What Was That Chinese Balloon Really Up To?

of South Carolina. China claimed outrage, and now that threatens to worsen the already tense relationship between two of the world's most powerful nations. My colleague Ras Mathison overseas Bloomberg's government and political coverage around the world, and she's here with me now from London to sort out what this was all about and where things go from here. So the Chinese are claiming that this balloon was a science monitoring device that somehow drifted off course and wound up

over the un seas. Is that plausible? Well, from what we know from the US government to U S intelligence sources, they say that this in no way could have been a weather balloon, which is what the Chinese authorities are saying, there was too much on board in terms of its ability to monitor and surveil to be just there to sort of check the clouds or the weather floating over US or Northern American airspace, and um, they could see

that it was obviously able to do much more. So this obviously was going over some very sensitive terrain in the US, which makes it very difficult of course again to sort of believe the Chinese assertions that was just there to check out the weather. These are very important and sensitive weapons installations and so on. I mean, obviously they can't quite dictate where this goes once it's in

the air. But it did seem to have some mobility control and certainly when it was sent up, sent in a certain direction, and all of that, including just the material was on board the balloon, suggests that it was in no way just a weather balloon. And what was the material and more, because when we think about, you know, a weather balloon or any of these balloons, we think of that kind of balloon. Maybe it has a little thing attached to it they can take weather readings, but

this thing was enormous. It was indeed, and very big in the sky, and that's in fact how it ended up getting spotted was because it was just showing up in the sky. It seems to have had some advanced

material for a balloon. Of course, I think we all think of balloon is sort of a child's toy at a fair but in fact, as you say, this was a very very big craft with a lot of sophisticated material on board, and that was packed into a fairly small space inside the balloon, and that was sort of the technology not just to take pictures, but also to

pick up a bunch of signals. So really doing semi the work of a satellite from a from a lower altitude is the idea that the technology in it was enabling them to get that kind of information that a satellite from a much higher altitude could also do. So it's not just taking photos, although that's a part of it, and that's what they were seeing in the technology. But what was interesting about this balloon was the technology to

drive it. Is they're saying there was there was sort of advanced material in this that enabled them to send the balloon in a certain direction and for the balloon then to essentially direct itself. And that's part of the again, the argument that this was much much more than a weather balloon, as you say, was spotted because people can actually see the thing. Everybody is looking at the sky. Now, we have satellites looking down, we have people looking up.

Why did the Chinese think that this wouldn't be spotted or did they know it was going to be spot Well? This is the interesting thing because I think when a lot of people think about China and the Chinese government, they think of this monolithic, all powerful, all in control, moving in the one direction under all orders entity. And it's a really big country and it operates not not necessarily in that way at all. So the first question really is did the Chinese government know it was going

up now? Um? Did they order it to go up? Now? Do you have entities that work on their own time scale? Perhaps had been the intention to send up surveillance balloons around now, but no one thought to send a memo to the organization that does this to say, perhaps don't do it at this point in time. It's a sensitive time,

and so no one stopped it. Um. So whether this was designed to happen now as as a message from the central government that's really unclear and as perhaps something we'll actually really never know for sure if it was. That's a really sort of big question, because it was really really clear also from the language from China, from Beijing in the previous weeks and including at the start of this incident, they really wanted this not to blow up.

Pardon the language, but the panner on balloons, but they really didn't want this to escalate. They started out very very sort of low key in fact, then there was a very unusual apology. We didn't mean this thing to come across right now. So that again points to the fact there wasn't necessarily some kind of coordinated action here and a real message trying to be sent. And yet this isn't the first time that the Chinese government has

sent a balloon toward the US. It happened a couple of times before when President Trump was in office and also at the beginning of the Boning administration. Is that right, well, that's right. In fact, there's a long, long history of Chinese surveillance craft, including balloons, coming into various orbits that affect the US but also other countries over the years.

And interestingly, conversely, the US obviously has deployed these also as mechanisms as surveillance over the years, so it's not an unusual thing to have balloons floating about in the air, and of course China always saying that they are indeed just to monitor the weather um, so there's been a

long history of this. The interesting thing is that with the deployment of satellites and advanced technology, there's still the use of these balloons above all just to sort of float across the air and take pictures really of terrain um and they've been reports the US government is looking to beef up its own use of surveillance balloons going forward,

even as they too rely on satellites. So these things are really still seen as sort of a low level tool of statecraft, partly because they don't really have radar, they don't have heavy materials, so they can drift along for days, usually out of sight, and they're not caught on radar, and that's why they're still quite useful. Obviously, this one was so big and so visible that they became a different story, but it's possible there have been many many balloons over the years that have gone over

that we've never really known about. As you mentioned earlier that it went over some pretty sensitive terrain. It was over in Montana where there's mental installations, and then traverse the entirety of the US until it were shut down off the east coast once it reached water, and it wouldn't damage anything when it fell. Do US officials know

exactly what this thing was looking for? Well, that they don't know, um, But at least the one thing is when they were aware of it and they could start tracking it, It's possible the U s could in fact be sort of reverse in telling this thing if that's such a phrase, um, and that they were able to work out what this thing was looking at they could draw their own intelligence from it. So letting it actually go across the US for several days probably gave the US in turn a treat a trove of stuff for

themselves to look out. Ras please stick around. Our conversation continues after the break. Razi used that great word, I don't know if it's a natural word reverse in telling that the US was trying to figure out where they could learn. Now that this thing is in the water, are they're going to be able to actually get it and crack it open and see what intelligence it gather. So it's actually quite interesting because they sent fighter jets

F twenty two Raptors to shoot this thing down. It's possibly the first time in the twenty five year history of the F twenty two that it's done what's not as an air to air kill, and that's sending something through the air to kill something else that's also in the air. After twenty five years of this program. It's also at high gravity. It's really really amazing the pilot managed to hit it, because it's very, very difficult to

shoot these things down. Um even though it's sort of semi slow moving, it's just sort of drifting through the sky. It doesn't have any heat on it, so you can't put radar on it to try and shoot it down. It's technically very difficult. I recall there was some years ago, I think it was in Canada where there was something else They tried to shoot down a balloon and they put thousands of rounds into it and it failed to

think it. So the fact they managed to do this is quite interesting, but also they did it in a very targeted way, which is they were trying to preserve what's known as the payload, which is the technological stuff they want to study afterward, and of course they're very used to picking stuff up out of the ocean after it lands, and so with that, of course, you know they're quite they're quite expert at being able to fish

stuff out of the water. So you imagine what they've done is they've they've shot it down over the sea. They're able to fish it out of the ocean and therefore they can study it. And of course this was a sidewinder missile that they used to fire again at very high altitude, so at first for the F twenty two, quite possibly in its twenty five year history. And so this thing crashed down into the ocean. Was it in

one piece? I guess the debris could be found up to seven miles away from where it splashed into the water, that's right. But the only thing they really need to track as it crashed was the payload, which is of course the stuff they want to study. There's a large part of the balloon which is just the infrastructure that allows it to float along, and that's not worth anything.

Of course, a missile will blow it into smithereens. But what we're trying to do when they shut it down was to destroy the infrastructure of the balloon while preserving the stuff that they would like to look out afterward, and that's the stuff they would have been tracking as it hit the water. Rise. What's the chance that when that thing hit the water, like all of its electron has just got fried, or maybe it had had a self destruct setting that win and goes plummeting it, you know,

fries itself out. Well, that's entirely possible, because again, this seems to have been quite an advanced Chinese surveillance balloon in terms of the technology that was on it. That's what they were saying. This is a different kind of balloon then they had seen before, and when they shot it down out of the sky again at very high altitude with a very big missile, there's every chance that it did destroy the entirety of the balloon, including what

they would like to pick up afterward. But at least we know that there's the chance that it hit the water intact, and if it did that they'd be keen to fish it out again. And of course whatever they faignd is going to probably come classified, so we may not know for a long time or ever, really what they found on board that thing. That's entirely right, and

there's been to see some similarities to previous incidents. Of course, there was a U. S. Navy drone that China picked up in the South China see some years ago and held onto for several weeks before they gave it back, and that was the question, of course, what were they doing with it in the meantime. So even if there is some kind of return transfer at some point, the longer they hold onto it, the more it gives them

the chance to study it. Ris You mentioned earlier that the Chinese government took pains to try to downplay the significance of the balloon, that they even issued initially an apology. Of course, after it were shot down, then it was anger and outrage because they're claiming, of course that it's a science balloon. This comes at a kind of a bad time for US Chinese relations right now. Can you talk about what that's going to mean going forward? Well,

that is the big question. I mean, we've seen episodes like this before again where we've had near collisions or collisions, or we've had China picking up US Navy material vice versa, and those things have escalated and then de escalated because in the end, neither China nor the US really wants

to see something escalate into a potential military conflict. But this became, This came at a really really important moment for China US ties because of course the US President Joe Biden met with Chinese President C J. Ping late last year at the G twenty in Bali, and that was their first face to face meeting as presidents, and they used that to really try and put a floor

at least under the relationship. No one's going to pretend that there are ongoing tensions over trade, over technology, over security, over human rights, and the longer term trajectories two big powers competing with each other, but there was an understanding at least that there was probably in their mutual interest

to put a floor under that relationship. And that set the scene for a bit of a thought, including what was going to be the visit to China by the U S Secretary of State Anthony B. Lincoln, which was happening the previous weekend, but of course the balloon made that impossible. And how we've seen the US defer that trip. They haven't canceled it, but they've deferred it. And that really is a setback to very fragile, fragile steps towards

a better relationship between the two countries. And now, of course, the shooting down of the balloon means what does China have to do or say here in terms of a response. We've seen the shift in rehetorate that you were talking about, whereas what does that translate to. Does that mean that we see some kind of retaliation from China? Is it in the trade space, is it in the security space, the military space, isn't a technology space. Do they feel they have to do some sort of response? And then

does that just have a cascade Effectum? What you do see though, really still through this, despite this tension, is probably a continued desire on both China and the US to try and still prevent this from spiraling out of control. Of course, there's a difference between the public response China as a show strength after those balloons were shut down,

and then there's the behind the scenes diplomacy. Do we know whether that conversation taking place is maybe more along the lines of what you said earlier, which is China saying, hey, look we didn't mean to send this thing. This was a screw up by somebody lower down in order to diffuse those tensions. Well, we do know that Anthony B.

Lincoln spoke with his counterpart Wangye on the weekend. They had a phone call, and that's something because that says at least they're still talking and again that China is

willing to pick up the phone. The other thing are reports in China that the officials that sort of run these operations with surveillance balloon that the senior official has been moved out of his job on the weekend, which is quite interesting, and the fact that that's actually been publicized another sign again that China doesn't want this to escalate. But as you made a really important point whereas, which is that C. J. Ping has to show strength at home.

He has to show that he's being firm in this moment, he's being tough because of course you know that's very much how his power resonates within China. So how much of this is for domestic purposes and how much for the rest of the world is in really that question and reading between that you can see again from the Wangi Anthony B. Lincoln phone call, at least communications are continuing and back channeling, no doubt is similar and that they really want to make sure this does not spiral

out of control. We'll be right back ras. Another big thing happening soon for Joe Biden is the Stage of the Union. That speech has always tinkered with up to the very last second. But boy, this is a big news section that he's probably going to need to add. Is there any indication of how he is going to talk about this? Well, it's interesting because of course they knew about this balloon for days when it was flying over the US. They didn't publicize that. When it became public,

there was a lot of Republican criticism. There were demands immediately to do something very assertive, and criticism for not having acted sooner. That said, he has now shot the thing down, so he can say, look at me, I'm being very tough on China. I'm being assertive. We're not getting pushed around. That on the back of some pretty good jobs numbers for the US in the latest employment data set him up on a better footing on the economy. So you can imagine a slight amount of possible Biden's

swagger going into the State of the Union. Look at me again, I'm being tough on China. The economy is on a better footing, so you can imagine they'll spin it that way. The question the longer term is that again, given the level of Republican criticism that happened here, he's got to deal with that through to the election in four the republic and controlled Congress. Is he going to be directed by Republican criticism? Does he have to react

to that every time when issues, including China. So you can imagine quite an assertive sort of the Union speech, But really the underlying question is easy going to be directed increasing on foreign policy by the Republican Party. I heard all that Republican criticism too. It seemed like kind of an easy enough thing for Republicans to complain about.

And people were saying, shoot that thing down. But of course if you shot that giant thing the size of three school buses down over the US, it would have fallen on something or someone. Well, that's right, And certainly now that he's actually acted and he said that he acted in the best interests of the safety of the American people. Um well, yet of course showing a reaction to the Chinese government, that that Republican criticism will fade.

But certainly you saw the rhetoric from the White House go from fairly low key to quite heated very quickly, and that was really probably driven by the need to show that he was being tough on China, and China of course understands that, especially in a big speech like that, Joe Biden is going to you know, rattle the saber, just like Ji Jimping is doing in the other direction. How do you get past that kind of moment of I don't know, political theater to make sure that it

doesn't become something else. Well, it's what you were talking about before. It's keeping those lines of communication open and the back channels open because they'll understand that c Jmping of course has to sound tough. He has had a very difficult time in China in terms of the COVID crisis that's really hit the economy. It's hit the Chinese

people very hard. He wants the economy moving again, and that's an imperative for him to keep again comms with the US going trade and investment coming in and out of China to help his own economy. So you can imagine the back channels there are going to be absolutely crucial to understand where either of them are coming from in this moment, and then of course, how do you see a way through? Is there any way in the future where this b Lincoln visit can now still go ahead?

What were the two supposed to talk about. There's a lot of billing about this meeting that they were going to reach some sort of breakthrough that would ease tensions with China before all this happened. Well, the interesting thing is that China never confirmed the meeting with C. Jimping, and so there was no guarantee until Lincoln got there and actually started his conversations as to whether that would

go ahead. And in fact, if it hadn't happened, it would have been very very telling because Seeching Pink normally meets with sort of the Secretary of State equivalent from the U S and other countries when they visit. If they did meet, they were going to talk about an awful lot trade, technology, their economies, common interests around the world. They probably would have talked about the conflict in Ukraine, for example, that's a big one for for both countries.

There were not going to be really any enormous breakthroughs from that meeting. Um, no coming away saying we've agreed to do X, Y, and Z, But really just having the meeting itself would have been a big signal and and and a win for both countries arguably, and it would have just set the tone because after that, potentially you would have had a visit to the US from Janet Yellen, the Treasury Secretary, and that you could see an ongoing series of visits coming after that that really

would have deepened this saw that we were expecting. So it was really about just opening the door to that that than significant initial breakthroughs. As we're talking about here. China in the US often like to talk tough about each other, but both of these nations need each other for economic and other reasons. When you look down the road a couple of months from now, do you think that this is still front of mind or do you think it fades and more pressing concerns eventually rise up again.

The reality is we're probably going to see further bouts of tension even if this immediate crisis passed, because, of course, the US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has said he intends to visit Taiwan, which is a democratically ruled ireland. However, that China sees as its sovereign territory. And we saw what happened when the then speaking Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan. China retaliated militarily by firing off a bunch of staff

around Taiwan, missiles and drools and so on. And if that goes ahead, we might we might see a pause for a couple of weeks or a couple of months after this, but that will then lead to another escalation. And the reality is in the run up to u S election and beyond, we're only going to see a hardening really from here and in the broader toime, we're just going to see again two very big superpowers in a in a very combative and competitive relationship. Ros Mathison,

thanks so much for talking with me today. Anytime you can follow all the news about the Chinese balloon, and no doubt there will be plenty of it at Bloomberg dot com. Thanks for listening to us here at the Big Take. It's a daily podcast from Bloomberg and I Heart Radio. For more shows from my heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen, and we'd love to hear from you. Email US questions

or comments to Big Take at bloomberg dot Net. This episode was produced and engineered by our supervising producer, Vicky Bergolina. Our original music was composed by Leo Sidrin. I'm Westkasova will be back tomorrow with another Big Take Take bad punk and punk punt bunk, then and there