The Chinese spy balloon that flew over US territory for days was shot down. Thus ended, only momentarily but spectacularly, a crisis that rekindled diplomatic tensions between the two major world powers.
It was the president of the United States himself, Joe Biden, who gave the order to shoot down the spy balloon: he did so on Wednesday, but the men of the Pentagon advised him to wait to wait for “the safest place to do it”, consider the huge size (like three buses) of the airship. The spy balloon was thus shot down when it was over the Atlantic Ocean, where its remains fell, off Myrtle Beach. The collection of the remains – which could give valuable indications of the nature of the aircraft – began immediately.
The shooting down took place at 14.38 (Atlantic time). Shortly before, the Federal Aviation Administration had suspended departures and arrivals at airports in Wilmington, NC, and in Myrtle Beach and Charleston, South Carolina.
US Defense Minister Lloyd Austin said he was convinced that the balloon was used by the Chinese government “to guard strategic sites in the United States”. The head of the Pentagon reiterated this in a statement released after the operation, in which he recalled that Biden gave the military authorization for the operation “as soon as the mission could be completed without undue risk to the lives of Americans under the ball”.
An F22 Raptor proceeded with the shooting down. These are fifth generation fighters capable of ensuring supremacy in the skies for the American aviation. The Russians, with their Mig-29, Mig-35 and Su-27 do not agree on this primacy, but in any case the Raptor runs invisible to radar at 2,419 kmh (two Mach, the speed of sound) up to 20,000 meters of altitude despite the (empty) tonnage of 20,000 kilograms. And even in the United States there is no shortage of criticism on the effective success of this aircraft, with the original top guns, those of the Navy that defend the veteran F18.
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