New Balloon a Load of Hot Air, or is There More to the Story?

Yet another balloon entered U.S. airspace last week. Apparently it has now left U.S. airspace and everyone can breathe a sigh of relief that the embarrassing spectacle of a Billion dollar fighter and a hundred thousand dollar missile being sent to dispatch a spy balloon costing thousands of dollars to build are not repeated.

Notice I didn't say thousands to operate. Such a spy balloon, if it was relaying data back to China in real-time that would require satellite communications: something that costs as much as the F-22 fighter to achieve.

Anyhoo, the new balloon has drifted off I assume over Canada so it's now someone else's problem. Someone with less capability in high-altitude interception: Sorry, no capability in high altitude interception or interdiction.

Strangely, the U.S. government are downplaying this latest balloon incursion into U.S. airspace. Why exactly would they do that, given the balloon that was shot down previously was confirmed to be a data-gathering device. i.e. a spy balloon. The only thing the U.S. could verify was if it had the ability to relay that data back to Beijing in real time. 

Which, given the strength and number of Chinese space assets is probably a foregone conclusion. I assume that the U.S. authorities know it was transmitting real time data, it's just that they couldn't verify the satellite network the Chinese were using to intercept the signals and transmit them back to Beijing.

Even if the new balloon didn't fly over the U.S. it still could gather intelligence on radar signals used to pick up the balloon, the readiness of assets used to identify the balloon and the type of assets used, etc. Intelligence gathering doesn't have to be blatant and obvious. 

I think I've said previously that the Huwawei affair is tied up with the spy balloons being launched by China. It sort of confirms that the Chinese did have software within Chinese-made routers that were syphoning off data to China. The raid on the Solar Observatory near White Sands Missile Range also reinforces the issue of Chinese espionage.

Now it's come to light the Chinese are buying up Farmland close to strategic military assets such as testing grounds for new tech. Also airbases operating the latest tech like the B-2 stealth bomber.

It wouldn't be an issue if the Chinese were buying land all over the U.S. but they are not. The majority of the land is clustered close to U.S. military assets. 

Again, what the Chinese are doing with that land has not yet been verified. They may just be being good landlords for American farmers. They could be installing intelligence-gathering assets. Currently there is no confirmation by U.S. intelligence regarding this issue. 

It seems that without the spy routers, the Chinese are finding other ways to try and spy in the signals around the U.S. in order to gather intelligence. And don't think that land that is not close to military bases has not intelligence value. There may be communications between bases that has value if intercepted.

It sort of reminds me of the U.K. intelligence services tapping into telephone conversations between England and Northern Ireland during the "troubles".

M.I.5 built a tower at Capenhurst when they found out the government nuclear facility there was in between two microwave towers that transmitted all the telephone conversations between England and Northern Ireland. Unwilling to arouse suspicion by applying for a formal tap of the telephone calls, they built a tower at capenhurst that intercepted the microwave beams and listened in to the conversations.  No need for a formal request to tap individual channels, they had the whole lot. Thousands of telephone conversations could be listened into by that tower.

The tower could be explained as something to to with the Nuclear facility. It was a secret for years.

It has long since been decommissioned and demolished, but it shows you have to be aware of signal security and also the attempts by bad actors to intercept those signals. Signals intelligence should work both ways.

It would be interesting if the grain silos on these Chinese Farms all started to look the same and come from the same supplier in China...