China won’t have gained much from its spy balloon

If you didn’t know any better, you might have thought China was preparing to unleash a large-scale invasion on the continental United States.

News of a Chinese surveillance balloon loitering over the picturesque landscape of Montana generated a wave of sensationalist coverage and panicked responses from lawmakers. We don’t know much about the balloon other than what the Pentagon has told us: the device, which was orbiting miles above the earth, made its way through Alaska’s Aleutian Islands into Canada before flying somewhere over Montana and drifting across the continental United States. On Friday, the Pentagon reported a second balloon flying somewhere over Latin America. And then this evening, according to AP, the balloon was shot down over the Atlantic Ocean, where the debris can be retrieved.

The balloons didn’t threaten civilian air traffic, although the airport in Billings was shut down as a precaution as the Biden administration weighed what to do.