Among the plethora of inexplicable reactions (or non-reactions) of the Biden administration to crises and other troubling events (self-created or otherwise) was a little bit of both after news broke that China had successfully tested a nuclear-capable hypersonic missile. Biden said zero and Psaki said something stupid.

In other words, Biden-style business as usual.

As we reported on Monday, hypersonic missiles are designed to travel in low orbit to effectively evade early detection and defense systems. The launch reportedly took U.S. analysts by complete surprise (we’ll dispel that notion in a minute) with one analyst saying, “We have no idea how they did this.”

The ever-alert Biden rushed to a White House podium as soon as his wobbly legs could carry him to alleviate the nation’s concerns. Just kidding — Clueless Joe™ was total crickets.

Meanwhile, Circle-back Psaki said — incredulously, but not for her — “We welcome stiff competition.”

Psaki on China testing a hypersonic nuclear missile: “We welcome stiff competition.” pic.twitter.com/RpMfXG5uEn

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) October 18, 2021

Needless to say, the news was a game-changer.

Someone who understood the portent of the missile launch in no uncertain terms was John Ratcliffe, Director of National Intelligence from 2020 to 2021. During a Wednesday appearance on Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom,” Ratcliffe told co-hosts Bill Hemmer and Dana Perino that reporting has not been accurate in the respect that the U.S. was caught flatfooted by the launch.

U.S. intelligence has been aware of Chinese hypersonic tests since 2013 and Ratcliffe said that when he was DNI, he commissioned and cleared several intelligence products on the state of Chinese hypersonics.

“But I don’t want obscure the point,” Ratcliffe said, as I transcribed from the below video:

“This is a really troubling development. It’s not surprising but it’s… frankly one of the reasons last year I increased our intelligence spending on China by 20 percent.

“Our intelligence very clearly told us that there are discrete areas — hypersonics was one of them — where we didn’t know exactly where the Chinese were, but we were afraid that they were ahead of us in terms of hypersonic technologies.”

“China [is] attempting to dominate us economically, technologically, and militarily,” Ratcliffe warned, “and this is all part of why I called for increased spending on China and why there has to be a greater focus and influence on this, going forward.”

John Ratcliffe: US needs to be investing in technologies to keep up with China https://t.co/COfJCCG7ys

— John Ratcliffe (@JohnRatcliffe) October 20, 2021

In an indirect reference to Psaki’s idiotic “stiff competition” nonsense — and perhaps even with a nod to Biden’s equally idiotic comment on the campaign trail in 2019 about China not “eating our lunch” — which in February of this year he attempted hedge against — Ratcliffe warned:

“I know that the Biden administration wants them to be a strategic competitor — I wish they were — but they are proving themselves with each passing day to be the ruthless autocracy that kills and tortures its own citizens, that lies, cheats, and steals in the global marketplace, and is responsible — at least as a proximate cause — for 5 million people dying from a pandemic that started in China, last year.”

“That’s who China is,” Ratcliffe stressed.

“Unless and until we focus on [China] as our greatest adversary that wants to supplant us as the world’s superpower, we’re going to continue to see things like what happened over the weekend — that China’s getting in front of us because they’re spending money in places that we should be instead of on ‘infrastructure’ bills that people don’t even know what’s in them.”

Hemmer then echoed the line that continues to play in the media about the U.S. lack of systems to defend against hypersonic technology, but there’s a relative “bright spot” to this story, which Ratcliffe then laid out.

“To give people a sense of comfort is even though we currently don’t have the missile technologies to defend adequately against hypersonics, the Chinese don’t have missile technology to defend against our current ballistic missile arsenal, so there’s some measure of comfort there.”

Incidentally, in stark contrast to Ratcliffe is Biden’s Director of National Intelligence, Avril Haines, a former owner of a cafe-bookstore that staged frequent erotica nights. Sorry (not sorry), I couldn’t stop myself.

Ratcliffe apparently knows “almost” as much about ballistic missile technology and “stiff competition” as does Biden’s intrepid White House press secretary, doesn’t he?

Moreover, to underscore Ratcliffe’s point, the U.S. currently has 14 ballistic missile submarines, each of which carries a maximum of 20 missiles with multiple, independently-targeted warheads. The subs serve as undetectable launch platforms for intercontinental missiles and are designed specifically for stealth and the precise delivery of nuclear warheads.

Translation: If Xi Jinping and his Communist comrades in Beijing were foolish enough to take out, say, Los Angeles or New York, with a hypersonic missile or two, the United States Navy has the current capability to turn every major Chinese city into a parking lot in retaliation.

That said, as paralleled between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, each country’s nuclear capabilities presumably serve as a deterrent to the other’s, or as it was referred to in the 1960s, MAD — Mutually Assured Destruction.

It all sounds good on paper, but here’s the thing. Given the weakness of the Biden administration and lack of focus on reality, the question is whether China views the next three years as a window during which to take some risks. Notably, a move on Taiwan.

And if the ChiComs do make a “unification” move, as they call it,” what will Barney Biden do in response?

Top Republican urges Biden to stand up to China after hypersonic missile test https://t.co/0nAWDWW6k7

— 9 Breaking News (@9_breaking_news) October 20, 2021

The Democrat Party has not understood since at least the days of Barack Obama and his infamous “world apology tours” that our enemies respect strength — and take advantage of weakness.

If there’s one thing that Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. has shown the world in just nine months it is the latter.