The 'Weirder' Side Of News!

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Whatever you do, don't tell Colonel “Butch” Blanchard.

US tracking suspected Chinese surveillance balloon

'The US is tracking a suspected Chinese surveillance balloon that has been spotted flying over sensitive
sites in recent days. Defence officials said they were confident the "high-altitude surveillance balloon"
belonged to China. It was most recently seen above the western state of Montana.


A Roswell reunion?!

The military decided against shooting it down in case debris falls. China warned against speculation
and "hype" until the facts are verified.

Canada said on Friday that it was monitoring "a potential second incident" involving a surveillance
balloon, but did not say which country could be behind it. It said in the statement that it is working
closely with the US to "safeguard Canada's sensitive information from foreign intelligence threats".

The object flew over Alaska's Aleutian Islands and through Canada before appearing over the city of
Billings in Montana on Wednesday, officials said. A senior defence official speaking on condition of
anonymity said the government prepared fighter jets, including F-22s, in case the White House
ordered the object to be shot down.



Top military leaders, including Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin and General Mark Milley, chairman of
the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, met on Wednesday to assess the threat. Mr Austin was travelling in the
Philippines at the time.

Montana, a sparsely populated state, is home to one of only three nuclear missile silo fields in the
country, at Malmstrom Air Force Base, and officials said the apparent spy craft was flying over
sensitive sites to collect information. But they advised against taking "kinetic action" against the
balloon because of the danger falling debris might pose to people on the ground.

The defence official, however, said there was no "significantly enhanced threat" of US intelligence
being compromised because American officials "know exactly where this balloon is and exactly
where it's passing over". He added that there was also no threat to civilian aviation as the balloon
was "significantly" above the altitude used by commercial airlines. The official said the balloon is
unlikely to give much more information than what China can already collect using satellites.

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China threat The US had raised the matter with Chinese officials in their embassy in Washington
DC and in Beijing, the official added.

China's foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said Beijing is currently attempting to verify the
reports of the surveillance balloon, adding that "until the facts are clear, making conjectures and
hyping up the issue will not help to properly resolve it."

During Thursday's briefing at the Pentagon, officials declined to disclose the aircraft's current location.
They also refused to provide more details of the object, including its size. "There have been reports
of pilots seeing this thing even though it's pretty high up in the sky," the unnamed defence official
said. "So you know, it's sizable."

They added that such surveillance balloons had been tracked in the past several years, but this one
was "appearing to hang out for a longer period of time this time around".

It confused social media users in Montana, with some posting images of a pale round object high
in the sky. Others reported seeing US military planes in the area, apparently monitoring the object.
Billings office worker Chase Doak told the Associated Press news agency that he noticed the "big
white circle in the sky" and went home to get a better camera.

"I thought maybe it was a legitimate UFO," he said. "So I wanted to make sure I documented it and
took as many photos as I could." Chinese state media has not reported on the incident, but it is being
widely discussed on Chinese social media, with many amused at the reported use of balloons for
surveillance.

"We have so many satellites, why would we need to use a balloon," wrote one user on Weibo. Senator
Marco Rubio, the top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee, slammed China's alleged balloon.
"The level of espionage aimed at our country by Beijing has grown dramatically more intense & brazen over
the last 5 years," he tweeted.

Montana Governor Greg Gianforte, a Republican, said in a statement that he had been briefed on the
"deeply troubling" situation. Speaking at an unrelated event in Washington DC on Thursday, CIA Director
William Burns made no mention of the balloon, but called China the "biggest geopolitical challenge"
currently facing the US.

The alleged spy craft is likely to increase tensions ahead of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken's visit to
China next week. It will be the first visit to the country by a Biden administration cabinet secretary. The top
US diplomat will be in Beijing to hold talks on a wide range of issues, including security, Taiwan and Covid-19.
He will also meet Chinese President Xi Jinping, the the Financial Times reported on Thursday.

Balloons are one of oldest forms of surveillance technology. Compared to other air surveillance devices, they
can be operated cheaply without personnel, while remaining airborne for long periods of time...'

BBC: