After U.S. downing of suspected Chinese spy balloon, can ties can be stabilized?

The United States’ dramatic decision to shoot down a suspected Chinese spy balloon over the weekend after it flew across the country has highlighted the growing trust gap between the two superpowers, raising fresh questions about whether Sino-American ties can be stabilized amid fears of a new cold war.

U.S. President Joe Biden said Saturday that he had issued an order on Wednesday to take down the balloon, but that military leaders had recommended waiting until it could be done over open water to protect civilians from debris falling from an altitude of roughly 60,000 feet (18,300 meters).

"They successfully took it down, and I want to compliment our aviators who did it," Biden said.

The balloon, which China had earlier claimed was a “civilian airship,” had spent several days flying over North America before being shot down just off the coast of South Carolina inside U.S. airspace. It was taken down with a single missile fired from an F-22 fighter jet, Pentagon officials said, before it fell into relatively shallow water just 47 feet (14 meters) deep.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin called the operation a "deliberate and lawful action" that came in response to China's "unacceptable violation of our sovereignty" and “attempt to surveil strategic sites in the continental United States.”

China's Foreign Ministry slammed the shootdown in a statement Sunday morning, saying the United States had "insisted on using force, clearly overreacting and seriously violating international practice."

"China will resolutely safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of relevant enterprises," the statement went on, adding that Beijing would "reserve the right to make further necessary responses."

China’s decision to double down on its claim that the balloon was civilian came a day after U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken put a hotly anticipated visit to Beijing on ice. Blinken said following through on the planned trip — which would have been the highest-level visit by a U.S. official to Beijing in five years — would not be appropriate “at this time,” leaving the door open for a future visit.

China’s Foreign Ministry had earlier offered up a rare statement of regret that “a civilian airship used for research, mainly meteorological, purposes” had strayed into U.S. airspace. However, it lambasted politicians and media in the U.S. for hyping the issue “to attack and smear China.”

Ian Chong, a professor at the National University of Singapore, said that the Chinese Foreign Ministry appeared to be “trying to de-escalate while trying concurrently to maintain its case that the balloon was a civilian device gone astray and pre-empt nationalist voices ... that might be calling for stronger action.”

Beijing may be particularly interested in de-escalation since China’s new foreign minister, Qin Gang — who previously served as the country’s ambassador to the U.S. — has sought to continue a charm offensive with Washington amid their soured ties, said Wen-ti Sung, a political scientist with Australian National University.

Observers say China is keen to create a more stable U.S. relationship so it can focus on its stagnating economy, which has been battered by its now-defunct “zero-COVID” policy.

Senior U.S. defense officials said that Saturday afternoon was the military's first opportunity to take down the balloon – said to be as wide as three buses, or roughly 30 meters – "in a way that would not pose a threat to the safety of Americans," while still enabling authorities to examine “sensitive Chinese equipment” that landed in U.S. territorial waters.

“While we took all necessary steps to protect against the PRC surveillance balloon's collection of sensitive information, the surveillance balloon's overflight of U.S. territory was of intelligence value to us. I can't go into more detail, but we were able to study and scrutinize the balloon and its equipment, which has been valuable," one official said, using the acronym for China’s formal name, the People’s Republic of China.

The official said that although this was the longest time such an aircraft had spent over the country, it was not the first time in recent memory. Three balloons were spotted during President Donald Trump's time in office and another one earlier in the Biden administration.

Still, despite the Biden team’s attempt to emphasize that a plan had been in place to deal with the balloon, the White House is likely to face continued questioning from Republican rivals in Congress who have argued that the president failed to act quickly enough.

U.S. officials have said the balloon entered U.S. airspace in Alaska on Jan. 28 before moving into Canadian airspace on Jan 30. It then re-entered U.S. airspace over northern Idaho on Jan. 31, staying over U.S. land until Saturday’s shootdown.

But Biden administration officials did not publicly disclose the balloon's presence over the U.S. until Thursday, after media reports began to trickle through, forcing their hand.

"It's clear the Biden administration had hoped to hide this national security failure from Congress and the American people," U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, a Republican who leads the House of Representatives Armed Services Committee, said in a statement.

Rogers, one of a growing number of lawmakers — in both parties — who are hawkish on China, said the U.S. needed to “project strength to deter China,” calling the White House’s response “another example of weakness by the Biden administration.”

Euan Graham, a Singapore-based senior fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said that “mounting outrage” over the flight would be “a watershed in public opinion” in the United States.

“The significance of this incident is it will further harden U.S. opinion against China,” Graham said. “The shootdown of a Chinese surveillance asset, while justified, feels portentous.”

Whether this hardening of attitudes affects the “postponed” visit by Blinken — and U.S. attempts to “build a floor” under the sinking ties — remains to be seen.

Sino-U.S. ties have plummeted in recent years, especially in the wake of then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to democratic Taiwan last August. That trip prompted China to respond with days of massive military drills around the self-ruled island — which China views as a renegade province — including exercises that sent missiles over Taiwan and into waters near Japan’s far-flung southwestern islands.

Blinken’s planned visit was widely seen as aimed at finding ways to keep Sino-U.S. tensions in check, promote dialogue and set up guardrails to prevent the rapidly deteriorating relationship — marked by intensifying geopolitical rivalry and competition — from veering into crisis or even conflict. It was also meant to help maintain the momentum built at a November meeting in Bali, Indonesia, between Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping, where the two sides agreed to increase dialogue and keep lines of communication open.

Blinken said Friday that he had told Wang Yi, director of China's Central Commission for Foreign Affairs, that the balloon’s passage over the U.S. was an "irresponsible act,” but noted that Washington remained committed to engagement and he would visit “when conditions allow.”

What these conditions might be are unclear, but experts said a certain amount of time would need to elapse before the two sides again come together.

“Likely a cooling off period will ensue until China gets through its own 'two sessions' and Cabinet reshuffle in early March, a major item on its political timetable," Wen said, referring to the annual meetings of China's national legislature and top political advisory body.

During last year’s sessions, then-Foreign Minister Wang used a news conference to lambaste the U.S. over a number of issues, including Beijing’s heated rivalry with Washington.

In the meantime, Biden is widely expected to face growing calls to maintain a tough line on China.

“The mounting political pressure in the United States for the Biden administration to act further indicates significant skepticism of PRC intentions, which limits scope for cooperation unless steps are taken to lower distrust,” said Chong.

And even if both Biden and Xi are hoping that the balloon saga quickly disappears from the public consciousness, the incident may have already deflated any hopes of correcting the trajectory of Sino-U.S. ties.

“The agreement between Biden and Xi in Bali was fragile and there was never any certainty that the relationship would be stabilized,” said Bonnie Glaser, a China expert and director of the German Marshall Fund's Asia program. “Mistrust is high and competition is intense. This episode won't blow over quickly.”