‘Spy’ balloon

Source: NYT (2/3/23)
China Says Suspected Spy Balloon Is a ‘Civilian Airship’ That Strayed Off Course
Beijing said the object, which had been seen flying over Montana, was used mainly for weather research. It was not immediately clear whether the explanation would satisfy the U.S.
By Chris Buckley

Beijing sought to defuse tensions with Washington on Friday over a Chinese high-altitude balloon that floated over the United States, expressing its regret over the incident, and saying that the balloon was for civilian research and had “deviated far from its planned course.”

The explanation from the Chinese Foreign Ministry came after Pentagon officials had said on Thursday that they had detected an “intelligence-gathering balloon, most certainly launched by the People’s Republic of China,” over the state that is home to about 150 intercontinental ballistic missile silos.

After initially telling a news conference that it had to check on the claims about the balloon, the Foreign Ministry said late on Friday in Beijing that it was an innocent mistake.

“The airship is from China. It is a civilian airship used for research, mainly meteorological, purposes,” an unidentified spokesperson for the ministry said in a statement on its website. “Affected by the Westerlies and with limited self-steering capability, the airship deviated far from its planned course. The Chinese side regrets the unintended entry of the airship into US airspace due to force majeure.” “Force majeure” refers to a violation caused by forces beyond a party’s control.

It was not immediately clear whether the Chinese explanation would satisfy the Biden administration or congressional Republicans who have urged the administration to take a strong stand over the incident.

Neither side has suggested that Beijing communicated with Washington about the balloon before the controversy broke out on Thursday. But China said in its statement on Friday that it would now talk with U.S. officials about how to “properly handle this unexpected situation.”

While the Pentagon played down the potential value of the balloon for acquiring intelligence, the initial public reaction by Biden administration officials had underscored how brittle and delicate relations with Beijing have become, even over one balloon.

The defense secretary, Lloyd J. Austin III, held a meeting about the balloon with senior U.S. defense officials while he was in the Philippines, and President Biden “was briefed and asked for military options,” a Pentagon official told reporters.

China appears eager to avoid letting the balloon become a festering irritant during the planned two-day visit to Beijing starting Sunday by Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken. Speaking before China’s statement, Drew Thompson, a former Pentagon official who is now a visiting senior research fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, said the timing of the balloon flight was at least maladroit.

China is also smarting over the United States’ announcement on Thursday that it would expand its military presence in the Philippines, gaining access to four more sites that potentially could be used to marshal forces to deter or respond to Chinese military threats to Taiwan.

“This balloon surveillance mission really demonstrates that even when Xi is trying to improve the tone of the relationship and the rhetoric softens,” Mr. Thompson said of China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, “there is no interest on Beijing’s part to act with restraint or amend its behavior in ways that actually contribute to genuinely improving the condition of the relationship.”

After the Chinese Foreign Ministry issued its explanation, Mr. Thompson said: “I don’t think the statement changes the facts or the violation of U.S. airspace. At best, it is irresponsible.”

China’s Ministry of National Defense, which usually comments on military issues, did not give any comment.

“China is a responsible country, always strictly abides by international law, and has no intention of violating any sovereign country’s territory or airspace,” Mao Ning, a spokeswoman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry told a regular news briefing on Friday afternoon. But she said then that the authorities needed to check the reports.

The Global Times, a Communist Party-run newspaper that has become a vehicle for pugnacious, sometimes quasi-official reactions from Beijing, suggested that the balloon reports were in line with what it called U.S. efforts to “create a Cold War atmosphere and exacerbate China-U.S. tensions.”

Plans for Mr. Blinken’s trip to Beijing firmed up in November, when Mr. Biden and Mr. Xi met in Bali and agreed to try to rein in tensions. Volatile strains have built up over Taiwan; technological barriers and bans; human rights issues in Xinjiang and Hong Kong, and resulting American sanctions on Chinese officials; and, most broadly, over a growing military rivalry across Asia and the Pacific.

Mr. Blinken would be the first U.S. secretary of state to visit Beijing in over four years. After the balloon news broke, a chorus of Republican politicians in Washington urged the Biden administration to take a tougher approach to China.

“China’s brazen disregard for U.S. sovereignty is a destabilizing action that must be addressed, and President Biden cannot be silent,” Speaker Kevin McCarthy said in a statement on Twitter.

Mr. McCarthy has said that as speaker he plans to visit Taiwan — the democratically ruled island that Beijing claims as its territory — which could prompt China to hold another round of intimidating military maneuvers near the island, similar to the ones it held last year when Mr. McCarthy’s predecessor, Nancy Pelosi, visited Taiwan.

Pentagon officials have refused to disclose many details about the balloon, including its size and features, making it harder for outside experts to assess its military intent and value. “We did assess that it was large enough to cause damage from the debris field if we downed it over an area,” a senior Department of Defense official told reporters.

The once-humble balloon is one of many technologies that China’s military forces have seized on as a potential tool in their rivalry with the United States and other powers. Other advanced machinery includes drones and hypersonic glide vehicles that can maneuver at high speeds in the atmosphere.

In studies and newspaper articles, People’s Liberation Army experts have tracked the efforts by the United States, France and other countries to use advanced high-altitude balloons for intelligence collection and for coordinating battlefield operations. New materials and technologies, they have said, have made balloons more resilient, maneuverable and far-ranging than past generations of balloons.

“Technological advances have opened a new door for the use of balloons,” one article in the Liberation Army Daily — the main newspaper of China’s military — stated last year. Another article in the same newspaper noted that airships in the upper reaches of the atmosphere could also become like “a thousand eyes” helping to monitor outer space.

Taiwan’s defense ministry has said that in early 2022, China flew balloons over the island. The balloon sent over the United States may be used to collect information on air defense systems or atmospheric conditions, said Su Tzu-yun, an analyst at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research in Taipei. American forces would have little trouble following the balloon now, even at much higher altitudes than those spotted over Taiwan, he said.

“Basically, they’re very obvious, and because of their large volume, they’re very easily tracked in time by radar,” Mr. Su said.

Amy Chang Chien contributed reporting.

Chris Buckley is chief China correspondent and has lived in China for most of the past 30 years after growing up in Sydney, Australia. Before joining The Times in 2012, he was a correspondent in Beijing for Reuters. @ChuBailiang