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U.S. Official: U.S. Military Has Shot Down Chinese Spy Balloon Off U.S. East Coast; Defense Secy Austin Confirms U.S. Brought Down Surveillance Balloon. Aired 3-4p ET
Aired February 04, 2023 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[15:00:00]
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN HOST: That there was more than one trajectory in the air and it's just that we can only see that the stream or the tail of one. But it does appear as though that object in the air is starting to descend unless it's my eyes playing tricks on me, but we're going to look at it again.
We're all seeing this together for the first time. And at least you can see at least two tails, and then you can say -- OK, and now I'm being told that is actually a plane below after the strike of a balloon. And then the balloon then losing shape going down.
Security Analyst Juliette Kayyem is back with us. Juliette, maybe your eyeballs more trained than mine to tell me what it is that we're seeing. But we can at least see with a -- perhaps, with a tighter view. It look like that balloon was disintegrating as we heard an eyewitness described earlier. Can you decipher what's going on here for me? Juliette Kayyem?
JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Oh, yes, I'm on --
WHITFIELD: Hi. I hear your doorbell, but it me ringing.
KAYYEM: Yes. Hi, sorry about that.
WHITFIELD: What do you see here?
KAYYEM: Yes, but that was people calling me. So you've got the -- look, F-22s, F-15s. We don't know which ones yet. We'll get a debrief from the Pentagon --
WHITFIELD: Sure.
KAYYEM: -- from areas in the Carolinas. The missile would have been launched from them. So what you're seeing on the bottom side is the airplane. And so now what we're seeing now. So what you saw beneath was the airplane not the balloon.
WHITFIELD: OK.
KAYYEM: And I don't know if we have images of the direct hit. So the balloon is now -- so this is the important thing for people to remember, the balloon is balloon and cargo. We want the cargo. It's ours now. Like, sorry, Chinese, like, it's ours now. Because we want to know what they have, what capabilities they had, what they may have picked up.
I don't know if the cargo which is this, the stuff that the balloon was holding. So that was about three school buses big. I don't know if it survived that. It looks like there's something solid that we're watching go down. We'll find out. But that's basically what we've seen right now.
And the airspace being closed for this long, maybe two things as we were reporting before. One is, of course, you've got debris and everything that you're worried about. But if there is some sort of rescue mission of the -- of what may have survived this hit because this is, as I said, important intelligence for us to know, you were not going to want airplanes surveillance over it.
So they might be protecting actually the water space and not the airspace, which is done often in these rescue missions is that you just simply don't want yourself. We will see, but that's what I see right now.
WHITFIELD: Yes, and as we continue to, you know, re-bracket and play it again, sometimes you see a little flash, you know, a reflection. So, obviously, you know, perhaps several pieces involved here. Aviation Correspondent Pete Muntean back with us. also he's a pilot and as a -- has great clarity on the kind of aircrafts that may have been engaged here.
So, Pete, talked to me about the variety of aircraft or if it has been isolated and determined which aircraft may have been used here.
PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: Seems likely that this was the Air Force F-22 Raptor used here. It's new generation of fighters, bases across the country, very likely out of Langley Air Force Base, Joint Base Langley-Eustis. This video to me has some very clear clues in it.
What you're seeing in a couple different instances is the contrail of a jet flying by, a contrail created by the hot exhaust of the jet engine of the airplane, meeting moisture in the air, and then causing it to condense. So you can see from left to right there, that looks to me like a contrail of what is likely a fighter jet. And then you see it take a bit of a turn.
And you can see also just what looks to be a bit of exhaust there from the impact and then likely some parts, so you can see a glint occasionally there.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
MUNTEAN: A little flash of light of what looks to be falling debris. Of course, the military will be trying to track where this debris is. And we know from crash investigations of large aircraft, they can track the debris in real time via radar and see exactly where that goes. We also know from reporting of some of my cohorts here at CNN, that there are assets in the water standing by to assist with the recovery effort of this Chinese spy balloon and the instrumentation below it, which will be really key here and how it was working because we know that was the size of several school buses.
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So a few 100 feet and that will be really, really telling, as the military tries to piece back that together, and then also figure out exactly what data or what that instrumentation was doing precisely. The FAA -- or the Department of Defense has not exactly said what they thought it was doing. It wasn't totally clear.
We do know, according to the FAA, though, and I'll just point this out lastly, that the large restricted piece of airspace that was put in place, apparently for the shutdown effort by the FAA, at the request of the Department of Defense has now been extended until 4:45 on the East Coast, very likely to keep airplanes and helicopters out of this area as they try to recover what was on this Chinese spy balloon.
WHITFIELD: OK. Pete Muntean, thank you so much. We're going to check back with you.
Jim Sciutto is back with us. Are you learning anything new from your sources, Jim?
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: I think we need to highlight that this is a great moment in the relationship between these two superpowers here. An exchange of fire in hostility, right? This was a surveillance balloon sent over the U.S. including oversensitive site that the first act and the U.S. President making the decision to fire, to destroy it and take it down.
These are significant moments in that relationship. And you really have to go back more than 20 years, thinking of the collision mid-air between U.S. spy plane UP-3D, and a Chinese fighter jet over Hainan Island which led to a long diplomatic dispute because there were people involved that different, you know, pilots who were held -- the crew -- flight crew held by China there for a number of days.
This thankfully does not have deaths involved because this was an unmanned surveillance balloon, but you had U.S. fighter jets, putting the eyewitnesses circling it and firing it and taking it down at a significant moment. And we haven't seen this kind of moment between these two powers in some time.
And if you compared to 22 some odd years ago, China is a much greater military power now than it was then. And the tensions between the two current countries more significant now than it was then, than they were then. So, it's a significant moment.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
SCIUTTO: The U.S. had a number of military options for how they might take this down. You could have used a surface to air missile, perhaps some ships deployed on the surface. Based on eyewitness accounts, having seen planes circling it prior and then the video that we put in just looking now seeing that what looks to be a missile trail, from the air, air to air in effect and air to air missile, that that's the weapons package that the Pentagon presented the President with and that the President then shows chose to do.
It's a decision that I know, U.S. officials, Defense of Department officials, embassy officials were taking very seriously over the last several days. There were a number of high-level discussions, particular concern in the immediate timeframe was concerned about shooting it down over occupied territory in the U.S., those pieces fall to the ground, gravity works.
And that would oppose the danger, according to those officials to people on the ground. And that's why they waited until it went over the ocean. But, of course, they're also thinking not just about the immediate effects of this, but the lasting impact in terms of the relationship and where it stands now today.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
SCIUTTO: As I mentioned earlier, a delayed visit by the Secretary of State which was already during tense times, now those times former tense. We'll have to watching very closely how they handle this going forward.
WHITFIELD: You know, and Jim, you started off by using from, you know, very powerful language talking about this is a grave, you know, moment, you know. So I wonder if you can help explain the kinds of considerations that the U.S. was making on a military, on a diplomatic, on a geopolitical level, because we're talking about an action that is a hostile action, right, which is met by a potentially hostile endeavor.
I mean, this was just not, you know, something that was thought about in a Cavalier manner, but instead there were some very serious considerations being made here, because this picture, I mean, this result, regardless of what kind of assets or Intel is retrieved, this is the moment, these are the images that are searing about U.S. military, you know, firing at missile use, you know, low grade or high grade of taking down on a foreign property --
SCIUTTO: Yes.
WHITFIELD: -- that is over U.S. land and see.
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SCIUTTO: To your point it's a hostile act met by a hostile act.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
SCIUTTO: And that's how escalation happens in conflict. You can be certain right now that there are channels open between the U.S. side and the Chinese side. I would expect that both the military and the diplomatic level to get a handle on this so it doesn't get worse, right? Because the nature of escalation is if you have a hostile act met by a hostile act, you don't want to another hostile act, right, to then --
WHITFIELD: Right.
SCIUTTO: -- create a cycle that is hard to unwind? Now, to be fair, there was some -- this did not happen in minutes or hours, right, that this balloon was floating over the U.S. for days. There were certainly communications prior not to detail what U.S. action would be. But I'm sure that two sides were speaking to each other prior and then this happen.
Perhaps with some expectation and then you did have the President giving a thumbs up when asked about this a number of hours ago. So it didn't come entirely out of the blue by any means. But these are the kinds of moments that the military takes very seriously because of concerns about getting worse.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
SCIUTTO: And listen, keep in mind, just a couple of weeks ago, you had a U.S. Air Force General warned his forces of the possibility of a war with China within two years. I know that that is an outlier in the Pentagon. I think there is concerned about the possibility of war in the next several years, not necessarily in two years. But that is how folks at very senior levels of the U.S. military are speaking. So to have a hostile act met by a hostile act today is no small thing.
WHITFIELD: Yes. And I wonder, Jim, you know if this also helps, I guess, help respond to -- or is this perhaps a response to an explanation, better explanation as to why the Secretary of State would postpone the journey to China? I mean, this was not likely decision made today.
You know, Intel, military, they've been watching the trajectory and the path of this balloon for days now and perhaps in anticipation of the jet stream or its maneuverability that it was soon to be over over water. And does it perhaps help make for a better explanation as to why there was a suspension or postponement of the Secretary of State's visit?
SCIUTTO: It does indeed. And I should note that to the point of communications prior, our Jennifer Hansler reporting that Secretary Blinken, quote, unquote, made clear to his counterpart Wang Yi, the Chinese Foreign Minister on Friday that the U.S. reserve the right to take whatever action that we -- the U.S., deemed appropriate.
You can consider that something of a telegraphing of the possibility of hostile action to take down the surveillance balloon. So they were speaking prior. I'd be surprised if the Chinese wasn't preparing itself for just such an action. That said, you lose a major military asset, even if it's one that you made the decision to float over the -- to United States. It is something I'm certain the Chinese are taking seriously right now.
WHITFIELD: Yes. You wouldn't want to have the Secretary of State -- SCIUTTO: Yes.
WHITFIELD: -- overseas in China, while a Chinese asset is being taken down by U.S. military --
SCIUTTO: Exactly.
WHITFIELD: -- all simultaneously. Thank you so much, Jim.
I want to go back to the Pentagon and Oren Liebermann. Oren, what are you learning?
OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Fred, we have our first statement from the Pentagon now. Official acknowledgement from the Department of Defense, and a little bit more information about what went behind this action and what assets took part in it.
In a statement from Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, the Pentagon says that it was U.S. fighter aircraft assigned to Northern Command that successfully brought down the high-altitude surveillance balloon. Let me read you a part of this statement here.
"The balloon which was being used by the PRC, the People's Republic of China, in an attempt to surveil strategic sites in the continental United States, was brought down above U.S. territorial waters. On Wednesday, President Biden gave his authorization to take down the surveillance balloon as soon as the mission could be accomplished without undue risk to American lives under the balloons path.
After careful analysis, U.S. military commanders had determined doubting the balloon will overland, posed an undue risk to people across a wide area due to the size and altitude of the balloon and its surveillance payload. In accordance with the President's direction, the Department of Defense developed options to take down the balloon safely over our territorial waters, while closely monitoring its path and intelligence collection activities."
Interesting there that DOD notes that President Biden gave his approval on Wednesday to shoot this down. So several days ago now. And then it was up to DOD to determine where and when was a safe location to do this. As we've reported over the course of the past several days, DOD officials recommended against shooting it down over the continental United States, because of the risk to people in places.
And we had theorized and hypothesized that then the place to do it is once it's out over the water, and that is exactly what DOD did. Waited until it had blown out over the water, following essentially the prevailing winds across much of the country up from Montana, down across the middle of the country.
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North Carolina as we track it today with all people looking for the balloon and then it was taken down just off the coast of South Carolina. The FAA putting in place that temporary flight restriction at the request of DOD. And then the interception by fighter jets and the video that we're looking at essentially right now of the downing of this balloon.
WHITFIELD: All makes perfect sense, doesn't it? Oren, so then also the retrieval of this intelligence debris, et cetera, is anything more being said about how the U.S. military, whether it be by Navy or Coast Guard will be going about trying to retrieve any debris?
LIEBERMANN: No official information on that right now. But we do know from a defense official that Navy and Coast Guard assets are on standby to participate if requested by Northern Command in any recovery efforts. Now the payload itself, as we see it falling in the video that has a long way to fall. 60,000 feet of falling at terminal velocity will do a lot of damage when it hits.
But certainly, the U.S. military, the government will want to see whatever it is they can gain to learn about Chinese surveillance technology, intelligence gathering technology. The Pentagon had pointed out of this had the ability to maneuver. It may have simply looked like a floating balloon, but the Pentagon said it had the ability to maneuver, it had the ability to loiter, and it had surveillance capabilities.
So this is an opportunity to see what can be recovered and what can be learned about that. I should also point out that the DOD statement from Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin also said this was done in coordination with Canada. Remember that it was from Canada, essentially, that this over flew into the United States and into Montana earlier this week. Fred?
WHITFIELD: Oren Liebermann, thank you so much.
Juliette Kayyem is back -- well, there's the President right there. Let's listen in.
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: On Wednesday, when I was briefed on the balloon, I order the Pentagon to shoot it down on Wednesday as soon as possible. They decided -- without doing damage to anyone on the ground. They decided that the best time to do that was as it got over water, outside -- within our -- within the 12-mile limit.
They successfully took it down. And I want to complement our aviators who did it. And we'll have more to report on this a little later.
Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, what does this say about China? What's your message to China?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You were saying the recommendation from your -- was from your national security --
BIDEN: I told them to shoot it down.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: On Wednesday?
BIDEN: On Wednesday.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But the recommendation from them --
BIDEN: They said to me, "Let's wait until the safest place to do it."
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What does this mean for China -- in relation to China?
WHITFIELD: All right, short and sweet, and very curt and to the point there from the President knighted states, I told them to shoot it down. That order was on Wednesday. And it was per recommendation of the Department of Defense to wait until that balloon was over water.
And we just saw that it happens somewhere inside the last hour that a military jet was used there off the coast of North and South Carolina over U.S. waters and it was taken down, it was shot down. And now we understand that U.S. assets from coast guard to the Navy are now in the water. And they will be retrieving any debris to learn from it.
Arlette Saenz at the White House there. Arlette, the President very, very clear there on the action.
ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Fred. President Biden trying to make clear that he was the one who did give this order saying that he first asked his military team to take steps to shoot it down on Wednesday, but followed their recommendations to wait.
We know that there had been concerns about taking down this balloon while it was overground and the impact it could have for people on the ground. Ultimately, they waited until it was over the water off the east coast to go ahead and take this balloon down. Now this all comes as the President really had been facing significant pressure not just to answer questions on this, but also to take action.
He has been criticized from Republicans who have been trying to paint it as weak throughout this entire process over the course of the past few days since it was first revealed that this balloon had been flying over the United States. He had also faced some pressure from Democrats who we've heard from people like Senator Jon Tester, who is the defense subcommittee appropriate or the head of that committee. And he has said that he wants to hold hearings about how exactly this situation all played out.
But the President trying to make clear today that he did in fact order that operation to take down this Chinese spy balloon. Of course, this represents a very tense contentious point now with the Chinese as tensions were already high between the U.S. and China.
Of course, Secretary of State Antony Blinken canceled or postponed his trip to China ultimately saying that due to this spy balloon flying over the United States, that would not have been a productive moment to travel there at the time.
But the President today acknowledging that he ordered that operation to take down this spy balloon. Of course, he was on Air Force One as this all played out over the waters off of South Carolina and we'll see what more of the White House and Pentagon has to say about this a bit later today.
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WHITFIELD: All right, Arlette Saenz, thank you so much.
Everyone, stay put. We're going to take a short break for now and we'll be right back.
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WHITFIELD: All right, welcome back. That Chinese spy balloon has been taken down off the coast of South Carolina by the U.S. military, by a jet there on the orders given by the President of the United States. The retrieval process now underway there in the U.S. waters and the ground stop that was experienced at three U.S. airports. Well, that has now been lifted.
Our Tom Foreman is in Washington for us to give us an idea of all that it took here off the South Carolina coast. I mean, quite the orchestration of events in order to be able to report that that spy plane is now down.
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, a lot of resources there because there is something of great value here to the U.S. in terms of piecing this all together. And it's right here. The part that was hanging up underneath this. About three school buses long, we've been told, so about 90 feet roughly.
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These balloons are capable of lifting hundreds, thousands of pounds. So, obviously, they want to recover this. And I was talking to a military analyst who made the point of saying, here are things you want to know about this. One, the basic technology. How were they flying this thing? Did they have maneuverability? Anything along those lines, any other technology that might be involved.
Secondly, is there native information on board here? For example, if it was taking photographs, if it was recording data that went across the country, is that attached to this hardware, or was all of that streamed back to China? And is this essentially an empty vessel? Or did they have the capability of remotely wiping it so that, yes, you get the hardware, but no sense of what it really recorded.
And the other part of this, of course, is how much of this survived. Oren mentioned this a short time ago, the idea of terminal velocity. We know based on what the President said that it's going to be somewhere between a line about here and shore because that's well within territorial waters, that also means it's only about 600 feet and 700 feet deep. So it's at a recoverable area.
But Oren mentioned terminal velocity a while ago. Terminal velocity refers to how fast something can fall before the atmosphere slows it down. A human being, a skydiver, terminal velocity is about 120 miles an hour. We don't know, when you watch that, streaming out behind this how much it was being slowed down, or how fast it was falling, or how much it will be damaged or has been damaged by striking the water.
But in this environment, it would seem relatively favorable, that they could get most of the pieces together, very different than 1986, when the Challenger blew up, only recovered about 43 percent of that. And then years later, we're still finding pieces of it.
This is much more likely a lot more compact, even if it's damaged a lot. That's why they want to get a hold of it for those questions we just talked about there. Can you figure out what it actually was doing along the way and technologically, how it was doing it? Fredricka?
WHITFIELD: Right. Tom Foreman, thank you so much.
Also, back with us now, John Miller. Let's talk more about the retrieval of the debris from this Chinese spy balloon and how the retrieval is also incredibly important to securing national security in order for U.S. Intel, military, et cetera to learn what exactly was part of the payload? You know, what was allowing this balloon to take the trajectory that it did, and what was its goal?
JOHN MILLER, CNN CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: You know, Fred, when we talked a couple of hours ago, one of the things I was pointing out is people in the intelligence community and the military, we're saying what everybody just calm down, OK? You've been screaming to shoot it down for days, we have a plan, and we have some missions.
So let's go chronologically. It crosses over the Aleutian Islands, it comes down through Canada, and enters Montana, and is looking straight at critical military spaces. Now that Chinese says, well, it drifted off course. OK. But then a number of things start to happen.
First of all, the U.S. government starts to track it. DOD and the intelligence community are first going to say, all right, let's see how it behaves. What does it do? Where does it go? How has it controlled? Is it really drifting through the wind? Or does it have navigation capabilities to which the Pentagon says yes.
The second thing you want to know is, what is it collecting and what is it doing with it? So they are looking at that payload on the bottom to see, well, what's it equipped with we can -- that we can see, what's it equipped with that we can't see, and how do we intercept that.
Now, if it's highly encrypted, then they might not be able to intercept what it's sending back, assuming that it's transmitting. But they could be able to jam that signal and make sure that whatever it's sending back isn't getting back. So there are a number of opportunities and things that they had to do along the way.
As we now know, the President gave that order on Wednesday, which is, when it's safe, and when it's proper, take it out of the sky. But that begins a whole set of new missions, which is they could blow it into a million pieces, you know, over the water.
But what you want to do is you want to hit the balloon, not the payload. You want it to come down as intact as possible, and you want to pre-dispose of those assets, have them in place so that when it does come down, you can recover it quickly. Because, this is the whole second part of your question --
WHITFIELD: Yes.
MILLER: -- which is, can we get the equipment? Can we look at what it is? We're going to recognize what it is. We use the same kinds of equipment on the same kinds of balloons and then say, all right, what is the equipment? How is it protected and contained from any water damage or impact damage?
And now the great question, which is, can we get inside it? Are we able to download what had collected and look at it ourselves? Or are we able to just how what it's capable of collecting?
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So this has been the menu of the week of things that they've had to go through, think about. And now the new menu is opening up, which is let's pick up the pieces, let's figure out the capabilities and the intent. Is it just photographic? Then we pretty much know what it saw. Is it photographic and signals? Were they pulling up signals from different communications? Is it photographic signals and radiation signatures? That's going to tell us a lot about the kinds of things they were looking for. And look who did it. It was North Com.
Northern Command is the command that is in charge of protecting the continental United States from foreign threats. So they're the logical player here and they also are pretty knowledgeable, because North Com uses the same kinds of balloons and the same kinds of surveillance equipment for counternarcotics work on the Mexican border, for tracking vehicles at crossings. So this won't be too foreign to them. A lot of friends here, though.
You've got NOAA, you've got the National Weather Service helping with wind direction and the path, you've got NASA, you've got the NSA talking about the signals piece, and the NRO, the National Reconnaissance Office, which actually makes these surveillance platforms for the United States. So many, many experts this week have been looking at this.
WHITFIELD: Right. So that coordination all week long, in which determined that over water really is the best opportunity to take it down safely. But as you say, really, you know, unraveling the mystery is starting at the very beginning. You know, at scare one all over again, after they try to ascertain what kind of debris, what they can learn from it. Thank you so much.
I want to bring in now also Cedric Keighton. Talk to me further about this coordination that John was underscoring. This took a whole lot of agencies and assets and expertise in order to get to this point, but for today talk to me about the coordination of being able to, you know, fine-tune the plan and pinpoint this balloon in order to take it down so that it's not so destroyed that they are not going to be able to ascertain what its makeup is. COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Yes, exactly, Fredricka.
As John was kind of alluding to, this is really a choreographed ballet. When you think about how all these different pieces and parts come together. You're looking at different air elements, you're looking at the naval elements, you're looking at the intelligence picture. All of that is being brought together.
So when you look at this, the American people and really the people of the world get a chance to see how the United States conducts operations like this. There's a lot of planning that goes into this. When you look at the kinetic effects of an operation like this or the kinetic effects in an operation like, let's say, Desert Storm or Iraqi Freedom, you know, you just see the blowing up of something and then you think that's it.
But the fact of the matter is there is so much that goes into this and there's so much thought that you put into something of this type. So, you know, when you look at the pictures that we're seeing here from, you know, from Myrtle Beach area, you're seeing a bunch of, you know, different elements that are coming together. The aircraft that was used, we don't know officially yet. It was, you know, probably my guess would be it was an F-22 that was doing this. These are top of the line fighters, you know, along with the F-35 in the American inventory.
They probably -- the F-22 probably came out of Langley Air Force base. They could have shot it down either with an onboard cannon or with a missile like the Amram missiles. So that's the kind of thing -- that point of impact that comes together that way. But there is so much that goes into that before you actually take that first -- in this case, I believe only shot in this situation.
WHITFIELD: Cedric, this is rare. I mean, you know, help underscore this occasion, how it came to be, what this is symbolic of.
LEIGHTON: Well, this really symbolizes, you know, on the one level, from the military standpoint it symbolizes everything coming together. On the diplomatic front, as Jim Sciutto was mentioning earlier, you've got so many different pieces. You know, these kinds of operations are often the result of failure of diplomatic efforts to come together. But what this -- you know, from a military standpoint, what you're seeing, Fredricka, is this success of all of the different pieces that the American taxpayer has been paying for.
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We're seeing all of that come together in a way that shows that we can not only intercept something like this, which is really an unconventional target, and that we can bring it down and hopefully will be able to actually recover these pieces so that we can piece together from an intelligence standpoint exactly what the Chinese were up to in this particular case.
WHITFIELD: All right. Colonel Cedric Leighton, apologies for calling you Cedric. I was trying to remember in my mind. I was like, I know that title, but I got to get that one right. So yes, it came to me. Colonel Cedric Leighton, thank you so much.
LEIGHTON: No worries, Fredricka.
WHITFIELD: OK. So Juliet Kayyem back with me now.
Juliette, you know, as I, you know, hear about the orchestration. We heard from the president himself who said he made this decision on Wednesday, but all of his military advisers were saying, wait, wait, wait. And hearing all of that, I was listening and hearing your voice again where you said, you know, earlier, patience. Patience. It really is about patience and making sure that everything comes together.
So now expand on that, if you will, on the thought you had earlier about, you know, you just can't be a knee-jerk about this. Everybody had an idea about just take it down, shoot it down. But there are so many things to get into place first and assess. And you put it succinctly, it's about patience.
KAYYEM: Yes, and clearly this is what President Biden and the military showed. So let me just walk through the chronology of the week. They probably have known about it for some period of time. Wednesday, the president does what's essentially a standing order. He asserts what he wants the end game to be, which is this thing is getting out of the sky the second that it is safe to do so. His military comes back and says, not exactly safe here in the homeland, which was a correct calculation, which is right. Let's see what happens.
And so they just essentially are seeing what happens. What they find out between Wednesday and Saturday is that the Chinese still have operational control of it and it appears as of last night when I was on, it appears that they're trying to get the thing towards water. So they know how this ends. And I cannot stress enough what an embarrassment this is for the Chinese. I know we have people, you know, saying, oh, we should have taken it down immediately.
This is an utter embarrassment for the Chinese. Because it goes to the ocean, which they're commanding. Now our challenge is, where are we going to shoot it over the ocean? So the standing order is in place. Saturday, the military decides it's not in international waters. Some calls I got in between suggested or at least confirming that the debris is not in international waters. That means it's ours. There's going to be no -- there was never be any question about it.
(CROSSTALK)
WHITFIELD: Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said so, I mean, he confirmed in his statement, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. It's in U.S. waters. But go ahead.
KAYYEM: It's in U.S. waters. So we have no jurisdictional -- thank you for that. There is no jurisdictional question about, you know, who owns it. And essentially, you know, this is now for us. So stage two was today, which is the shoot-down, the standing order has taken the place, and then stage three is now the debris and pickup for an ongoing mission. What I need to make clear is this is ongoing. So they are likely able
to have put radar or they had radar on the debris. I'm seeing it in open source right now. That debris will be picked up by the Navy or the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard is clearly going to have a role on this. If anything comes ashore, this will be a Coast Guard and state and local mission. So this will take a little while. As John was saying -- I'm sorry, as Cedric was saying, you want -- hopefully they got the balloon.
It looks like they did. It is going to take a while. This thing is up in the air twice as high as a jetliner, now as the debris falls. As it falls, they are pinpointing it and then they have missions, then they have what's essentially just the maritime mission now. We have the aviation mission. The maritime mission now which is to pick up what they can to determine what did the Chinese now, what did they get, and we did this -- they did this with patience and without putting any civilian Americans at risk.
It was so -- I have to say, you know, as we were talking patience, ends up being a strategy and it was used perfectly here. And then the bigger issues that Jim Sciutto was talking about, U.S.-China relations, which are going to have a lot of moments like this. This is a long-term challenge between the two countries.
WHITFIELD: Right. But likely this makes an impact. Yes. This likely make -- you'll make some sort of impact.
KAYYEM: Exactly. We keep -- yes.
WHITFIELD: On what's next between U.S. and China.
KAYYEM: Exactly.
WHITFIELD: Juliette Kayyem, I'm going to leave it there for now. Short break, might have you back on the other side of it.
[15:40:01]
So hold tight. Thank you.
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WHITFIELD: All right. That Chinese spy balloon has been shot down by a U.S. military jet off the South Carolina coast, just under two hours ago. Our Natasha Bertrand is learning more information from the Pentagon on this operation that got the green light from the president as early as Wednesday, but with patience they waited until today to take it down.
NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Fred, so we are getting new information literally just in right now from a senior Defense official who tells reporters that the fighter jets that took off to take down this balloon were actually -- they took off from Langley Air Force Base, which is located in Virginia, and it was a single missile that took down that balloon. Now interestingly they added that the surveillance balloon is of value
to the United States. They said that, quote, "I would also note that while we took all necessary steps to protect against the Chinese surveillance balloon's collection of sensitive information, the surveillance balloons overflight of U.S. territory was of intelligence value to us. I cannot go into detail but we were able to study and scrutinize the balloon and its equipment which has been valuable. So that's a really key statement -- that this balloon is of intelligence value to the United States.
Now, that stands in direct contrast of course to what the Chinese government had been saying, which is that this was just a weather balloon and it had no surveillance or intelligence value. The senior Defense official went on to say that that explanation, quote, "lacked any credibility," the U.S. simply did not believe that. And the U.S. was able to determine what was inside that payload in that balloon and they know that it is of significant intelligence value to the United States.
So it will be interesting to see when they examine that what more they can learn about what the Chinese government was actually looking for when it launched this balloon, and of course what they were able to obtain while this balloon was over the U.S. territory over the last few days -- Fred.
WHITFIELD: All right. And Natasha Bertrand, all right, thank you so much.
I want to bring back aviation expert Pete Muntean.
So, Pete, you know, a little bit more on the jet and the accuracy Natasha was just telling us, one jet from Langley Air Force Base that was able to fire at this balloon and take it down with incredible accuracy. And, you know, help people understand what we're talking about with this accuracy, with this balloon 60,000 feet up, the speed in which the jet would be going and then with one strike be able to pierce it, not destroy it, but pierce it enough for it to descend and intelligence gathering, hopefully, you know, will be rich.
MUNTEAN: Well, you know, what we're seeing here in this video really tells the story, especially combined, with all of those new details from Natasha, that this was shot down by an air-to-air missile officially from the Pentagon from a jet from Langley Air Force Base. This likely put some more creative store predictions that this was going to be a mission by the F-22 Raptor. There's a squadron of them based out of Fort Eustice Langley Joint Base in Virginia, Virginia.
This is a fifth generation fighter used by the airports. It's the replacement of the F-15 and the F-16. You can see in the video the contrail, that's the hot exhaust meeting with the air, the moist air up at altitude there. You can see that bend there. That looks to me like it's the jet. The other trail, the thinner one, that looks to me like it's the air-to-air missile, likely an M-19 sideliner, going into that balloon. So you can also see in some of this video that we have been getting from sources online what in essence amounts to a waiting game. These fighter pilots were circling this balloon like sharks until they
could get away from the populated areas along the coast of North Carolina and South Carolina. President Biden said he ordered the Department of Defense to order this shootdown on Wednesday, but the Department of Defense wanted to wait until much, much later when there would be no risk to folks on the ground. You could see there that looks to me like the envelope of the balloon, the top of the balloon deflated and falling down there.
This was a pretty easy day, likely, for the aviators of this F-22. It is the perfect missile mount to do this in the military arsenal. 65,000 feet is as high as the F-22 can go. We know that this balloon was at 60,000 feet according to the Pentagon. It is a very fast jet. It can go 2.25 mach, that's twice the speed of sound, 1500 miles an hour. This balloon hardly going that, maybe 60 or 80 miles an hour with the winds aloft up there at 60,000 feet. So the speed difference was relatively big. They just needed to wait, these fighter pilots, until the right moment when it got away from land and over the water off the coast of North Carolina and South Carolina.
Really interesting here that this is still over the territorial waters of the U.S. That ends about 12 nautical miles off the shore. So essentially what falls down is ours. We get to keep it now. But this is so interesting because these fighter pilots just simply had to wait and wait until this was in the right spot. And you can see in other videos circling online of these fighter jets just drawing contrails in the sky, these big racetracks, until they could get the right moment.
President Biden commended these pilots. A pretty commendable job by them this afternoon in the shootdown of this Chinese spy balloon.
WHITFIELD: Unbelievably impressive. Hey, so, Pete, we have some new video in. I want you to watch it with me.
MUNTEAN: Sure.
WHITFIELD: I'll be seeing it for the first time, just as I believe you will be, too. But it gives another point of view on the actual hit and you're going to hear it, I'm told, as well. So let's take a listen and watch right now.
[15:50:20]
Oh, gosh. Now is that the firing of that, you know, arsenal or is that the piercing of it, the contact made? What do you think?
MUNTEAN: I have to guess that that is the impact.
WHITFIELD: OK.
MUNTEAN: And what we're seeing is -- the video there, the visual is delayed. The speed of light is faster than the speed of sound. We're hearing the impact much later than when it actually happened. You can see some of the contrail there up there in the sky. That looks to me like the contrail of the missile, but then you can also see a little bit further to the right of the screen, kind of right in the center portion of the screen what looks to be the envelope of the balloon falling.
And in some of these other videos that we were able to see, you can see what looks to be the contrail of a jet there on the right side of the screen, near that gutter and roof there. So what was so interesting to me also and some of the other videos we were able to see is the debris of what appeared to be the instrument apparatus below the balloon falling, shredded into pieces, and falling, glimmering in the light down to the surface.
And so what will be really interesting -- that's the balloon still intact before it was shot down. That's the full envelope. That's the envelope as it was deflated, but the really important step -- we don't care so much about what is in the balloon. It is really so much about what is in the instrumentation that was dangling below it which we know was the size of a few buses, a few school bus sizes. So maybe 100 feet or so. And so --
WHITFIELD: The mechanics of it as well as the payload of it because I mean --
MUNTEAN: Right. And that's really critical.
WHITFIELD: Yes. As Natasha had mentioned that, I mean, there's an acknowledgment from the U.S. Military, from the Pentagon, that the payload is of significant intelligence value.
MUNTEAN: Right.
WHITFIELD: So they want that. I mean, U.S. Military, U.S. intelligence wants it to dissect, to understand.
MUNTEAN: Yes. And the fact that we will be able to track this, too.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
MUNTEAN: You know, the large swath of air space that was closed off here, of course there will be a lot of radar trained on the air there, not only from the fighters in the air but likely other military assets also in the air that carry radar on them and then also radar on the ground. And so they will be able to see the parts as they sort of float through the wind there exactly where they go and crews on the ground will be able to scoop them up, pick them up and analyze them. A lot of clues here.
WHITFIELD: Yes.
MUNTEAN: It's not unlike a crash investigation. They will be able to find out all of these parts and essentially put them back together, put back the pieces to the puzzle and that is where all the information lies.
WHITFIELD: Amazing, Pete. OK.
Air Force Colonel Cedric Leighton, I know you were watching and heard it, too. So from your point of view, how do you dissect, analyze what we just experienced and saw and heard from that new vantage point? LEIGHTON: Yes, Fredricka, this is quite an interesting video because
when you're looking at it, you know, you see what appears to be the missile contrail so that could have been the possibility, of course, as Pete mentioned, side winder, the other possibility, and I think actually slightly more likely is an Amram missile that would use by the F-22. And you see that come together in a way where all of a sudden you hear the noise then, you know, it's a clear indication that there was impact and you see the payload at the bottom there coming down.
And that payload is, you know, like Pete said, this is a very critical piece. What it reminds me of is what happened about 22 years ago when we lost an EP-3 to China. EP-3 is a Navy surveillance plane and the Chinese brought it down using some unsafe aerial maneuvers and hurt the crew for a bit, the U.S. Navy crew, and this is, of course, different because there are no personnel involved on the Chinese side but the intelligence collection aspect of this is what's similar.
So, you know, with that Pentagon statement that this payload is of high intelligence value, I think that's true and I think that's going to be really the most significant aspect of this. But these flight crews did a tremendous job putting it together and as you can see there with the contrails there, that the missile going after that target, a very hard target for an aircraft to go after, that, you know, really gives you an idea of, you know, how complex this operation really was.
WHITFIELD: Thank you so much, Colonel Cedric Leighton.
[15:55:01]
Hey, John Miller, in 20 seconds or less, you know, what did you hear in that statement from the Pentagon? The payload is of significance intelligence value.
MILLER: What I heard, Fred, was what we were just talking about a few minutes ago, which is you want that payload and you want to take it apart, put it back to take it apart, put it back together, see what's inside, see if you can download it and as the colonel was talking about, when they shot our plane down in 2001, they took it all apart. They sent it back in boxes, you know, part by part. It was a diplomatic travail for us. And this will be the same. You know, we'll take a good hard look at this and we'll send the pieces back, maybe we won't.
WHITFIELD: All right. Julia Kayyem, you get the last 20 seconds. What's next here? OK, we lost her. All right, well, everyone, thank you so much. Colonel Cedric Leighton, Juliette Kayyem who was here earlier, John Miller, Pete Muntean, Jim Sciutto, everybody. I mean, what an extraordinary sequence of events that we all witnessed, heard, and our eyewitness who called in earlier, too, Travis.
So this mysterious Chinese spy balloon, it is down. It has been taken down by the U.S. Military upon the orders of the president of the United States. That came on Wednesday but U.S. Military advisers said wait until today and that's what we just saw right off the coast of South Carolina.
We've got so much more to come. I'm Fredricka Whitfield. Thank you so much for joining me today. The news continues with Jim Acosta after this.
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