There were the impossible demands that China made of the US - designed to leave Beijing nursing a useful set of grievances when they were not met. There was the steady ramping up of state propaganda as the missing pilot was first named, then eulogised, and his sobbing family wheeled out on television, night after night. Even the final disappointment of those Chinese who had demonstrated in support of their government was predictable. The same pattern was evident in 1999, after America bombed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade. Several goals were being pursued during the spy plane stand-off.
China wants to take back Taiwan, by force if necessary.
It also wants to be the regional superpower in East Asia. To date, the US Seventh Fleet is in the way. That goal lay behind China's indignant complaints about American spy flights within its 200-nautical mile economic exclusion zone. Beijing has demanded an end to all such flights. America has not agreed, at least in public.