White Jade (The PROJECT) Page 21

  The door to the Oval Office opened and an aide beckoned them in.

  Rice was sitting behind his desk, in front of the tall windows fronting the Rose Garden. A large, round rug bearing the Presidential Seal filled the center of the room. A cluster of elegant, upholstered chairs were grouped in front of the desk. Sitting there were General Holden, the Secretary of State and Cheryl Wilson, the Assistant Secretary for Asian Affairs. The President rose and took Selena's hand.

  "Selena. I was surprised to learn you were part of this. It's good to see you again. I was very sorry when William was taken from us. Everyone, please sit down."

  "Thank you, Mister President," she said. They sat.

  "Director Harker has told me about your mission. What I wanted was to look you in the eye and hear about it directly from you."

  "It was an experience, Mr. President."

  Rice glanced at his notes.

  "Gunnery Sergeant Peete. You were wounded."

  "It's nothing, sir." Ronnie sat ramrod straight in his chair in a suit and tie, holding the cane he'd been given at a perfect 90 degree angle. It was quite a change from his usual Hawaiian riot. He might as well have been on parade.

  "At ease, Gunny. Give your leg a rest, you deserve it. " Ronnie relaxed by about a millimeter.

  Rice looked at Nick. "Major Carter. You led the team."

  Nick's service jacket lay on the desk. Sitting a few feet away from the President, he felt the aura of power that went with the office. He had no doubt he was in the presence of the most powerful man in the world.

  "Yes, sir. Sir, I am no longer in the service."

  "I know that, Major. However, you never resigned your commission, so that is not quite accurate. What were your instructions?"

  "To penetrate an ancient temple complex in Tibet."

  "For what purpose?"

  "General Yang had gone to extremes to obtain the location of this complex. We weren't sure what he wanted. We only knew it was important to him. We felt it was in the national interest to get there first and confound any plans he might have for whatever was found. We were operating on the theory that what was bad for Yang would be good for us."

  "You found evidence of a high yield uranium deposit?"

  "Yes, Mister President. In the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region."

  Rice gave him a careful look.

  "I understand you have video of the underground chamber."

  "Yes, sir."

  "I would like all copies of this video delivered to me personally. Is that clear?"

  "Very clear, sir."

  "Good." Rice sat for a few seconds, said, "How did the firefight begin?"

  Carter told him the story. He smiled.

  "Outstanding. Well done, Major. What is your assessment of the fallout from your mission?"

  "Sir?"

  "Fallout. Political, military. Consequences, if you like."

  The President of the United States was asking for his opinion. It was a first.

  "Well, sir, I don't think there are going to be any consequences to speak of."

  Wilson made a sound of disgust. "Mister Carter, you illegally entered Chinese sovereign territory and attacked and killed over thirty of their troops. How can you possibly say there won't be any consequences?"

  Rice's eyes flicked toward her, but he said nothing.

  Carter felt his temper rising.

  "First of all, they attacked us, not the other way around. Those troops were under the command of Colonel Wu, Yang's man. If I were running the PRC, I wouldn't want to make a big deal about it. It's a deniable incident in a remote region, the result of actions taken by a madman trying to take over China."

  "You insist there is a coup being planned."

  Carter looked at her.

  "Are you as stupid as you seem?"

  Wilson's face tightened into a puckered scowl.

  Carter said, "Yes, I do insist. From our satellite intel, I would say it has already happened and succeeded or not. If it did succeed, we've got a problem that has nothing to do with Tibet. If it didn't, there aren't going to be any consequences from my mission."

  Wilson's face pinched itself together and she was about to say something when an aide came in, whispered in Hogan's ear, and left the room.

  "Mister President, President Zhang is calling."

  "About time. Put him on the speaker."

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  "Sir…" Hogan was looking at Nick and the others.

  "Just put him on the speaker, Kevin."

  "Yes, sir."

  "Mister President." The voice quality was good. Zhang spoke in Chinese, with simultaneous translation on his end. Rice gestured to Selena, pointed to an earpiece lying by a pen and pad on the end of his desk and indicated she should pick it up. He flipped a switch on his desk. China could not hear him.

  "Selena, you speak the language. Listen and tell me if the translation is correct. Listen for anything that might help me understand this man."

  She picked up the earpiece. Rice activated the phone.

  "President Zhang. What can I do for you?"

  "Mister President, there have been some events here. We do not wish to have these events, ah, misunderstood. I am calling to let you know our situation."

  "Our satellites show unusual military movements. Some of my advisors are quite disturbed. Tell me, Mister President, should I feel disturbed?"

  "No, no, not at all. We are merely conducting exercises. There is no cause for you to be alarmed. We have had a problem with one of our senior commanders, but it has been resolved."

  Selena was scribbling on a piece of paper. Nick took it and handed it to the President.

  Stressed, she had written. Used idiom associated with desire to placate without admitting wrong-doing.

  "What was the nature of the problem?"

  "It is unimportant, now."

  "Mister President, there has been an attack on our country. We believe one of your ranking officers is responsible. If this proves to be true, there will be serious consequences for our nations."

  "This cannot be true! Who is suspected?"

  "Your General Yang."

  There was a pause. Everyone watched Rice.

  "Mister President." The voice on the speaker phone was flat, metallic. "Coincidentally, General Yang is the senior officer I mentioned earlier. He has been removed from command for promoting reactionary policies. If he has initiated attacks against your country it was without our knowledge or compliance."

  "All that is well and good, Mister President, but it will not be enough." Rice allowed anger to creep into his voice. "Perhaps you can persuade General Yang to reveal how he accomplished his vicious and unprovoked actions. Our people are upset and angry. I assure you, President Zhang, if your government had anything to do with these events, consequences will be severe. Do I make myself clear?"

  There was a rapid burst of Chinese in the background, several people talking at once. Selena scribbled.

  Great concern. Someone arguing for a full war alert. Zhang is nervous. Someone saying he should tell you the truth.

  After a moment the President of China came back on the line.

  "President Rice. I will be candid. General Yang has been arrested for attempting to install himself as the new leader of our country. He admitted initiating attacks against you. We were unaware of these plans. We deeply regret that harm has come to your people. We have not yet had time to question him to determine more."

  Scribble, scribble. Sounds like telling the truth.

  "A coup?"

  "Yes. We uncovered his plot to take power and were prepared for it. Yang did not succeed in taking control of our military installations."

  Wilson gasped, a sound like she was choking on her own bile.

  Rice tapped his fingers on his leg. "What about Luoyang?"

  "Ah, Luoyang is being resolved as we speak. Should preparations for a launch be detected, we will prevent it. Mister President, we will not allow missiles to be launched
under any circumstances. Please believe me. The missiles are equipped with a self-destruct system. We are prepared to destroy them if necessary."

  General Holden reached for his pager. With an apologetic nod toward Rice, he stood and walked to the side of the room and took out his phone. Nick watched him go rigid.

  "That is satisfactory, Mister President. We will monitor Luoyang quite closely. If we detect preparations to launch we will be forced to take appropriate counter measures. I sincerely hope it does not come to that."

  "Mister President, any aggressive action toward our country would be very badly received here and met with strong response. I assure you, we have no hostile intentions."

  "President Zhang, I appreciate your..."

  General Holden interrupted. He still held his phone.

  "Sir, the silos at Luoyang have been activated and the mobile platforms are emerging from the tunnels. They're getting ready to launch."

  Rice looked at him. "You are certain."

  "Yes, sir. Their launch sequence has begun."

  "General, go to DEFCON1, but hold at Fail Safe."

  Holden spoke again into his phone. Rice paused. He said, "President Zhang. I have just been informed that your missiles are being readied. We are now at the edge. You must take action, immediately."

  Carter held his breath. Over the speaker, there was a confusing sound of many people speaking at once in Beijing and an angry command. The noise stopped. The voices of Zhang and his translator came through the speaker.

  "Mister President. Our forces are entering the base at Luoyang as we speak. We can deactivate the missiles with codes sent from here. Please wait a moment."

  Selena wrote. Zhang telling someone to send deactivation codes. They are raising their defense level. They may be panicking.

  Zhang continued. "It will take seconds, Mister President. Please, let us not make a mistake."

  Rice said, "If missiles are launched, we will be forced to retaliate, President Zhang. I am being deliberately blunt. You must stop this."

  There was more excited conversation in the background. Selena wrote. Radio codes ineffective. They can't shut the missiles down from there. He's ordering an air strike on the base.

  "President Rice." Zhang's voice was strained. "We are unable to disable the missiles by radio. We are taking other measures. Our planes will be in the air. If needed, we will launch our ABMs to intercept. I repeat, we have no hostile intention. Please do not misinterpret these actions. This is not an attack. We do not wish for war."

  Everyone waited for Rice's response. He stood and everyone rose with him.

  "President Zhang. I am now moving to my command center, where I will monitor your activities. I will call." He hung up the phone.

  "Sir," General Holden said. "Marine One is standing by. You should remove yourself to Weather Mountain." Weather Mountain was an underground command center and fallout shelter for high civilian officials, near the town of Bluemont in West Virginia. It was forty-five minutes away.

  Rice looked at him. "No, General. Even if we got there, you know as well as I do that it may not be adequate. We're going to KNEECAP. Send the Vice-President and the Cabinet to West Virginia."

  "Yes, sir." KNEECAP was designation for Air Force One as an airborne command center in the event of war. Rice could stay up for three days, if needed, with refueling. Then the engines would fail. He'd have to set down before that, if there was any place left to land.

  Rice said, "How much time until launch, General?"

  "They're starting cold, sir. The DF-5s need to be fueled. Perhaps an hour or a little longer. Once they lift off, then another twenty minutes or more to impact on the West Coast, thirty minutes here, unless we can intercept. The DF-31s are a different matter. Once the mobile launchers are in place, a matter of minutes to fire."

  "Can we intercept?"

  "Not all of them. The AEGIS system around the Ronald Reagan can get some of them. Some of the Alaska ground based missiles will probably be effective. Sir..." He looked at his watch.

  "Yes, General, I know." He turned to Harker. "You're welcome to remain here in the White House shelter, if you wish."

  What he didn't say was that it wouldn't make much difference where they were if war began.

  "Thank you, Mister President."

  Rice strode from the room. Hogan and General Holden followed, with the Secretary of State and Wilson.

  The team stood in the Oval Office and looked at each other. Ronnie looked down at the Presidential Seal on the rug.

  "Might as well have a picture of Ground Zero on it. The White House doesn't seem like a real good bet at the moment," Ronnie said. "I wish I was back on the Rez."

  "Let's go back to the Project," Harker said. "It's as good a place as any to watch the end of the world."

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  They sat in Harker's office. There didn't seem much else to do. War would begin or it wouldn't. No one had any illusions they were safe. Nothing would be safe within a hundred miles of Washington if the DF-5s made it out of the silos.

  Maybe it was a good sign there had been enough time to get back to Project HQ. Stephanie was there. Elizabeth brought up a live shot of Luoyang on the monitor. It was a war zone. The main buildings were heavily damaged, shell pocked and surrounded by tanks. Troops scrambled toward the silos, but Elizabeth knew they were almost impenetrable from above.

  "They've taken out the mobile launchers," Carter said. Smoking craters and twisted debris marked where the missiles had been positioned. "Zhang means it. He doesn't want a war."

  Elizabeth picked up her pen. "He sent an air strike. That stops the quick threat. It looks like they bombed the silos."

  "Will that stop them?" Selena said.

  "Maybe. Maybe not. Those silos are hardened against conventional weapons."

  "They could still launch."

  "Yes."

  "I hope they..." Carter didn't finish the thought.

  From a dozen silos, missiles rose on pillars of fire. Three other silos erupted in huge balls of flame. The soldiers near the silos were obliterated. The images on the monitor disappeared under clouds of exhaust and smoke.

  "Launch failure in three," Elizabeth said. "Those DF-5s are liquid fueled. The fuel must have exploded. It still leaves twelve."

  "How long till they get here?" Ronnie asked.

  "About thirty minutes. Unless we knock them down. Maybe Zhang will get some of them. The Chinese have ABMs around Beijing and Chengdu."

  She moved the satellite shot over Beijing. "Yes, he's launching his ABMs. I hope they're good."

  She opened the bottom drawer of her desk and took out a bottle of Cognac. She poured silently and handed glasses around. Even Ronnie took one.

  They raised to each other and drank. They waited.

  ***

  Off the shores of Kodiak Island in the Aleutians, Burt Rasmussen was operating a large winch hauling in the net with the day's catch. The sky was overcast and gray. This was the last run before the Sally B. headed back to port. A pretty good day.

  He swung the net over the ice packing the open hold, where four of the crew waited, and lowered it down. Suddenly two bright bursts of light like newborn suns appeared far above in the gloom.

  "What the hell was that," one of the men said. They stared upward. As Burt watched, a third sun blossomed.

  "UFOs. Must be UFOs."

  "Yeah, right."

  "Maybe some kind of exercise. You know, military."

  "Ought to be worth a beer at the Shack when we get in."

  "Wonder what it means?"

  It meant Burt would live to fish another day.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  It was two days later. There were strands of gray in Harker's hair Carter hadn't noticed before.

  She said, "That was too damn close."

  No one said anything.

  "The PRC got six of the missiles with their ABMs. The AEGIS group around the Ronald Reagan got three more. The last three were interc
epted over the Bering Sea from Alaska. Without warning it wouldn't have worked out so well. If those last missiles had gotten past our intercepts, Rice was going to turn China into a radioactive wasteland. Checkmate for the human race."

  "He had some balls to wait that long, " Ronnie said.

  "What happens now?" Carter asked.

  "There's a summit being set up with all the nuclear powers. It's a real wake up call. Maybe we'll end up with some kind of rational progress on nukes for a change."

  "Sure," Carter said. "I'll believe that when I see it. What about Yang?"

  "The PRC sent a video of his interrogation and execution to the White House. He gave it all up. The FBI is taking the Triads apart at the seams. The whole country is pissed at China. It's not a good time to be Chinese here."

  There had been no way to keep the lid on. There had been a lot of incidents. Chinese businesses were vandalized, people beaten. There was a nation wide, grass roots boycott of everything and anything Chinese. The economy was poised to slip into deep recession. Congress was in an uproar. Rice was being attacked or praised in equal measure, but his approval rating with the public had skyrocketed. There was still an America to come home to.

  Harker said, "There's a purge going on in China. Zhang has arrested the key figures and the Officer Corps is in disarray. They're hunting everyone down. There hasn't been anything like it since Mao."

  She reached into her desk drawer and brought out the Cognac and glasses.

  "Cheryl Wilson resigned from the State Department. She's going to teach at Princeton."

  "I'd hate to be in one of her classes," said Nick.

  Harker poured. Coke for Ronnie.

  After a moment Selena said, "I wonder if the Chinese will excavate the site in Tibet?"

  Harker said, "My guess is no. It would be a huge culture shock to find out the emperor isn't buried in Li Shan. I don't think the PRC wants any more shocks."

  She sipped. "You three made a pretty good team out there. Selena, I've been thinking. Why don't we make it official?"