By Randall Hill, Phil Stewart and Jeff Mason

SURFSIDE BEACH, S.C. (Reuters) -A U.S. army fighter jet shot down a suspected Chinese language spy balloon off the coast of South Carolina on Saturday, per week after it first entered U.S. airspace and triggered a dramatic — and public — spying saga that worsened Sino-U.S. relations.

President Joe Biden mentioned he had issued an order on Wednesday to take down the balloon, however the Pentagon had advisable ready till it might be accomplished over open water to safeguard civilians from particles crashing to Earth from 1000’s of ft (meters) above industrial air visitors.

“They efficiently took it down, and I need to praise our aviators who did it,” Biden mentioned.

A number of fighter and refueling plane had been concerned within the mission, however just one — an F-22 fighter jet from Langley Air Pressure Base in Virginia — took the shot at 2:39 p.m. (1939 GMT), utilizing a single AIM-9X supersonic, heat-seeking, air-to-air missile, a senior U.S. army official mentioned.

China strongly condemned the army strike on an airship that it says was used for meteorological and different scientific functions, and which it mentioned had strayed into U.S. airspace “utterly by chance” — claims flatly dismissed by U.S. officers.

“China had clearly requested the U.S. to deal with this correctly in a relaxed, skilled and restrained method. … The U.S. had insisted on utilizing power, clearly overreacting,” China’s international ministry mentioned in a press release.

The balloon was shot down about six nautical miles off the U.S. coast of the Atlantic Ocean, over comparatively shallow water, probably aiding efforts to get well components of the Chinese language surveillance gear over the approaching days, U.S. officers mentioned.

One U.S. army official mentioned the particles subject was unfold out over seven miles of ocean, and a number of U.S. army vessels had been already on web site.

The downing of the balloon got here shortly after the U.S. authorities ordered a halt to flights out and in of three airports in South Carolina — Wilmington, Myrtle Seaside and Charleston — as a result of what it mentioned on the time was an undisclosed “nationwide safety effort.” Flights resumed on Saturday afternoon.

Whereas Saturday’s shootdown concludes the army dimension to the spying saga, Biden is prone to proceed to face intense political scrutiny from Republican opponents in Congress who argue he did not act shortly sufficient. 

Questions additionally stay about how a lot data China could have gathered in the course of the balloon’s trek throughout america.

The balloon first entered U.S. airspace in Alaska on Jan. 28 earlier than transferring into Canadian airspace on Jan 30. It then re-entered U.S. airspace over northern Idaho on Jan. 31, a U.S. protection official mentioned. As soon as it crossed over U.S. land, it didn’t return to open waters, making a shootdown troublesome.

U.S. officers didn’t publicly disclose the balloon’s presence over america till Thursday.

“It is clear the Biden administration had hoped to cover this nationwide safety failure from Congress and the American folks,” mentioned U.S. Consultant Mike Rogers (NYSE:), a Republican who leads the Home of Representatives Armed Companies Committee.

Biden’s emphasis on Saturday that — days in the past — he ordered the balloon shot down as quickly as doable might be an effort to answer such critics.

Former President Donald Trump, Biden’s potential rival within the 2024 election, referred to as earlier this week for the balloon to be shot down, and has sought to painting himself as stronger than Biden on China. The U.S. relationship with China is prone to be a serious theme of the 2024 presidential race.

Washington had referred to as the balloon’s look a “clear violation” of U.S. sovereignty and notified Beijing in regards to the shootdown on Saturday, a U.S. official mentioned.

Nonetheless, officers on Saturday appeared to minimize the balloon’s influence on U.S. nationwide safety.

“Our evaluation — and we’ll study extra as we choose up the particles — was that it was unlikely to supply important additive worth over and above different (Chinese language) intel functionality, equivalent to satellites in low-Earth orbit,” the senior U.S. protection official mentioned. A Reuters photographer who witnessed the shootdown mentioned a stream got here from a jet and hit the balloon, however there was no explosion. It then started to fall.

The Pentagon assesses that the balloon was a part of a fleet of Chinese language spy balloons. On Friday, it mentioned one other Chinese language balloon was flying over Latin America.

“Over the previous a number of years, Chinese language balloons have beforehand been noticed over international locations throughout 5 continents, together with in East Asia, South Asia and Europe,” the U.S. official mentioned. The suspected spy balloon prompted U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to postpone a go to to China this week that had been anticipated to start out on Friday.

The postponement of Blinken’s journey, which had been agreed to in November by Biden and Chinese language President Xi Jinping, was a blow to those that noticed it as an overdue alternative to stabilize an more and more fractious relationship between the 2 international locations.

China is eager for a secure U.S. relationship so it could deal with its economic system, battered by the now-abandoned zero-COVID coverage and uncared for by international buyers alarmed by what they see as a return of state intervention out there.