Posted on 02/06/2023 3:18:55 AM PST by guinness4strength
A balloon US officials are calling a Chinese surveillance tool spent days flying over the continental United States before it was shot down by an F-22 fighter jet on Saturday.
Pentagon leaders advised President Joe Biden against immediately shooting the flying orb out of the sky due to safety concerns for civilians as the high-altitude object was large enough to create a large debris field, a senior defense official who spoke on background told reporters Thursday.
The dayslong spectacle saw many Republicans criticize the Biden administration for what they viewed as a slow response to the foreign object, while some conservative leaders and pundits took the opportunity to pick at confidence under the Biden administration in general as they claimed no other leader such as Donald Trump would have let a Chinese spy balloon fly over the US.
"Would Trump have let China fly a spy balloon over our country?" Rep. Jim Jordan wrote on Twitter. "Would Reagan? JFK? Truman? No, no, and no."
But senior Pentagon officials said in an on-background press conference on Saturday that suspected Chinese surveillance balloons crossed into the US at least three times during the Trump administration and once earlier in the Biden administration.
"PRC [People's Republic of China] government surveillance balloons transited the continental United States briefly at least three times during the prior administration and once that we know of at the beginning of this administration, but never for this duration of time," a senior defense official said at the conference.
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(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
Trump, others in his cabinet deny Chinese spy balloons flew across the U.S. during Trump administration
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/4128853/posts
Trump’s fault.
REAL officials said it NEVER happened!
I say BS because the Media would have been all over this 24/7. They would cover this just like Russia Russia Russia. Non-stop news cycle.
Simple, Bidung got caught with his diaper down!
That phony story has already been shot down.
I see what you did there
“ transited the continental United States briefly”
Briefly.
What is that supposed to mean.
It means it’s bs.
It happened 3 times during the Trump administration, officials LIE.
This Trump balloon lie is also easily dismissed because the media would have loved to cover that story in order to smear Trump.
.
It’s a giant balloon in the sky. Can’t really hide that.
If it happened someone would have seen it.
Already debunked and the administration walked it back. It happened “after” Trump left office, which means it once again happened on Biden’s watch.
Great point.
I have no doubt balloons and much other surveillance was going on.
People are seriously naive if they don’t think the Chinese and Russians haven’t been constantly trying to do what we do all the time.
This is common. The question is if they get caught.
If it happened, they didn’t tell anyone. That’s the Pentagon’s fault.
you’re way too obvious of an anti-trump troll to be effective ... yes, i took a look at your posting history: definitely anti-trump troll, no doubt about it ...
this particular anti-trump post has reached new levels of stupidity, even for you, given that the dementia joe administration lie that chicom balloons traversed the sky during the trump administration has been repeatedly and credibly repudiated during the last 36 hours ...
This balloon was highly visible. You’d think if it happened in the past, someone would have noticed.
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