Page 595 - Balloon News Today

BEIJING (Reuters) -- China said on Wednesday that U.S. high altitude balloons flew over its Xinjiang and Tibet regions, and that it will take measures

Seem to know what these objects are. one thing theyre communicating very clearly however is that its not a chinese balloon and thats really as far as they seem to want to be able to take it right now. >> laura: well, im not sure i believe any of what theyre saying. i mean, i get they can say that but we dont have any way of confirming that. ryan i want to get your reaction to something john kirby said today. >> these very well could be balloons of a completely benign nature, perhaps commercial o...

Are? >> its unclear. it is unclear exactly what the policy is. dana, over 250 of these unidentified objects were found last year. unclassified from our director of national intelligence. none were shot down. we have a balloon flown over alaska ends up being shot down over north carolina and sudden le we shoot down three. seems to me those were similar. has there been a change in risk calculus or change in policy, do we know something about the three that followed the balloon that we didnt know a...

And this is important because if in fact it is proven or shown or intelligence suggests that this path towards the continental united states from china where it was originally launched was in fact unintentional, this would go a pretty long way in easing tensions between the u.s. and china. but just to take you back a minute, the u.s. did track this balloon from the moment that it took off from china. originally based on the flight path that it kind of settled in, the u.s. believed it was going t...

China to impose countermeasures on US entities, in a response to US illegally sanctioning Chinese firms over the balloon case, Foreign Ministry says.

China has much to feel awkward about in its international dealings. Issues that attract common international ire include Beijings bullying of Taiwan, its imperial claims over the South China Sea, its global espionage, its trade manipulation, its mix of repressive and genocidal domestic policies, its debt diplomacy, and its gutting of fishing habitats.

Less likely anything would escape detection. >> john: so in terms of escaping detection, senator kennedy, your colleague was on this morning and told me in yesterdays briefing he learned the pentagon or intelligence at least was watching this balloon from before it was launched, when it was launched, all the way across the pacific ocean, came toward the united states and he believes unless somebody had spotted it and reported it, the intelligence community likely wouldnt have said boo about it a...

>> absolutely. >> okay, we dont have that sound, jeremy, go ahead. >> what is amazing, we now know a week before the balloon got into our air space, we had eyes on it and knew it was happening. when it was flying over our country, the white house said, we want more information on it, we are concerned about civilian impact here. that was hog wash, they knew a week before, it could have been shot down in the territorial water over alaska. >> harris: or guam, we watched this since january 21, it ha...

So in order to do that, you have to have somebody to talk to and that in respect on the sidelines of munich security conference, i think it makes sense to at least establish those lines of communication to deconflict and avoid such conflict. >> lastly, do you think the president should address the public about this balloon later this week? >> look, i think when we know more about the other elements that were taken down, which appear to be different in context but raise questions about even if th...

On china in a much more robust way than we are right now. >> it camomes as relations are an all-time low. theyre not returning calls from their u.s. counterparts. the secretary of state in response to the balloon postponed a meeting with president xi and it is reported that he may be meeting with his counterpart. would you support that? >> look, i think having open lines of communication, especially so that we deconflict any potential risk of conflict that is unintended is incredibly important a...