This past Sunday, Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) appeared on CNN’s “State of the Union” to criticize President Joe Biden over his handling of the recent incident involving a Chinese spy balloon that flew over U.S. territory. In the interview, Rubio accused the administration of being slow to respond and suggested that this was a deliberate move by China ahead of Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s visit to their country. Let's dive further into this issue.
“I think what’s embedded here is a clear message. It’s not a coincidence that this happens leading up to the State of the Union address, leading up to [Secretary of State Antony] Blinken’s visit to China,” Rubio said. “The Chinese knew that this was going to be spotted. They knew that we were going to have to react to it. They flew it over military installations and sensitive sites across — right across the middle. I mean, look at the flight path of this thing. It’s a diagonal shot right through the middle of the continental United States.”
“And the message embedded in this to the world is, we can fly a balloon over airspace of the United States of America, and you won’t be able to do anything about it to stop us,” he added. “They calculated this carefully with a message embedded in it. And I think that’s the part we can’t forget here. It’s not just the balloon. It’s the message to try to send the world that America — we can do whatever we want, and America can’t stop us.”
The Incident
This incident is especially concerning considering that the spy balloon flew over various military installations and sensitive sites within the United States. This reveals how little respect China has for America’s sovereignty and security, as these actions could have had serious consequences if something had gone wrong with the balloon or if it had been carrying an offensive payload instead of surveillance equipment as many suspect it was doing.
Furthermore, it took nearly two days for President Biden to make an official statement about what had happened and what actions would be taken in response — meaning that during those two days, there was zero accountability for China’s actions by our government or any other international body.
Why Did It Take So Long For The U.S To Respond?
It is clear from Senator Rubio’s comments during his interview with Jake Tapper that he seems to think this delay was strategic on behalf of both China and the United States; however, there is no clear evidence that this was indeed the case. It is possible that it simply took longer than usual due to bureaucratic issues within our government or because Blinken had requested more time to prepare before making a statement in order not to cause an international incident while he was still in Beijing conducting talks with Chinese officials.
Regardless, it is important we get answers as soon as possible so we can understand why such a long delay happened and whether intentional or not, ensure proper protocols are put into place so history does not repeat itself in this fashion again anytime soon.
TL;DR:
Senator Marco Rubio made valid points about why President Joe Biden should have responded more quickly when news broke about a Chinese spy balloon flying through U.S territory recently; however, without specific evidence backing up his claims about strategic delays from either side involved here, it remains difficult to know exactly why such a long delay happened before any sort of response from our government occurred.
It is imperative we get answers from the administration soon so we can better understand this situation and take steps to ensure similar incidents do not happen again in the future — regardless if it was intentional or simply due to bureaucratic issues within our government at play here. We must remain vigilant in protecting our nation’s sovereignty and national security against foreign threats with swift action every single time they arise on American soil going forward!
