I’ll try to make this short even though it’s a sign of something that should worry the hell out of Americans and allies that still would have a need for American military assistance. The short version is that Pete Hegseth’s ‘warrior culture’ might be causing the troops to be like ICE/CBP as in trigger-happy. Shoot first and ask, or rather avoid asking questions later. While conducting training near El Paso which as you know borders Mexico they shot down what they assumed was a drone that turned out to have been a freaking Party Balloon. For good measure they jacked up the FAA into announcing a ten-day shutdown of airspace over El Paso!
I wish I was joking and this was a bad audition for a job with The Onion but it happened for real this morning. You can read details from Newsweek. What startled me when I read the article was their citing FOX NEWS reporting on this debacle:
Fox News first reported that the airborne object was intercepted after raising concerns of a potential drone operating near the southern border. Officials later concluded the object was not an unmanned aircraft but a party balloon, a U.S. official told the outlet.
The airstrike prompted a temporary closure of airspace around El Paso International Airport for what authorities described as security reasons. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) later lifted the restriction, stating there was no threat to commercial travel, Fox reported.
What the linked article doesn’t outright say but anyone can see is that the Bigly-Party- Balloon-Shot-Down-Cause-We-Thought-It-Was-A-Drone panic created (initially) more than a mere ‘temporary shutdown’ of operations at El Paso’s airport. No, a TEN DAY shutdown was announced! I’d say panic is the right word if right off the bat the FAA was convinced to make such a sweeping announcement only to hours later issue a ‘never mind, it’s all okay’ rollback. But the cold, hard and to me worrisome as hell fact that the panic got that out of control is something we should pay attention to:
Sources told CBS that at least one airborne object targeted during the operation was later determined to be a party balloon. Officials also indicated there may have been legitimate drone activity near the border, potentially involving cartel-linked unmanned aircraft, though details remain unclear.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy described the shootdown as involving a suspected cartel drone incursion that had been neutralized, according to CBS. However, the misidentification of the balloon raised questions about the circumstances that led to both the shootdown and the temporary grounding of flights.
Sorry, but I’m not buying the insertion of cartel activity as DOD and the FAA got into CYA mode. Initially shutting things down for a day would have been one thing. A problem to be sure because even medical flights weren’t allowed. They had to be diverted to Las Cruces, and other flights also had to be diverted. A mess to be sure, but maybe kinda sorta warranted. However TEN FREAKING DAYS is another yet that’s what was initially announced. I’m no great fan of Sean Duffy at the FAA but I don’t believe his announcing a ten day shutdown of airspace for ten days was his idea.
I also believe he had to be convinced to take such a drastic step. Just what the hell did Petey-BOY Hegseth tell him to make that happen? I recall his attempt at Quantico to imitate Patton and the professionals, actual warriors who’d actually faced enemy fire sitting there stone-faced, almost to a person thinking ‘Who the f**k does this little pissant think he is? How the hell are we going to convince our troops to follow THIS dickhead?’ Well, leadership has been a concern and with this incident our own military and our allies have to be looking at this and fearing the worst.
That’s why this matters folks. A training exercise led to a panicked shoot down of a party balloon. Ok, so sh*t happens and a mistake was made. However to turn it into an incident that for a while led to an announced shutdown of an international airport (and all airspace below 18k feet in the area) and had airlines having to scramble to figure out not just what to do with flights headed there, but for ten freaking days is something else. However that’s the level of leadership, or rather piss-poor leadership our armed forces have. As so many of us (and for those who don’t know I once served) we feared Hegseth’s incompetence would filter down. Clearly it has.
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so people in and around el paso don’t have drones? you want to shoot down all of them that kids are playing with?
It seems a food fight has broken out between the Army and CBP with the FAA being drawn in. It’s the Army’s equipment and their people were there but they say it was the CBP folks being trained on it who screwed up. The FAA is saying no one cleared all this with them and it should have been because operating lasers near crowded airspace like exists around major airports is dangerous to pilots. Hell, passengers looking out the wrong window at the wrong time too. The whole thing was one gigantic “Charlie Fox” (the polite way of saying cluster f**k) and in any other administration including the first Trump one heads would roll. But nothing will happen to anyone in the government. Air carrier’s tab for both the diverted flights and facing a ten day suspension of flights wasting hours starting to rework operations will be in the millions. And if someone died because of the medical flights that also had to be diverted? You think anyone in THIS administration cares? Only if say an organ destined to be placed in a rich donor or one of their loved ones lost viability or something along those lines!
Ten Days!!!!
To put it into perspective 9/11 led to a two day shutdown.
How was this FIVE TIMES worse than that?
Damn. Wish I’d thought of that! Thanks for pointing it out.