Commentary
Beijing’s “balloon warfare operations” against North American targets—believed to be launched from a number of sites in Inner Mongolia—may have proven strategically counterproductive at a critical moment for China.
The long-standing capability, evolving technologically and operationally over many years, came to a head with the public disclosure and shooting down by the U.S. Air Force of four lighter-than-air craft over North America in the first two weeks of February.
The revelation of the presence of the first of the February untethered aerostats caused sufficient public outcry in the United States—particularly as a result of the seeming White House indecision over handling the issue and the difficulty in shooting it down—that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was forced to “indefinitely postpone” his planned visit (he had been due to depart Washington on Feb. 3) to Beijing to meet with Foreign Affairs Minister Qin Gang and possibly Communist Party leader Xi Jinping….