US spy balloon shooting triggers Chinese condemnation

The United States has shot down a suspected Chinese spy balloon off the coast of the US state of South Carolina, a week after it entered US airspace and triggered a dramatic spying saga that worsened relations between Beijing and Washington.

The military attack on February 4 drew an immediate rebuke from China, which warned of “necessary” responses and insisted the “unmanned civilian airship” was a weather research balloon that had strayed into US airspace “completely accidentally”, Al Jazeera writes.

US defence officials said multiple fighter and refuelling aircraft were involved in the mission on February 4, but just one – an F-22 fighter jet from Langley Air Force Base in Virginia – took the shot at 2:39 pm (19:39 GMT) using a single AIM-9X supersonic, heat-seeking, air-to-air missile.

The balloon, which had been flying at about 18,300 metres (60,000 ft), was shot down about six nautical miles off the coast of South Carolina.

US President Joe Biden told reporters that he had issued an order on February 1 to take down the balloon, but the Pentagon had recommended waiting until it could be done over open water to safeguard civilians from debris crashing to Earth.

“We successfully took it down, and I want to compliment our aviators who did it,” Biden said in Maryland.

The shootdown came shortly after the US government ordered a halt to flights around the South Carolina coast due to what it said at the time was an undisclosed “national security effort”. Flights resumed on Saturday afternoon.

Television footage showed a small explosion, followed by a balloon falling towards the water. The Associated Press news agency said an operation was underway in US territorial waters in the Atlantic Ocean to recover debris from the balloon.

Reuters quoted a US military official as saying that the debris field was spread out over 11 km (seven miles) of the ocean and that multiple military vessels were on site.

US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin called the operation a “deliberate and lawful action” that came in response to China’s “unacceptable violation of our sovereignty”.