Spy Balloon Marks Beginning of a Nuclear Fear Campaign from China: Expert

Sailors assigned to Explosive Ordnance Disposal Group 2 recover a high-altitude surveillance balloon off the coast of Myrtle Beach, S.C., on Feb. 5, 2023. U.S. Navy via AP

The Chinese spy balloon that entered U.S. airspace on Jan. 28 is the beginning of a nuclear fear campaign that'll only grow, Asia military expert Rick Fisher alleged in an interview, which aired on Newsmakers by NTD and The Epoch Times on Feb. 16.

“The balloon is really the first of what’s going to become a constant pattern in our lives of aircraft carriers sailing off our coasts, bombers flying off our coasts,” Fisher said.

“[People’s Liberation Army (PLA)] nuclear and military intimidation is only going to grow and become regular in our lives from this point. The balloon marks a beginning of the Chinese desire to make Americans afraid.”

Party leader Xi Jinping votes at the closing of the 19th Communist Party Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, on Oct. 24, 2017. Lintao Zhang/Getty Images

Fisher, a Senior Fellow on Asian Military Affairs at the International Assessment and Strategy Center and a recognized authority on the People’s Republic of China military, believes China is beginning its fear campaign because of Taiwan.

“This is the year that Xi Jinping wants to make clear to the United States that their support for Taiwan, for freedom on Taiwan could lead to war—even nuclear war,” Fisher said.

Nuclear Missiles and Weather

According to Fisher, instead of putting forward a message that the balloon wasn’t a significant threat, the Biden administration needs to explain to Americans that China launched the balloon from Hainan Island, a Chinese nuclear stronghold, and detail what that means.

“In the last 24 hours, U.S. intelligence officials have revealed that the balloon was launched from Hainan Island,” Fisher said. “Hainan Island is where China keeps most of its nuclear missile armed, nuclear powered submarines. Its SSPNs. These are now armed, according to a U.S. Navy revelation about five months ago, with the new JL-3 Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missile.”

Further, Fisher said that while reports say the balloon was initially aimed at Guam and blown off course, those claims are “not credible.”

“If the People’s Liberation Army thought their surveillance balloon was being mistakenly directed, they could have prompted it to be destroyed. But they didn’t,” Fisher said.

“They were quite pleased that the balloon would be carried over the United States. That it would allow the PLA to observe several American nuclear weapon bases and provide, what’s really key here, is intimate weather data over these nuclear bases.

A new submarine-launched ballistic missile is seen during a test in this undated photo released, on Oct. 19, 2021, by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). KCNA via Reuters

“In order for nuclear warheads, or more importantly, new hypersonic glide vehicle nuclear warheads to hit their targets, the PLA requires intimate weather data. A balloon inside the atmosphere can provide that data,” Fisher explained.

Fisher explained that the balloon was a surveillance platform capable of capturing imagery and weather data—both of which are necessary if you want to hit a specific target using warheads and hypersonic glide vehicles.

“[The balloon] is part of a complex of systems that allow China to accurately target its nuclear weapons. It can’t be overstated that estimating the weather, the density of the atmosphere, the direction of the winds, whether there’s rain, or snow over a target, is crucial to the targeting of these weapons,” Fisher said.

“A balloon inside the atmosphere will always obtain better data, weather data, than satellites in space. And this balloon is controlled by the Strategic Support Force, most likely. The Strategic Support Force also controls the satellites and is intimately involved in the targeting of Chinese nuclear weapons.”

Sending a Message

According to Fisher, the Biden administration’s delay in shooting down the balloon allowed it to gather valuable weather data, and sent a message to China.

“The administration’s delay, for several days, in shooting down this balloon sends a message of confusion and chaos,” Fisher said. “How will Biden react when China actually attacks Taiwan, slaughtering tens, or hundreds of thousands, of people?

“And why isn’t the administration explaining plainly that the balloon was launched from one of the most important PLA nuclear weapons complexes? It is equipped to help target Chinese nuclear warheads, and it’s traversing the United States represents a Chinese exercise in nuclear coercion and intimidation.”

The suspected Chinese spy balloon drifts to the ocean after being shot down off the coast in Surfside Beach, S.C., on Feb. 4, 2023. Randall Hill/Reuters

The Chinese spy balloon first entered the U.S. Air Defense Identification Zone over the Aleutians Islands, a chain of volcanic islands west of the Alaska Peninsula, on Jan. 28. It traversed the United States until it was shot down on Feb. 4 off the coast of South Carolina.

Since it entered U.S. airspace, Beijing has maintained that the balloon was not a spy balloon but a weather balloon that blew off course.

Beijing has condemned the United States’ decision to shoot down the balloon as an “excessive reaction” and said it “retains the right to respond further.”

The Pentagon responded to China’s claims by saying the Department of Defense is “100 percent” sure it wasn’t a civilian craft and was a “surveillance balloon” with “intelligence-collection capability.”