WASHINGTON: A Chinese 'spy' balloon has been flying over the United States for a couple of days, US officials said on Thursday, just days ahead of a planned trip to Beijing by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
Fighter jets were mobilised, but military leaders advised President Joe Biden against shooting the balloon out of the sky for fear debris could pose a safety threat, advice Biden accepted, US officials said.
The United States took “custody” of the balloon when it entered US airspace and had observed it with piloted US military aircraft, one of the officials told reporters on condition of anonymity.
Separately, Canada’s defence ministry said a “high-altitude surveillance balloon” was detected and that it was monitoring a “potential second incident”, without giving further details, adding that it was in frequent contact with the United States.
The news initially broke as CIA Director William Burns was speaking at an event at Washington’s Georgetown University, where he called China the “biggest geopolitical challenge” facing the United States.
“The United States government has detected and is tracking a high-altitude surveillance balloon that is over the continental United States right now,” Pentagon spokesperson Brigadier General Patrick Ryder told reporters. “The balloon is currently traveling at an altitude well above commercial air traffic and does not present a military or physical threat to people on the ground.”
Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said Beijing was “verifying” the situation.
“I would like to emphasise that until the facts are clarified, speculation and hype will not be helpful to the proper resolution of the issue,” she told a regular daily briefing in Beijing on Friday.
“China is a responsible country and has always strictly abided by international laws, and China has no intention to violate the territory and airspace of any sovereign countries. As for the balloon, as I’ve mentioned just now, we are looking into and verifying the situation and hope that both sides can handle this together calmly and carefully," Mao said at a daily briefing.
Mao said that politicians and the public should withhold judgment “before we have a clear understanding of the facts.”
“What I want to emphasize is that before we have a clear understanding of the facts, speculation and sensationalizing will be unhelpful to the proper handling of the issue. As for Blinken’s visit to China, I have no information," Mao said.
US officials said they raised the matter with their Chinese counterparts through diplomatic channels. “We have communicated to them the seriousness with which we take this issue,” a US official said.
One US official said the balloon was assessed to have “limited additive value from an intelligence collection perspective.”
It was not clear how the discovery of the spy balloon might affect those plans.
POTENTIAL SAFETY RISK
US military leaders considered shooting down the balloon over Montana on Wednesday but eventually advised Biden against it because of the safety risk from debris, the official told reporters.
The Billings, Montana, airport issued a ground stop as the military mobilised assets including F-22 fighter jets in case Biden ordered the balloon be shot down.
“We wanted to make sure we were coordinating with civil authorities to empty out the airspace around that potential area,” the official said.
“But even with those protective measures taken, it was the judgment of our military commanders that we didn’t drive the risk down low enough. So we didn’t take the shot.” Billings resident Chase Noak, who filmed the balloon on February
1, said at first he thought it was a star.
“But I thought that was kind of crazy because it was broad daylight and when I looked at it, it was just too big to be a star” he told Reuters.
A separate US official said the spy balloon had been tracked near the Aleutian Islands and Canada before entering the United States.
Such balloons typically operate at 80,000-120,000 feet (24,000-37,000m), well above where commercial air traffic flies.
