Biden signaled he agreed with what the National Security Council said earlier this week, stressing the UFOs the military shot down over the weekend were probably there for commercial or research reasons.
“We don’t yet know what these three objects were,” Biden said, adding “the intelligence community’s current assessment is that these three objects were most likely balloons tied to private companies, recreation or research institutions studying weather.”
This position hasn’t done much to ease concerns from some lawmakers, who have questioned why no company or institution has come forward to claim the mysterious flying objects.
Biden on Thursday said the UFOs had to be taken out because they posed a threat to civilian aviation, regardless of whether they were benign or not.
And regarding the suspected Chinese spy balloon his administration also downed earlier this month, Biden said he has no regrets ahead of an expected conversation with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
“I hope we’re going to get to the bottom of this, but I make no apologies for taking down that balloon,” Biden said.
The revelations of a sprawling Chinese spy balloon program across five continents has stymied attempts from Biden and Xi to manage tensions from spiraling out of control.
Tim Bergreen, a former staff director of the House Intelligence Committee Democrats, told The Hill “the U.S.-China relationship at the moment is bad in pretty much every possible dimension.”
“And that includes the military one,” Bergreen added.
