Chinese military confirms snub of U.S. Defense Secretary Austin’s call over balloon -
People’s Liberation Army Sr. Col. Tan Kefei, the spokesman, said in a statement carried by the official Xinhua news agency that the use of force against what the Chinese insist was a civilian weather balloon led to the decision to turn down the call.
“Unfortunately, the PRC has declined our request,” the Pentagon said in a statement, using the acronym for People’s Republic of China. “Our commitment to open lines of communication will continue.” The incident is likely to fuel criticisms in the U.S. that the Pentagon’s decade’s long program to seek to build trust with the PLA is based on a misunderstanding of the nature of the Chinese military. Unlike the U.S. military, the PLA is not a national army but one devoted primarily to defending the interests of the ruling Chinese Communist Party.
“We know the PRC has overflown these surveillance balloons over more than 40 countries across 5 continents,” the statement.” “The United States sent a clear message to the PRC that its violation of our sovereignty was unacceptable by shooting down the balloon, protecting our own sensitive intelligence, and maximizing our ability to track the balloon and recover the payload to get more information on the PRC’s program,” the statement said.
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