Where Do Things End With Vlad? (h/t romad1)

[romad1]

1 hour ago, 1776 said:

I hadn’t seen this before. Thoughts?

 

 

Mystery Drones Swarmed a U.S. Military Base for 17 Days. The Pentagon Is Stumped.

U.S. officials don’t know who is behind the drones that have flown unhindered over sensitive national-security sites—or how to stop them

 

A view of Langley Air Force Base at dusk from Gosnold’s Hope Park in Hampton, Va. KRISTEN ZEIS FOR WSJ

Oct. 12, 2024 at 9:00 pm 

U.S. Air Force Gen. Mark Kelly wasn’t sure what to make of reports that a suspicious fleet of unidentified aircraft had been flying over Langley Air Force Base on Virginia’s shoreline.

Kelly, a decorated senior commander at the base, got on a squadron rooftop to see for himself. He joined a handful of other officers responsible for a clutch of the nation’s most advanced jet fighters, including F-22 Raptors. 

For several nights, military personnel had reported a mysterious breach of restricted airspace over a stretch of land that has one of the largest concentrations of national-security facilities in the U.S. The show usually starts 45 minutes to an hour after sunset, another senior leader told Kelly. 

The first drone arrived shortly. Kelly, a career fighter pilot, estimated it was roughly 20 feet long and flying at more than 100 miles an hour, at an altitude of roughly 3,000 to 4,000 feet. Other drones followed, one by one, sounding in the distance like a parade of lawn mowers.

 

The drones headed south, across Chesapeake Bay, toward Norfolk, Va., and over an area that includes the home base for the Navy’s SEAL Team Six and Naval Station Norfolk, the world’s largest naval port.

A view of the Langley base in Virginia. PHOTO: KRISTEN ZEIS FOR WSJ

Officials didn’t know if the drone fleet, which numbered as many as a dozen or more over the following nights, belonged to clever hobbyists or hostile forces. Some suspected that Russia or China deployed them to test the response of American forces.

Federal law prohibits the military from shooting down drones near military bases in the U.S. unless they pose an imminent threat. Aerial snooping doesn’t qualify, though some lawmakers hope to give the military greater leeway.

Reports of the drones reached President Biden and set off two weeks of White House meetings after they first appeared in December last year. Officials from agencies including the Defense Department, Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Pentagon’s UFO office joined outside experts to throw out possible explanations as well as ideas about how to respond.

given their tech base is garbage i wouldn't ascribe anything like this to Russia.   I would suggest that most UFO sightings in recent years have been advanced US UAVs.   There are also a lot of AI UAV swarm things the US military is doing and that the doctrine shops for such things are in the Tidewater area of Virginia.

[1776]

1 hour ago, romad1 said:

given their tech base is garbage i wouldn't ascribe anything like this to Russia.   I would suggest that most UFO sightings in recent years have been advanced US UAVs.   There are also a lot of AI UAV swarm things the US military is doing and that the doctrine shops for such things are in the Tidewater area of Virginia.

I would think China before any other adversary. The impression I get here is that there could be a serious security issue that no one has answers for.
More from the attached article above:

continued…

Over 17 days, the drones arrived at dusk, flew off and circled back. Some shone small lights, making them look like a constellation moving in the night sky—or a science-fiction movie, Kelly said, “‘Close Encounters at Langley.’” They also were nearly impossible to track, vanishing each night despite a wealth of resources deployed to catch them. 

Gen. Glen VanHerck, at the time commander of the U.S. Northern Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command, said drones had for years been spotted flying around defense installations. But the nightly drone swarms over Langley, he said, were unlike any past incursion.

Gen. Glen VanHerck arriving for a closed-door briefing for lawmakers about the suspected Chinese spy balloon on Feb. 9 last year in Washington. PHOTO: DREW ANGERER/GETTY IMAGES

VanHerck, who led the military response to the Chinese balloon, ordered jet fighters and other aircraft to fly close enough to glean clues from the drones. He recommended that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin authorize a full menu of electronic eavesdropping and spycraft to learn more, though the Pentagon is limited in what it can do on U.S. soil.

“If there are unknown objects within North America,” VanHerck said, the job is “to go out and identify them.” 

Solving that mystery, even for the world’s pre-eminent superpower, proved easier said than done. Local police were among the first to try.

For two nights, starting on Dec. 6, Hampton, Va., officers chased the drones, by patrol car and on foot, relaying momentary sightings along with information from Langley over police radios: One was seen in the area of Marshall Street or Gosnold’s Hope Park.

Edited Sunday at 03:54 PM by 1776

[CMRivdogs]

Read the story and reminds me of the on line comments about this a few weeks ago. Especially since the "ring" was in the vicinity of Fort Eustis

https://www.yahoo.com/news/mysterious-black-ring-appears-sky-212530161.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAKLeiHZbQZh3YOKY7at0h8vKnnlB65X0rgTJVVjd-tKzGbWw6dplljkz7g-S4W94h412iw2zHKxq9sdC0tuUqSKUjXlqlEuzVyhdNEwHprbt2RQkvzpl8ARfZ1fq1nTxVAmQE1dGh14b8opu5gR5hJBPrA1bWIBsNXsS_yISFH7L

[romad1]

This is strong.

What is interesting is that they declare that Trump sold or gave away TS/SCI secrets to Russia from Maralago in such terms that if Trump wanted to challenge that he'd be able to go to court.   Which if he did would involve a wonderful discovery process. 

[romad1]

Reminds me of Peta from Hunger Games 

[romad1]

Woah

Feels true as well.

[chasfh]

On 10/8/2024 at 11:22 AM, RatkoVarda said:

same number of times he flew with Epstein. Coincidence?

Had to get the girls from somewhere.

[chasfh]

On 10/8/2024 at 12:26 PM, romad1 said:

I think China is definitely steeling for a fight. All the signs are there.  They are whipping up hostility among the population toward foreigners.  The Japanese did that prior to WWII.   The PRC are losing their contacts with the outside world and that trend is not good for reasoning through conflict and crisis.   They are a little intimidated by the US and its allies and that will have some sway over their generals but maybe not their leaders.   

For all our sins and flaws we are still a very powerful country.  Whatever Tucker MF Carlson thinks about our armed forces being too woke to fight, he's both silly and wrong. 

Tucker Carlson works for Moscow, so of course he’s going to shït all over the United States and its people, same as Trump does.

My impression is that even acknowledging the wide population gap between the two, the economic and military might of the United States outpaces those of China by a factor of multiples. Confirm or reject?

[chasfh]

On 10/9/2024 at 8:34 PM, ewsieg said:

I liked a candidate that blanked at the word "Aleppo" and once he was given a hint of "Syria" he gave a legitimate answer, one better than anything you'd ever hear out of Kamala.  This very forum declared that alone made him unworthy to be POTUS.

Libertarians should not be anywhere near the White House except if they’re on the paid tour.

[romad1]

7 minutes ago, chasfh said:

Tucker Carlson works for Moscow, so of course he’s going to shït all over the United States and its people, same as Trump does.

My impression is that even acknowledging the wide population gap between the two, the economic and military might of the United States outpaces those of China by a factor of multiples. Confirm or reject?

Not as much as is necessary for us to easily win a road game at the extreme western end of the Pacific against a strong near-peer power.   We need to keep our allies and build more collective security structures to dissuade the PRC from thinking anything but bad things would happen if they tried.   Of course if Trump wins, they win.  So...

[chasfh]

Further to the point:

On 10/10/2024 at 8:16 AM, pfife said:

And false.

That said, it’s 1/1000 as alarming as thinking free markets self regulate …

… in the interest of consumers.

[gehringer_2]

China's idee fixe is Taiwan. Once they are there, there won't be a whole lot the US and our allies will be able to do about it. This one is 100% about deterrence - making Taiwan such a porcupine that China will never see a point where the ledger adds up on the positive side for the attempt.

But this means making big investments up front to meet a threat which will be seen as purely speculative. So in the end the problem for Taiwan is less about technology and relative military advantage between the US and China, than about their own and US politics being up to those investments.

Edited 8 hours ago by gehringer_2

[romad1]

 

[ewsieg]

3 hours ago, chasfh said:

Libertarians should not be anywhere near the White House except if they’re on the paid tour.

A true libertarian....yes.  He was the most centric libertarian candidate ever though.  We would have been better today if he was voted in over Trump.  

[ewsieg]

3 hours ago, chasfh said:

Further to the point:

… in the interest of consumers.

I won't say free markets regulate themselves, but both Democrats and Republicans have consistently instituted laws that protect the industry leaders in a market.  Not saying government needs to get completely hands off like your hard core libertarians suggest, but government picking winners (the biggest guy on the block with the most money to feed them) hasn't faired well either.

[romad1]

3 hours ago, gehringer_2 said:

China's idee fixe is Taiwan. Once they are there, there won't be a whole lot the US and our allies will be able to do about it. This one is 100% about deterrence - making Taiwan such a porcupine that China will never see a point where the ledger adds up on the positive side for the attempt.

But this means making big investments up front to meet a threat which will be seen as purely speculative. So in the end the problem for Taiwan is less about technology and relative military advantage between the US and China, than about their own and US politics being up to those investments.

Taiwan won't be easy for the PRC.    Normandy was close to the south coast of England and the Luftwaffe was cooked by the combined air offensive but it was still very hard to land and get ashore.  Taiwan would be a tougher nut because of advanced weapons and bad conditions for the invader. 

Taiwan has a very, weird weather pattern and very few good beaches.   The Atlantic hurricane season is chaotic for the US; but the western Pacific tropical cyclone season is murder for the east coast of China, the South China Sea and Taiwan.  

Landing on the west coast of Taiwan is channelized in only a few possible places.  Tactical airborne landings are murder in any environment where shoulder fired SAMs exist.  Note how hard it was for the Russian elite forces to take Hostumel Airport: they didn't.

Now the US has been working fast to integrate some very advanced and effective systems such as the Typhon, Rapid Dragon, AIM-260 which will meet or beat similar advances for the PRC.  China is seeing the importance of swarm AI with drones which the US leads in development of but they have a lot of tech advantages in as well.  

The war would be bloody and expensive.  If we can keep our alliances we can and should win but I do not like to contemplate the costs.   This is a very good essay on the subject:

https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2024/september/no-one-should-think-war-will-be-short

and the author discusses it here

 

[gehringer_2]

1 hour ago, romad1 said:

Taiwan won't be easy for the PRC.

It seem to me the other question is how desperate would Taiwan be? How much revenge will they extract in a lost cause? There have to be 400 million Chinese living cheek by jowl along the Pacific coast, does the PLA have the air defenses to keep Taiwan from killing literally hundreds of thousands of mainlanders before they go down? People tend to talk about wars in much neater terms than they actually happen.

Edited 4 hours ago by gehringer_2