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They also could have had ground penetrating radar. Note the path of the balloon was over the US missile silos

https://geo-matching.com/content/new-approach-to-use-ground-...

Outside the atmosphere you would not be able to do it




You could.

The Space Shuttle flew missions with an imaging radar that discovered ancient riverbeds beneath deep sand in the Sahara. At the time, some thought it would have worked equally well to disclose buried military infrastructure.

https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/shuttle-imaging-radar-a-si...


Not just silos, going through the Dakotas and Missouri put it fairly close to Ellsworth and Whiteman, as well.


If that thing had a radar strong enough to see through dirt from 50,000ft, it should have also been causing havoc to all sorts of electrical equipment too.


I know nothing of radar, but could the radar be shaped like routers beam forming? Couldn’t the radar also be switched off over the majority of inconsequential areas?


> could the radar be shaped like routers beam forming?

Yes, SAR [1].

[1] https://www.earthdata.nasa.gov/learn/backgrounders/what-is-s...


SAR is just a method to virtually increase the aperture of the antenna with a moving platform, it is unrelated to the localisation of the beam




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