by David Poyer
He dragged himself back to the present as Byrne said, “Zhang’s executed his rivals and consolidated his position as both Party general secretary and state president. He now holds all leading titles in the state.
“On the diplomatic front, he proposes peace on the basis of ‘union and demilitarization’ of the two Chinas and the two Koreas. He offers to return Okinawa to Japan. But in exchange, all remaining U.S. bases in Japanese territory must be vacated, and alliance ties dissolved.
“He also warns that anyone who offers America basing rights is the enemy of what he calls the ‘Associated’ or ‘United’ Powers—China, Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, Laos, and ‘Miandan,’ their puppet state in northern Myanmar.
“Finally, Russia has announced major aircraft and ordnance sales to China.” Byrne paused. “Any questions?”
One of the generals lifted a hand. “Energy supplies?”
Byrne flicked slides and briefed on stockpiles, consumption, and imports. “Seaborne imports are essentially zero, but roughly two hundred thousand tons a day of oil and liquefied natural gas are flowing in via a pipeline across Xinjiang from Pakistan.”
“Can we cut that?”
Yangerhans twisted in his chair to say over one shoulder, “It’s deep in Chinese territory, and well protected … but it’s a possible target.”
Dan felt reluctant to speak up, but finally did. “We have weak points too. Iran’s threatened to close Hormuz before. If they do—?”
Byrne said, “CentCom has plans against that contingency. If they try to close the strait again, we land an armored regiment to occupy Qeshm Island, on the eastern side of Hormuz, and cut off all Iranian exports by sea. We’ll see how they like that.” He waited a moment, then stepped back.
Yangerhans pulled his feet in, got up, and paced back and forth. He tucked his elbows like a boxer. “One thing Jack didn’t brief is the domestic reaction. They’re still suffering from power and network outages back home. The financial markets have reopened, but most folks have lost half or more of their net worth. And Zhang’s threats are having an effect, especially on the West Coast. The civil defense program’s been reactivated. People are stockpiling. Defense industries are reporting difficulties keeping labor forces in place. We’re taking steps to fix that, but they’ll take time.
“That and the focused cyberattacks on defense industries mean production is not going well. Missiles and torpedoes, especially, are in short supply. I’ve called the Canadians, Australians, British. They’ve promised to ramp up production, but their capacities have always been limited compared to ours.”
A lifted hand. “The Europeans?”
A grim look. A negative headshake. “They’ve got their own problems, with the Russians.”
Another hand; an Air Force uniform. “Admiral, the Franklin Roosevelt battle group was wiped out with a nuclear missile. Can you enlighten us on the rationale for not retaliating in kind?”
Yangerhans paced again, fingers twining behind his back. “I won’t go into my exchanges with national command authority on that issue. Suffice it to say they were … frank. The bottom line, I guess, is that as long as we don’t respond, we hold the escalatory advantage. Zhang won’t know where, or how hard, we’ll counterpunch. Only that we owe him one.”
“He won’t see it as a sign of weakness? That we took ten thousand casualties, lost six ships? And didn’t hit back?”
Dan twisted in his seat, but didn’t see who’d asked that. Yangerhans grimaced. “Like I said, that’s above even the theater commander’s pay grade. A lot of people don’t believe retaking the western Pacific is worth risking Los Angeles. The pundits thought the elections would give us a clear signal. They didn’t. If we want leadership, we’re not going to see it from Washington.”
The four-star turned brisk. “All right … outlining my intent.” Instead of a new slide, the display went to bluescreen. Yangerhans gazed off above his audience’s heads. “We’re digging in on the line Honshu-Saipan-Guam, the second island chain. We’ve bought, or been granted, a breathing space while Zhang, and his naval staff chief, Admiral Lianfeng, consolidate their gains. Taiwan, Korea, Okinawa, Vietnam—those battles will determine whether this so-called People’s Empire pulses outward again.” Yangerhans eyed Dan. “One of our officers has said, ‘We’ll be back.’ But to do that, we have to keep our logistics open, and concentrate on building up our warfighting capability.
“We face a lot of negatives. Ordnance is short. We have high ship and airframe losses. The enemy’s on a roll. But we can’t simply hold. If we do, that solidifies into the new status quo. Somehow, we have to push back. Even if we come a cropper, it keeps the Allies in the fight.”
Nods from the audience, but also doubtful looks.
Yangerhans nodded, and the next screen showed the South China Sea. “We already have a left hook started. On hold at the moment, but it can resume once we beef up our shipping numbers, and reassure the Australians and Indonesians they can release some of their covering forces. Next, please.”
A kidney-shaped island. “Let’s look more closely at Taiwan. An idea a think tank in DC’s pitching. How solid is the mainland’s grip? Granted, they hold the west coast, the plain, and the northern metropolis—Taipei, and its industrial and residential suburbs. But that’s not the whole island. And everything they fight with has to come across the strait.
“Like every struggle in the Pacific, this will be conducted across vast distances, dependent on access, production, reinforcement rates, and logistics pipelines. The good news is, we can make life hell for the enemy too. We’re redeploying from Europe and the Atlantic. As our sub numbers in the strait and the south ramp up, we’ll be able to reduce his shipping, start starving his deployed forces.
“Meanwhile, significant elements of the Republic of China Army have fallen back into Taiwan’s eastern mountains. The Chingyan Shan is unpopulated, ravined, forested. In other words, ideal for a guerrilla campaign. We’ve established contact with Luong Shucheng, deputy chief of the general staff. As far as we can tell, he’s the senior general still at large. If we can supply him with weapons, ammunition, and food, we can keep Zhang fighting, while we bleed him at the end of his supply lines.
“It might be possible to strand half a million troops on Taiwan. Cut them off, and force them to surrender. An island Stalingrad. If our other allies hold, that may give us a chance at war termination on reasonable terms.”
The group seemed to take a collective inhale. Yangerhans paused as if gauging the reaction, twisted face screwed up as if in pain. “We’ll see if the enemy cooperates … and whether Washington supports us. Any further questions?… That’ll be all for now, then.”
They got to their feet, not with the alacrity of a group of junior officers, but PaCom didn’t wait. Just waited for Niles to lumber up, and gestured him aside.
The meeting broke in an undertone of murmurs. Dan glanced at Niles, but the four-stars had their heads together. He strolled over to Byrne. “Jack. What’re you doing here? I thought you retired.”
“Civilian policy adviser. Triple the salary.”
“Nice. How’s Rosemary? The kids?”
Byrne lowered his voice. “Got ’em out to the country. Blair, I guess she’s—where? Still parked square on the bull’s-eye?”
“Uh, still in DC, if that’s what you mean.”
“Your daughter?”
“Seattle. A good job, microbiology.”
“Good Lord. Seattle? Get her out of there. Or at least, ready to evacuate.”
“Lenson? Lenson?” Niles’s rumble, over the mutter of side conversations.
“His master’s voice,” Byrne cracked.
Dan bit back an angry response. Turning away, he located the CNO in the far corner, by a GCCS terminal. Niles and Yangerhans were contemplating a ground terrain display. The northern border of Vietnam. Yangerhans shook Dan’s hand, grip bony and dry. “Nick here says you’re a fighter.”
“We’ve had our differences,” N
iles put in. “And right now, he’s suspended from command pending an investigation. But I kept him in my back pocket, just in case.”
“We need bruisers.” PaCom nodded curtly. “That was a good question about Hormuz, by the way. You’re thinking ahead. Any amphib experience?”
“A PHIBRON staff, in the Med. During the Syrian crisis,” Dan said.
Yangerhans half smiled. Close up he looked even uglier. “And you led the attack in the Taiwan Strait?”
“That was him,” Niles said.
“I’ve been looking for a street fighter. Somebody with balls and brains, both. You can stonewall these investigations, right, Nick?”
“Lenson’s your guy,” Niles rumbled. “Only problem will be keepin’ him on the leash.”
“If you vouch for him, Fireball, that’s good enough for me,” Yangerhans said equably.
With surprising grace for such a huge man, the CNO executed a wheeling movement, opening the distance between him and Yangerhans. A beefy hand plumbed a pocket. Fat fingers tore open a plastic packet. “Sorry Blair couldn’t be here for this,” Niles grunted.
Dan stood bewildered as the two admirals manipulated his lapels, as a camera flashed. Applause battered his ears. He looked down at his palm. His old captain’s eagles glittered there.
“It’s not a permanent commission.” Yangerhans leaned in, still holding the handshake as he grimaced into another camera-flash. “Only Congress can give you that. Which, as I understand it, isn’t going to happen in your case. This is just a fleet-up, understand? A temporary wartime rank.”
Dan touched his new insignia. The hard outline of a five-pointed star. “Um, yessir. I get that. But still. Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. You haven’t heard the job description yet.”
“You’ll love this, Lenson,” Niles said. “Right up your alley.”
Yangerhans said, “I mentioned a pushback. I want you to lead it.”
Dan nodded cautiously.
“It’ll be like sticking your face in a blast furnace. But we can’t sit on our thumbs. Nick and I envisioned TF 76 as a combined U.S.–Japanese force. But Japan’s accepting Zhang’s cease-fire. We’ll plug the Koreans in instead. That’ll give you a robust force level. Concur?”
“I’d be happy to fight alongside Min Jun Jung,” Dan said. “But wouldn’t he be senior to me?”
Niles said, “Why d’you think you got the promotion? Your first task will be to clear the sea lanes between Guam and the fighting on Okinawa. Then, land an element of the Second Marine Division in a location to be designated. Also, be ready to position as a blocking force to protect Guam and the Marianas, if the enemy moves faster than we expect.”
“I personally don’t think Zhang will make the mistake Tojo did, and overextend,” PaCom said somberly. “But he’s kicked our asses so damn hard already, Lianfeng might just persuade him to keep it up. So be wary. They’ve got more surprises for us, I’m sure.”
“Your next question will be about carrier support,” Niles rumbled. “For obvious reasons, there won’t be any. Not after what happened to FDR.”
Yangerhans said, “We’re holding the remaining battle groups out of missile range. Nimitz, Vinson, and Reagan east of Hawaii. Abraham Lincoln, off Australia. The good news: we have more decks on the way. Not attack carriers, but ESBs and containership or tanker hulls with modular decking. And we should have microsatellite recon and at least limited chat up again before too long.”
“Report to USS Hornet, and take command of your force,” Niles concluded. “Your orders will be there this afternoon.”
* * *
WHEN they emerged from the building a siren was screaming. Dan was looking around for a shelter when a passing trooper called, “It’s a drill, sir. Testing a new missile-attack warning.” The wind freshened, blew harder. The palms clashed above their heads, and rain danced across the asphalt, bringing coolness and the smell of the never-far-off sea.
Niles was lumbering toward the Humvee that had brought Dan up the hill. The driver stood holding the door. Dan double-timed after him. “Admiral,” he called.
The massive head half turned. “Yeah—Admiral?”
“I’m not ready.”
“Nobody’s ready for a war, Lenson. I think you know what’s at stake. Otherwise I wouldn’t have pinned those stars on you.”
A second siren joined the first, then a third. They dropped an octave, then rose again, and began to keen in earnest: a spine-chilling, off-key note that sawed at some primitive chord of the back-brain. Niles frowned. “Or did you mean the rank?”
“I didn’t ask for it. I don’t want it.”
“I don’t remember asking for your fucking preferences, Lenson. The Navy needs somebody we can afford to lose. You fit the requirement. Clear?” Niles slammed a beefy hand on the frame of the vehicle. Half-ducked into the door, then paused. “I’m gonna data-dump you everything you need to know about wearing those stars. Listening?”
The sirens rose another octave, screaming like attacking velociraptors, like plunging Stukas. The rain prodded Dan’s face like the icy fingertips of hungry zombies. Humid air was supposed to be easier to breathe, but his airways, scarred from sucking smoke on 9/11, were starting to constrict. He said with difficulty, “I’m all ears.”
Niles squinted toward the mist-glitter of squall-shrouded sea. “Lead your people. They want to see who’s taking them into harm’s way.
“Tell them what you want done, then let ’em do their jobs.”
He paused, scowled. “Stay out of the fucking press! Yeah, I know, you’ve already fucked the dog on that one. But try harder, got it?
“Read Nimitz’s memo to Spruance on calculated risk. Right now we have inferior forces. So we engage only when we can count on the attrition rates being on our side. But if you decide to gamble, don’t go halfway. Shove all your chips in.
“Be ready to pick up that red phone and answer a call from the president.
“And remember, those stars don’t belong to you. Be ready to take ’em off whenever we ask for ’em back.”
Niles eyed him as the sirens quavered, dropped, then lifted again to a skull-splitting scream. Dan fought the impulse to cover his ears. The driver, too, was eyeing him curiously. As if waiting for some response, comment, or reaction. But he didn’t have one. He just felt numb.
Lifting his face to the falling rain, closing his eyes, he concentrated on taking one breath after another.
2
Camp 576, Western China
THE POWs slept in a corrugated iron lean-to built against one wall of the gigantic pit. Behind the hut a cave went back into the rock. The ceiling was just high enough that Teddy could sit upright, but not stand. Dried turds littered the ground between this hut and the next. More hut-caves stretched around the jut of the bluff. All night long lights shone down from the guard towers. Dried grass was the prisoners’ only bedding. Teddy slept nestled with Pritchard and the Vietnamese, and was glad of the warmth.
There were seven POWs in the cave. Teddy Oberg, captured in the raid on Woody Island. “Magpie” Pritchard, the Australian, shot down in the South China Sea. The three Vietnamese, Trinh, Phung, and Vu, whose ship had gone down in the same action. And two U.S. airmen, Fierros and Shepard, shot down over the Taiwan Strait. The space was cramped, but it wasn’t important where you crawled to sleep.
What mattered was more basic.
There was no clock. Only the whistle. No calendar, so Master Chief Teddy Oberg, SEAL Team Eight, U.S. Navy, didn’t know what day it was. Or even what month.
Only that the wind kept getting colder, and now and then crystals drifted down. The air was too dry to snow. But their piss froze in the plastic buckets, and they shivered all day long. The camp’s only concession to winter was to issue a thin flannel-lined jacket and one too-short, weary-looking quilted cotton blanket per man. The prisoners scavenged anything that would burn. Paper, trash, broken shovel handles. One of the Vietnamese stole a discarded tire, but when
they burned it in the cave, the smoke drove them out like sprayed hornets.
Lice spread among the prisoners, then fever. The guards sniffled and blew their noses into their fingers, then slapped the POWs. This sickness spread. One by one, prisoners began to vanish.
At night, wolves howled. And now and then machine-gun fire clattered from the towers.
Their Australian messmate raved and shook in a corner. His cough grew worse. Once Teddy caught Pritchard studying what he’d expectorated. Bright blood blossomed in his palm.
One day one of the trusty mechanics left a screwdriver near Teddy’s tray, at the breaker where they processed the ore. When the trusty came back later, Obie said he hadn’t seen it, didn’t know where it was.
Some days there wasn’t any soup, only rice gruel. Then for two days there was no gruel either. After that they were served slops of some grain he didn’t recognize. The hulls were sharp and scratched his throat as he swallowed. He had to force himself to eat it.
He mostly stopped shitting. When he did manage to squeeze a turd out, it was small and hard and licorice-black, with bits of the undigested grain sticking out.
For several days, Phung complained his legs hurt. Soon he screamed softly, talked to himself, and crawled back to the darkest part of the cave, raving and twisting under his blanket. He stank like rotting meat. Vu smuggled back his own corn gruel for him, but Phung wouldn’t touch it.
The next morning Phung was dead. They dragged him outside, and when they came back from work, his body was gone.
* * *
THEN one day the truck didn’t show up. Instead one of the guards came hiking along, rifle slung. She was about five feet high, and her uniform might have fitted her father. She looked to be about fifteen.
Over the last month, the military-age guards had disappeared, leaving only kids and old men. Also, Teddy had stopped hearing the distant thuds he’d always figured were dynamite, excavating explosives, down in the pits. “Prisoners, come with me,” she snapped.
