Prior to being shot down by the Americans, a Chinese spy balloon is said to have collected intelligence from many American military installations.
According to two current senior American officials and a former senior administration official who spoke to NBC News on Monday, the balloon absorbed electronic signals of US intelligence despite efforts by the Biden administration to stop it.
According to the three individuals, China allegedly controlled the balloon to hover numerous times over some military locations, sometimes in figure-eight patterns, and transmitted the data in real time.
The balloon gathered most of the information from electronic signals coming from weapons systems and base personnel correspondence, according to the sources. It did not capture much in the way of images.
In addition, the balloon was capable of intaking more intelligence, but the Biden administration once it detected the apparatus stopped its systems from sending out electronic signals, the officials said.
The US shot down the balloon on February 4 off the coast of South Carolina. China claimed it was a weather-monitoring balloon that had blown off course. As the US recovered the debris in the Atlantic Ocean, a US State Department spokesperson said the balloon was equipped to collect intelligence.
A Defense Department spokeswoman on Monday told NBC News that any intelligence the balloon took in had ‘limited additive value’ for Beijing. The spokeswoman did not confirm that the balloon sent any details in ‘real time’ to China.
And National Security Council spokesman Kirby John declined to comment on the type of electronic signals the balloon may have nabbed.
‘Knowing it was going to enter US airspace we took action to limit the ability of this balloon to garner anything of additive or especially useful content,’ said Kirby. ‘So again, I won’t get ahead of what we’re learning off this thing.’
The Defense Department also pointed to remarks that senior officials made in February that the balloon was not able to collect much intelligence ‘over and above what (China) is likely able to collect through things like satellites in low earth orbit’.
It first entered the US airspace over Alaska on January 28 and moved over several states including Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana.