President Joe Biden on Thursday will give remarks over a high-altitude Chinese balloon that his administration watched take off from China, traverse the United States – including over sensitive nuclear facilities, before it was shot down off the coast of South Carolina.
Biden will also discuss three other unidentified objects shot down by US fighter jets over North America, two sources tell Reuters.
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Thursday’s comments mark the most substantial made by the US president since the Chinese spy balloon was shot down on February 4 – which Biden said was “not a major breach.”
Including the first balloon, the US Air Force shot down four objects over the span of eight days, prompting the head of NORAD (North American Aerospace Defense Command) said that the Pentagon can’t rule out that a spate of unidentified objects shot out of the sky over the past week might be extraterrestrial in nature.
“I’ll let the intel community and the counterintelligence community figure that out. I haven’t ruled out anything,” said US Air Force General Glen VanHerck, who oversees NORAD, during a Sunday press briefing at the Pentagon. “At this point we continue to assess every threat or potential threat, unknown, that approaches North America with an attempt to identify it.”
VanHerck said that, unlike the Chinese spy balloon, all three UFOs gunned down over the weekend were of a similar size and speed.
He added that the since the Chinese balloon was found in late January, the US adjusted its radar so it could track slower objects. He explained that this radar adjustment, plus the heightened state of alert following the Chinese balloon, explains the frequency of UFO sightings. –Daily Mail
“With some adjustments, we’ve been able to get a better categorization of radar tracks now,” said VanHerck. “‘and that’s why I think you’re seeing these, plus there’s a heightened alert to look for this information.”
The Air Force general added that after the Chinese balloon incident, the US had to adjust its radar to be able to track slower objects – which explains the spate of new UFO sightings and takedowns. This prompted concerns that the US Air Force may have missed untold numbers of UFOs in the past.
“The last 72 hours revealed to the public what was happening for years, unidentified aircraft routinely operating over restricted US airspace,” tweeted Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL). “This is why I pushed to take this seriously and created a permanent UAP task force two years ago.”
Of note, a June report to Congress in 2021 noted 144 sightings by US military aviators dating back to 2004 – one of which was attributed to a large, deflating balloon. The rest were beyond the government’s ability to explain without more analysis. Meanwhile, 366 additional sightings were noted in a January report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence – though most of them were things like drones, birds, balloons or other airborne clutter.
Tyler Durden
Thu, 02/16/2023 – 13:55
