Live from Music Row, Monday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed international relations expert and contributor for The Epoch Times, Dominick Sansone, to the newsmaker line to speculate on the reasoning the Chinese spy ballon that recently entered the United States airspace was allowed to complete it’s trek and causing the sowing of division between US leadership.
Leahy: This morning on our newsmaker line, our very good friend Dominick Sansone, who is an Epoch Times contributor, an expert on all things eastern Europe, and a doctoral student at Hillsdale College. Welcome to our microphones, Dominick.
Sansone: Hey, Michael. Good to speak with you.
Leahy: Dominick, you’ve been studying foreign policy and we’ve been talking about the Chinese spy balloon fiasco. The Chinese spy balloon, which we didn’t learn about until it was over in Montana.
We’ve heard that the U.S. military was aware of it at least when it was over the Aleutians, but may have heard about it before. Just give us the facts about what we know about the spy balloon and the current status of our foreign policy relations with regard to China and our projection of, I don’t know, weakness around the world.
Sansone: Yes, definitely. As you said, it was first reported over the Aleutian Islands in Alaska but floated over the United States for quite a few days. Of course, we saw it in Montana, which is home to a major U.S. Air Force base that houses 150 minutemen and IBMs. So that’s alarming.
Whether it was collecting information on that, I can’t say. But again, it raises more questions, I think, than any answers we have. Why did we wait until it was over the Atlantic Ocean which spans the entire continental United States before President Biden decided to shoot it down?
As you alluded to as far as state projecting an image of weakness in the international scene, that’s definitely a possibility. I also think there are some pretty odd coincidences that happened with this event.
Why did it happen right on the eve of Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s planned trip to China in which there were reports of a potential (Inaudible talk) Why did that happen right now? Obviously, China knew that this balloon was over in the United States at this specific time. What was going on in the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party that would need them to reach that calculus that this is the right time to do this?
Leahy: Let me ask you this question and if you can give us a concise and brief response to it. It seems to me, looking at this, that the Chinese Communist Party, they look at this, they know Joe, the legal but not legitimate President of the United States, is compromised by all of the dealings of his drug-addled influence-peddling son, Hunter Biden.
And they know that all this in the press, that he is the big guy who is getting 10 percent of all these foreign deals, including deals with the Chicoms that Hunter Biden is involved with. Did they send this probe out in order to test the reactions of Joe Biden? So answer that first, and then I’ve got a follow-up question.
Sansone: That’s definitely a possibility. You hit it on the head, they have their man in the White House. That’s who they want there. And all of Joe Biden’s dealings proven with China, so, yes, I think that could definitely potentially be a possibility.
Leahy: The follow-up question to that is the following: what did they learn from the weak, and there’s another adjective I could use here, but I’m not going to use it because we’re on the air and the FCC might have a word to say about that. (Sansone chuckles)
But to the weak blank response of Joe Biden, who allowed this spy balloon to go across the breadth of the United States, collecting all sorts of information and sending it back to the Chicoms before, “shooting it down?” Well, he did shoot it down after it had done all its spying as The Babylon Bee responded. What grade would you give Joe Biden as a commander-in-chief for his response to this spy balloon?
Sansone: I’m going to give him a C plus and maybe a D, honestly, only not a failing grade because I don’t really think that he’s legitimately in control and as you said, making decisions. I think we saw a lot of division between him, General Mark Milley and the entire United States’ high command.
Leahy: Let me jump in here, Dominick. I would give him an F minus. (Sansone chuckles) It sounds like you’re suggesting that Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin were really in charge of America’s response and not Joe Biden. And I see Crom Carmichael also has a follow-up question for you on this.
Carmichael: Biden, he’s the commander in chief. Are you saying that Biden is not responsible for the lack of action until after the spy satellite had done all that the Chinese desired for it to do?
Sansone: Of course, he certainly deserves all responsibility as the commander-in-chief. But again, I do think that there’s a lot of different inclusive acting in the White House. I don’t think that he’s just making decisions by himself. I do think that that is one thing that the Chinese government showed very well, that they wanted to show, that worked well for them, that they sowed a division in the U.S. Leadership.
And also when we see the media response of left-wing sources now coming out, all these other things during Trump, I think they get off on all of this division that they sell here and it shows – just projects – U.S. weakness in general.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Dominick Sansone” by Modern Diplomacy. Background Photo “U.S. Capitol” by Andrew Van Huss. CC BY-SA 4.0.
