Only US Warmakers Could Create a Panic as Absurd as the “Spy Balloon” Fiasco
The US government and media instigate international fearmongering and saber-rattling on a regular basis. But the recent Chinese spy balloon incident belongs in the Hall of Fame as one of the most idiotic panics by a jittery, trigger-happy warfare state.
President Joe Biden speaks about the US response to the high-altitude Chinese spy balloon and three other unidentified objects that were recently shot down by the US military over American and Canadian airspace, in the South Court Auditorium at the White House Complex on February 16, 2023, in Washington, DC. (Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Ever since an alleged Chinese spy balloon made its merry way across the United States, triggering a full-on meltdown from the political class, we’ve been treated to seemingly around-the-clock panic-mongering about China’s dastardly balloon ambitions.
GOP lawmakers and Fox News wasted no time in speculating whether the balloon was carrying a bioweapon (“Did it take off from Wuhan?”). The balloon was a prelude to Chinese mobilization for World War III, we heard from China “expert” Gordon Chang, who suggested it “seems more than accidental” this was happening three weeks out from the anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In fact, China’s game was possibly to make the United States shoot it down, said retired House Republican Adam Kinzinger, so they could “evaluate high altitude capabilities of certain fighters.” Actually, no, it was there to “surveil strategic sites in the continental United States,” defense secretary Lloyd Austin informed us. Republicans widely criticized President Joe Biden for not blowing the balloon out of the sky earlier.
The panic only continued once the military shot down three more unidentified objects in the sky last week. “Could they say with assurance that that payload under the balloon . . . did not contain a nuclear weapon?” uber-hawk John Bolton asked on CNN. A former intelligence officer and current administration official told the New York Times that China was trying to “harass America” on the cheap and that both it and Russia wanted to test US intelligence. “Lock your doors tonight,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) darkly warned reporters after a briefing on the incidents.
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