The huge Chinese balloon has ignited domestic curiosities, political finger-pointing, and an international diplomatic crisis, leaving Americans across the middle swath of the country looking to the skies for the white floating apparatus. Where it will go remains unknown, but officials have confirmed it continues to move east and dismiss Beijing's insistence it is a weather balloon that got blown off track.
The Pentagon said Friday it does not plan to shoot down a suspected Chinese spy balloon floating 60,000 feet above the U.S. because "any potential debris field would be significant" and could cause "civilian injuries or deaths or significant property damage” — but did not provide a plan to respond to the slow-moving violation of "U.S. airspace and international law."
Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday postponed a trip to Beijing next week after China said a suspected high-altitude surveillance balloon spotted over the United States was in fact a “civilian airship” used for weather research.
Many prominent Republicans said the U.S. should have shot down the balloon.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s bid to slow the downward spiral in relations between the world’s two largest economies has been blown off course by a Chinese balloon.
Chase Doak took video of an object in the sky Billings, Montana, on the same day a suspected spy balloon passed over the area, according to the Pentagon.
