America’s New Fear of UFOs

Published in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
(Germany) on 12 February 2023
by Andreas Ross (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Mallory Matsumoto. Edited by Laurence Bouvard.
Does Joe Biden look like a decisive commander in chief? Not if Washington can’t confirm soon why it found the downed airborne objects to be threatening.

Republicans called President Joe Biden a weakling because he did not shoot down China’s espionage balloon until a week after it was first sighted. However, there are few indications that the two subsequent downings of objects over the weekend were a demonstration of power motivated purely by domestic politics, ordered by a Democrat who wants to announce another run for the White House soon.

Launching a missile is not something that a responsible commander in chief orders casually. This is especially true because in the second case, it was Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau who decided and announced the decision.

Silent Administration

In Washington and Ottawa, there was presumably a reason to be worried even if it was “only” about air traffic. If both administrations knew where the airborne objects were from and what they were doing there, they have been strikingly silent about it. That may refute the idea that these incidents are just continuations of the Chinese espionage saga, because in that case, the U.S. instead sought transparency. It used the crisis to demonstrate to the world how brazen China is.

It is very possible that the Pentagon really couldn’t identify the other airborne objects, just like the 143 “aerial phenomena” that have been sighted since 2004, which intelligence services described (vaguely) in a 2021 report. Maybe the wreckage will soon provide insight. In any case, the balloon episode taught us one thing at least: UFOs do not necessarily come from another planet.


Amerikas neue Angst vor Ufos
Steht Joe Biden jetzt als entschlossener Oberbefehlshaber da? Nicht, wenn Washington nicht bald sagen kann, warum die abgeschossenen Flugobjekte bedrohlich waren.

Die Republikaner hatten Präsident Biden zum Schwächling gestempelt, weil er Chinas Spionageballon erst eine Woche nach der ersten Sichtung abschießen ließ. Dennoch spricht wenig dafür, dass die beiden weiteren Abschüsse am Wochenende eine rein innenpolitisch motivierte Machtdemonstration des Demokraten gewesen wären, der bald seine abermalige Kandidatur für das Weiße Haus erklären will.
Ein Abschuss einer Rakete ist nichts, was ein verantwortungsvoller Oberbefehlshaber mal eben so anordnen würde. Zumal es im zweiten Fall der kanadische Ministerpräsident Tru¬deau war, der den Abschuss beschlossen und verkündet hatte.
Schweigsame Regierung
In Washington und Ottawa wird man Anlass zur Sorge gehabt haben, und sei es „nur“ um den Luftverkehr. Sollten die beiden Regierungen wissen, woher die Flugobjekte kamen und was sie bezweckten, so sind sie bemerkenswert schweigsam. Das mag dagegen sprechen, dass sich hier nur die chinesische Spionagesaga fortsetzt, denn in der Sache suchten die USA eher die Öffentlichkeit: Sie nutzen die Krise, um der Welt Chinas Dreistigkeit vor Augen zu führen.
Gut möglich, dass die weiteren Flugobjekte für das Pentagon bisher wirklich unidentifizierbar waren – so wie die 143 „Luftphänomene“ seit 2004, welche die Geheimdienste 2021 in einem Bericht (vage) beschrieben hatten. Vielleicht geben bald die Trümmer Aufschluss. So viel immerhin lehrt schon die Ballon-Episode: Ufos müssen nicht von anderen Planeten sein.
This post appeared on the front page as a direct link to the original article with the above link .

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