More than three decades ago, the U.S. faced the threat of the Soviet Union in the Cold War. 

Now, the U.S. might be facing a situation with China that could be more dangerous than at any moment in the Cold War, in the wake of the shooting down Feb. 4 of a Chinese spy balloon after it flew over U.S. territory.

“Well, one of the more concerning reports out of this whole thing is the fact that the Pentagon rang up their buddies over in China, a hotline, and said, ‘We’re concerned about this thing, whatever it is,’ and nobody on the Chinese side answered the phone,” Dakota Wood, senior research fellow in defense programs in The Heritage Foundation’s Center for National Defense, says on today’s episode of “The Daily Signal Podcast.” (The Daily Signal is the news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.)

“So, even during the heights of the Cold War, our U.S. Pentagon and their counterparts in the Soviet Union would at least keep these communication lines open. We’ve got communication lines with Russia as it continues to be involved in the war in Syria,” Wood says. “So, the ability to talk to each other really helps to mitigate the risk of misinterpreting something or a road to war or something along those lines.”

Wood joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss the Chinese spy balloon, whether we are seeing heightened aggression from China, and how the downed spy balloon compares with the three other downed aerial objects since. 

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