While China’s Foreign Ministry claims the high-altitude balloon the U.S. shot down over the coast of South Carolina was for meteorological research, it’s apparent that surveillance was China’s true intent. A balloon might sound like a rather pedestrian intelligence-gathering tool, but the U.S. sees China’s spying operations as another attempt by its government to gain a competitive edge. Straight Arrow News contributor Peter Zeihan argues that in this case, the tactic backfired, and will end up giving the U.S. more intelligence on China than the other way around.

Excerpted from Peter’s Feb. 13 “Zeihan on Geopolitics” newsletter:

Unfortunately for the Chinese, their balloon didn’t make it in time for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade… however, it’s made a much bigger splash than the rest of this year’s balloons.

Now I’m no balloon expert, but it seems to me that a “spy balloon” is a little outdated for 2023; especially when an open-source satellite could have given them the same intel.

The effect of this balloon is two-fold. First, it’s shown the world that the disconnect within the Chinese government has reached an all-time high. Second, diplomatic relations between the U.S. and China have grown colder than ever and will likely be strained even further.