Commentary
My goodness. There seem to be more balloons over North America than at a birthday party, although they keep popping as if made in China. But citizens of self-governing democracies might be given some idea what’s going on.
Unfortunately Justin Trudeau said, “we will continue to keep people informed.” And as I’ve noted, “continue” is what poker players call a “tell” for our prime minister and his colleagues that they’ve been caught not doing something they obviously should but have no idea how.
Worse, his full sentence was “You can know that this is something that NORAD and Canada and the United States are taking extremely seriously, and we will continue to keep people informed as we know more.” So currently, as merely effective head of our executive branch, he doesn’t know more. And we “can know” they’re taking it seriously. But do we?
Did they tell us a week ago these things even existed? Before the White House watched that Chinese balloon cross North America west to east for a week or so gathering intelligence before downing it off the east coast in response to an outcry, had the State Department told anyone there was this massive communist Chinese espionage effort involving “more than 40 countries across five continents”?
Of course, citizens and the press must be vigilant, because governments are so prone to hide potentially embarrassing information that they risk stamping the menu “Top Secret” on the “Yes, Minister” principle, “If no one knows what you’re doing, then no one knows what you’re doing wrong.” Like having no effective air force and having to beg your neighbour to shoot down that thing over Yukon. Or being so cozy with a tyrannical regime you don’t investigate its election meddling.
The Chinese Politburo is so used to imposing intimidating lies they were genuinely indignant at being confronted with the spy antennae on their supposed weather balloon, and accused the Americans of “indiscriminate use of force” for blasting it. And the kinder, gentler Canadian officials who say any effort to combat Chinese espionage must be “inclusive, diverse and culturally sensitive” would presumably agree, though all I’ve come up with is using a missile painted like a chopstick. But by now the secret is out and tact is history.
On Feb. 8 The New York Times, not keen to expose, say, Hunter Biden’s Chinese dealings, did cough up, “American intelligence agencies have assessed that China’s spy balloon program is part of a global surveillance effort that is designed to collect information on the military capabilities of countries around the world.” And the U.S. military has known for “several years” and told dozens of other countries. Just not us.
To be fair, The Washington Post said a day earlier, “U.S. officials have begun to brief allies and partners who have been similarly targeted.” So they only told them, and sanctioned six “Chinese entities” making spy-balloon parts, following the embarrassment of having this “domain awareness gap” exposed. Despite Kipling’s “giving a thing a long name doesn’t make it any better,” bureaucrats worry that if they say “we flubbed our job of watching for threats,” someone will ask why.
The Pentagon also pre-emptively insisted they were on it all along, hiding everything important then spying on the balloons. But I’d be more easily persuaded if they’d hinted about the fleet of “Made in China” blimps cruising around watching us while they did nothing before we found out independently and said, “What’s with the Zeppelins?”
Or whatever they are. After the U.S. toasted a second over Alaska, a National Security Council official “confirmed” that “We’re calling this an object because that’s the best description we have right now.” And what’s the worst? Why, “We do not know who owns it, whether it’s state-owned or corporate-owned or privately owned.” (As the Wall Street Journal groused, not much to show for US$850 billion on defence.) And Trudeau tweeted about being “briefed,” so it was news to him too.
When the third in a week was shot down, over Yukon by an American F-22, it was news as far as Australia. And Trudeau tweeted Patton-like, “I ordered the take down of an unidentified object that violated Canadian airspace.” Though the Pentagon press secretary gently corrected him, saying after chatting with Trudeau, “President Biden authorized U.S. fighter aircraft” to Top Gun the thing.
On Feb. 12 another was destroyed on the Michigan side of Lake Huron. What was it? Duh. “We’re calling them objects for a reason” said the general running NORAD. Namely that dratted “domain awareness gap” right in the heartland.
Had they come clean earlier about these UFOs, they might have had to determine what they were, or tell us frankly why they didn’t know. Instead, it just burst suddenly around them, and us. It’s no way to stay safe.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
