There's no coexisting with these people
(media.scored.co)
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Quick question. How are you going to fire a missile at something that a) doesn't have a friend-or-foe transponder signal, and b) also doesn't have the heat any significant heat signature?
You do what they did: design an anti-balloon missile to shoot at it, the majority of which are not readily deployable for combat because no one typically engages in combat with balloons.
It's a floating ball filled with air. You don't need specialized weapons to shoot at it, pretty much any sort of projectile will take it down. Missiles can be fired at things without signatures.
It's not going to be filled with air, otherwise it isn't going to float properly at 65,000 feet. You have to hit the thing. Most air to air weapons aren't designed to fight balloons, because nobody fights balloons (except on the off occasion that they need to fight a balloon).
You are wrong enough that you prompted me to make an account.
The Air Force could have used an AIM-120 AMRAAM with its active radar guidance to target the large radar cross section of the balloon's gondola. They didn't.
They could have used an AGM-114 Hellfire laser guided missile following the beam of a ground based laser designator to hit the balloon's envelope. The Israelis have used this ground attack missile to target slow moving aircraft before. The Air Force didn't use this.
According to the Wall Street Journal, they used an infrared seeking AIM-9X Sidewinder missile.
I'm not linking it, but they headline is "Pentagon Used Its Highest-End Fighter, Reliable Missile to Down Chinese Balloon."
The untargetable super balloon spy platform was burst by a missile that has been in service for 20 years from a family of munitions that have been in service for 67 years.
Ha! Gotcha bitch!
Now you have to contribute more instead of lurking, or I'll say more stupid things!