Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

US Official: Recovery Effort Of Chinese Spy Balloon Underway; Chinese Balloon Will Be Taken To FBI Lab In Quantico To Be Analyzed; U.S. Official: Recovery Effort Of Chinese Spy Balloon Underway; DEA: 99 Percent Of 50M Confiscated Pills Are Fake, Contain Fentanyl; Experts: Balloon Merely Latest Example Of China's Bold Spying Efforts. Aired 6-7p ET

Aired February 04, 2023 - 18:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[18:00:00]

JIM ACOSTA, CNN HOST: You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Jim Acosta in Washington.

Right now, off the coast of South Carolina, US Navy divers are scrambling to recover that downed Chinese spy balloon or what remains of it. US fighter jets shot it down this afternoon, a few days after it crossed the US border and was spotted over Montana. It then floated all the way to the Carolinas raising National Security concerns for days.

Most of the wreckage is believed to be sitting in 47 feet of water at this hour. Let's go now to CNN's Oren Liebermann over at The Pentagon.

Oren, do we think we might get some kind of update this evening as to whether or not they have been able to secure that wreckage and retrieve it.

OREN LIEBERMANN, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: They'll put a perimeter around that wreckage with Navy and Coast Guard assets that were already in the area. Whether they can retrieve it tonight or not, that is a different question. Forty-seven feet of water according to a senior Defense official, so not all that deep.

But still, it's a question of what's left, what's down there and what shape is it in? And how do you bring it up without damaging it further. A salvage vessel is on the way, it might not be there in time to do it tonight, but it will get there as quickly as possible to begin that salvage effort.

Why is that so important? Because the Pentagon has said repeatedly, this was a Chinese surveillance balloon that had the ability to maneuver, to loiter, to gather Intelligence, and because of that, there is information they want to glean from that wreckage once they find out what sort of condition it's in and can pull it up.

It is worth pointing out that the Intelligence gathering operation from the US perspective hasn't started now. It happened as this balloon made its way across the United States. The Pentagon says they took steps to mitigate the ability of the Chinese to gather information or Intelligence from this, and instead tried to gather their own Intelligence about the capabilities and the technology aboard the Chinese surveillance balloon.

So now that will shift from it being in motion to once they bring it up seeing it in person up close, instead of at a distance of something like 12 miles in the sky -- Jim.

ACOSTA: And what did it take to shoot this balloon down? This was executed, it seems perfectly, Oren.

LIEBERMANN: From what it looks like, from what we can see, it certainly looks like it, and there were days of planning ever since President Joe Biden gave the greenlight to shoot this down as soon as possible. The Pentagon decided it wouldn't be safe to do it over the continental US because of the risk to property and people below what would be a payload of a length of three school buses falling apart and creating a debris field from 60,000 feet.

So the decision was made to shoot it down once it was off the coast. It was F-22s launched out of Langley Air Force Base in Hampton, Virginia that fired a A9-sidewinder missile, a heat seeking missile, that's a fairly short range weapon, so they had to get up close.

The Pentagon says that the F-22 fighter jets were at about 58,000 feet. The balloon somewhere between 60,000 and 65,000 feet, and it was one shot, one kill for the balloon.

ACOSTA: All right, Oren Liebermann, thank you very much.

Let's go over to CNN's Arlette Saenz. She is at the White House for us, busy afternoon at the White House once again, on a Saturday afternoon, Arlette. What are we hearing from the President?

He was very emphatic earlier this afternoon and make it clear that he issued this order on Wednesday. I thought that was interesting.

SAENZ: Yes, Jim. President Biden really trying to lay out the timeline for when this decision was made, saying that he told his military leaders to shoot down that plane as soon as possible when he was briefed on Wednesday.

Of course, the military leaders put together options for him and ultimately advised that they wanted to wait until there were safer moments where fewer people might be impacted, compared to, if they had shot it down over land, for instance.

But President Biden was on Air Force One as the military carried out this plan this afternoon. And here is what he had to tell reporters as he landed in Maryland earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: On Wednesday, when I was briefed on the balloon, I ordered 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 when it got over water, so within the 12-mile limit.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SAENZ: Of course, President Biden has faced some criticism in recent days since the news of this balloon first broke as Republicans have been asking why he didn't shoot this down sooner.

There has also been some Democrats like Senator Mark Warner, the Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, who said that China would never allow a balloon like this to be flying over the heartlands.

Now, lawmakers up on Capitol Hill have called for briefings and for hearings as well. The so-called Gang of Eight up on Capitol Hill will be receiving a briefing as they return to Congress later next week.

But of course, this also comes at a very new high point of tension between US and China. Of course, Secretary of State Antony Blinken had been planning a trip to China, ultimately postponing it due to the revelation and appearance of this balloon and this is something that the White House will have to navigate diplomatically as they've seen tensions really rise with China in recent days.

[18:05:12]

ACOSTA: Absolutely, and I'm sure reporters who are the White House will have questions for days on this, Arlette Saenz. Thank you very much. Appreciate that.

Let's discuss that with CNN national security analyst and former Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper.

Director, thanks so much for being with us. As always, we appreciate it. Just your reaction to the decision to wait to shoot this balloon down after it reached the Atlantic as opposed to earlier in the week. What's your sense of how this went down?

JAMES CLAPPER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: I think it was the right thing to do. I think there's a balance drawn here by affirming our sovereignty and at the same time, protecting the safety of people below.

I can imagine the reaction if the thing -- the balloon had been shot down over a Red State, and somebody got killed or hurt or the extent of property damage, and you know, the outrage that would result from that.

So to me, this was the best of both worlds. It was, as I understand it, done within our territorial waters. And obviously, no jeopardy to anyone on the ground. So to me, it was the right thing to do. I think, in the end, this will afford us some diplomatic leverage with the Chinese.

ACOSTA: Well, that leads me to my next question, which is what do you think the Chinese were up to here? Because obviously, they had to assume we are going to see this thing in the sky, and this was going to be detected. Does that tell us a little bit about what their motivations might have been?

CLAPPER: You know, Jim, to me, this is the mystery, is why exactly they did this and that's why I have a tendency to accept the explanation that this was really you know -- it went astray.

I don't buy what they are saying was on the way of sensors. That's why this is going to be very good to recover, the payload from the balloon and find out what kind of sensors they had on it.

As others have already discussed, the Chinese have very capable overhead reconnaissance satellite system that can collect all kinds of imagery Intelligence, probably better than with a balloon.

Now, the issue for me is what other kinds of sensor or other phenomenology that this balloon was trying to collect, and hopefully, we'll learn that by exploiting the payload.

ACOSTA: Because the balloon might not have been just taking pictures, is that right?

CLAPPER: Exactly. If it was just taking pictures, and I really don't understand it, because as I say, the Chinese overhead reconnaissance satellites can do every bit what that balloon could do and more.

Now, if it was somehow intercepting radiation, nonliteral communications, literal communications, I don't know, and we'll learn that. But it just seems to me strange that the Chinese would intentionally do this, particularly at this particular time.

ACOSTA: And the balloon we're told will be analyzed once it is retrieved at an FBI lab in Quantico. How critical is it at this point for Navy divers, assets there in the Atlantic right now retrieving this? How critical is it for them to get that piece of equipment out of the water?

CLAPPER: Well, it's pretty critical, because obviously, I doubt it was designed to survive in a wet environment. That's not the environment it was operating in. So the quicker the divers can get to it and retrieve it, the better. And, again, I don't know the depth of the water where it actually fell. That's -- that will be another challenge, depending on how deep the water is, but the quicker the better.

ACOSTA: You were Director of National Intelligence, maybe you can answer this question. Is this unusual to have spy balloons flying over continental United States?

CLAPPER: Yes. I don't recall an instance of it during my time as DNI for six-and-a-half years. I don't recollect this.

I will tell you, Jim, I've had some personal experience with using balloons as Intelligence collector, particularly for imagery and they are really not very efficient for that purpose. That's why I'm a little skeptical about imagery.

They are so subject to the vagaries of weather, you know, mist, fog, rain, and especially as we've seen in this case, wind. They're hard to control, so I'm very interested to learn if we can publicly just what sort of sensor suite was in the payload of the balloon.

[18:10:09]

ACOSTA: And do we have the technical capabilities, do you think to -- do we already know what this balloon was doing? What the surveillance equipment was doing? Could they have gotten an up close look at it before it was shot down to know exactly what this thing is?

CLAPPER: I'll just say that is possible. I don't know either, through direct observation or indirect collection from some other source. So, it is possible, but I'm just speculating here.

ACOSTA: Yes. One of the interesting things that our Oren Liebermann was reporting earlier this afternoon is that the US -- it was able to prevent the balloon from gaining some Intelligence, that they were able to do some mitigation efforts. It sounded as though they were talking about, I guess, jamming the balloon to some extent.

What did you make of that? What do you think about that?

CLAPPER: Well, one thing I wondered about is if it had some sort of communication relay system, either through satellites or some other terrestrial downlink that we somehow got access to, I don't know.

And if that were the case, well, certainly they could jam out and prevent the transmission either guidance to the balloon if it had that, or some sensor or sensors on the balloon and interfere with that. So it's quite conceivable.

ACOSTA: And you know, one of the questions that I think is floating around that is highly intriguing is what does this say about Chinese espionage efforts in the United States? It looks like they were doing some over the United States, but what does it say about Chinese espionage efforts inside the United States? And how extensive they are?

Because I imagine -- I mean, the American people might surmise that it's going on and that it is extensive. But how expensive is it?

CLAPPER: Well, it's a great question, Jim, because what is so significant and dramatic about this is it's very visible. The Chinese have reconnaissance satellites, both signal Intelligence collectors and imagery Intelligence collectors that are traversing over the United States every day collecting reams of Intelligence. They have very aggressive intellectual property attacks on us.

So they are very aggressive about this. Having said all of that, this, to me is sort of a ham-handed to do this as an Intelligence collection effort when they have so many other ways of gaining Intelligence on the United States, that is not nearly as visible and dramatic as this and this is what's drawing so much attention to this.

Now, we're concerned about our sovereignty, well, how high does sovereignty go? So we're going to shoot down the balloon because it's an affront to our sovereignty. Well, the satellites, I guess, you could argue are an affront to our sovereignty as well and we're not about to shoot them down.

ACOSTA: That's right. All right, former Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, always a pleasure to speak with you, sir. Thanks so much for your insights. We gained a lot of knowledge in this segment. So thanks for your time. Thank you.

CLAPPER: Thanks, Jim.

ACOSTA: Appreciate it.

All right what will National Security officials be looking for once the balloon and its payload had been successfully recovered? That's something we're watching at this hour, we will talk about that next.

Plus, as we just discussed there a few moments ago, China has had multiple chances to spy on the United States. They do this routinely. Much more on the recent examples of its espionage efforts. That's next.

You're live in CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:17:59]

ACOSTA: Welcome back.

We want to show you some live pictures now from Surfside Beach there in South Carolina. Just off the coast of this beach, earlier this afternoon, the Chinese surveillance balloon that we've been talking about over the last several days was shot down by a US aircraft.

Canada has been putting out a statement here in the last hour or so thanking the US after this operation with Canadian National Security officials thanking their US counterparts for bringing down the Chinese balloon, they say violated US and Canadian airspace and international law. Efforts are now underway at this hour off the coast of South Carolina to successfully recover and retrieve what's left of that payload that that balloon was carrying.

And joining me now to talk about this CNN legal and national security analyst, Carrie Cordero.

Carrie, I know you worked as an attorney at the Director of National Intelligence at one point, your reaction to all of this, how this went down? And how much of a security risk do you think this posed? Or is this more of an Intelligence risk, I suppose?

CARRIE CORDERO, CNN LEGAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: I think what we're seeing -- what is so interesting about this particular story is that we're seeing Intelligence activities spilled out into the open. I mean, presuming that this balloon is not a meteorological piece of equipment, and instead is an Intelligence collection device by the Chinese, assuming that, then we are seeing an area that normally is all behind the scenes, particularly with respect to Intelligence activities that take place by the United States and China against each other.

All of that usually is behind the scenes, super-secret, super classified, and here in this this example, we have this type of activity where it is just so out in the open, and I think that's the piece that is so surprising and both interesting from a public perspective, as well as from a National Security perspective.

ACOSTA: Yes, it is kind of baffling, right? Because why would the Chinese want us to see something like this? I mean, I think that's one of the questions that's been raised is, I mean, perhaps they did want us to see. It is as sort of like flying a spy craft, a sort of Goodyear blimp over the US and saying, okay, look, what we can do, we can send one of this over your airspace.

[18:30:13]

CORDERO: Well, sure, so much Chinese Intelligence activities, which really -- I mean, if we look at the past, you know, decade and more Chinese Intelligence activities are so aggressive against the United States, but so much of it takes place in cyberspace. Really aggressive, persistent efforts by the Chinese government to go after US government systems, go after US private industry, Defense industry, intellectual property theft -- all of these areas where again, behind the scenes things that are not revealed unless the United States government brings a prosecution, and then we become knowledgeable about it in the public space.

This is an example where, if this is some sort of surveillance device, they are, you know, placing it in a place where not just the US military or the US Intelligence community knows about it, which would be you know, more in the satellite realm, but somewhere where every day Americans and the entire American public as well as the Canadians, which this was over their airspace, as well, are aware of it and paying attention to what's happening.

And so one of the questions for me is, when the United States government goes in, looks at what they are able to recover, what will that reveal about what it is the Chinese were doing to begin with.

ACOSTA: And that underlines how critical it is that the US Navy divers and assets that are out there, off the coast of South Carolina right now retrieve, that they recover this piece of equipment, because I assume, and we've been told, once they do, it's going to be brought up to Quantico there in Virginia, I mean, that is going to be a very interesting operation there once they pull that thing on board, whatever ship they have out there and start examining this over at Quantico.

CORDERO: Sure, for our Intelligence community professionals, looking -- and the forensic professionals who are going to be looking at this information. I mean, this potentially, could be a really interesting period for them to be able to observe what exactly was in this particular balloon? What is it that the Chinese were intending to do? What is it that they were actually able to collect? And so you know, when we think I know, throughout the course of the day, we've been talking about the decision to shoot down the balloon, should it have been done earlier? Aside from the public safety issues of potentially shooting it down over the continental United States and not waiting to look out to see, there also, is the issue from an Intelligence perspective of letting it go a little bit and what more will the US Intelligence community learn when they are eventually able to analyze the data that was in this by letting it continue its work for an additional period of time.

ACOSTA: Well, and The Pentagon alluded to that by saying through officials and our Oren Liebermann was reporting this earlier this afternoon, that we were successfully, according to The Pentagon, mitigating whatever the Chinese were trying to do with this surveillance balloon, and it sounded like they were maybe jamming it, its equipment to some extent.

Very quickly, the Chinese have claimed that this is all for civilian weather research, that sort of thing. How do you think this is going to impact tensions with China?

CORDERO: Well, the United States government and the United States is clearly in a substantial National Security competition with China that expands over all areas of our National Security apparatus and our economic apparatus.

And so this, I think, in the near term, is a tension that had led to the delaying of the Secretary of State's trip to China, whether or not it will have long term consequences, I think, in part will depend on what is actually learned from what was in this device. How nefarious was it? And so that potentially will be a factor in how the United States government deals with China at least in the near future, if not longer term.

ACOSTA: All right. It's going to be very interesting when the US gets its hands on that balloon. We'll see where it goes from there.

Carrie Cordero, thank you very much. We appreciate it.

Coming up, be ready to roll. That's what a higher ups told the FAA last night as officials finalized plans for shooting down that Chinese spy balloon. More on the logistics of that needed coordinating before airspace could be closed and we'll discuss that next.

You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:28:35]

ACOSTA: Back with the breaking news.

Commercial and private planes are now back in the air all along the Carolina coast. The FAA closed the airspace and grounded planes for a short time earlier today just ahead of the military's efforts to shoot down the Chinese spy balloon. CNN aviation correspondent, Pete Muntean has more on the layers of coordination between the FAA and the military and how it played out.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT: The Federal Aviation Administration has now ended its temporary flight restriction, the restricted airspace that it put in place it says at the request of the Department of Defense, because apparently, of this shoot down of this Chinese spy balloon as it wafted over the coast of the Carolinas.

This huge piece of restricted airspace twice the size of the State of Massachusetts, five times the size of the restricted airspace that's been in place post 9/11 over Washington, DC. What was very telling about this one, this went into place about 1:30 PM on the East Coast on Saturday was that this was up to 60,000 feet, which The Pentagon says was the altitude that this balloon was floating at.

That is very critical because the FAA simply wanted to clear out the airspace below and make it so there would not be a hazard to airliners which fly at roughly half the height of this balloon. The FAA put in place a ground stop as well because of that restricted airspace at three airports along the Carolina coast -- Wilmington and North Carolina, Charleston in South Carolina and Myrtle Beach in South Carolina. Those airports were paralyzed for about an hour as the shootdown took place.

It wasn't long after that all of these restrictions were lifted, although, this would likely go down in history as one of the largest pieces of restricted airspace ever. We have never seen something like this put into place, and the FAA says, it was all at the request of The Pentagon.

Pete Muntean, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[18:30:34]

ACOSTA: All right. Our thanks to Pete for that.

A government source tells CNN, agencies work throughout the week to find the right time and place to intercept the balloon. And last night the FAA was told to be by the phone early this morning and ready to roll.

CNN Transportation Analyst and former Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Transportation, Mary Schiavo joins me now.

Mary, I just have to pause for a moment and reflect on how extraordinary it is to have the U.S. Military shoot down something, a foreign aircraft - yes, a spy balloon.

MARY SCHIAVO, CNN TRANSPORTATION ANALYST: Right.

ACOSTA: A foreign aircraft - off of the coast of the United States. I mean, I know that this - some of this was contemplated around 911. How extraordinary is this to see something like this occur today?

SCHIAVO: Well, it's extremely extraordinary. And you're right, in 911 it was contemplated for flight 93 and that, of course, headed over to Ohio and was turning around, went back over Pennsylvania. I mean, it was contemplated when the Payne Stewart plane, I don't know if you recall, the pilot and those onboard had - were incapacitated in that plane headed out across the United States towards the upper Northwest. And it was discussed whether to shoot it down and let it come to Earth by itself.

And so it's extremely rare, was discussed when TWA 800 went down off the coast of New York because there were military operations nearby. But, of course, that was not a shoot down, but it was - there were suspicious - a lot of suspicious people about that.

So it's very rare and, of course, it is dangerous when you have military operations around civilian aircraft. Awful things can happen and so this was the right thing to do to shut down the airspace, even though obviously hugely inconvenient.

ACOSTA: And this isn't the first time that a spy balloon has floated through U.S. airspace. What have we learned from other instances in the past?

SCHIAVO: Well, from other instance in the past, and also from reports that there are - apparently this has been going on for about five years, one was cited over Hawaii, one over Costa Rica and there are many more.

And so what we need to learn to do is let the government take care of these spy balloons. There are actually pictures floating around the Internet people saying they're going to go out and shoot at them. That's a ridiculous idea.

Civilian aircraft, by the way, of the United States have been shot at before at U.S. airline - U.S. airplane, I think back in 2011, landed at Charlotte with a bullet hole on top of it. In foreign countries, passengers that actually been shot on planes by straight bullets.

So what we've learned is that the government can deal with these hopefully will pick up the remains of this balloon and will keep us safe. But the American public, I think should have been alerted to what was going on so they knew the government had it in hand. And from here on out, make sure it's the government that shoots them down, and not civilians on the ground with guns shooting at anything in the air, except maybe if they're in authorized hunting areas.

ACOSTA: Yes. I mean, in terms of lessons learned, I think you just touched on something. We just explore that a bit further, because earlier in the week, you heard critics saying that this should have been shot down over Montana or something like that, sparsely populated area, your thoughts on that. And I think what I just heard you say a few moments ago is that you think that maybe the administration might have been better off at least alerting the public that they were on top of this, that they were dealing with this, that they were exploring all options, that all options were on the table, that sort of thing.

SCHIAVO: That's right. I think the American public, if they knew, hey, the government is on it. You don't have to go out in the backyard with your shot gun and take an aim at this thing. The government's got it under control. And by the way, even if you think it's a UFO, do not go out in your backyard and shoot at it because that's highly dangerous to aviation.

And one other thing, everyone knows that major aircraft have collision avoidance systems and they rely on transponders by and large, so that was another reason to clear the airspace. If this balloon suddenly took a turn, although it was floating on the jet stream and commercial carriers are at 40,000 and this was at 60,000, had it started coming down into the airspace, collision avoidance may not have worked as intended. It wouldn't have picked up any transponder signals, et cetera.

So it was right to keep the civilian airspace clear, safe. It's better to be on the ground wishing you were up there than up there wishing you were on the ground. That's our old pilot saying and that's probably the case today.

[18:35:00]

ACOSTA: It made more sense to wait until I got off the coast, what do you think?

SCHIAVO: Well, this is getting into the - a sort of James Bond. I mean, people my age will remember Moonraker where James Bond in space shuttle had to shoot down the orbs of Drax who was - they were going to float around the Earth and cause everybody to die.

But over the ocean, since they didn't really know what it was, they had two things going for them. They didn't know what was happening - would happen when they shot at it. And two, they had a chance of getting the debris intact, which is hugely important.

Now, I saw it on television like everybody else, but it looked like a piece fell off before the rest of it. So they do have chance to recover it from the ocean floor and they're pretty good at that. They've recovered everything from space shuttles and mines and fallen aircraft sadly.

And so, we are pretty good at getting aircraft, and balloon and space pieces off the bottom of the ocean floor. So perhaps that was the best way to hope to recover something that's salvageable and you have information that you can use to keep America safe.

ACOSTA: All right. Very good. Mary Schiavo, thanks so much for your time. We appreciate it. And great Moonraker reference. Great film. Thanks so much, we appreciate it.

SCHIAVO: I like it.

ACOSTA: That was a good one. Up next, what the U.S. government is looking for in the debris of that Chinese spy balloon the military shutdown earlier today. We'll continue to discuss that. You're live in the CNN Newsroom.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:40:36]

ACOSTA: All right. We have some new video to show you here at CNN showing the moment that U.S. fighter jets closed in on that Chinese spy balloon and shot it down. There you can see the video right there. This video is taken by a man in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, who said he watched a couple of fighter jets circle around the balloon for about an hour before they then started closing in. The balloon went down off the coast of South Carolina as we've been reporting all afternoon into the Atlantic Ocean. The takedown ended a day's long drama after the balloon had floated across much of the continental United States.

As we wait to learn more, we're also looking at what China might have gained from this mission. Earlier I spoke with Democratic Congressman Adam Smith of Washington. He's the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee and terms China as a reckless bully on the international stage. Here's what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ADAM SMITH (D-WA): Yes, I don't know what message they're trying to send. But the message that China has been sending now for the last several years is they are reckless bully in many different areas, not just in the way they treat the U.S. They went after Australia launching a trade war against Australia when Australia dared to suggest that China could be more open and transparent on COVID.

I was in Indonesia last year. Indonesia is doing some exploration in their territorial waters looking for natural gas, China moved in and push them back off of that claim, in territory that isn't theirs. They now trapped numerous countries in the developing world in a debt trap by loaning the money and running up the bill on that.

China is behaving like a reckless bully and what we need to do is work with the rest of the world to rein that in, in a way that deters them without launching a full out war with China. And that's what I hope people understand, China's a big powerful country. They're going to be a big powerful country (inaudible) for as long as I can see. We need to find some way to rein in their worst behavior while finding a way to - for the world to be big enough for the both of us.

So it's a difficult challenge, but I think the President's taking the right approach.

ACOSTA: And should the Secretary of State reschedule this trip, go to China, confront the Chinese in-person?

SMITH: Yes. That's the one thing actually that I strongly disagree with. I think Secretary Biden should - sorry, Secretary Blinken should have gone. I don't think he should have canceled the trip. Now, one of things I'm really worried about with both China and Russia is the lack of regular dialogue between senior officials in all three governments. Also, Russia and China may well be talking together regularly, but we need to talk more to Russia. We need to talk more to China. I think that's a missed opportunity. I don't support, we're mad at you, so we're not going to talk to you anymore approach to diplomacy. I think we should seek out those opportunities to get this dialogue going in a more constructive direction.

ACOSTA: And what about the notion, I'm sure you've heard some of this yourself, that this happens all the time that nations spy on one another, that we fly surveillance satellites and all sorts of things over countries and they do it to us, I would assume from time to time. And what about the possibility that ...

SMITH: Yes, if ...

ACOSTA: ... China has done this in the past, do we know that for a fact that this has been done in the past and we just didn't know about it?

SMITH: Well, I can't reveal anything in that regard except to say I would be stunned if China hadn't done similar things in the past. But, again, it's more about the overall behavior of China than it is about this one incident. It is the brazen and reckless behavior as they've tried to throw their weight around in Asia and across the world.

But look, when you're talking about the efforts of countries to spy on each other, I mean, people know enough of the history to know that that goes on a lot. Now, flying something directly over U.S. airspace, that I think is a far more rare event. I don't, off the top of my head, know of a precedent.

So, it - again, it speaks to the increasingly reckless behavior that China is engaged in and the importance of us working with the rest of the world to try to get them to stop and be a more productive partner in the world.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Our thanks to the congressman for his time and we are continuing to monitor this developing situation of the U.S. Military shooting down the Chinese spy balloon. But we have other subjects to cover.

[18:45:01]

In the meantime, the new CNN film American Pain traces the rise and fall of identical twin brothers who ran one of the largest opioid pill mill empires in the country. The FBI says it's been linked to thousands of deaths.

CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta takes us inside the secret DEA lab fighting the latest opioid threat of fentanyl-laced pills and meets with families whose lives have been changed forever.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I like looking at pictures, even if they're not my own family. They tell the story.

DEENA LOUDON, SON MATTHEW DIED FROM FENTANYL: Mm-hm. He was such a happy baby. Oh, my God, he was so happy all the time.

GUPTA: Is it hard to talk about him?

LOUDON: No, I love talking about him. I talk about him to anybody that will listen.

I loved seeing him on the hockey rink. And I think that was really, really his happy place, where he could just sort of be free.

His friends packed up immediately from schools, wherever they were, and came over. And the family started showing up. And I was just in shock. We tried. We were doing CPR. And not a chance. He was long gone.

I don't say he overdosed. I say he died from fentanyl poisoning. Truthfully, like at the end of the day, to me he was murdered, because he asked for one thing, they gave him something different and it took his life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA (voice over): On a single sad night, November 2nd, Deena's son, Matthew Loudon, became one of the nearly 92,000 fatal overdoses in 2020 alone, much of it driven by fentanyl.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA (on camera): The problem is there's so many of these drugs that are now on the street that the DEA had to set up a secret forensics lab just to try and keep up. We're making our way there now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA (voice over): Scott Oulton is deputy assistant administrator of the DEA's office of Forensic Sciences.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA (on camera): You're getting more pills and more of those pills are coming back positive for fentanyl?

SCOTT OULTON, DEA OFFICE OF FORENSIC SCIENCES: We almost - yes, almost every one of them comes back positive.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA (voice over): In 2019, the DEA seized roughly 2.2 million pills. In 2022, 50.6 million pills. At the beginning of the opioid epidemic, many of the pills were authentic. The majority of the pills being seized today at the borders, on the streets, even in schools ... (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OULTON: Over 99 percent of what we see are fake. They contain fentanyl.

GUPTA (on camera): Ninety-nine percent. That's just - that's mind numbing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA (voice over): And look closely at how sophisticated the counterfeiters have become.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OULTON: And just for an example, these are some of the ones that we will seize that have the same "M" and has (inaudible) 30 on the other side.

GUPTA (on camera): If you look at what is real here and the rainbow fentanyl, they're not even really trying anymore to disguise this. This is clearly fake. But also, if you look at this, 800 grams of fentanyl, that turns into 400,000 to 500,000 potentially lethal pills. Think about that one bag gives you 400,000 to 500,000 lethal doses.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA (voice over): It's the message the DEA wants out there, one pill can kill. The days of experimentation are over. And so this sophisticated lab has to keep up, trying to analyze these pills down to their molecular structure, using the equivalent of an MRI machine.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OULTON: We have seen hundreds and hundreds of unique combinations. So we'll see one with - contains fentanyl, one with fentanyl and xylazine, one with fentanyl and caffeine, one with fentanyl and acetaminophen and you don't know what you're getting.

GUPTA (on camera): How hard is it to keep up with how much counterfeit stuff there is out there?

OULTON: The market is constantly changing. So we are trying to do everything we can from a science base to keep up with that. One pill can kill. Don't take the chance. It's not worth your life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GUPTA (voice over): It's a message Deena wishes Matthew could have heard. So, instead, she has made it her mission to be his voice.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LOUDON: As soon as you can start having these conversations with your children at an age where they can really, really comprehend it, I think it just needs to be talked about. It's Russian roulette, you never know what you're going to get.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GUPTA (on camera): Jim, I got to emphasize that there are hundreds of millions of these pills out there and we know what the DEA seizes but we don't know how much they're missing. We don't know the denominator here. So that's a really important point.

Also, to be fair, if you're talking about bricks and mortar sort of pharmacies, CVSes, Walgreens, things like that. I asked the DEA and they say they are very confident those supplies are safe. That's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about pills that are bought on the streets, even mail order. That's where things get murky and potentially very, very dangerous.

So the message they wanted to get across, Jim, was one pill can kill. That's it. One pill can kill. The days of experimentation are over, Jim. And that's, I think, a really important point for everybody to hear. Jim?

ACOSTA: Very important. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you.

[18:50:01]

See the true story that Variety calls a gripping documentary portrait, American Pain premieres tomorrow night at 9 right here on CNN.

Coming up, the spy balloon is just the latest in the dramatic escalation and brazen Chinese spying on U.S. soil in the past decade. That's - that story next. You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:54:45]

ACOSTA: All right. Check this out, a brand new video into CNN just now of the moment the U.S. Military shot down the Chinese spy balloon. Take a look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

[18:55:00]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They just shot it. See smoke coming from it?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: All right. And this is very important footage, a very clear image of what occurred earlier this afternoon and - because there have been questions all afternoon. We've been talking with our experts as to whether or not the surveillance equipment attached to that balloon might be retrievable, might be salvageable.

And it does look - if we're to reshow the video again, here it is - you can see the bottom part of that balloon appears to be the surveillance equipment dropping below what was left of the balloon after it was popped, after it was destroyed by that fighter jet.

And so that does bode well, I suppose, if and when they're able to retrieve that equipment from the ocean, because it does look a - you can see a right there, a fair amount of it still intact, dropping very quickly below what was left of that balloon after it was shot out of the sky.

Fighter jets from Langley Air Force Base shut down that balloon earlier this afternoon. China insists the spy balloon drifted over the U.S. accidentally. Its foreign ministry also says its purpose was purely scientific, mostly weather-related research. Of course, that's according to the Chinese. But if recent history is a guide, that explanation cannot be taken at face value.

CNN's Jim Sciutto explains.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEON PANETTA, FORMER US SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: I think that would be wise to remember that they will say whatever needs to be said in order to cover what they're trying to do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JIM SCIUTTO CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Security officials say there has been a dramatic escalation in brazen Chinese spying on U.S. soil over the past decade.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. DARIN LAHOOD (R-IL): When you look at China's track record of being deceitful, not being honest, playing by a different set of rules, I have real concerns.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO (voice over): In 2017, a plan for China to build an ornate $100 million Chinese Garden at the National Arboretum in Washington, D.C., complete with temples and a pagoda was scrapped after counterintelligence officials raised red flags.

The pagoda, they said would have been strategically placed on one of the highest points in Washington, D.C., just two miles from the US Capitol, a perfect spot for signals Intelligence collection.

China also wanted to use materials shipped to the U.S. in diplomatic containers,, which Customs officials are banned from examining.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ROBERT O'BRIEN, FORMER NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER TO PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: And we want to continue to work with the Brits and we may have to go if they're going to have Huawei in their system, we'll go to carrier pigeons or these carriers with locked briefcases or something we have to, but we're not going to let the Chinese have access - unfettered access to our state secrets, I mean, that's for sure.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO (voice over): Concern also rose in 2019 over cellular towers with Chinese made Huawei hardware atop them near military bases in the Midwest, and in the same area in Montana where their surveillance balloon was spotted over a military base that houses intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Huawei is a company that has drawn intense scrutiny from the U.S. government for its ties to the Chinese government. But the company has strongly denied any efforts to spy on the U.S. and said in a statement to CNN that its equipment is not capable of operating in any communication spectrum allocated to the Defense Department.

And in North Dakota, near Grand Forks Air Force Base, a plan for a Chinese company to build a corn mill was halted just days ago, because of security concerns.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR BRANDON BOCHENSKI, GRAND FORKS, NORTH DAKOTA: I had a brief conversation with the Wing Commander on it, we just talked how interesting the timing was, just on the national level with what was going on with the corn mill here, and that kind of coming to an end, and then two days later, this balloon being spotted.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO (voice over): And now the balloon, which is only adding to already tense relations between the U.S. and China.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MICHAEL LAWLER (R-NY): It just, again, speaks volumes to the situation with respect to China. They are our greatest geopolitical threat. They are a threat economically, they are a threat militarily and we need to take it serious.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ACOSTA: That was Jim Sciutto, again, with that report.

Coming up, recovery efforts are underway right now off the coast of South Carolina after the U.S. Military shot down that Chinese spy balloon. What the government is hoping to find next.

You're live in the CNN NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)