A Brief History
On February 5, 2023, America is abuzz with partisan bickering over the way President Biden handled the alleged Chinese spy balloon shot down on February 4th.
Digging Deeper
Despite Republican criticism that President Biden “waited” to decide to take action, the White House reports that Biden had ordered the balloon to be shot down back on February 1st, and that the military waited until the spy in the sky was over water for the safety of those on the ground. The balloon is reportedly the size of “three buses,” and presumably would weigh hundreds or even thousands of pounds with its propulsion and spy equipment.
Additionally, the US allegedly jammed the spy capability of the balloon electronically, preventing any useful gathering of intelligence by the Chinese.
Democrats claim that the Trump administration took no action and covered up three Chinese spy balloons that crossed the US during his time as president.
Question for students (and subscribers): Was President Biden correct in waiting until the balloon was over water to shoot it down? Please let us know in the comments section below this article.
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Historical Evidence
For more information, please see…
Noble, Jeff. Spy in the Sky: The Chinese Balloon Over Montana : Uncovering the Capabilities and Impacts of Chinese Surveillance Balloons. Kindle, 2023.
Sutter, Robert. US-China Relations: Perilous Past, Uncertain Present. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2022.
The featured image in this article, a comparison by osunpokeh with size of estimated balloon, is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.
You can also watch video versions of this article on YouTube.
