Page 879 - Capabilities News Today

Basically trying to determine what threat to u.s. national security was there from this intelligence collection platform in and to the extent that the intelligence apparatus of this balloon actually survived, the fbi would be trying to look at that to determine what were its capabilities? was this the realtime collection that weve heard about is this was it stored collection? a lot of questions there, obviously. i can tell you, having worked in the fbi, a lot of people, when you think about the ...

Typically, they are quiet, theyre more difficult to find, and are not this brazen. they>> tracey, just a follow-upn one part of this, and i think a lot of people are wondering about, what can counter intelligence agents hope to learn from the middle balloon, this debris that will be recovered? >> the one thing that could come out of this is this can be, i guess what i would say an intelligence bin for us. in that its sometimes nice when something like this happens. we can recover the data, we ca...

What the pentagon will focus on and others will focus on. it does become an extraordinary opportunity, perhaps, to learn about chinese technologies. the u.s. knows there are u.s. spy satellites going overhead all the time. that doesnt mean you can look at one up close and see what kind of tech it has on it. this is a unique opportunity to see the tecum close and get a look at what they were looking for, how they controlled and it what other capabilities it may have been as it made its way over s...

Balloon? theyre satellites. as we were talking about, there are cyber intrusions and that sort of thing. theyve been doing that for years. yl a balloon? >> well, why when i came in, we were using balloons to drop sensors. we would love to have a balloon over where they test their nuclear weapons. but we dont. were not provoking the chinese. these balloons are technologically advanced. way beyond satellites in many aspects. how far this would go is far beyond anything. >> we were talking to james...

Only the shoot down but also falling to the water. but assuming it did, if investigators are able to look at that and re-create that, that could then answer a lot of important questions. not only what this device was, but assuming this was something sophisticated in nature perhaps that could be an intelligence gold mine for the u.s. intelligence community as well about the chinese governments tactics and capabilities. there will be a calculus, wolf, about what actually the fbi or the intelligenc...

We dont really know what the americans, if anything, were able to jam or block as it flew along. but what sorts of things might the payload reveal once the americans get it off the ocean floor? >> well, that largely depends on just what the shape of the payload is. i mean, its fallen from 60,000 feet, as you saw in the shoot-down video. the payload, the instrumentation package, and the solar paneled separated from the balloon itself, which was ruptured by the sidewinder shot. so it would have be...

China spying on us. in this case, china got caught. >> you know, tracey, we do know u.s. military officials have told the media that they werent able to scope this balloon out, get the idea of the technology that was on board, the payload of this particular bloom, what is it you are hoping to learn from the debris it is actively recovering from the atlantic ocean right now? >> that is a great question. im actually hopeful from what we can discover from this debris. it sounds like they shouted do...

Here. and they never acted so brazenly. this is a shocking turn of events and they are quiet, they are difficult to find and they are not this breeze of. >> tracey, just a follow-up, on one part of this, that i think a lot of people are wondering about. what can counter intelligence agents hope to learn from the wreckage of the balloon, this debris that is going to be recovered? >> you know, the one thing that can come out of this is that this can be, what i would say, an intelligence balloon ri...

Capabilities as well this is something we have to be concerned about. not just for china but all of our adversaries. >> reporter: the balloon was 60,000 feet above sea level when it was shot down. for reference a typical commercial plane cruising level is 35,000 feet. rachel: interesting. one of the interesting things, that little gag gel he had where joe biden was commented on the balloon, what is your message to china? he never answered that question. i find that very curious as well. >> repor...

It went to the east coast of the united states. it was specifically designed, following a path that allowed it to go over our nuclear capabilities as well as critical infrastructure, thereby endangering the united states and should have been taken out much sooner than what it was. pete: why dont you think it was, commander? what spin could possibly be used -- is it really a safety issue? often times leaders hide behind safety rather than doing the right thing? >> thats a good question, pete. i d...