China claims the balloon hovering over US Nuclear sites is for research purposes.

Despite American suspicions that a balloon seen over American airspace was eavesdropping, China claimed on Friday that it was actually employed for meteorological research and was blown off course. Relations between Beijing and Washington, which were already fraught, were further strained by the discovery.

Because there might have been critical installations in the balloon’s path, the Pentagon decided against shooting it down for fear of endangering civilians on the ground.

The Chinese explanation came as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was scheduled to visit Beijing for the first time this weekend, but the U.S. did not respond right away. No official announcement of the visit has been made, and it was not known how the finding of the balloon would influence his travel arrangements.

As the highest-ranking official in President Joe Biden’s administration, Blinken will travel to China in an effort to improve deteriorating bilateral ties caused by trade disputes and worries about Beijing’s more aggressive behavior toward Taiwan and in the South China Sea.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry claimed in a statement late Friday that the balloon was a civilian airship mostly used for meteorological research. According to the ministry, the airship’s weak “self-steering” abilities caused it to “deviate far from its planned course.”

According to the statement, which used the legal term “force majeure” to describe circumstances beyond one’s control, “the Chinese side regrets the accidental entry of the airship into U.S. airspace due to force majeure.”

Earlier this week, an object was spotted flying over American airspace. On Thursday, a senior American defense official told reporters at the Pentagon that the U.S. has “very high confidence” that the object was a Chinese high-altitude balloon that was flying over sensitive sites to gather information. One of the states where the balloon was noticed was Montana, which is home to Malmstrom Air Force Base, one of the country’s three nuclear missile silo fields. In order to share sensitive material, the official spoke on the condition of anonymity.

In terms of giving intelligence that couldn’t be gained by other technologies, including spy satellites, the balloon has “limited” usefulness, according to the defense official.

What will happen to the balloon if it isn’t brought down isn’t yet known.

According to Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder, the press secretary for the Pentagon, similar balloon activity has been observed in recent years, and the administration has taken precautions to make sure no important material was stolen.

He said that because the balloon was flying much higher than the altitude at which commercial aircraft fly, there was no danger to those on the ground.

According to a senior administration official who was also not permitted to publicly disclose sensitive material, Biden was informed and urged the military to give options. According to the senior defense official, American fighter jets, including F-22s, are ready to shoot down the balloon on command.

Because there are dangers to the safety of personnel on the ground, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Army Gen. Mark Milley and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin cautioned against initiating “kinetic action.” Democratic candidate Biden endorsed that suggestion.

Even though the balloon was above a sparsely populated region of Montana, its size would have resulted in a significant enough debris field to endanger people.

An official from the defense department declined to give the balloon’s size but said that commercial pilots could see it from their cockpits.

NBC News was the first to report on the balloon.

The Billings Gazette took a picture of a gigantic white balloon hovering over the neighborhood. According to Gazette photographer Larry Mayer, it was visible drifting in and out of the clouds, and had what appeared to be a solar array dangling from the bottom.

The presence of the balloon heightens national security fears among American politicians on China’s influence in the country, which also includes purchases of American farmland and the prevalence of the wildly popular smartphone app TikTok.

Republican Party House Speaker Kevin McCarthy tweeted that “China’s flagrant contempt for U.S. sovereignty is a destabilizing conduct that must be addressed.”

The South China Sea, Taiwan, the Xinjiang area in western China, the crackdown on democracy campaigners in Hong Kong, and many other problems are causing particularly high tensions with China. Not least among these irritants are China’s persistent trade and technological disputes, its failure to restrain North Korea’s burgeoning ballistic missile program, and its covert support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In reaction to neighboring operations by 34 Chinese military aircraft and nine warships, which are part of Beijing’s effort to unnerve and intimidate the self-governing island democracy, Taiwan scrambled fighter fighters, put its navy on alert, and activated missile systems on Tuesday.

Twenty of the planes went across the middle line in the Taiwan Strait, which has traditionally served as an unofficial buffer zone between the two sides, which split apart in 1949 due to a civil war.

Beijing has also stepped up its preparations for a future blockade or military action against Taiwan, raising concerns among military officers, diplomats, and elected officials in the US, Taiwan’s main supporter.