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by bxs24p 1233 days ago
The fact that this became a story at all is purely geopolitical in my opinion. Perhaps to do Blinkens up coming Beijing visit (which has since been canned). As far as I can tell the chinese dislike bad press like this. Having the balloon become a fiasco becomes a reason to cancel the trip. Can't exactly tell the why's but this is my guess.
2 comments

100%. If the balloon was a threat, why wasn't it shot down over Alaska? Or earlier on it's trip over the continental US. There was no threat... Here's an opportunity to drum up a lot of FUD and use it as a geopolitical lever.
Also painting China bad is a great method of painting yourselves in better light domestically. Both sides of politics in the US have vested interest in this narrative.
The cancellation came from the US side, not the Chinese side.
Exactly my point, having the balloon become a fiasco becomes reason to cancel the trip. There's some tit for tat that we don't know about.