Photo by Florian Klauer on Unsplash
Recently, a suspected Chinese surveillance balloon surfaced in Montana, in which the United States (US) shot down. The Chinese claimed that the balloon was a civilian airship, a weather balloon that was blown off-course. However, the US maintains that it was a balloon capable of spying as the balloon had antennas with surveillance capabilities, and it had flown at a very high altitude. As such, there has been great controversy regarding the true purpose of the balloon. This article seeks to discuss the impact of the balloon controversy towards US-China relations.
One key impact I would like to cover is the diplomatic crisis and strained US-China relations the balloon controversy has caused. For context, the US and China have had a rocky relationship due to conflicts in the economic dimension, the ideological dimension and even the social dimension. However, to start 2023, these two nations have actually started to improve relations between one another. Anthony Blinken, US Secretary of State had planned to visit China to further discussions between both countries after they had made constructive discussions in the Group of Twenty meeting in Bali. China was also apparently quite keen for this meeting to occur. President Xi hoped this meeting would repair ties with the US and also help recover China’s economy. Xi’s desire to mend relations with the US was seen in his response to the balloon incident, where he had expressed regret, instead of responding aggressively. However, the US insisted that the spy balloon was an infringement of national sovereignty and Blinken postponed his meeting to China. Also, the US blacklisted a Chinese research institute and five aviation and defense companies, limiting their access to US technology since these firms were reportedly involved in the construction of the balloon. As for China’s response, following its initial response of regret, China then claimed that the US’ response to the balloon was an overreaction, an act of hype and political manipulation. The Chinese also responded with claims of US balloons flying into China’s airspace more than 10 times in the past years.
Evidently, the balloon incident has sparked more tensions, and has led to back and forth jabs that we have seen occur in the past. With continued US-China tensions, it remains a major detriment to the world. The US-China trade war has caused great repercussions economically, and markets have continued observing the relations between these two countries, in hopes of warmer relations. As these two countries continue their tense relationship, many countries in the world will continue to suffer, and become forced to pick a side.
Thankfully, Blinken did manage to still meet China’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, in an informal setting in Germany to discuss key issues like Ukraine, Taiwan and the spy balloon incident. While the meeting is a good sign and a step in the right direction towards improved US-China relations, the different statements by the US and China following that meeting suggests that relations between the two might still be tense. Simultaneously, the fact that there was no formal agreement reached and mechanism for increasing dialogue between the two countries, it might take more time for US-China tensions to heal.
As such, the controversy over China’s balloon has certainly inflicted great harm towards US-China relations, with relations between the two countries seemingly becoming more tense. For now, the world can only hope that the informal meeting between Wang and Blinken could help set up future meetings to ease tensions between the two countries.
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