The balloon had been flying over North American airspace for several days. The United States claims that the balloon was monitoring their various military installations. Tensions between Washington and Beijing over the balloon continued to rise. In such a situation, the US Department of Defense, the Pentagon, said that they destroyed the balloon by firing a missile from an F-22 fighter jet on Saturday.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin called the operation a ‘deliberate act’. He said China has committed an unacceptable violation of US sovereignty. And the operation was carried out in response to this.
