Chinese Balloon Was Not Spying, US Government Admits Months Later
The US government has admitted that severe accusations it made against China were just a lot of hot air. The highest-ranking official in the US military has clarified that a Chinese balloon that crossed into US territory in February 2023 was not spying; it was likely blown off course by wind. CBS News published an interview this September with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, who stated, “The intelligence community, their assessment – and it’s a high-confidence assessment – [is] that there was no intelligence collection by that balloon”. Milley conceded that the large rubber object was probably pushed off track by powerful wind.