The US military and intelligence community had been tracking the Chinese spy balloon because it launched from a base on Hainan Island near the southern coast of China — and officials are actually looking into the chance that it could have drifted off beam, in line with a report.
US officials told the Washington Post on Tuesday that the balloon shot down off the coast of South Carolina earlier this month had been monitored for nearly every week before it penetrated US airspace, and that it initially appeared that the surveillance balloon was heading toward Guam before it took an unexpected turn to the north.
Intelligence analysts are usually not sure whether the balloon’s sharp turn north was intentional or accidental, but consider the surveillance craft was likely on its solution to spy on US military installations within the Pacific before its path suddenly shifted.
The balloon wound up floating over Alaska’s Aleutian Islands on Jan. 28 after which entered Canada before strong winds appear to have pushed it south into the continental US on Jan. 31, the officials told the Washington Post, adding that analysts are examining the chance that China didn’t intentionally direct the spy craft to penetrate the US mainland.
Nevertheless, once it crossed the US border with Canada, US officials say Beijing took advantage of the chance to collect intelligence and directed the craft to loiter over Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana, which houses one-third of the country’s land-based nuclear missile arsenal.
Because the balloon hovered over the Big Sky State on Feb. 1, it was spotted by civilians.
A senior US official told the Washington Post that China’s balloon surveillance program appears to be meant to “augment the satellite systems” the communist country has in place, and that it’s “part of a bigger set of programs which are about gaining greater clarity about military facilities in the USA and in quite a lot of other countries.”
The People’s Liberation Army Air Force was tasked with launching the balloon from Hainan Island, in line with the report. The craft was outfitted with propellers and a rudder, allowing for some maneuverability, nevertheless it was partly directed by air currents, the news outlet said.
A US official told the Washington Post that the downed balloon’s payload, described as the dimensions of three school buses, has still not been analyzed but that “it doesn’t appear like it’s a dramatic latest capability.”
“It looks prefer it’s more collection — everybody at all times wants more,” the official said.
US intelligence officials don’t consider that three other objects shot down over the weekend by US military aircraft were tied to China’s spy balloon program, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters Tuesday.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Tuesday that “the intelligence community is considering as a number one explanation that these might be tied to business or research entities and benign.”