Still assessing what exactly intel China was able to gather from spy balloon, says Pentagon
Washington (PTI): The United States has said it is still doing an assessment of what exactly intelligence information China was able to gather from its spy balloon that flew over sensitive American military sites in February.
The comments from the Pentagon came after a media report said the Chinese spy balloon gathered information about some of the US military sites through electronic signals.
"As of right now, we're still doing an assessment of what exactly the intel was that China was able to gather but we do know that the steps that we took provided little additive value for what they've been able to collect from satellites before," Pentagon Deputy Press Secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters at a news conference here.
The balloon had entered the United States from Alaska on January 28 and crossed through several States over various sensitive military sites, including Montana where the US stores some of its nuclear assets, before it was shot down in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of South Carolina on February 4.
NBC News, citing two current senior US officials and one former senior administration official, said China was able to control the balloon so it could make multiple passes over some of the sites (at times flying figure eight formations) and transmit the information it collected back to Beijing in real-time.
"The intelligence China collected was mostly from electronic signals, which can be picked up from weapons systems or include communications from base personnel, rather than images, the officials said," the news channel said.
Responding to questions, Singh said because of the steps that the US was able to take, it was able to prevent transmission of certain aspects of the sites to be transmitted.
"But in terms of transmission back to the PRC (People's Republic of China) and what was able to be transmitted back, I just don't have further information for you at this time," she said.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation, she said, is still assessing the parts that the US was able to recover from the balloon.
"As we mentioned early on when we first started tracking the balloon, we do know that the balloon was able to be manoeuvred and purposely driven along its track but not going to get into specific sites it was able to hover over," Singh said.
"But what we did do is take precautionary steps to limit the intelligence value that it would be able to collect and we took steps to protect our military installations from foreign intelligence collection," she said.
The White House told the reporters that the spy balloon had limited ability to collect intelligence information.
"As the Pentagon said before, the surveillance balloon, we believe, had limited ability to collect any much additional intelligence beyond what could be collected through other surveillance means," White House Deputy Press Secretary Olivia Dalton told reporters during an Air Force One gaggle.
Following the news reports, Senator Roger Wicker, ranking member of Senate Armed Services, said "these revelations" clearly demonstrate that the administration made an "unacceptable mistake".
"We have consistently learned more from press reports about the Chinese surveillance balloon than we have from administration officials. These revelations clearly demonstrate that the administration made an unacceptable mistake," he said in a statement.
"I will not abandon my oversight efforts to discover the full range of information related to this event, and I intend to hold this administration accountable. It is critical that Congress also explores the capability and protocol improvements at the Department of Defense that are necessary to prevent something like this failure from ever happening again," Wicker said.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Leopard spotted near Kadri Manjunath Temple in Mangaluru
Mangaluru: A leopard was spotted in Doctors’ Colony near the Kadri Manjunath Temple area in Mangaluru in the early hours of Monday, February 23, creating anxiety among residents of the locality.
According to local residents, the animal was spotted in the CCTV footage of two cameras installed in the locality around 1 am near the entrance gate of Doctors’ Colony. The footage shows the leopard walking calmly in front of the gate before moving out of view.
The sighting has come as a surprise as the area is largely urbanised, with apartment complexes and villa-type houses dominating the surroundings. Except for a small patch of forested land above the Kadri temple area, there is little greenery nearby. Residents say the concrete landscape offers limited scope for wild animals to find food.
This is not the first time wild animals have been spotted in the locality. Two years ago, a wild gaur had entered the same area and was later guided back into the forest through Shaktinagar. Just last week, a smaller leopard was sighted in Shaktinagar and was also captured on CCTV cameras. Now, a bigger leopard has been recorded near Kadri.
So far, no one has reported a direct sighting of the animal, and no formal complaint has been lodged with the Forest Department.
Forest Department officials said leopard movement is common during the months of January and February, as the animals often enter human settlements in search of food. In areas near forests, they usually prey on poultry and stray dogs.
Officials added that leopards are capable of travelling 15 to 20 kilometres in a single night and generally do not remain in one place if they are unable to find food. While sightings are more common in forest-fringe areas such as Bajpe and Neermarga, repeated appearances within core city limits this time have caused concern among residents.
