On Friday’s broadcast of Newsmax TV’s “The Record,” House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party Chairman Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI) stated that there hasn’t been “a coherent answer for” why the United States didn’t shoot down the Chinese spy balloon as it was crossing over the Aleutian Islands, where falling debris wouldn’t have been much of a concern.
Gallagher stated, “I think the question everybody’s asking and which I haven’t gotten a coherent answer for yet is why we didn’t shoot this down as it was transiting over the Aleutian Islands in Alaska in particular. There, there would be really little concern about debris. And if the Pentagon doesn’t have the capability to take it out safely, or even better yet, capture it so we can look under the hood, look at the instrumentation, well then that’s a capability we’re going to have to develop pretty rapidly. Because I suspect this isn’t the last Chinese spy balloon we’re going to see. So, the fact that this is just slowly floating over American sovereign airspace is really an insult. It’s embarrassing to us. And again, I still haven’t gotten a good answer as to why we didn’t shoot it down earlier.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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