"I can't confirm whether it had explosives or not. Anytime you down something like this, we make an assumption that that potential exists," Air Force General Glen D. VanHerck, commander of U.S. Northern Command told reporters. "We did not associate the potential of having explosives with a threat to dropping weapons, those kinds of things, but out of a precaution, abundance of safety for not only our military people and the public, we have to make assumptions such as that."The Chinese surveillance balloon discovered hovering over the United States last week reportedly may have contained self-destructive explosives.
A Pentagon official revealed the Chinese surveillance balloon — which was 200 feet tall, weighed thousands of pounds, and had a payload comparable to the size of a jetliner — potentially carried explosives designed to self-destruct, DailyMail reported.Loading...
VanHerck's statement followed a briefing by National Security Council spokesman John Kirby who defended President Biden's decision to postpone shooting the surveillance balloon down until Saturday.
"The president decided they wouldn't shoot it down until he could do so safely — and that meant over water — that afforded us a terrific opportunity to gain a better understanding to study the capabilities of this balloon," Kirby told reporters.
"The time that we had to study this balloon over the course of a few days last week, we believe was important and will give us a lot more clarity, not only on the capabilities that these balloons have, but what China is trying to do with them," Kirby continued. "It hasn't gotten a lot of attention and I understand there's criticism over the fact that it traversed the United States, but again, we took steps to mitigate whatever collection capability that balloon would have over our sensitive military sites."
A senior Biden administration official also alleged three suspected Chinese surveillance balloons previously flew over the United States during former President Trump’s administration, though the former President and previous administration members denied the claim.
"The Chinese Balloon situation is a disgrace … now they are putting out that a Balloon was put up by China during the Trump Administration, in order to take the ‘heat’ off the slow moving Biden fools," said the former President in a Truth Social post.
"China had too much respect for ‘TRUMP’ for this to have happened, and it NEVER did," he added, saying the claim was "fake disinformation."
"Did the Biden administration invent a time machine? What is the basis of this new detection?" asked former Trump administration national security adviser John Bolton.
However, Bolton said he would participate in a Biden administration briefing on the alleged Trump-era Chinese surveillance balloon discoveries.
The United States military initially decided against shooting the surveillance balloon down, citing fear of endangering bystanders in the vicinity of the balloon, CNN reported. However, on Saturday, the surveillance balloon was shot down by a United States fighter jet off the coast of South Carolina.
President Biden claimed he ordered to Pentagon to shoot the Chinese surveillance balloon down after he was briefed about its existence last Wednesday, according to CNN.
House Republicans are reportedly considering the passage of a resolution condemning the Biden administration’s handling of the surveillance balloon.
"The admin should have taken care of this before it became a national security threat. I hope we will be able to recover the wreckage to help determine what intelligence the CCP collected while its spy balloon was over our country for days," said Texas representative Michael McCaul, a Republican, who serves as chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee. "I will be demanding answers and will hold the admin accountable for this embarrassing display of weakness."
