The Chinese spy balloons that entered the airspace of the United States and at least three Latin American countries in late January and early February, capturing the world’s attention, exposed China’s growing interest in low-cost and difficult-to-detect devices for surveillance and defense systems, Spanish daily El País reported.
“The more information China has, the more advantage it will have in the world,” Antonio Alonso, an expert in international relations and professor at CEU San Pablo University in Madrid, Spain, told Diálogo on February 20. “The information gathered is passed on to the Chinese intelligence service.”
U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken warned Chinese Diplomatic Advisor Wang Yi during the February 18 Munich Security Conference that the balloon incident must never happen again because the U.S. will not tolerate any violation of its sovereignty. The U.S. shot down the Chinese spy balloon on February 4.
The Chinese stratospheric tools that flew over U.S. and South American airspace were spying devices, despite China’s claims that they were only weather research airships that strayed by mistake, Mexican daily La Jornada reported.
“The balloon incident was part of a long-standing Chinese intelligence-gathering program,” Political science professor Taylor Fravel, at the Massachusetts Institute, told the New Yorker magazine. “The program itself was very poorly coordinated, not just within the Chinese PLA [People’s Liberation Army], but between the PLA with other parts of the state.”
“China aspires to be a global superpower, no longer just in its economic growth, but to have a say of its own on the international arena,” Alonso said. “Beijing is preparing for that […], standing up to North America and expanding its tentacles […] in South America.”
U.S. intelligence, CNBC reported, believes that China’s spy balloons have entered the airspace of more than 40 countries in recent years.
Strategic support
The space, cyber, and electronic warfare force, known as the PLA Strategic Support Force, has private sector entities operating spy balloons to supplement military satellite surveillance, Japan News reported.
These are helium gas-filled devices that can reach altitudes similar to or higher than commercial aircraft. They are equipped with high-sensitivity cameras, solar panels, radars, sensors, and collect information on what is happening on the ground, Colombian newspaper El Tiempo reported.
Despite their size and vulnerability, these kind of airships offer advantages over satellites and manned aircraft. They are slow and can remain over an area much longer than a satellite passing at orbital speed, British platform BBC Mundo reported.
Flying at an altitude of just 20 kilometers (60,000 feet), their cameras can achieve a higher resolution than those in orbit at 160 kilometers. They are cheaper than satellites, drones, or manned aircraft, can make use of large payloads, and look less menacing, according to BBC Mundo.
Unlike satellites, which require space launchers costing hundreds of millions of dollars, balloons can be launched cheaply, and are not always easy to detect with traditional surveillance technology, Argentina’s La Nación newspaper reported.
“They are much more susceptible to current changes and difficult to manage. But as we have already seen, the objective of these instruments is to monitor and spy, not only on enemies, but also on their allied friends; the more information they have on them the better,” Alonso said.
According to Alonso, China won’t stop using this type of stratospheric balloons. Even if it has satellites, they are part of its strategy to reach its centennial goal, he added. “China is preparing for 2049, when it wants to celebrate in style the centenary of the communist revolution, with a consolidated position in the world,” he concluded.