Opinion by Arthur Holland Michel: The Chinese balloon is hardly alone in watching America from the sky
spotted floating about a dozen miles above the northern United States is indeed a spy craft, as the Pentagon claims, it’s hard to believe that it was meant to chart its course in secrecy. After all, it’s a giant balloon. If anything, it was more likely dispatched precisely for the purpose of being seen.
As U.S. officials were quick to note on Thursday, the balloon is unlikely to have gathered any novel intelligence that China couldn’t already have accessed by other means. Yet the balloon has captured something just as precious: our attention.This makes the incident an important lesson about both the power and increasing pervasiveness of aerial surveillance technology.Things that watch us from the sky are frightening.
This effect can be so profound as to linger even when nothing’s up there. Next time Americans see an unfamiliar speck in the sky, they’ll be much more likely to think it’s another Chinese incursion — even if it’s merely the twinkle of a planet or an errant birthday balloon. So even if the balloon’s tactical value was nominal, its psychological impact has been significant. It perhaps adds some insult to injury that
— and, by extension, its collective sense of security — was pierced by a lumbering sack of gas traveling no faster than a sturdy wind.This has been by no means an isolated incursion, however. It is becoming more and more likely that any specks seen in the sky are, in fact, something that spies on you. Other methods of watching from above, especially drones, are becoming cheaper and more easily available, and there’s a strong probability that U.S.
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