As many people may know by now, there had been an extremely large balloon floating around above American territory over the course of a few days. It has since been dealt with by the United States Department of Defense.
On Wednesday, Feb. 1, sightings of a large floating device were reported in Billings, Montana. It was later identified as an airship, with suspicion of it belonging to the Chinese government. It had traveled across the Pacific Ocean and into American and Canadian airspace days prior to the Montana sightings and was expected to fully cross U.S. airspace over the course of several days. The Department of Defense speculated that the airship was a spy balloon sent to gather protected and secret information about the United State’s government for China’s advantage. Despite the possibility of the aircraft invading U.S. intelligence information, there was no immediate threat opposed to the civilian population. China publicly announced that the balloon was harmless and meant for meteorology and research purposes, but the American public has felt differently about the true reasoning for the suspected spy balloon (BBC News; Mansoor, 2023; Britzky, 2023).
The Chinese government stated that the harmless research balloon had been blown off its track and was never meant to “violate the territory and airspace of any sovereign country,” explains the Chinese foreign ministry in a statement that was released. China explains how its balloon deviated from its flight course ‘by mistake.’ However, U.S. officials do not fully believe this to be true.
To give a better understanding, a high-altitude surveillance balloon flies between 80,000 feet (24 kilometers) and 120,000 feet (37 kilometers) above the ground. This altitude is higher than the range that fighter and commercial aircraft normally fly. These devices are large helium-filled balloons with solar panels to provide power. Technology and instruments such as cameras, radar, sensors, and communications equipment are attached to these balloons (BBC News).
On Saturday, Feb. 4, the Chinese airship reached the east coast and was spotted in the Carolinas. The U.S. Department of Defense decided against shooting the spy balloon down while over land to avoid excessive debris falling from the sky which could cause damage to civilian populations. On Feb. 4, the U.S. Department of Defense and U.S. fighter jets finally decided to shoot down the spy balloon over the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
In addition to the balloon shot down in American airspace, another spy balloon was spotted late Feb. 3 crossing over Latin America, around the countries of Costa Rica and Venezuela. China denied the balloon was a property of the Chinese government, but finally declared its ownership on Monday, Feb. 6.
The U.S. Department of Defense extracted the fallen balloon and technology from the Atlantic Ocean and continued to further assess and analyze. U.S. officials declared the balloon not a threat to collect intelligence and surveillance, but for its stated purpose of research. However, U.S. officials consider this act and the balloon’s presence a ‘violation of international law’ and very irresponsible of the Chinese government.
What do I think?
I believe there is no coincidence to this irresponsible act. Tensions have been rising between China and the United States in recent years. With China having close ties with Russia and the U.S. funding Ukraine in their dilemma; it just all seems too suspicious. This isn’t the first instance of a large floating device that has hovered over American territory. In recent years, there have been four others spotted and deemed to belong to the Chinese government. Three spy balloons crossed U.S. territory during Trump’s administration and one during Biden’s in recent years, yet these were ignored to the public eye. Why?
China publicly announced that these balloons were ‘mistakenly’ blown off path and were never intended to cross over foreign countries. However, as I just stated, this isn’t the first instance… or their first ‘mistake.’ In addition to previous spy balloons being present, there happened to be another one currently crossing over Latin America coincidentally, which also happened to deviate from its original course.
U.S. officials do not take this statement from the Chinese government to be true because it just so happens that the spy balloon spotted in Montana coincidentally hovered over several areas where sensitive and classified government informational sites are located. Although the U.S. Department of Defense finally declared the airship to be harmless and not of surveillance or intelligence intent once its materials were analyzed, I do not believe that to be true. It is very possible that Chinese technology possesses the capability to extract important information and go undetected. Another potential reason is that the U.S. government could have announced to the public that there is no real reason for concern simply to keep peace among its civilians. Is the U.S. government and officials downplaying the severity of the situation?
My final hypothesis is this: Is this all a distraction scheme? In the political and media world, we as citizens are not unfamiliar with media distraction tactics to draw us into a certain direction and avoid the actual root of problems. It is possible that the Chinese government could have purposely deployed these spy balloons around the world to further draw attention away from an underlying motive. And to be devil’s advocate, could the U.S. government itself be behind all this?
All of these are possible and hypothetical explanations for the current situation. It is important to shed light on the issue as it is relevant to how the U.S. moves forward in its defenses. We must take careful consideration in the next following steps to avoid causing more harm and further tension, but appropriately acknowledge such acts and deem them reckless. Biden’s Administration must move with caution, while holding China, and other foreign states involved accountable. It will definitely be interesting to discover the U.S. government’s next steps towards dealing with this issue.