US shoots down fourth object as China flings new accusation

Bloomberg

The US military had never shot down an object in American airspace before taking out a Chinese balloon off South Carolina earlier this month. Now it’s becoming a near-daily occurrence.
The sudden spate of US jets blasting unidentified objects of mysterious origin from the skies has provoked so much befuddlement — not to mention panic — that Pentagon officials were forced to field questions about the issue, just as Americans were tuning into the second quarter of the Super Bowl. One reporter even asked if it was possible the objects-turned-targets were sent by
extraterrestrials.
“I haven’t ruled out anything at this point,” said General Glen VanHerck, commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command.
In reality, the answer is probably more mundane. Officials said they had started watching the skies more closely in the days since the alleged Chinese spy balloon traversed US territory, provoking both a national uproar and a new round of tensions with China.
That resulted in the US shooting down smaller objects over Alaska on Friday, northern Canada on Saturday, and Michigan on Sunday.
“We have been more closely scrutinising our airspace at these altitudes, including enhancing our radar, which may at least partly explain the increase in objects that we’ve detected over the past week,” Assistant Secretary of Defense Melissa Dalton told reporters.
The growing number of incidents is raising more questions about the direction of relations between the world’s two largest economies, especially now that the Biden administration is hyper-alert about the threat it says is posed by a global Chinese military-backed surveillance program spanning more than 40 countries — a claim Beijing has rejected.
China also stepped up accusations against the Biden administration, saying the US sent balloons over its territory more than 10 times since the beginning of 2022.
Over the weekend, a Chinese news outlet, The Paper, said China was getting ready to take down an unidentified object flying over its waters near the port city of Qingdao.
“It is nothing rare for US balloons to illegally enter other country’s airspace,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters at a regular briefing in Beijing. “We reserve the right to take necessary means to deal with relevant incidents.”
National Security Council spokeswoman Adrienne Watson called reports of it using surveillance balloons over China “false” and turned the accusation back on China. “This is the latest example of China scrambling to do damage control,” she said.
While each incident in the US may have a reasonable explanation, questions persist for the Biden administration. The most immediate: Will the Pentagon send up fighter jets every time it spots some new object — be it a weather balloon, a hobbyist’s craft or a drone — if it potentially threatens civilian aviation or drifts near one of many military sites scattered across the country?