BEHIND THE WAR BALLS ARE PLAYED

FIRST POWER ISSUES

BETWEEN CHINA AND THE UNITED STATES

Nearly a week after a US fighter jet shot down a Chinese spy balloon over the Atlantic, a new flying object was shot down on Sunday, February 12, 2023. The Pentagon said on Sunday that US and Canadians were planning an operation to try to recover the fourth object.

The first three craft were shot down by US F-22 fighters using AIM-9X missiles, authorities said. The first flying object was a Chinese balloon, about 60 meters high, and "carrying a kind of huge basket weighing more than a ton", according to the Pentagon.

Its size would be comparable to that of three buses. A senior US State Department official said the device had "numerous antennae, an array likely capable of collecting and geolocating communications" , and was "fitted with solar panels large enough to provide the energy required to operate multiple sensors collecting intelligence," the Pentagon said in a press release.

On Monday, February 13, 2023, it is China's turn to accuse the United States of flying balloons "illegally" in its airspace. "Since last year alone, American balloons have flown over China more than 10 times without any permission," Chinese diplomatic spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters. Washington quickly dismissed Beijing's accusations. China also announced on Sunday February 12, 2023 that it had spotted, in turn, a suspicious balloon off its coast.

High-altitude spy episode ?

For Washington, there is no doubt that these are Chinese spy balloons, which entered American territory several days ago. Beijing replies that these are civil aircraft used for research purposes, mainly meteorological. Still, the debris of its various downed objects will be analyzed.

An official of the FBI, the agency responsible for examining them, has also recently indicated that only a “small part” of the surveillance equipment from the first balloon had been recovered. They are being examined at federal police labs in Quantico, Va., he added.

Possible link with tensions around Taiwan

According to specialists, American and Canadian intelligence continuously receive huge amounts of data and are particularly on the lookout for potential missiles, not slow objects like balloons.

US Deputy Defense Secretary Melissa Dalton said on Sunday that after the Chinese balloon was detected, the US air defense adjusted its radar systems to be able to detect smaller, slower-moving objects.

The United States believes the balloon was controlled by the Chinese military and was part of a fleet sent by Beijing over more than 40 countries on five continents for espionage purposes. For some analysts, this could be the start of a major Chinese spy operation to map out foreign military capabilities, ahead of a possible rise in tensions around Taiwan in the years to come.

A real high-flying spy mission, as assured in the press by American officials, or a simple scientific balloon tossed about by the winds ?

Beyond the exchange of arms between the two countries, the incident reminds us that these machines, used for more than fifty years to carry out atmospheric measurements (ozone, CO2, methane, etc.), can also respond to less innocent uses. .

Today's stratospheric balloons are very efficient: they evolve between 18 and 40 kilometers in altitude and the diameter of the largest can reach 130 meters, for a volume of 800,000 m3.

The largest balloons today are capable of carrying a ton of payload. As for autonomy, it can be pushed up to about three months. Ideal for carrying out scientific measurements, but also monitoring operations…

A fierce race for technological innovation

But the most important point according to the Wall Street Journal is that it is not just a question of unidentified flying objects but above all a new stage in the rivalry between the United States and China.

A growing rivalry: the Wall Street Journal recalls that last Friday, the United States Department of Commerce added new Chinese companies to the list of groups with which American companies are no longer allowed to trade.

Washington is thus trying to set up a glacis to hinder the technological development of China. In addition to the measures taken against Huawei and other major Chinese companies, the United States imposed in November 2022 drastic restrictions on the export of advanced semiconductors, in the name of “national security”.

Unprecedented measures which "aim to block the entire Chinese innovation system" and whose consequences - still hard to assess - could be heavy for Xi Jinping, who shows his desire to raise his country to the first place of world powers in all fields by 2049 - the year of the centenary of the seizure of power by the Communists - particularly in tech, a sector at the heart of American ambitions.

So what is trade warfare or espionage ?

"There is a gray area between the two, analyzes Marc Julienne in the article by our colleague Shirley Sitbon. For the Americans, preventing the Chinese from progressing technologically is a question of security".

A vagueness also maintained by the Chinese system, where the links between the government and private companies are sometimes difficult to determine as they can be intertwined in one way or another.

This balloon war only revives the strong tensions between these two rival powers that are the United States and China for a world first place...