The Defense Department insists Beijing’s assertion about the dirigible’s civilian nature is false.
A Defense Department spokesperson said Wednesday that the Chinese high-altitude balloon shot down off the East Coast last weekend was definitely not civilian in nature.
Pentagon press secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder told a media briefing there was no possibility the dirigible was a weather-monitoring balloon, as has been insisted by Chinese officials.
“I can assure you this was not for civilian purposes. We are 100 percent clear about that,” said Ryder, who called the balloon “an intelligence-collection capability.” If it were a weather balloon, he said, any “responsible nation” would have notified governments before an errant aircraft crossed into another’s sovereign airspace.
“The [People’s Republic of China] did not do that. They didn’t respond until after they were called out,” Ryder said.
The United States believes the balloon was part of a larger Chinese surveillance balloon program, whose purpose is to surveil military sites. The program has been operational for several years, with similar craft spotted over at least five continents, he said.
