Joe Biden Says 3 UFOs Shot Down After Chinese Spy Balloon Were Likely Harmless
President Joe Biden said Thursday the US is developing “tighter rules” to track, monitor and possibly shoot down unknown airborne objects after three weeks of high-stakes drama sparked by the discovery of a suspected Chinese spy balloon , which traversed much of the country.
The President has ordered National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan to lead a “cross-agency team” to review US procedures after the US shot down the Chinese balloon, as well as three other objects that Biden said the US is now highly likely to see “benign” objects launched by private companies or research institutions.
Although Biden did not express regret over the downing of the three yet-to-be-identified objects, he said he hoped the new rules would help “distinguish between those who are likely to pose security risks that require action and those who who do not.”
“Make no mistake, if any object poses a threat to the safety of the American people, I will take it down,” he added, repeating the legal rationale for the downings – that the objects, flying between 20,000 and 40,000 feet, were a Role played a low risk to civilian aircraft.
The downing of the Chinese surveillance ship was the first known peacetime downing of an unauthorized object in US airspace — a feat that was later repeated three times a week.
Biden has slammed China’s surveillance program, saying the downing sent a “clear message that violating our sovereignty is unacceptable,” but said he’s trying to maintain open lines of communication with Beijing. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken postponed his first scheduled trip to China as the balloon flew over the US and a new meeting with his Chinese counterpart has yet to be scheduled.
“I expect to speak to President Xi and I hope we can get to the bottom of this,” Biden said, adding, “But I’m not apologizing for shooting down that balloon.”
Biden said the rules would remain secret so as not to “give our enemies a roadmap to try and evade our defenses.”
The Chinese balloon has escalated tensions between the US and China. Blinken is traveling to the Munich Security Conference on Thursday and there is speculation he could take the opportunity to meet senior Chinese foreign policy figure Wang Yi, who will also be attending the conference.
Biden had remained largely silent on the objects shot down on Friday off the coast of Alaska, on Saturday over Canada and on Sunday over Lake Huron. On Monday, the White House solemnly announced that there was no evidence of “aliens or extraterrestrial activity.” On Wednesday, US officials said they were still working to locate the objects’ debris but expected all three to be unrelated to the surveillance effort.
“The intelligence community is considering as a leading explanation that they could only be balloons associated with a commercial or benign purpose,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby said. No country or private company has come forward to claim any of the objects, Kirby said. They do not appear to have been run by the US government.
Unanswered questions remain about the original balloon, including what spying abilities it had and whether it sent signals as it flew over sensitive military sites in the United States. According to a US official, American intelligence believed it was originally on a lead towards the US territory of Guam.
The US tracked it several days after it left China, said the official, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information. It appears to have deviated from its original trajectory and eventually flew over the continental United States, the official said.
Balloons and other unidentified objects were previously sighted over Guam, a strategic US Navy/Air Force hub in the western Pacific.
It’s unclear how much control China retained over the balloon after it deviated from its original trajectory. A second US official said the balloon could have been maneuvered from the outside or directed to hover over a specific target, but it’s unclear if this was done by Chinese forces.
After the balloon was shot down, the White House announced that such balloons had crossed US territory at least three times during President Donald Trump’s administration without Trump or his associates knowing – and that others across dozens of nations on five continents have flown. Kirby emphasized on Monday that they were only discovered by the Biden administration.
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