After a US stealth fighter jet shot down the Chinese language surveillance balloon off the South Carolina coast on Saturday afternoon, the response from Beijing abruptly modified from expressing remorse to being defensive and outraged.

China’s Overseas Ministry revealed a assertion on Sunday morning, stating its “robust dissatisfaction and protest towards the US’s use of power to assault civilian unmanned airships.”

“China will resolutely uphold the related firm’s legit rights and pursuits, and on the similar time reserving the correct to take additional actions in response,” the ministry stated.

The ministry continued: 

“The Chinese language aspect clearly requested that the US appropriately take care of this in a relaxed, skilled and restrained method.”

It added:

“For the US to insist on utilizing armed power is clearly an extreme response.”

As early as Wednesday, President Biden needed to blast the balloon out of the sky, although Pentagon officers persuaded him to attend till the balloon was safely over the Atlantic Ocean. 

Beijing has said the balloon unintentionally veered off beam and was primarily used for “meteorological functions.” However not in accordance with US Protection Secretary Lloyd Austin, he accused China of utilizing the balloon to “surveil strategic websites within the continental United States.” 

The incident compelled US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to postpone his weekend journey to Beijing, indicating high-level talks between each international locations to calm tensions will not occur for a while. 

“This incident tells us we have not discovered the ground of the connection,” Drew Thompson, a visiting senior analysis fellow on the Lee Kuan Yew Faculty of Public Coverage in Singapore, informed Bloomberg. 

Thompson added:

 “The connection just isn’t heading in a optimistic path and will deteriorate additional.” 

Even earlier than this weekend, President Biden was ramping up a tech battle towards China to make sure their chipmaking capabilities had been capped. 

In the meantime, Basic Mike Minihan, head of the US Air Mobility Command, final week predicted a significant battle between the US and China may happen in “2025” — because of a Chinese language invasion of Taiwan.  

And Republicans have spent the final a number of days criticizing the Biden administration’s balloon response. 

“Would Trump have let China fly a spy balloon over our nation?” Rep. Jim Jordan tweeted. “Would Reagan? JFK? Truman? No, no, and no.”

Would Trump have let China fly a spy balloon over our nation?

Would Reagan?

JFK?

Truman?

No, no, no, and no.

So why’s Biden letting China off the hook?

— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) February 3, 2023

South Carolina Republican Senator Tim Scott additionally tweeted, “the balloon ought to have been shot down earlier than it crossed the continental United States, not after,” including that the incident was a “dereliction of Biden’s responsibility.”

The balloon ought to have been shot down earlier than it crossed the continental United States, not after. We nonetheless don’t know what data was collected and the place it was despatched. This was a dereliction of Biden’s responsibility, and let’s hope the American folks don’t pay a worth.

— Tim Scott (@SenatorTimScott) February 4, 2023

Nonetheless, Bussiness Insider identified suspected surveillance balloons breached US airspace throughout the Trump years although US officers by no means made it public till the final week.