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North Dakotans need to be always on guard

When a Chinese spy balloon flew over the United States a few days ago, it followed a path not that far from North Dakota.

A photographer in Billings, Montana, happened to see the balloon, took photos of it and posted them for people to see all over the country. It took a few days while the balloon traveled across the country before the president gave the order to shoot down the balloon.

There should be great concern across this country about incidents like this occurring. North Dakotans need to be concerned as well.

Was this balloon able to conduct any surveillance of North Dakota and its military sites?

Minot Air Force Base is the only base with dual-wing, nuclear-capability. It has intercontinental ballistic missiles in underground facilities in this part of the state. The base also has B-52 bombers. It’s the only base with two legs of the nuclear triad. The third leg is the Navy’s nuclear missile armed submarines.

According to news reports, the Chinese spy balloon flew over Montana. Malmstrom Air Force Base in western Montana is one of the three bases along with Minot AFB and F.E. Warren AFB in Wyoming with ICBM fields.

Sen. Kevin Cramer, R-ND, said in a statement provided to The Minot Daily News on Thursday, “From what we know at this point, we don’t have any reason to believe the balloon flew over Minot. However, this balloon was floating about 60,000 feet in the air. Long range, wide range – who knows what type of surveillance we are dealing with and how much land it can visually cover. We should be questioning that. I will be receiving more briefs on this issue shortly.”

All of this follows on the heels of the U.S. Air Force providing its official position on the Fufeng project in Grand Forks to Sens. John Hoeven, R-ND, and Cramer. A Chinese food manufacturer purchased land near Grand Forks AFB to build a corn milling plant there. Grand Forks AFB is the center of military activities related to both air and space operations. The Air Force said the proposed project “presents a significant threat to national security with both near- and long-term risks of significant impacts to our operations in the area.” The senators and Gov. Doug Burgum urged the City of Grand Forks to stop the project.

Our adversaries are prowling and doing things we might not even suspect. We need to be on guard all the time.

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