The U.S. military brought down the Chinese surveillance balloon on Saturday afternoon once it reached the Atlantic Ocean off the South Carolina coast after it traveled across the continental United States.
President Joe Biden authorized the military to bring it down on Wednesday once it was deemed to safe to do so, which defense officials determined would not be until it was no longer over U.S. territory, according to a Saturday afternoon statement from Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin that confirmed the a U.S. fighter aircraft assigned to U.S. Northern Command successfully shot it down.
The balloon first entered U.S. airspace last Saturday, but then crossed into Canadian airspace until Tuesday when it reentered U.S. airspace over Idaho, before it became publicized over Montana the next day, according to the senior defense official. The balloon traveled across the country, heading through Montana on Thursday before spotted in Kansas on Friday, according to Sen. Roger Marshall , and then traveled over the Carolinas.
"This balloon was clearly crossing over sensitive sites, including sensitive military sites. And so we took additional precautions to make sure that whatever added Intel value would be minimized," the senior defense official added."I would also note that while we take all necessary steps to protect against the PRC surveillance balloon collection of sensitive information to surveillance balloons overflight of US territory was of intelligence value to us.
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