China claims the suspected Chinese high-altitude surveillance balloon flying over the continental United States is a “civilian airship” used mainly for weather research that deviated from its planned course, CNN reports….
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“The State Department has indefinitely postponed Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s trip to Beijing after what U.S. officials identified as a Chinese reconnaissance balloon was detected loitering above the continental U.S.,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“U.S. officials on Thursday said the craft was loitering over Montana having earlier crossed Alaska’s Aleutian Islands and Canada. The Pentagon scrambled jets and at one point considered shooting down the balloon, the officials said, though didn’t over concerns that the debris posed a risk to people on the ground.”
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“House Speaker Kevin McCarthy on Thursday night called for a briefing of the ‘Gang of Eight‘ — the group of lawmakers charged with reviewing the nation’s most sensitive intelligence information — following reports of a Chinese spy balloon flying over Montana,” Politicoreports.
Note…
Anyone think the Chinese would just let an American spy ballon just hang over their country’s balistic missile locations?