Tag: United States Defense and Military Forces

After Spy Balloon Clash, U.S.-China Tensions Loom Over Biden’s Speech

Chin@Strategy

While Russia’s war in Ukraine presents a more urgent day-to-day foreign policy issue for President Biden and his aides, they have said repeatedly that China is the greatest long-term challenger to American power — even as the two countries maintain robust trade ties. The spy balloon episode that unfolded in the skies above the United States last week and a resulting surge in diplomatic tensions have underscored that. Many of the Democratic and Republican lawmakers who will be in the chamber when Mr. Biden delivers his State of the Union…

After Spy Balloon Incident, China Rejects Pentagon’s Request to Speak

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — The Pentagon said on Tuesday that China had rejected a request from Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III to speak with his Chinese counterpart on Saturday soon after an American fighter jet shot down a Chinese spy balloon off the coast of South Carolina. As the debris was settling into the Atlantic and Navy divers were beginning the arduous task of trying to recover the balloon’s sensors and other surveillance equipment, the Pentagon reached out to China to clear the air. “We believe in the importance of maintaining…

Trump-Era Chinese Spy Balloon Incursions Initially Went Undetected

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — The top military commander overseeing North American airspace said Monday that some previous incursions by Chinese spy balloons during the Trump administration were not detected in real time, and the Pentagon learned of them only later. “I will tell you that we did not detect those threats, and that’s a domain awareness gap,” said Gen. Glen D. VanHerck, the commander of the Pentagon’s Northern Command. One explanation, multiple U.S. officials said, is that some previous incursions were initially classified as “unidentified aerial phenomena,” Pentagon speak for U.F.O.s. As the…

Previous Chinese Balloon Incursions Initially Went Undetected

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — The top military commander overseeing North American airspace said Monday that some previous incursions by Chinese spy balloons during the Trump administration were not detected in real time, and the Pentagon learned of them only later. “I will tell you that we did not detect those threats, and that’s a domain awareness gap,” said Gen. Glen D. VanHerck, the commander of the Pentagon’s Northern Command. One explanation, multiple U.S. officials said, is that some previous incursions were initially classified as “unidentified aerial phenomena,” Pentagon speak for U.F.O.s. As the…

Balloon Incident Reveals More Than Spying as Competition With China Intensifies

Chin@Strategy

Of course, there is nothing new about superpowers spying on one another, even from balloons. President Dwight D. Eisenhower authorized surveillance of the Soviet Union by lofting cameras on balloons in the mid-1950s, flying them “over Soviet bloc countries under the guise of meteorological research,” according to an article published by the National Archives in 2009. It “yielded more protests from the Kremlin than it did useful intelligence,” the author, David Haight, an archivist at the Eisenhower Library, reported. With the advent of the first spy satellites, the balloons appeared…

Downing of Chinese Spy Balloon Ends Chapter in a Diplomatic Crisis

Chin@Strategy

Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, alerted Mr. Biden. By Wednesday, when the balloon had made its way to the skies above Billings, Mont., Pentagon officials were alarmed because the state is home to the 341st Missile Wing at Malmstrom Air Force Base, one of three U.S. Air Force bases that operate and maintain intercontinental ballistic missiles. One Pentagon official described shock at what officials viewed as a blatant, and poorly concealed, effort at spying. A senior Biden administration official called the move audacious.…

U.S. Shoots Down Chinese Spy Balloon Off the Coast of the Carolinas

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — The United States shot down a Chinese spy balloon on Saturday that had spent the last week traversing the country, American officials said, an explosive end to a drama that put a diplomatic crisis between the world’s two great powers onto television screens in real time. The balloon, which spent five days traveling in a diagonal southeast route from Idaho to the Carolinas, had moved off the coast by midday Saturday and was over the Atlantic Ocean. The Federal Aviation Administration had paused departures and arrivals at airports…

Chinese Spy Balloon or ‘Civilian Device’?

Chin@Strategy

WASHINGTON — American military officials on Thursday said they had detected a “high-altitude surveillance balloon” launched by China floating in the skies of Montana, causing a diplomatic panic that led Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken to postpone a planned trip to Beijing. On Friday, Chinese officials declared that the floating orb was a “mainly meteorological” balloon and described its drift into American airspace as caused by “force majeure” — forces beyond a party’s control, which cannot be considered a violation. The development comes months after President Biden and President…

U.S. Detects Suspected Chinese Spy Balloon Hovering Over Northwest

Chin@Strategy

Secretary of State Antony Blinken has postponed his trip to China after a surveillance balloon was detected flying over the U.S. Read the latest. WASHINGTON — The United States has detected what it says is a Chinese surveillance balloon that has been hovering over the northwestern United States, the Pentagon said on Thursday, a discovery that comes days before Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken’s visit to Beijing. President Biden has chosen, for now, not to shoot down the balloon after a recommendation from Pentagon officials that doing so would…

Blinken Postpones Trip to China After Balloon Is Detected Over U.S.

Chin@Strategy

China’s Ministry of National Defense, which usually comments on military issues, did not comment. “China is a responsible country, always strictly abides by international law, and has no intention of violating any sovereign country’s territory or airspace,” Mao Ning, a spokeswoman for the foreign ministry, told a regular news briefing on Friday afternoon. But she said then that the authorities needed to check the reports. The Global Times, a Communist Party-run newspaper that has become a vehicle for pugnacious, sometimes quasi-official reactions from Beijing, suggested that the balloon reports were…