House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner (R-Ohio) stated on Feb. 12 that he supports the United States shooting down unidentified objects over North American airspace rather than allowing them to fly over the continent.
His comment came after a U.S. fighter jet downed an unidentified object over northern Canada on Feb. 11, making it the third time in a week that the U.S. military has shot down an object in North American airspace.
American F-22s shot down the object in Alaskan airspace on Feb. 10, and a Chinese surveillance balloon was destroyed by F-22s several days before that off the coast of South Carolina.
“What I think this shows, which is probably more important to our policy discussion here, is that we really have to declare that we’re going to defend our airspace. And then we need to invest,” added Turner.
“This shows some of the problems and gaps that we have. We need to fill those as soon as possible because we certainly now ascertain there is a threat.”
Turner stated on Feb. 12 that lawmakers are frustrated by the Biden administration’s lack of timely briefings for Congress on the issue.
“This is particularly annoying about this administration. The Biden administration needs to stop briefing Congress through our television sets and actually come and sit down and brief us,” he said.
“I do think that there needs to be more engagement between the administration and Congress.”
The lawmaker voiced concerns about the seeming escalation on the part of China that prompted their balloon launch.
“It’s certainly a new, recent development that you have China being so aggressive in entering other countries’ airspace and doing so for clear intentions to spy with very sophisticated equipment,” Turner said.
“I mean, the very scale of this balloon and the technology that was deployed by China in spying on the United States is unprecedented.”
