U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, called for greater transparency for the American people from President Joe Biden and senior Biden administration officials regarding the nature of the multiple unidentified aerial objects shot down over North America in recent days.
“I think the Biden administration needs to provide more transparency to the American public,” Sen. Sullivan said on “Fox and Friends.”
“Our military intel agencies, they’re normally secretive, but we live in a democracy. If you don’t start providing information, people can wildly speculate, and we don’t want that. What we need right now is more information on all of these kinds of incidents so the American people have full information. I think that’s going to be really important in the next few days,” Sullivan said.
Sullivan’s comments come as North Slope workers reported a possible C-130 military jet circling from 11 am until 3 pm on Sunday, a day after an Air Force fighter jet knocked an unidentified object out of the sky north of Deadhorse. The item landed on the ice-covered Arctic Ocean. As seen in the photo above, provided by an anonymous North Slope worker, Blackhawk helicopters were also in the area on Sunday.
Sen. Sullivan also said that Americans should assume the unidentified objects are adversarial aircraft probing for weaknesses in U.S. defense capabilities until that scenario can be ruled out.
“The one that was shot down over Alaska is different from the one that was shot down over Canada, according to the briefings that I’ve been given,” Sen. Sullivan said. “With regard to China, I think we need to assume [that these objects are] our adversary’s surveillance, assume that they’re objects that are probing for weakness in our defenses. And, if they’re more benign when we find that out later, okay. But at least we’re doing the number one thing that we’re supposed to be doing, [which] is protecting our nation.”
Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Rep. Mary Peltola took a less forceful approach to the need for transparency, using words like “encourage” and “expecting” transparency:
“For the third time in the past week, U.S. forces have brought down a high-altitude object that was violating sovereign airspace—this time, just across the border in theYukon, in direct cooperation with our Canadian allies and at the direction of Canada’s Prime Minister,” Murkowski’s statement said.
“I again commend the excellent mission execution by our military men and women from the 11th Air Force and the Alaska Air National Guard, as well as the leadership at Alaska NORAD and NORTHCOM, in taking this object down.
“As operations continue off of Alaska’s north coast to recover the debris from the object shot down yesterday, I also greatly appreciate all of the Air Guardsmen from the Rescue Triad who are engaged in those critical efforts, which are taking place in harsh conditions and terrain. It is those difficult operations that will allow us to determine what these objects are and who is violating our sovereignty.
“As we learn more about these objects, I will continue to encourage maximum transparency so that Alaskans have the greatest possible understanding of what they are and what we are doing, on the front line of our nation’s defense, to take them safely out of the sky.”
Rep. Peltola issued the following statement, also commending the military for its swift and skillful actions:
“My office was briefed by the Department of Defense regarding the unidentified object over Alaska this morning, February 10. I commend our military for their swift and skillful operation to track, study, and eliminate this object after confirming that it was a potential threat operating in civilian airspace,” she said.
“This incident reinforces Alaska’s strategic importance and the necessity of investing in our Arctic defenses. Our incredible pilots at Elmendorf and Eielson AFBs are vital links in the protection of Alaska and the United States, and they proved that today.
“I join my fellow delegation members in expecting answers from our military leaders for how unidentified objects have been able to infiltrate our airspace in recent weeks. We need to be aware of any other such objects over Alaska. The Defense Department must thoroughly investigate and close this gap in our domain awareness. Continued violations of sovereign American airspace cannot be allowed.”
