Minesweeping was a thoroughly dangerous business, and it had to be conducted and executed with extreme care. The President wanted to know how it was done, and Arnold Morgan suggested that Admiral Dixon enlighten everyone.
“Sir,” said the CNO, “when you locate the mine, it’s going to be ten or twelve feet below the surface, attached by its cable to a mooring on the floor of the ocean. Basically it’s buoyant, and it’s trying to float up to the surface, but is held down by its own cable.
“Well, you sweep them by towing cutting cables from the minesweeper, pulled down to the right depth and out from the side by an otter board. When the sweeper’s cable snags a mine’s mooring line, it keeps moving until both cable and line are taut. Then the cutter severs the line, allowing the mine to float to the surface. There it can be detonated by small-arms fire from a safe distance. They’re easy when they’re on the surface, but of course impossible when you can’t see them. However many times you’ve done it, you’re always astounded by the size of the explosion.”
“Hey, that’s pretty neat,” said the President.
“And pretty time-consuming,” replied the Admiral.
“How many sweepers are the Indians bringing?”
“Six,” replied Admiral Morgan. “That’ll help speed things up.”
“Cost?” asked the Secretary of Defense, Bob MacPherson, predictably.
“I told the Indian Navy Chief that we would arrange for all affected nations to share the costs. Between us, the U.K., the Japanese, Germans, France and some of the Middle East exporters, it’ll come out as peanuts.”
“No problem,” said MacPherson.
“Look, Arnold,” said the President, using his adviser’s first name for the first time in months, “I know you want to play this down right now. But I’m not sure we shouldn’t go straight into Beijing and demand to know if they have played any part in this whatsoever.”
“Sir, they will simply deny any knowledge, whatever we say…and that brings me to a very serious point.”
“It does?”
“Yessir. From our observations it looks very much as if the mines were transported to Iran in Chinese warships. And now we have a situation where, for the next couple of weeks, the Iranians are going to get pretty rich. And to an extent so are the Chinese. They seem to have a way through the minefield, in Iranian national waters, and the price of oil futures is probably going to forty dollars a barrel for West Texas Intermediate on NYMEX and the same for Brent Crude on the London market.
“However, I completely fail to see what the Chinese are doing. How could it possibly be worth it?”
“Maybe they just want to show us they can be real world players in the oil game with their new Kazakhstan pipeline,” offered Harcourt Travis.
“Maybe,” replied Arnold Morgan. “But that’s a hell of a dangerous card to play for such a slim moral victory. Christ, for all they know, we might get seriously pissed off with ’em. It just doesn’t make any sense to me.”
“Well, Admiral, perhaps the political minds at the table can offer something that may have escaped you?”
“Beats me, sir,” said Harcourt.
“All I know is this,” said the National Security Adviser. “The Chinese are very devious, very patient and utterly insincere when it suits them. What they are not is very stupid. And, so far, everything in the Strait of Hormuz is plain stupid. What the hell are they doing getting mixed up in something like this?”
“I guess they have their reasons,” said the President. “But even more worrisome is what the hell are the Iranians playing at? I know they believe the Gulf of Iran is, by its very name, theirs by rights, and that the West has no real business in there at all. But they also know that if they attempt a blockade of the gulf, we’ll dismantle it, and probably them with it. They’re not stupid, so what are they doing?”
“Six weeks ago, I could not have answered that question, sir,” said Arnold Morgan. “But things are coming to light. And again we are seeing a new rise in Muslim fundamentalism. Again the balance of political opinion is swaying against the West, and every damn time that happens you get a new militant resurgence in Iran. All those pictures we got from Tehran a month ago…the street riots…the new calls for elections. They were all shouting for the same thing — total separation from the West, the right to their own oil, the right to make the gulf private…the enduring vision of Islamic world domination.
“It’s a phase, but it’s a problem. Meanwhile, the present blockade of the Iranian Gulf is a giant-sized PITA… pain-in-the-ass, that is. We gotta get it cleared or we’re looking at world economic chaos.”
Admiral Zhang Yushu had just walked into his new office, where his Navy C-in-C, Admiral Zu Jicai, was already waiting.
“And what do the satellites tell us today?” he asked.
“Excellent news all around, Yushu. Two American CVBGs are closing the strait. The
“That leaves just the
“Yessir, and all the signs are that she is accelerating her overhaul, planning to leave in the next few weeks. There is truly the most thunderous commotion in the United States — every newspaper, every television network. They’re becoming hysterical about this threat to their national interest in the Strait of Hormuz.”
“Perhaps we should offer to sell them some very fine Russian oil, direct from our refinery in Iran…very cheap…fifty dollars a barrel…ha ha ha!”
“Yushu, you are a hard man. Although I admit the prospect has great appeal, I would counsel silence. Say nothing. Do nothing. See nothing.”
“Meanwhile, to more important matters, Jicai. Are these military estimates accurate? We still have sea-lift capacity for only twelve thousand troops? And two hundred fifty main battle tanks?”
“Yessir. But the turnaround time for our amphibians will be short.”
“Are the ships on their way back from the Indian Ocean?”
“Yessir.”
“Excellent. That’s the three guided-missile frigates, plus two Kilos?”
“Correct. They’re all on their way home, sir. And as you know, the destroyer is making its way back toward Bandar Abbas, just as a warning to the USA…that we don’t want them to attack our friends in Iran, under any circumstances.”
“Ah, but it’s a mission well achieved. Eh, my Jicai?”
“In the ancient tradition of the great Admiral Zheng He, sir. Just as you always dreamed.”
“And such a dream, my Jicai. Remember the words we all learned, the words written by the immortal Admiral five hundred years ago…
Zhang paused for just a moment. And then he said quietly, “That’s our tradition…and it’s only been dormant. Not dead. We will rise to rule those seas again.”
No day in the entire 26-year history of Europe’s principal oil futures trading floor had ever been awaited with more dread, trepidation and alarm. Here in the shadow of the Tower of London, bounded by streets with echoing names like Thomas More, hard by the waters of historic St. Katherine’s Dock, the industrial world’s fate hung in the balance.
Five hours before New York’s NYMEX oil trading gets under way on Wall Street, the London Exchange opens for business, setting the world’s pricing benchmark for the day, maybe the month. The commodity is Brent Crude Futures, and the price per barrel of North Sea oil is the one upon which the major international traders and investors are prepared to speculate.
If the traders think there’s likely to be a glut of oil in the foreseeable future, the price may go below $15,
