Pompeo: Biden Made an ‘Enormous Mistake’ with Chinese Spy Balloon
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Former secretary of state Mike Pompeo said on Monday that President Joe Biden’s handling of the Chinese spy balloon was an “enormous mistake” that caused “global shame.”
Pompeo tore into the Biden administration during an interview with The Hill, criticizing officials for waiting several days before shooting down the spy balloon off the Carolina coast.
“I don’t know what it collected … I don’t know what signals intelligence it may have had. I don’t know what imagery it may have been able to garner,” he told the outlet.
“The whole world saw a slow-moving balloon transiting Montana, Kansas, South Carolina — and the United States of America did nothing,” the former CIA director added.
Pompeo said the delay gave China “an enormous geopolitical advantage.”
“I can’t imagine that the risk of some falling debris over a place like Montana exceeded the risk of global shame,” he said.
The Pentagon first became aware of the balloon on January 28, when it entered U.S. airspace over Alaska. The Biden administration kept the discovery under wraps to avoid jeopardizing Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s planned trip to Beijing, Bloomberg reported. Blinken postponed the trip just hours before he was set to depart.
Several Republican lawmakers called on the U.S. to shoot down the balloon days before it was ultimately downed, but the military waited to take down the balloon until it was over water off the coast of South Carolina due to concerns from the Pentagon that the action could cause civilian casualties if carried out elsewhere on the balloon’s flight path.
The balloon was part of a larger surveillance program run by the People’s Liberation Army, U.S. officials said. The program has collected information on military assets in a number of countries, including Japan, India, Vietnam, Taiwan and the Philippines, U.S. officials told the Washington Post.
The program has carried out dozens of missions since 2018, according to the report. The balloons, which fly 60,000 or higher, supplement China’s long-range surveillance efforts that are typically conducted via military satellite array.
Four balloons were seen above Hawaii, Florida, Texas and Guam in recent years, according to the report. While several former high-ranking Trump administration officials pushed back on the Biden administration’s recent claim that at least three Chinese spy balloons flew over the United States during their tenure, officials have since said the balloons were only recently identified as Chinese surveillance airships.
Pompeo also said he and other members of the Trump administration were not aware of spy balloons entering U.S. airspace at the time.
“You’re bringing it up too, and this is exactly what the Biden administration wants you talking about: ‘Look over here. See this shiny object. Trump, Trump, Trump.’ Right? This wasn’t remotely the same thing,” he told The Hill. “As best as I can tell, no one was aware. And this is fundamentally different from what has transpired over the past two weeks.”
Pompeo’s interview promoting his new memoir, Never Give an Inch: Fighting for the America I Love, comes amid speculation that he is planning to launch his own 2024 presidential bid against his former boss. Pompeo told the outlet he is considering a run but insisted no decision has been made.
Asked how he would distinguish himself from former president Trump, Pompeo said: “I approached my public service in a way that’s different from his. I try my best to use language that reflects the greatness of our country. I think that’s important.”
