Checks and Balance: The great fall of China’s balloon
Checks and Balance from The Economist
The Economist
4.6 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 10 February 2023
⏱️ 46 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
“If China threatens our sovereignty, we will act to protect our country.” In his state-of-the-union speech earlier this week, Joe Biden promised to deal with any threat from China. The House has voted unanimously to condemn the CCP for flying a spy balloon over America. What’s next for Sino-American relations?
Congressman Darin LaHood shares the plans of a new select committee on China. We go back to the time a plane rather than a balloon caused a crisis. And The Economist’s David Rennie brings us the view from Beijing.
John Prideaux hosts with Charlotte Howard and Idrees Kahloon.
You can now find every episode of Checks and Balance in one place and sign up to our weekly newsletter. For full access to print, digital and audio editions, as well as exclusive live events, subscribe to The Economist at economist.com/uspod.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The Gallery of Great Battles sits in the south wing of the Palace of Versailles. Among |
| 0:08.2 | marble columns and gilded stucco, its walls aligned with over 30 giant paintings of famous |
| 0:14.4 | French military victories. One depicts the Battle of Flairouce in 1794 when the French |
| 0:22.3 | Army defeated a coalition of European foes who wanted to overturn the revolution. It's |
| 0:28.7 | a typical battlefield scene, a French general sitting atop a rearing white horse leading |
| 0:34.0 | his barenet wielding troops on another charge, the enemy soldiers fleeing in disarray. |
| 0:40.6 | But to the top right of the painting, almost hidden in the Cannonsmokefield sky, is a floating |
| 0:45.8 | white orb. It's a spy balloon, the first known use of one, deployed by the French to |
| 0:52.6 | track the movement of the enemy forces. It looks strikingly similar to the Chinese |
| 0:58.1 | spy balloon that traversed American skies last week. I'm John Prado and this is checks |
| 1:04.5 | and balance from the economist. Each week we take one big theme shaping American politics |
| 1:12.2 | and explore it in depth. Today, what do America and China want from each other? |
| 1:28.1 | If China threatens our sovereignty, we will act to protect our country. In a state of the |
| 1:42.4 | Union speech earlier this week, Joe Biden promised to deal with any threat from China. A |
| 1:48.0 | relative detente between the two superpowers has been endangered by the appearance of the |
| 1:52.3 | Chinese spy balloon above Montana. The mood in Washington is hawkish, the House voted |
| 1:58.6 | unanimously to condemn China for the incident, and a new select committee may further undo |
| 2:03.5 | the recent efforts of Biden and Xi Jinping to play nice. What's next for Sino-American |
| 2:09.9 | relations? |
| 2:18.8 | With me this week to discuss what America and China want from each other in 2023 are |
| 2:24.9 | Charlotte Howard in New York and Idris Calune in Washington. Charlotte, what's happening |
| 2:30.6 | in New York? Do you have any more bagel news? We had a lot of letters from readers about |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Economist, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Economist and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.