DID Trump’s defense secretary KNOW Chinese spy balloons were flying over the US but ‘chose not to tell him’?

A senior Republican said Monday that the Pentagon may have been aware of Chinese balloons flying across the country during Donald Trump’s tenure, but could have withheld the information from the White House because of the president’s reputation for ‘provocative’ and ‘aggressive’. action.

The Biden administration has been criticized for taking days before deciding to shoot down a Chinese spy balloon.

But since then, defense officials have told reporters that similar balloons were detected under the previous administration without action being taken.

The result has been a spate of Trump officials denying any knowledge of such incidents, saying they only came to light after they left office.

Rep. Mike Waltz of Florida, who sits on the House Armed Services Committee, offered an explanation of the different stories, saying his office had been briefed on the details and that it had happened in Florida, Texas and elsewhere.

“We have more detailed questions, but what is not clear … and this is the key point: Did the Pentagon under the Trump administration inform the Trump White House and give them the option to take action, or did they choose not to inform them? for whatever? reason,’ he said.

“And there’s some speculation — I spoke to Trump White House officials over the weekend — that the Pentagon deliberately did it because they thought Trump would be too provocative and aggressive.”

He said the questions needed to be answered by the general who spent two years as Trump’s defense secretary.

“One person I’m waiting to hear from, who we haven’t heard from on the entire list, is the former Secretary of Defense, General Mattis, who was the secretary during this period,” he said.

‘What did he know and what did he decide to convey and report to the president?’

Mattis was Trump’s first defense secretary before he resigned in protest of the decision to withdraw US troops from Syria.

On Saturday, the same day a U.S. Air Force fighter jet shot down a drifting balloon off the coast of South Carolina, a Pentagon spokesman told reporters that “the surveillance balloons transited briefly across the continental United States at least three times during the previous administration.”

It provided fodder for Democrats to defend President Joe Biden against criticism of wavering, as Trump himself said he would have brought down the interloper sooner.

Republican Rep. Mike Waltz said Jim Mattis had to answer questions about how much he knew about Chinese spy balloons crossing the US when he was Trump’s defense secretary.

Jim Mattis was Donald Trump’s Secretary of Defense before resigning at the end of 2018

But a number of top Trump national security officials said they had not been aware of any incursions at the time, including the former president himself.

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former Defense Secretary Mark Esper, former Acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller, were among the figures who rejected the claim or expressed doubt that China could have violated US airspace without their support. knowledge.

“I never remember anyone walking into my office or reading anything about the Chinese having a surveillance balloon over the United States,” Esper told CNN. ‘I would remember for sure.’

Former National Security Adviser John Bolton told Fox News: “I’m not aware of any balloon flights by any power over the United States during my tenure, and I had never heard of any of it before joining in 2018.”

Nor have I heard anything about what happened after I left.

“I can say with 100 percent certainty: not during my tenure.”