“Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action.”
–Ian Fleming
OTTAWA (AP) — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Saturday that on his order a U.S. warplane shot down an unidentified object that was flying high over northern Canada, acting a day after U.S. planes took similar action over Alaska.
Hmm.
Given that the object was unidentified and, presumably, flying, the headline really should have said that they shot down a UFO.
“UFO” is no longer a simple acronym, in my opinion. It now has such firm links to little green men and anal probing, that it should only be used in news articles in that context.
The Washington Post referred to the Alaskan incident with the headline “Car-sized Object Shot Down Over Alaska”.
When I read that, I told my husband, " 'Bang, bang, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang! ’ "
Time for the Council to activate the X-Com project.
Good luck, Commander.
As an F-22 fan I could not be happier. Good times.
It didn’t make sense to me that Trudeau ordered an American fighter jet to shoot it down, so I checked on CBC News which has a more accurate version of the story. In response to the incursion of Canadian airspace, NORAD scrambled both US and Canadian fighter jets. It just happened to be a US F-22 that shot down the object. I suspect that one or more US airbases in Alaska are probably closer to the area than any Canadian airbases. Canadian Forces are now recovering the wreckage.
Yes, as I noted above, both US and Canadian aircraft were involved as it was a NORAD operation.
In the words of Phil Ochs, “if you ever get a war without blood and gore, I’ll be the first to go”. Let’s hope it stays that way.
Typical example of over-classification. Whomever sent the object knows who they are and what it is. My tax dollars paid to find that out. Someone in Maj. Gallant’s chain of command needs to realize they are public servants and let the public know what they know. Ideally they should do this by de-classifying, but, if that’s for some inpenetrable reason impossible, I hope it is promptly leaked to the New York Times or Washington Post.
Continuing the tradition of money well spent.
Things a spy balloon could discover in Canada:
Secret Bob and Doug McKenzie “Great White North” tree fort
Recipe for Beavertails
Government plan to return 100 million pop bottles to New York to take advantage of higher deposits and American dollar
Map from above, showing if “connect the dots” of already installed Huawei equipment, it spells “hosers”.
Communication with groundhogs who predicted an early spring to try to convince them to demoralize Canadians by changing their interpretation of their shadows.
Try to subvert our industry by changing it to a system of lucrative duopolies. Wait…
Able to predict upcoming Arctic weather in the Arctic regions
Get inside information for gambling in next Iditarod
Alter Northern Lights so that magnetic pulses spell out lyrics to “Remember Zhao Lei”
Game internal computer systems to get free delivery of Quarter Chicken Dinners and Covid tax credits
Could also have been a ceiling issue. CF-18 can get to 50,000’ compared to 65,000’ for F-22.
Probably excessive caution by someone unsure if they have the authority to release the information. I imagine in due course we’ll know what the object was.
Officially, we don’t yet know where it came from or whether its communication equipment transmitted details of delicious Beavertail topping options.
Whoever sent it knows what was on it, what it was doing, and that it’s been shot down. But they don’t know what we were able to learn from it. That still matters.
It will be ironic when the wreckage reveals that it really was an alien craft that came in peace. This time. Next time, they come for dinner.
You really don’t understand how this game is played, do you?
Anything our government shares with us in public also tells the enemy how much we know. Keeping them guessing about how much we know is a vital part of the intel / counter-intel process. Anything we tell them we know, they’ll promptly change so we don’t know it anymore. Anything they think is still secret from us they’ll keep doing the same way because that’s easiest and cheapest for them.
The punchline being that the less we tell them, the greater our advantage gained from this encounter.
Of course our government could choose to lie to us, or tell us half of what they know, all with the intent of fooling the enemy. But I expect you would not like that idea much either.
As long as these incursions don’t interfere with the upcoming NHL draft, both the U.S. and Canada need to chill out.
Presumably, the American pilot would not have fired if Canada didn’t want him to, so in effect, the order did have to come from Trudeau. The F-22 just got there first.
It’s very unlikely any scrambled fighters would have had carte blanche to engage the moment they were launched; it would be much safer to establish some degree of visual contact, because God forbid they shoot down a civilian aircraft in error, and THEN ask for permission to fire. I note these targets are being shot down with short range Sidewinders, not the longer range AMRAAM both air forces use, which can be fired from far beyond even the eagle-eyed vision of a fighter pilot.
Absolutely true. I’ll just add that even in non-military matters, there is a need to control how information is disseminated. A tech multinational I once worked for – a very ethical company with nothing to hide but very conscious of its image and also the protection of its many proprietary and confidential technologies – had a strict rule that you were NOT – ever – to speak to the media unless specifically authorized. Which I sometimes was, on specific subject matters. But otherwise, the mandatory action when approached by media was to refer them to Public Relations and say absolutely nothing else.