Spy balloon part of a bigger Chinese military surveillance operation, US intel sources claim

(CNN) ⸻ US intelligence officials believe that the recovered Chinese spy balloon is part of an extensive surveillance program. The surveillance program, which includes a number of similar balloons, is in part run out of the small Chinese province of Hainan. Not all of the balloons sighted around the globe have been exactly the same model as the one shot down. FBI engineers are studying the remnants of the balloon to learn more about how best to track them in the future. The US wants to examine the balloon's hardware in order to learn more about its precise capabilities. The biggest unanswered question, officials say, remains China's intent. The US gleaned important clues to the answers of some of these questions while the balloon was transiting the United States. But how much the intelligence community will be able to learn about what information it actually collected isn't clear at this point. The team specializes in creating technical surveillance measures and analyzing those of the US' adversaries. Defense officials insist the US learned more about the balloon's capabilities by allowing it to pass over the United States than they would have by shooting it down immediately.