There's no coexisting with these people
(media.scored.co)
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It isn't hitting it that is the issue.
At maximum altitude it is something like 35 km up, two microns thick and filled with low pressure gas. It is very slightly more substantial than a cloud.
Poking a little hole in it will only allow gas exchange by diffusion. That is, very, very slowly. It won't pop like a latex party balloon!
Who said anything about 'poking a little hole'? High explosives with flak would rend it asunder. The array it was hauling was also a pretty big target.
So flack is launched from Anti-Aircraft Artillery. Got any laying about? How about AAA with the capability of hitting targets at an altitude of 35 km?
As for proximity fused cannon shells; cool! you are shooting at a cloud. Proximity to what?
Two fighter jets strafed the balloon with anti-aircraft cannons and it didn't care. It was eventually shot down with an air burst of a guided missile. That would be hundreds of thousands of dollars of ordinance.
The array was an insignificant target compared to the balloon, which was about the size of a football stadium at that point; Moreover shooting the array would not bring the balloon down.
This is what I was talking about. They could have done this the moment it entered US airspace, instead of waiting for it to complete it's mission when it made its way to the goddamn Atlantic. the hell are you being such a pedantic faggot?
In that case I agree.
It was a feat that could have easily been achieved should the Chief of Staff had the political will and the willingness to drop a few million bucks on a sortie of modern air-superiority fighters and ordinance.
I'd go further, and say that the reason they didn't shoot it down in flyover country is because of the splash it would have made on the internet.