The American authorities announced on Thursday the presence of a machine of Chinese origin above Montana. This is in the upper airspace (HAO). This zone is not regulated by any international text or agreement.
by Cédric Pietrapurunga
Surveillance machine that comes to spy on “sensitive” sites, especially nuclear missiles, as Washington says? Or simple “civil aircraft, used for research purposes, mainly meteorological”, which would have been lost, as Beijing defends? Since the United States revealed, Thursday, February 2, the presence of a stratospheric ball of Chinese origin above the state of Montana, speculation is going well on the nature and exact capacities of the machine , whose size would be equivalent to that of three buses.
According to experts, send a spy ball in the upper airspace (Higher Airspace Operation, Hao, in English), that is to say at an altitude between 20 and 100 kilometers, has several advantages. “Unlike a low orbit surveillance satellite, which goes around the earth every ninety minutes, a machine sent to the stratosphere can stay above the same area, which Allows you to make more optical or electromagnetic observations “, explains a military source.
Above all, this so -called hao area is now regulated by any international text or agreement, unlike airspace, located below 20 kilometers above sea level, governed by the 1949 Chicago Convention , or space proper, beyond 100 kilometers, which meets standards fixed in 1967 in a treaty on the extra-Atmospheric. In other words, nothing a priori prevents China from sending a machine over another country if it is located in this area. A legal vagueness which, for some, would explain the American hesitation to bring down the Chinese intruder.
directed at a distance
“Sending a stratospheric ball above the United States can also be a way for China to test American anti-aircraft defense: what altitude is it detected? Can it be destroyed? How? The answers to these Questions undoubtedly interest Beijing, “said Joseph Henrotin, a researcher at the International Analysis and Pregnancy Center. In this regard, the presence of solar panels on the Chinese balloon, attested by photos, would tend to prove that it can be directed remotely.
pointed out, China is not the only one to be interested in the upper atmosphere. In 2022, the European Commission, for example, launched a program, called Eurohaps (demonstration of high-altitude platform systems) and endowed with 1.2 billion euros, to develop balloons or stratospheric airships for purposes military intelligence. The Franco-Italian Thales Alenia Space works in particular on a platform called Stratobus, capable of carrying out surveillance operations for an altitude of 20 kilometers.