The clip everyone shared shows Donald Trump flinching. Two B-1B Lancers came over Joint Base Andrews near the end of the American national anthem, the President ducked, gritted his teeth and lowered his salute to look up, and Xi Jinping, standing next to him, followed the bombers with his eyes and very little else. Afterwards Trump turned to him and said: “That was really loud.”

It was. But the flinch is the least interesting thing that happened to the Chinese president’s airspace this week. In the space of about twenty-four hours, the United States flew two different strategic bombers over him — a B-1 at Andrews on Wednesday, and a B-2 Spirit over the White House on Thursday. Only one of those was on the published schedule.

Wednesday: an Unannounced B-1 at Andrews

Airport welcomes for visiting leaders have largely fallen out of use in Washington; presidents normally receive guests at the White House. The last time a US president greeted a foreign leader on the tarmac at Andrews was Barack Obama meeting Pope Francis in 2015. George W. Bush did the same for Pope Benedict XVI in 2008. For a Chinese head of state, it was a deliberate compliment, and the White House framed it as reciprocity for Xi hosting Trump in China earlier in the year.

Xi’s Air China Boeing 747-8 — registered B-2479, since the Chinese civil prefix happens to be the letter B — taxied in to a guard of honour, an Air Force band playing both national anthems and a 21-gun salute. Then, as the American anthem was ending, the flyover: two B-1B Lancers, six F-16s and six F-22s.

Nothing about the B-1s appeared in the programme the White House had released in advance. The Office of the First Lady had announced a flyover for Thursday’s ceremony, not for the airport. One outlet described the Andrews bombers as a complete surprise, and nobody in the administration has explained why they were chosen.

A word of caution on the viral clip. Different camera angles tell slightly different stories, and at least one shows Xi turning towards the aircraft while Trump appears to be smiling. The version doing the rounds is the most dramatic cut of a two-second moment. The noise, on the other hand, is not in dispute.

Why “That Was Really Loud” Is Simply Accurate

A B-1B is four afterburning General Electric F101 turbofans in a variable-sweep airframe, and a ceremonial flyover is flown low and slow over a crowd on purpose. It is one of the loudest things the Air Force owns, and it is being aimed at a small patch of concrete full of people in suits. Flinching is not a character trait in those circumstances. It is an auditory reflex.

Anyone who has stood under a B-1 at an air show will recognise the moment. It is not a sound so much as a pressure change.

Why the B-1, of All Aircraft

If you wanted to pick a single American aeroplane that Beijing associates with American pressure in its own neighbourhood, it would be hard to beat the B-1.

B-1s are the workhorse of the Air Force’s Bomber Task Force rotations in the Indo-Pacific and have flown repeatedly over the South China Sea. In April 2020, two B-1s flew a 32-hour round trip from Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota to the South China Sea and back, integrating with American F-16s and Japanese F-15s along the way. The Air Force was not coy about the purpose.

So when two of them come over the tarmac during the anthem that greets the Chinese president, it is reasonable to ask whether the choice meant anything. It is also worth being honest that nobody has said it did. Some commentary has called the flyover a deliberate blend of courtesy and a display of capability. That is analysis, not a confirmed intent, and the administration has offered no explanation either way. What can be said is that if a message was intended, Xi was unusually well placed to read it.

Thursday: the B-2 Was on the Schedule

The second flyover was announced in advance. The First Lady’s office published the programme for Thursday’s state arrival ceremony on the South Lawn: 479 military personnel from every branch, an honour cordon, the Army Herald Trumpets, the Marine Band, the Marine Silent Drill Platoon and the Old Guard Fife and Drum Corps. It closed with a military flyover featuring a B-2 Spirit and four F-22 Raptors.

Put the two days together and the Chinese president was overflown by two of the three bomber types in American frontline service, both escorted by the F-22, the one American fighter Congress has barred from export to anyone. Whatever else that is, it is not accidental casting.

Trump Has Done This Before

This is the second time in just over a year that a strategic bomber has flown over a summit between Trump and the leader of a rival power.

On 15 August 2025, as Trump and Vladimir Putin met on the tarmac at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Alaska, a B-2 Spirit escorted by four F-35s passed overhead. The bombers had been deployed to the base specifically for the task.

A pattern is forming. Flyovers have always been part of state ceremony, but the traditional choice is fighters or a display team. Putting strategic bombers into the backdrop of a handshake with Moscow or Beijing is a newer habit, and it is one this administration clearly likes.

Meanwhile, the Actual Diplomacy

Underneath the noise, the visit produced something concrete. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced that the two sides had agreed to extend the tariff truce known as the Busan Agreement from its 10 November expiry into January.

Xi, according to Xinhua, said the two countries should be partners and not rivals. Trump, for his part, gave Xi a tour of the new granite helipad on the South Lawn and Marine One, and described the Chinese leader as an expert on stone. The programme also included a state dinner in the East Room and, on Friday, a visit to the National Archives.

It was, by the standards of the relationship, a warm few days. It just happened to have bombers in it.

Sources: US Air Force; the White House, Office of the First Lady; South China Morning Post; Axios; Al Jazeera; IBTimes UK; CBS News; The Aviationist; Eurasian Times; Associated Press