Following up with our editorial yesterday, the balloon that floated across the US has been shot down. US authorities are now working to retrieve and analyze instruments in what they insist was a spy balloon but the Chinese say was a weather balloon.
Yes, the tension between these two countries was brought higher by a balloon.
China said the US overreacted to the entire situation. "China expresses its strong dissatisfaction and protest against the US using force to attack civilian unmanned airships... China will resolutely defend the legitimate rights and interests of the enterprise involved, and retains the right to respond further," they said.
Ominous words “the right to respond further”, but we may just be overthinking it.
That part is also undeserved. Can they really blame the Americans for acting how they did considering how tense the situation has become between those two countries? These days it doesn’t take much to put America on edge, what with so many local events going on that disturb its internal peace.
The US may be paranoid but China must be understanding; what if this had happened to them? What if the shoe had been on the other foot? Let’s say a balloon suddenly appeared over Chinese airspace, then their greatest rival would say “oh, nothing to worry about, it’s just our runaway weather balloon” how would they react?
Most likely they would have had the same suspicions and reaction which is to shoot it down. Most likely they would have done it even earlier than their American counterparts.
On the point of the US being overly paranoid, we should also point out that they already insist the flying object was a spy balloon even as no evidence has been recovered as of this writing.
There’s actually three things that it could be: First, it may be just what the Chinese say it was, a legit weather balloon blown off-course. Second, it could really be a spy balloon, unlikely as this scenario is. Third it could be just a plain old balloon that China deliberately shoved in the direction of the US just to gauge how the US would react to such an “incursion” into their territory.
Now we wait until after the equipment the balloon carried is retrieved, pieced back together, and analyzed. Now we wait to see who was right about the balloon.
It may not be a stretch to say that right now world peace might hinge on a balloon.
If proven to be a spy balloon, the US won’t take this sitting down. While it may not go to a shooting war over a balloon it is likely to come up with a stunt just as audacious just to provoke China.