[ad_1]
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Thursday said the U.S. will shoot down any future flying objects that threaten American safety in his first remarks about the Chinese spy balloon and unidentified objects shot down by the U.S. military in the skies above North America.
“Make no mistake, if any object presents a threat to the safety and security of the American people, I will take it down,” Biden said.
Biden also said he expects to speak to Chinese President Xi Jinping. Diplomatic relations have been icy in the wake of the balloon being shot out of the skies, which the Chinese have insisted was not intended for spying.
“We’re not looking for a new Cold War, but I make no apologies. I make no apologies and we will compete and will we responsibly manage that competition so that it doesn’t veer into conflict,” Biden said.
Biden said that the U.S. still doesn’t know what the three unidentified objects over North America were that were shot down by the military over the weekend. But, he suggested the intelligence community believes they didn’t have nefarious purposes.
“We don’t yet know exactly what these three objects were, but nothing right now suggests they were related to China’s spy balloon program, or they were surveillance vehicles from other any other country,” Biden said in remarks from the White House. “The intelligence community’s current assessment is that these three objects were most likely balloons tied to private companies, recreation, or research institutions, studying weather or conducting other scientific research.”
Members of Congress, including Democrats, called on Biden to address the situation publicly. Lawmakers were briefed by top officials from the Department of Defense and the office of the director of national intelligence.
“The American people need to hear more about the nature of these objects or whatever they were,” Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said Thursday.
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said at an event Thursday that, in addition to the alleged Chinese spy balloon, the U.S. still doesn’t know what the additional three objects shot down over North America were. One was shot down Friday over Alaska, another was shot down Saturday over Canada, and a third was shot down Sunday over Lake Huron.
“It could be commercial, it could have been weather balloons,” Kirby said at Georgetown University. “They could be scientific research, we just don’t know.”
The U.S. still hasn’t recovered debris from any of the three objects, Kirby said.
“We haven’t found anything just yet because of where they landed and because of the extreme winter weather in these locations,” he said.
The U.S. has been able to retrieve remnants of the alleged Chinese surveillance balloon that was shot down off the coast of South Carolina on Feb. 4, more than a week after it first began traversing the country.
NBC News first reported the existence of China’s alleged spy balloon on Feb. 2.
Earlier this week, Biden directed his national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, to coordinate an interagency team to address the recent spate of objects in the skies.
The interagency team will lay out parameters by the end of the week, Kirby said Tuesday, for how the U.S. will address such objects in the future.
[ad_2]
Source link