Why would China use a spy balloon when it has satellites?

It is amazing how we get crystal clear pictures when it benefits them and other times, that can't come up with much. I've noticed this on the UAP's. All we get is these white dots that I can't make heads or tails out of.

What are some of your theories about this?

 

Maybe something to do with an antigravity propulsion system that is apparently used on UAPs? Engine noise never seems to be heard on these crafts. Maybe due to an electromagnet force field propulsion system? My guess is as good as anyone’s.

 

A blimp is a blimp and a balloon is a balloon. FAA regulations acknowledge the differences. The former has controllable thrust, the latter has no thrust at all.

 

It's a balloon. It's as far as I know not controlled. It's not a zeppelin. And no doubt lots of countries toss up weather balloons.
On any given day, nearly 1,800 weather balloons are launched across the world

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/weather-balloons-hundreds-turns/story?id=97082985#:~:text=How many weather balloons are there?,to the National Weather Service.

 

Yet, ONLY China's seems to cross over into countries they have problems with.

 

Iran sometimes has drones from an other country, and they do damage. Unlike the balloon.

 

It has been said that it was maneuverable

 

Yes and these fly up high and eventually pop and come back down.

 

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I haven't seen a single picture explaining where the propellor was at.

 

So... this was just a bigger balloon for all I know. I mean. You would think a general would be holding a press conference by now about what they picked up. It's not exactly the first time US intel lied.

 

I agree. I’m still waiting on satellite pictures of the slow moving objects but I’m not holding my breath. I don’t believe anything was shot down. Where’s the wreckage?

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64562100

It's been 10 days that they found the first debris, but no spy gear as far as I know.
And you know. I like to believe. But eventually.... it's walk the walk

 

You won't find a propeller on an astronaut when they space walk either.

 

Astronauts space walk in an atmosphere environment so a propeller would be useless.

 

If that's your guess then it isn't a very good one.

 

A couple of perhaps pertinent observations.

Firstly balloons can in fact, to a very limited extent be 'steered' by the operator, either remotely via radio or by a pilot if one is on board. The ability to do so however is governed by the operators knowledge of local atmospheric conditions particularity the speed and direction of local winds. Since these vary with altitude by changing altitude it possible to have a degree of control over the speed and direction of flight. Not very much but some.

This usually isn't an issue for manned civilian balloons since they are extremely limited in terms of the maximum altitude they can safely fly at. This means usually they have little or no control over such things, albeit they still have (and require) expert knowledge of local wind conditions before launching. But if your talking about unmanned balloons designed to reach the stratosphere? Well then you have much more altitude to play with and the potential to utilize changes in altitude to t advantage of known variances in wind speed and direction. And it helps that at higher altitudes wind speed and direction are much more consistent and reliable. In fact any meteorologist on the planet could probably give an give you a fairly good estimate of high altitude wind speeds and direction at any time of the year for any part of the planet. And of course all that meteorological data is shared globally, it has to be in order for everyone to make accurate predictions.

As to why you use balloons for intelligence gathering purposes.? I can think of few reasons.

1) It's much much cheaper than trying to put an additional spy satellite in orbit.
2) Spy satellites generally have predicable orbits and as a rule everyone who can keeps a very close eye and when and where potential opponents satellites are at any given moment.
3) Spy planes can usually be detected long before they get close and legally can't penetrate another nations sovereign airspace without permission.
4) Lower altitude gives you better/higher quality imaging potential.
5) Because you can. If your job is intelligence collection and someone presents you with a low cost/low risk means of collecting it you use it.

Of course now that the 'balloon has gone up' . Spy balloons may no longer be considered such a good option.

 

Because there is no air to be moved around with a propeller, so it's useless. har har. And as you posted: they walk. But it's more like a crawl around.

I've yet to see how that balloon was steered around.
You're free to go prove this.

 

Jets of compressed air.

 

Yes correct compressed air or other bas would work.

 

I didn't propose a fan. The China balloon was huge and probably carried compressed air bottles for limited maneuvering and for replenishing the floatation gas.

 

Okay wouldn't be the first time. Are your guesses usually spot on when dealing with very little information or facts? I was asked to offer my opinion and I did. It's pretty arrogant to call someone out for offering a poor guess without offering one. So by all means...

 

No, now the Pentagon and its media have chosen to pull your chain, to scare you silly. If you buy into their BS you are complicit

 

The 'China’s spy balloon may have been more interested in signals intelligence and threat response communication than photographing ICBM silos (though they might well have done some of that too). Because radio waves bounce off the ionosphere, that’s the sort of information you can’t get from satellites. Maybe the point of the exercise was intended to see what sort of signals they could capture when we scrambled assets to take a look at them.'

https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=54115

 

You wouldn't need a balloon to do that. Just monitor the return signals