The rightie-tighties all fail to notice that the military said they took care to prevent the balloon from gathering useful intelligence at the military sites. The military knows how to do this. Back in my nuclear weapons effects days, the Defense Nuclear Agency wanted to simulate an explosion over a (replica) missile silo. The operation had to be timed to avoid Russian satellite observation. This involved covering the site up with essentially a very large tent before and after the large explosion.
So compared to that, hiding stuff from a balloon borne probe trundling along at speeds of less than 100 kts is easy-peasy.
The military jammed radio signals. The military is good at that when they need to be.
As for optics (cameras, etc) , we have lasers. When I was involved with tracking satellites with lasers, we could not light up unapproved satellites without having to explain to the State Department and getting shut down for months. But that little package on the balloon. In US airspace! Fair Game! Cameras would be dazzled with lasers at more than one wavelength. Dang, I wish I could have seen it.
So no, I am not worried that the Chinese got much in the way of useful information.
The rightie-tighties all fail to notice that the military said they took care to prevent the balloon from gathering useful intelligence at the military sites. The military knows how to do this. Back in my nuclear weapons effects days, the Defense Nuclear Agency wanted to simulate an explosion over a (replica) missile silo. The operation had to be timed to avoid Russian satellite observation. This involved covering the site up with essentially a very large tent before and after the large explosion.
So compared to that, hiding stuff from a balloon borne probe trundling along at speeds of less than 100 kts is easy-peasy.
The military jammed radio signals. The military is good at that when they need to be.
As for optics (cameras, etc) , we have lasers. When I was involved with tracking satellites with lasers, we could not light up unapproved satellites without having to explain to the State Department and getting shut down for months. But that little package on the balloon. In US airspace! Fair Game! Cameras would be dazzled with lasers at more than one wavelength. Dang, I wish I could have seen it.
So no, I am not worried that the Chinese got much in the way of useful information.