time a Chinese spy balloon crossed into American airspace late last month, U.S. military and intelligence agencies had been tracking it for nearly a week, watching as it lifted off from its home base near China’s south coast, an earlier sighting of the balloon than has been previously known.

U.S. monitors watched as the balloon settled into a flight path that would appear to have taken it over the U.S. territory of Guam. But somewhere along that easterly route, the craft took an unexpected northern turn, according to several U.S. officials, who said that analysts are now examining the possibility that China didn’t intend to penetrate the American heartland with their airborne surveillance device.

The balloon floated over Alaska’s Aleutian Islands thousands of miles away from Guam, then drifted over Canada, where it encountered strong winds that appear to have pushed the balloon south into the continental United States, the officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: bidenforeignpolicy; chinaballoon; chineseballoon; cya; itcamefromchina; liars; wtf
Original Washington Compost article.

Link to archived copy.

https://archive.is/BE1XB#selection-343.0-343.17

1 posted on 02/14/2023 11:20:29 PM PST by McGruff
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To: McGruff

So, when do Biden family members go to prison?


2 posted on 02/14/2023 11:38:51 PM PST by The Antiyuppie (When small men cast long shadows, then it is very late in the day.)
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To: McGruff

RE: the possibility that China didn’t intend to penetrate the American heartland with their airborne surveillance device.

Aw, c’mon now.
That’s one of the lamest excuses I’ve ever heard.

It was all to unfurl a banner saying “People of Guam, we love you.”


3 posted on 02/14/2023 11:42:11 PM PST by frank ballenger (You have summoned up a thundercloud. You're gonna hear from me. Anthem by Leonard Cohen)
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To: McGruff

The administration at first denied they had any knowledge of the balloon. Apparently, they have been letting these things traverse our air space for fear of confronting China. But someone in Montana looked up and their cover was blown and they were forced to do something about it. Now, they have someone leaking they had followed the balloon from China and knew all about it. They got lots of splainin’ to do. The latest lies involve the air clutter they have been shooting down the last few days for optics and lying that they don’t know it was random benign junk balloons that are released globally at a rate of 1800 a day that regularly escape to higher altitudes


4 posted on 02/14/2023 11:45:14 PM PST by chuckee ( )
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To: McGruff

The balloon can be roughly “steered” by adjusting its altitude to conform to Jet-Stream wind shifts.


5 posted on 02/14/2023 11:46:07 PM PST by Does so (What distinguishes today's Russian aggression from that of the USSR?)
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To: McGruff

Sounds like crap.

I think it left from Inner Mongolia.


6 posted on 02/14/2023 11:51:54 PM PST by ifinnegan (Democrats kill babies and harvest their organs to sell)
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To: McGruff

Anybody wanna buy a bridge in Brooklyn?


7 posted on 02/14/2023 11:54:42 PM PST by Equine1952
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To: chuckee

Good post. Let’s hear Karine explain all that.

Now their earlier wimpy explanations sound nonsensical. Just happened to see the one big Chinese balloon and heavy payload, then no one knows what a cylindrical one with no propulsion method detected and not a balloon, followed by an octagonal shape “not a balloon”?

Leftist CNN said:One Democratic congressman, speaking on background to offer a frank assessment, told CNN Sunday night that the silence from Biden was “odd” – particularly given that “people are freaked out.” The lawmaker noted that the American public had notably heard more from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer over the weekend than the president himself.


8 posted on 02/14/2023 11:56:06 PM PST by frank ballenger (You have summoned up a thundercloud. You're gonna hear from me. Anthem by Leonard Cohen)
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To: McGruff

They have been desperate to drag Trump into their reluctance to confront China over the spy balloons by coming up with the narrative that intelligence has been able to retroactively determine that 3 spy balloons traversed the country during the Trump administration. Yet, they have no clue as to what they shot down for political optics in the last several days. They don’t want to admit it was benign airborne junk balloons escaping to higher altitudes, much like the junk balloons they are alleging they have determined were spy balloons during the Trump administration.


9 posted on 02/15/2023 12:09:26 AM PST by chuckee ( )
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To: frank ballenger
"RE: the possibility that China didn’t intend to penetrate the American heartland with their airborne surveillance device."

Just like they didn't intend to leak the Covid virus either, but waited 54 days to let the rest of the world know about it. That's right up there with the Chernobyl disaster, and Russia's concealment of it.

10 posted on 02/15/2023 12:48:47 AM PST by mass55th ("Courage is being scared to death, but saddling up anyway." ~~ John Wayne )
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To: chuckee

Ah so now the Compost is telling us that the Biden admin was aware of it the whole time and competent. And 81 million votes.


11 posted on 02/15/2023 12:57:16 AM PST by KC_Conspirator
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To: mass55th
Just like they didn't intend to leak the Covid virus either, but waited 54 days to let the rest of the world know about it.

Agree 100%. They have been playing us, economically, geopolitically, and now with early shots in a stealth war.

From Chinese warrior/General Sun Tsu:

"The whole secret lies in confusing the enemy, so that he cannot fathom our real intent.” "Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.”

12 posted on 02/15/2023 1:26:55 AM PST by neverevergiveup
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To: McGruff

Denial first then saying it happened under Trump now the truth starts to leak out after they have created sufficient propaganda fog to cover Joe


13 posted on 02/15/2023 1:35:29 AM PST by newzjunkey (Trump cannot win in 2024)
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To: frank ballenger

It is proof of something everyone knows and no Democrat can say: someone is running America today, but it isn’t Joe Biden.


14 posted on 02/15/2023 2:40:58 AM PST by chajin ("There is no other name under heaven given among people by which we must be saved." Acts 4:12)
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To: chuckee

What surprises me about all of this is maybe, just maybe we were collecting our own intelligence on the balloon, its intelligence gathering equipment and its operating parameters. This is what intelligence agencies do.

I mean, every enemy satellite operating today has already mapped every missile installation, airfield, military base and other sensitive facility. They have been doing it for years as have the US. This is nothing new and we have been doing it for at least 60 years to our enemies.

If anything, this is a “look, squirrel” false flag exercise to distract us from what is really going on in this country. Tie the balloon incident in with UFO’s and people will lose interest in why their infants do not have formula, why gas prices are sky high, why inflation is running rampant, why fentanyl is killing our youth, why young healthy athletes are dropping like flies, and why illegals are swarming our border and our cities are being destroyed from within.


15 posted on 02/15/2023 4:09:00 AM PST by EQAndyBuzz (“Racist” is the new “Nazi”.)
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To: McGruff

I wonder if any of these brainiacs have overlaid the balloon’s light path with a chart of the jet stream during the relevant period?


16 posted on 02/15/2023 5:36:57 AM PST by grobdriver (The CDC can KMA!)
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To: McGruff

I call BS on this explanation. What now? The Biden admin. trying to cover for China’s spying? Wow, just wow!


17 posted on 02/15/2023 6:51:25 AM PST by JoJo354 (We need to get to work, Conservatives!)
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To: EQAndyBuzz

“just maybe we were collecting our own intelligence on the balloon, its intelligence gathering equipment and its operating parameters. This is what intelligence agencies do.”

One of the news conferences sort of implied this. Then why shoot it down and destroy the payload? They might say we already know what it transmitted and we don’t need the actual equipment itself to tell us anything. Maybe. But I would have found a way to bring it down in a controlled manner off the coast of Alaska.


18 posted on 02/15/2023 9:11:03 AM PST by plain talk
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To: plain talk

the one in alaska hit the ice in the ocean, so i am sure something was recovered


19 posted on 02/15/2023 11:45:05 AM PST by markman46 (engage brain before using keyboard!!!)
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To: neverevergiveup
"Agree 100%. They have been playing us, economically, geopolitically, and now with early shots in a stealth war."

Back when we first heard of Covid coming from China, the first thought that ran through my head was that China was doing this deliberately to get out of the trade agreements they had made with President Trump.

20 posted on 02/15/2023 12:30:08 PM PST by mass55th ("Courage is being scared to death, but saddling up anyway." ~~ John Wayne )
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