U.S.: China sends balloons over military sites worldwide
U.S. intelligence agencies have assessed that China's spy balloon program is part of a global surveillance effort that is designed to collect information on the military capabilities of countries around the world, according to three American officials.
The balloon flights, some officials believe, are part of an effort by China to hone its ability to gather data about U.S. military bases — in which it is most interested — as well as those of other nations in the event of a conflict or rising tensions. U.S. officials said this week that the balloon program has operated out of multiple locations in China.
At a news conference Wednesday, Brig Gen. Patrick S. Ryder, the Pentagon spokesperson, said that over the past several years Chinese balloons have been spotted operating over Latin America, South America, Southeast Asia, East Asia and Europe.
“This is what we assess as part of a larger Chinese surveillance balloon program,” Ryder said.
Antony J. Blinken, the U.S. secretary of state, said at another news conference in Washington that the State Department has shared information on the spy balloon program with dozens of countries.
“We're doing so because the United States was not the only target of this broader program, which has violated the sovereignty of countries across five continents,” he said.
Biden administration officials said over the weekend the balloon that crossed the United States last week was part of a larger Chinese surveillance effort. The Washington Post reported Tuesday new details about China's balloon surveillance program, including that the program had operated partly out of the islands of Hainan province off China's south coast.
The balloons have some advantages over the satellites that orbit the Earth in regular patterns, U.S. officials say. They fly closer to Earth and drift with wind patterns, which are not as predictable to militaries and intelligence agencies as the fixed orbits of satellites, and they can evade radar.
American officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said that intelligence agencies during the Biden administration had developed a far deeper understanding of the scope and size of the Chinese spy balloon effort.
However, U.S. officials said most of the previous observations of the surveillance balloons had been short. The latest spy balloon's transit across the United States gave the U.S. military and intelligence agencies a long period of time to study the capabilities of the surveillance equipment attached to it.
“This last week provided the United States with a unique opportunity to learn a lot more about the Chinese surveillance balloon program, all information that will help us to continue to strengthen our ability to track these kinds of objects,” Ryder said.
“This last week provided the United States with a unique opportunity to learn a lot more about the Chinese surveillance balloon program, all information that will help us to continue to strengthen our ability to track these kinds of objects.” — Brig. Gen. Patrick S. Ryder