London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Monday, Jun 02, 2025

U.S. military completes recovery of Chinese balloon, now analyzing its 'guts'

U.S. military completes recovery of Chinese balloon, now analyzing its 'guts'

The United States said on Friday it had successfully concluded recovery efforts off South Carolina to collect sensors and other debris from a suspected Chinese surveillance balloon shot down by a U.S. fighter jet on Feb. 4, and investigators are now analyzing its "guts."
The last of the debris fro the Chinese balloon, which was downed by a Sidewinder missile, is heading to an FBI laboratory in Virginia for analysis, the U.S. military's Northern Command said in a statement.

Reuters was first to report the conclusion of the recovery efforts, which were halted on Thursday.

"It's a significant amount (of recovered material), including the payload structure as well as some of the electronics and the optics, and all that's now at the FBI laboratory in Quantico," said National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby.

Kirby said the United States had already learned a lot about the balloon by observing it as it flew over the United States.

"We're going to learn even more, we believe, by getting a look at the guts inside it and seeing how it worked and what it was capable of," he told a White House news briefing.

The U.S. military said Navy and Coast Guard vessels that had been scouring the sea for nearly two weeks have departed the area.

"Air and maritime safety perimeters have been lifted," Northern Command said in a statement.

The U.S. military has said it believes it has collected all of the Chinese balloon's priority sensors and electronics as well as large sections of its structure, elements that could help counterintelligence officials determine how Beijing may have been collecting and transmitting surveillance information.

The Chinese balloon, which Beijing denies was a government spy vessel, spent a week flying over the United States and Canada before being shot down off the Atlantic Coast on orders from President Joe Biden.

The episode caused an uproar in Washington and led the U.S. military to search the skies for other objects that were not being captured on radar. The military's Northern Command carried out an unprecedented three shootdowns of unidentified "objects" between last Friday and Sunday.

But Biden's administration sought on Friday to temper expectations about recovery efforts for those three objects, which fell over challenging terrain and, in one case, the very deep waters of Lake Huron.

"We all have to accept the possibility that we may not be able to recover it," Kirby said, noting it would be difficult to identify those objects without finding debris.

The Chinese balloon incident also prompted U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to postpone a planned visit earlier this month to Beijing and has further strained already frayed ties between Washington and Beijing.

That Blinken trip would have been the first by a U.S. secretary of state to China in five years and was seen by both sides as an opportunity to stabilize increasingly fraught ties.

U.S. officials have since been looking at the possibility of a meeting between Blinken and China's top diplomat Wang Yi on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference that began on Friday.

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, who is also in Munich for the conference, has defended the administration's handling of the balloon incident and the shooting down of the three other objects.

The Chinese balloon "needed to be shot down because we were confident that it was used by China to spy on American people," Harris told MSNBC.

"We will maintain the perspective that we have in terms of what should be the relationship between China and the United States," she said. "That is not going to change, but surely and certainly that balloon was not helpful."
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Ukraine Executes Long-Range Drone Strikes on Russian Airbases
Conservative Karol Nawrocki wins Poland’s presidential election
Study Identifies Potential Radicalization Risk Among Over One Million Muslims in Germany
Good news: Annalena Baerbock Elected President of the UN General Assembly
Apple Appeals EU Law Over User Data Sharing Requirements
South Africa: "First Black Bank" Collapses after Being Looted by Owners
Poland will now withdraw from the EU migration pact after pro-Trump nationalist wins Election
"That's Disgusting, Don’t Say It Again": The Trump Joke That Made the President Boil
Trump Cancels NASA Nominee Over Democratic Donations
Paris Saint-Germain's Greatest Triumph Is Football’s Lowest Point
OnlyFans for Sale: From Lockdown Lifeline to Eight-Billion-Dollar Empire
Mayor’s Security Officer Implicated | Shocking New Details Emerge in NYC Kidnapping Case
Hegseth Warns of Potential Chinese Military Action Against Taiwan
OPEC+ Agrees to Increase Oil Output for Third Consecutive Month
Jamie Dimon Warns U.S. Bond Market Faces Pressure from Rising Debt
Turkey Detains Istanbul Officials Amid Anti-Corruption Crackdown
Taylor Swift Gains Ownership of Her First Six Albums
Bangkok Ranked World's Top City for Remote Work in 2025
Satirical Sketch Sparks Political Spouse Feud in South Korea
Indonesia Quarry Collapse Leaves Multiple Dead and Missing
South Korean Election Video Pulled Amid Misogyny Outcry
Asian Economies Shift Away from US Dollar Amid Trade Tensions
Netflix Investigates Allegations of On-Set Mistreatment in K-Drama Production
US Defence Chief Reaffirms Strong Ties with Singapore Amid Regional Tensions
Vietnam Faces Strategic Dilemma Over China's Mekong River Projects
Malaysia's First AI Preacher Sparks Debate on Islamic Principles
White House Press Secretary Criticizes Harvard Funding, Advocates for Vocational Training
France to Implement Nationwide Smoking Ban in Outdoor Spaces Frequented by Children
Meta and Anduril Collaborate on AI-Driven Military Augmented Reality Systems
Russia's Fossil Fuel Revenues Approach €900 Billion Since Ukraine Invasion
U.S. Justice Department Reduces American Bar Association's Role in Judicial Nominations
U.S. Department of Energy Unveils 'Doudna' Supercomputer to Advance AI Research
U.S. SEC Dismisses Lawsuit Against Binance Amid Regulatory Shift
Alcohol Industry Faces Increased Scrutiny Amid Health Concerns
Italy Faces Population Decline Amid Youth Emigration
U.S. Goods Imports Plunge Nearly 20% Amid Tariff Disruptions
OpenAI Faces Competition from Cheaper AI Rivals
Foreign Tax Provision in U.S. Budget Bill Alarms Investors
Trump Accuses China of Violating Trade Agreement
Gerry Adams Wins Libel Case Against BBC
Russia Accuses Serbia of Supplying Arms to Ukraine
EU Central Bank Pushes to Replace US Dollar with Euro as World’s Main Currency
Chinese Woman Dies After Being Forced to Visit Bank Despite Critical Illness
President Trump Grants Full Pardons to Reality TV Stars Todd and Julie Chrisley
Texas Enacts App Store Accountability Act Mandating Age Verification
U.S. Health Secretary Ends Select COVID-19 Vaccine Recommendations
Vatican Calls for Sustainable Tourism in 2025 Message
Trump Warns Putin Is 'Playing with Fire' Amid Escalating Ukraine Conflict
India and Pakistan Engage Trump-Linked Lobbyists to Influence U.S. Policy
U.S. Halts New Student Visa Interviews Amid Enhanced Security Measures
×