China has high-altitude balloon programme linked to army, White House says

Published

2 years ago

February 14, 2023

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The White House has determined that China has a “high-altitude balloon programme” for intelligence gathering.

It comes as tensions are mounting between the US and China after the US shot down a fourth unidentified object over North American airspace.

It was downed over Lake Huron in Michigan at 2.42pm local time on Sunday on President Joe Biden’s orders and came after objects were shot down in Alaska and Canada on Friday and Saturday.

John Kirby, the national security council coordinator for strategic communications, said on Monday that the US is still working to “better understand” foreign intelligence collection efforts.

“We were able to determine that China has a high-altitude balloon programme for intelligence that’s connected to the People’s Liberation Army,” he said at a news conference.

He says the balloons have provided “limited capabilities” but in the future as technology advances, it could become “more valuable to them”.

Mr Kirby says because the US cannot “definitively” identify what the risks of the balloons are, they reacted out of “an abundance of caution”.

Mr Kirby said the objects were not manned and there were no signs they had manoeuvring or propulsion capabilities.

He added: “We did assess that their altitudes were considerably lower than the Chinese high-altitude balloon and did pose a threat to civilian commercial air traffic.

“And while we have no specific reason to suspect that they were conducting surveillance of any kind, we couldn’t rule that out.”

He said the missions were “conducted successfully and safely”.

Efforts are under way to recover what remains of the objects to understand what they are, but the ones in Alaska and Canada are in remote terrain, making it more difficult to find them.

Outside of recovery operations, NORAD (North American Aerospace Defence Command) is continuing to monitor the situation, Mr Kirby said.

‘No indication of aliens’

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, also addressing the media at the news conference, emphasised that the American people should hear “there is no indication of aliens” from the White House.

She joked with the journalists gathered for the briefing: “I loved ET the movie, but I am just going to leave it there.”

Elsewhere, US defence secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters from Brussels that the “safety and security” of the American people is President Joe Biden’s “number one priority”.

He said: “I want to reassure Americans that these objects do not present a military threat to anyone on the ground. They do, however, present a risk to civil aviation, and potentially an intelligence collection threat. And we’ll get to the bottom of it.”

He added that the US has not been able to “definitively assess what these recent objects are”.

‘Very serious situation’

Earlier, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the invasion of North American airspace is “a very serious situation” and is being taken seriously.

He said the issue will be part of discussions when he meets US President Biden.

Mr Trudeau said search and recovery efforts for the object shot down by a US fighter jet over Yukon territory on his orders on Saturday were under way, but the weather was posing some challenges in the search for debris.

“Obviously there is some sort of pattern in there, the fact we are seeing this in a significant degree over the past week is a cause for interest and close attention,” he said.

ET jokes aside, this could escalate very easily

There was a joke about ET from the White House podium today.

But beyond the bemusement, even amusement, over these UFO shoot-downs, there is a very serious side to this.

We know one of the four “objects” was Chinese. The balloon shot down off South Carolina was claimed by Beijing as a “weather balloon”. It’s possible, even probable, that the others were Chinese too; all part of an attempt by China to fish for intelligence or simply to test America’s red lines.

Here’s the concern though. The Chinese will want an opportunity to retaliate, at the very least for the shooting down of their “weather balloon” last weekend. You can see how this could easily escalate. The Americans routinely operate surveillance aircraft in the Pacific region.

At the White House, an official said repeatedly: “There is no US surveillance aircraft in Chinese airspace.” But he wasn’t answering the question he was asked. Does the United States have any surveillance aircraft in airspace claimed by the Chinese?

China claims a vast swathe of maritime territory off its southern coast – within what Beijing calls a “nine dash line” that stretches well into Filipino and Malaysian waters.

If American aerial surveillance activity is taking place in that area, or over Taiwan (also claimed by China as its “renegade province”) then they could now be at vastly increased risk of being shot down. The ultimate concern would be that a manned aircraft is shot down by one side or the other as part of an escalation or miscalculation.

What we know so far about the flying objects:

On 4 February, the first object, described by US officials as a suspected Chinese “spy” balloon, was shot down off the Carolina coast;
On 10 February, a second object, described as being “about the size of a small car” was spotted by NORAD near Alaska and downed;
Just a day later, on 11 February, a third object, again unidentified, was tracked entering US airspace over Alaska before drifting over Canada and was shot down;
On Sunday, US officials confirmed another unidentified object had been shot down by fighter jets over Lake Huron on the US-Canada border near Michigan;
A US F-16 jet fired a missile at about 20,000ft at the latest object amid concerns that its altitude and flightpath could endanger civilian planes;
A senior US official, speaking anonymously, described the latest object as having “an octagonal structure with strings hanging off but no discernible payload”;
Last week, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said teams were searching for the object shot down over his country.

US

Downtown LA is a scene of pandemonium and lawlessness

Published

10 hours ago

June 9, 2025

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Downtown LA is a scene of pandemonium and lawlessness

A shirtless man waving a Mexican flag stands atop a burning car in the heart of Los Angeles, as another man throws a traffic cone into the flames and some play drums and shout chants in opposition to immigration officials.

In the background, city hall can be glimpsed through a haze of thick black smoke.

The downtown district of one of America’s biggest cities was a scene of pandemonium and lawlessness as protests, which had previously been mainly peaceful, turned ugly.

Critics of Donald Trump said the president’s extraordinary decision to deploy National Guard troops, defying the wishes of the state’s governor, had inflamed tensions and stoked emotions.

The 101 Freeway, the main highway cutting through the downtown area, was also closed down for much of the day as police and protesters faced off, with flash bang devices sending some people scattering.

Bottles and other projectiles were hurled towards police, who responded by using tear gas and rubber bullets.

It was this chaos, his critics say, that Donald Trump wanted to provoke.

Trump’s decision to call in 2,000 National Guard troops, several hundred of whom were on the streets of LA on Sunday, was taken without consultation with the California governor and LA mayor, and marked an extraordinary escalation by the president.

The military arrived on Sunday morning and was ordered to guard federal buildings, after two days of protest against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers.

As part of Trump’s closed border policy, ICE has been ordered to find, detain and deport as many illegal immigrants as possible, and it was these raids that stoked the first signs of protest on Friday into the weekend.

By midday Sunday, the military was surrounded by protesters outside the Metropolitan Detention Centre in downtown LA. It was here that many immigrants had been held before being shipped off to detention facilities.

The walls and floors are covered in expletive-ridden graffiti, reading f*** ICE.

The Los Angeles police soon split the crowd and drove a wedge between the National Guard and the crowd.

California Governor Gavin Newsom has called Donald Trump’s acts those of a “dictator, not a president”.

He’s formally requested that the Trump administration withdraw the National Guard. The White House say the military will remain there until order is restored. Five hundred marines are still on standby.

Los Angeles Police Department police chief Jim McDonnell, asked whether the National Guard was needed, said: “This thing has gotten out of control.”

He said that although the LAPD would not initially have requested assistance from the National Guard, the disorder had caused him to reevaluate his assessment.

Several people were arrested.

Sky News witnessed a young woman, who called herself Gabriella, riding her motorbike at speed towards a line of police officers.

One of the police officers used his arm to push her off the bike. She said she was protesting because her “people were being rounded up.”

Politicians on both sides of the aisle condemned the violence, but some vehemently disagreed about what actions led to the escalation.

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National Guard to be deployed to LA immigration ‘riots’ – as Trump claims state officials ‘can’t do their jobs’

Published

1 day ago

June 8, 2025

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National Guard to be deployed to LA immigration 'riots' - as Trump claims state officials 'can't do their jobs'

The National Guard will be deployed to Los Angeles after “riots” in response to immigration raids extended into a second day.

California Governor Gavin Newsom confirmed that the Trump administration is deploying “2,000 soldiers” to Los Angeles after local police used tear gas, stun guns, and riot shields to push back immigration protesters on Saturday.

Demonstrations began outside the Los Angeles Federal Building in the downtown area of LA on Friday after officials from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) carried out raids in the area.

On Saturday, several dozen protesters were involved in police standoffs in Paramount, a city south of LA.

Mr Newsom warned in a post on X: “The federal government is sowing chaos so they can have an excuse to escalate. That is not the way any civilized country behaves.”

He described the deployment as “purposefully inflammatory” and claimed it will “only escalate tensions”.

President Donald Trump hit back at Mr Newsom in a post on his social media platform Truth Social on Saturday.

“If Governor Gavin Newscum, of California, and Mayor Karen Bass, of Los Angeles, can’t do their jobs, which everyone knows they can’t, then the Federal Government will step in and solve the problem, RIOTS & LOOTERS, the way it should be solved!!!,” he wrote.

Mr Trump’s defence secretary Pete Hegseth claimed that active duty marines would also be mobilised if “violence continues”.

LA mayor Karen Bass said that amid the recovery from this year’s wildfires, “many in our community are feeling fear” following “recent federal immigration enforcement actions” across LA County.

“We’ve been in direct contact with officials in Washington, D.C., and are working closely with law enforcement to find the best path forward,” she said.

“Everyone has the right to peacefully protest, but let me be clear: violence and destruction are unacceptable, and those responsible will be held accountable.”

Reports the guard would be deployed to LA came earlier on Saturday, from Mr Trump’s border tsar Tom Homan on Fox News.

44 arrested in Friday raids

At least 44 people were arrested on suspicion of immigration violations during raids on Friday, with crowds of around “1,000 rioters” forming around the building before some “assaulted law enforcement officers, slashed tires, and defaced taxpayer-funded property”, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

The raids saw street vendors and day workers rounded up across Home Depots, a clothing factory, and a warehouse, Salas of Chirla (The Coalition for Humane Immigration Rights of Los Angeles) said.

In a statement on Saturday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said “violent mobs” had “attacked ICE officers and federal law enforcement agents carrying out basic deportation operations”.

She described such activity as “essential to halting and reversing the invasion of illegal criminals into the United States”.

Ms Leavitt said Californian politicians were “feckless” and had “completely abdicated their responsibility to protect their citizens”, prompting Mr Trump’s order to send in the guard.

Protests spread to second city

On Saturday, protests spread to the Paramount area, where there is a significant Latino population, after demonstrators spotted ICE employees in a Home Depot car park they appeared to be using as a base.

Law enforcement officers faced off protesters at a road junction at around 5pm where a car had been set on fire earlier in the day.

The roads were pictured strewn with trolleys and rubbish bins set on fire, as gas canisters and fireworks were also set off.

Commenting on Saturday’s protests, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Office said: “It appeared that federal law enforcement officers were in the area, and that members of the public were gathering to protest.”

Vice President JD Vance claimed that “insurrectionists” were seen “carrying foreign flags” and “attacking immigration enforcement officers” in Paramount.

“One half of America’s political leadership has decided that border enforcement is evil,” he posted on X. “Time to pass President Trump’s beautiful bill and further secure the border.”

The clashes come amid Trump’s nationwide crackdown on illegal migration.

As soon as he was re-elected in January he set a target of arresting 3,000 suspected illegal migrants per day – and promised to lock down the US-Mexico border.

US

Elon Musk post claiming that Donald Trump appears in Epstein files removed from X

Published

2 days ago

June 7, 2025

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Elon Musk post claiming that Donald Trump appears in Epstein files removed from X

Elon Musk’s social media post claiming Donald Trump is in files relating to the disgraced paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein has been removed.

The tech billionaire made the allegation on X as he traded blows with the US president in a dramatic public row.

In the post, which now appears to have been deleted, Musk said: “@realDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public.

“Mark this post for the future. The truth will come out.”

He gave no evidence for the claim, which was dismissed by the White House – with the post disappearing from his social media platform by Sunday.

Users clicking on the message – first posted on Thursday – were instead greeted with: “Hmm…this page doesn’t exist. Try searching for something else.”

Epstein killed himself in his jail cell in August 2019 while awaiting trial on charges of sex trafficking minors.

Musk and Mr Trump’s relationship broke down publicly on Thursday, just days after the Tesla and SpaceX chief executive left his role as a special government employee.

In a fiery exchange, Musk posted a series of messages on X criticising the president’s signature tax and spending bill as a “big ugly spending bill”.

President Trump posted on Truth Social, saying Musk had been “wearing thin” and claimed he “asked him to leave” his government position – something Musk denied.

Musk then hit back with his claim about the US president appearing in the Epstein files.

Press secretary Karoline Leavitt dismissed the comment in a statement.

“This is an unfortunate episode from Elon, who is unhappy with the One Big Beautiful Bill because it does not include the policies he wanted,” she said.

“The president is focused on passing this historic piece of legislation and making our country great again.”