Some background for POTUS's address to the nation, about Chinese balloons

Joe Heller | Copyright 2023 Hellertoon.com

Today’s TAT will be a fair amount shorter than the last few posts. It’s not because it’s not an important topic but I feel like I need to offer a bit of context to President Biden’s upcoming speech, later today, regarding the Chinese balloon issues we’ve all heard so much about lately.

Photo: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center/Flickr (CC BY 2.0)

Because the timing of his speech and is still unannounced, I will make this brief and via numbered points.

1.      China is a threat, although not so much in the way that most expect. Xi is a threat because he has a strategy to literally, rule the world by 2049.

2.     He has had some success during the early phases of his strategy, over the past few years.

3.     His military, though large is fully untested and based primarily on shared weapons systems, largely originated by Russia. The war in Ukraine shows just how poorly those systems and the lack of experience of the users have worked.

4.     Xi and Putin have been collaborating on a variety of efforts but in respect to the so-called balloon issue, there’s a lot happening between the two, above the altitude of normal airspace. The maneuverable, high-altitude lighter than air platforms, LTAs are the balloons and, for several years have been mostly experimental platforms for more nations than China. This is more of a threat.

5.     In theory, LTAs could deliver sophisticated weapons and especially those that would leave our defenses blind or partially so. That is in fact a serious threat… if used.

Flying near the edge of space, a NASA Ultra-Long Duration Balloon broke the flight record for duration and distance. The balloon, almost as large as one and one-half football fields, soared for nearly forty-two days, making three orbits around the South Pole. The U.S. military has periodically explored the practicality of employing high-altitude balloons and other similar vehicles for a range of applications including using them as cost-effective platforms to launch other flight vehicles into space. (Artist rendition courtesy of NASA)

6.     Any use by China would without a doubt, demand a significant and likely proportional response. Xi’s arrogance and aggression right now could trigger an accidental conflict from which he would probably not survive, politically and China would end up a commercial albatross around the neck of the global economy.

7.     At this time, the likelihood of Xi being this ridiculously stupid is highly unlikely.

8.     These events though drive several points more valuable to psychological warfare that we must do our best to resist.

9.     Understanding these and other parameters that for good reasons, won’t be disclosed here or in the President’s address are key to keying the American people in the loop.

10.  Threats are difficult things to talk to people about, especially in the hyper-partisan situation we are now trying to survive.

11.   Threats, until 2015 were always events that unified Americans. This is a good opportunity to support the US Government, regardless of political affiliation. It’s the American way.

12.  Enemies calculate popular support when assessing whether to attack, or not. A unified nation is the best defense against our aggressors like China, Russia, Iran and several others.

Summary

Homeland propaganda during WWII: The perspective of this picture is to encourage the war. This is a message telling Americans that if we united, we will win the war. this can get most Americans to think the same and be patriotic. The creator of this picture showed an American Flag and a white and black working together to fix some machinery.

Let’s all do our very best to remove our political party hats, and rally around our defense. This type of defense is something we’re very good at. The technology regarding balloons and the IP that drives the threat didn’t originate with China. Remember, if they don’t steal the IP, they will remain behind in effectiveness.

Right now, for the first time in my life, we have our biggest threats on their back foot. Putin is destroying Russia, Xi hasn’t missed any chances to make poor strategic decisions and we’re finally ahead of the game on the Pandemic.

The US national security community busts their butts every minute of every day to keep us safe. I suspect that our POTUS will ask us all to remain calm and to listen to credible sources discussing these matters. I have already heard countless conspiracy theories that are intended to drive division in our response. The best defense is that pesky word in the name of our nation… “United.” It may sound cliché’, but it’s true: divided we stand, divided, we fall.

I’ll just stand with and support those who are actually working this threat. They have “got this.”

Thanks to one and all, in the national security community