CNN Newsroom: Interview With Rep. John Garamendi (D-CA)
Interview
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Well, Fredricka, first of all, it's great to be with you and thank you for carrying this story -- very, very important story.
That balloon was an observation balloon to try to sort out what the United States is doing. We are very, very sophisticated, and a lot of the things that are not being said on your show or any other show is what exactly the United States is doing while that balloon was traveling across from Alaska all the way to South Carolina.
I can assure you that we were gathering information. We probably gathered information the Chinese did not want us to have -- communications systems, the way in which they're communicating from that balloon, probably the satellites. Also what it was that the Chinese were looking for as they were on this little journey. And also all of the detail, and we'll go back and we'll take all of that apart. And we'll learn from this.
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I suspect the strong words that you're hearing from the Chinese are not nearly as strong as the Chinese government is giving to whomever was responsible for sending this balloon and allowing the United States to gather so much information about what the Chinese are up to.
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I do. I do. We can surveil surveillance programs, and we do it. We do it all the time in many, many different ways. And so yes, I'm absolutely certain we were surveilling it. I'm absolutely certain that we were listening, observing very carefully how the balloon was communicating back to China, and we probably know as much about -- probably more about this than the Chinese do.
And they're not happy. We have in our hands or will shortly have in our hands whatever information they have. We'll be able to determine how sophisticated it is or not. And it is an intelligence trophy that we will be using.
Keep in mind this is not the first time this has happened. During the Trump administration at least three times these observation balloons transited the U.S. territory, probably Alaska as well as the continental.
We don't know. We were never told about that. There were no intelligence briefings during the Trump period about those three times in which this happened before.
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Well, let's be clear. The Republicans are trying to grab at every straw they can to somehow diminish the fact that this president has been extraordinarily successful.
Just look at the economy of the United States. Last six months, inflation going down. 12 million jobs being created in two years, the greatest number of jobs created during any four-year period by any previous president.
All of these things -- the unemployment rate, lowest since 1969. And they're looking for anything they can to try to diminish the extraordinary record of the Biden administration with regard to China.
The Biden administration through the military, through the Armed Services Committee in the House in which I'm a senior member, as well as the Senate, we have been ramping up every part of the American security program dealing with China.
And the Republicans have been part of that effort to deal with that and now they're basically floundering around trying to find some way to harm this presidency and this administration which has done a terrific job.
With regard to the balloon, if you want to talk about balloons, let's talk about the three times the balloons transited the United States during the Trump period where nobody that I'm aware of was ever told it happened. And certainly Trump did absolutely nothing either with the military or with the public.
So let's get on with this. We've got a lot of very good things going on. We have a very strong military. At some point we'll learn that we -- we'll learn more about this balloon and when we first observed its arrival into the United States territories.
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Well, the issue of fighter jets has been ongoing for really since this war started. There's some very good reasons that the United States did not previously send fighter jets to Ukraine. First of all, the pilots have to be trained, all of the ground, all the maintenance programs, all of the connections, the intelligence connections, the communications connections need to be set up.
The American systems are far different than the systems that Ukraine had in place prior to the war. They basically were using Russian jets and they're certainly capable of flying those and doing a good job with them.
Going forward, if you bring these new F-16 platforms into this war, it's going to require a very, very significant support structure as well as the equipment, the weapons and the ongoing maintenance. Does Ukraine need them?
Well, at the same time Russia has a very sophisticated air defense system deployed on the outskirts or on the border between Ukraine and Russia. Those S-400s are very sophisticated, have a very, very long range, can hit into the central part of Ukraine.
It's not at all clear that it is in the interest of Ukraine to have our jets so that they'll be shot down as they try to defend the eastern part of Ukraine, the Donbas region, which is certainly subject to those S-400 air defense system that are just in that neighborhood.
So we'll see what happens here. The rest of this package is extremely important, and we will in very short order, together with our European allies, sending armored vehicles of all kinds as well as the heavy tanks.
We've committed to send at least 50 Abrams tanks. Once again, they're completely different than the European model, the Leopard tank which is being talked about, as well as the French and the British tanks. Those are diesel engines.
The Abrams is a completely different engine system, runs on a turbine, uses jet fuel and not diesel fuel. And the maintenance of those tanks is extensive and on going. And so these tanks will all arrive, and they will arrive in time for the spring. That is the European tanks will arrive in time for the spring offense or defense as the case might be.
The long-range missiles, those will be there in short order. And keep in mind that all of this equipment is flowing into Ukraine on a steady basis. And the Ukrainians are trained on how to repair and maintain all of this equipment including the new equipment that's coming in.
Also the Ukrainians are extraordinary in being able to update and adapt.
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Thank you.
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