If Trump was in the White House, as he should be, this wouldn’t have happened.
Pentagon Tracking Suspected Chinese Spy Balloon Over Northern US
The U.S. military is currently tracking a suspected Chinese spy balloon over Montana, according to a senior Pentagon official.
“The United States Government has detected and is tracking a high altitude surveillance balloon that is over the continental United States right now,” said Pentagon Press Secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder in a Feb. 2 statement.
A senior defense official told reporters the Pentagon has a “very high confidence” that the balloon comes from China.
The high-altitude surveillance balloon allegedly floated over the Aleutian islands and Canada before crossing over the airspace of Montana, according to an NBC report that cited three unnamed government officials.
That the Chinese feel free to violate our airspace with impunity is very telling. They aren’t being very stealthy and don’t expect that a large balloon would escape our notice with all of our surveillance capabilities.
This is a deliberate provocation to test our response.
Of course, it also raises the question of whether they feel free to be so bold because they’ve got Brandon by the shorthairs, so if he retaliated, they’d release damning information about his grift with them? Not that we need any more evidence of his corruption involving the Chinese. Just how deep it runs is the real question.
Kevin McCarthy brings the pressure. “China’s brazen disregard for U.S. sovereignty is a destabilizing action that must be addressed, and President Biden cannot be silent. I am requesting a Gang of Eight briefing.”
I suppose a briefing is appropriate, but why would we even hesitate to bring that sucker down? Bring it down, confirm whose it is, then call their ambassador in and read them the riot act. We are a sovereign nation and the incursion is a violation of that sovereignty.
Who are we afraid of offending? It’s the government’s job to protect its citizens from foreign threats. But they’d rather chase paper tigers like all the white supremacists who are the greatest terror threat we face.
We’ve often had to intercept Russian aircraft off the coast of Alaska and few times off the coast of California. Here’s one from 2006, one from 2014, one from 2015, one from 2019, one from 2020, the 14th time from 2020, and one from 2022.
But none of them were over the continental United States. The only time that happens is when it’s a part of “the Open Skies Treaty––a 17-year-old program that permits many countries, including Russia and the U.S., to send surveillance flights over each other’s territories each year.“
So far, all we know is that the Pentagon has engaged the PRC through several channels, including the Chinese Embassy in the U.S. and the U.S. Embassy in China.
As The Epoch Times also reports,
Experts have warned with increasing frequency that the CCP is preparing its military for a war to seize Taiwan that would likely draw it into conflict with the United States. As such U.S. officials have said that the regime is studying the United States’ military capabilities and building technologies with the explicit purpose of overcoming them.
I suppose we could take it down with ground-to-air missiles, but maybe that would give the Chinese government what they want. Probably dangerous for civilians along the balloon’s path, too.
Whatever the reason it’s there and we’re not taking it out, the incursion is unsettling to me and I’m not happy with our government’s response.
Have a good weekend.