Page 671 - Balloon News Today

Very excited. >> fancy that. >> reporter: can we just go back for a moment. another aircraft of some sort, airship, balloon, something, was shot down today. who owns it? what were the circumstances? was the president directly involved in ordering this? and is wreckage being recovered? >> im going to try. yes, the president was involved in this decision. he ordered it at the recommendation of pentagon leaders. he wanted it taken down, and they did that. they did it using fighter aircraft, assigne...

40,000 foot range, has it happened before? and second of all, why did you -- can you say more about why you knew that last balloon or object was from china whereas this one you dont know? >> so in terms of this particular object, again, as i highlighted, we dont know where its from. it posed a reasonable threat to civilian air traffic, and so the determination was made to take it down. in terms of the other balloon, as i mentioned in our previous briefing, we have learned a lot about the chinese...

Threat to civilian air traffic. could not confirm if this was manned, this object was manned or not. interesting for them to come forward with so many details unknown. forward with so many details unknown-— forward with so many details unknown. , . , ., , unknown. they have been really open about it, but — unknown. they have been really open about it, but they _ unknown. they have been really open about it, but they have _ unknown. they have been really open about it, but they have been - un...

Certainly curtail anything that would be above and beyond, you know what they normally try to collect through other means. >> thank you, john. was this latest object shot down within the last hour was that based upon any information gleaned from the monitoring of the last balloon over the last -- over the last week, in terms of what you learned about that chinese program? did that inform the decision to shoot this down? >> i think i would be careful saying anything specific to what we learned fr...

About balloons in there. he spent a lot of money and effort, but no balloons, we learn about taiwan and chinas balance of power against them and satellites and jets, no balloons, why not? >> tony, what i would say on the unclassified china power report, there are going to be certain elements intelligence aspects in the unclassified version that may not be included in that particular report, in terms of what is in that report and what is not in that report, again, we can go back and look at that,...

Probably had no idea how little we are able to ascertain in realtime when it comes to any sort of reconnaissance aircraft or balloon or whatever that enters our airspace. i mean this one entered our airspace and the government, the biden administration says they still dont know where it came from. obviously there was all that retro inspection that found balloons that happened during the trump years, but they found it during the biden years. part of the pentagon is the national reconnaissance off...

Saturday. the way it was described to me was roughly the size of a small car. as opposed to a payload that was, like, two or three buses sized, right. so much, much smaller. and not of the same -- not -- no significant payload, if you will. >> is it now the policy of the united states that if unidentified aircraft are over u.s. territory that it is likely the president will choose to shoot it down? >> the president will always act in the best interest of our national security and in the safety a...

Over or in alaskan airspace. it proves that they can do it. we can do it. we will see what the debris field looks like the recovery so forth and so on. >> john: john kirby the national security spokesman with the announcement about the latest shootdown and former defense secretary mark esper saying well, this sort of undermines their reasons for not bringing down the other balloon earlier. lets bring in our panel. harold ford jr. former tennessee congressman and co-host of "the five" with us. mo...

You can lain on the frozen water. i temperature in prudhoe bay is minus 20 degrees, dangerous, freezing conditions and you have oilfields up there, might be a reason something is floating overhead taking a look. >> neil: thank you, lucas at the pentagon with all of that. speaking of the china balloon and recovery effort to get as much of that as possible, it is going on for a number of days, brian yennes is in south carolina with how that is going. brian. >> neil, fox news learn china spy balloo...

Ukrainian people, the u.s./polish alliance? >> i wont get ahead of the presidents remarks. certainly im not going to do that. again, the president will make it very clear that the united states will continue to stand with ukraine for as long as it takes. he will continue to call for the kind of international unity that we have seen, not just across nato, but across the world, not just across europe. and i think he will certainly make clear that additional security assistance, additional financia...