The photographs were the most terrible thing Chi Haotian, minister of defense of the People’s Republic of China, had ever seen in his life. Even though they were taken from a helicopter more than a hundred meters above ground, the human carnage was clearly visible and dreadful.
“What was the casualty count again?” Chi asked his aide. The aide looked at the final report and murmured a number. “Speak up, damn you.”
“Four thousand eight hundred thirty-one dead, sir,” the aide replied. “Eight thousand forty-four wounded, two hundred missing.”
“And every death should be avenged threefold, sir!” Chief of Staff of the People’s Liberation Army General Chin Zi-hong said angrily. “It was a dastardly sneak attack, the most heinous I have ever witnessed in my life!”
“Our president has stated to the world that he will never use weapons of mass destruction again unless we ourselves are attacked with such weapons,” Minister Chi said. “We will no doubt be world outcasts for an entire generation for what we did to Taiwan and the United States, and we have no wish to extend that one day longer.”
“So we become the world’s whipping boy now?” Chin shouted. “Do we now roll over and play dead and watch as country after country around us arms itself with weapons of mass destruction and uses them against us without provocation?”
“Calm yourself, comrade Chin,” Chi said. “All I am saying is that the president has warned us not to present a plan to him or the Politburo involving first use of special weapons — nuclear, chemical, or biological — unless we are attacked first. I expect you to have contingency plans available in case we are so attacked by the United States, Taiwan, Japan, or Korea. But in response to this unholy atrocity, the president will not accept a plan that uses nuclear weapons. Now speak: tell me what our response to this tragedy should be.”
General Chin took a deep breath and thought for a moment; then: “Our major concern, sir, is the Koreans’ nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons,” he said. Chi nodded, urging him to continue. “We know where the major bases are located in North Korea, and we can predict with great certainty where most are located in the South — only a few bases, mostly ex-American bases, have the apparatus to handle them.”
“Full invasion of the South will not meet with approval, comrade General,” Chi said. “Although the president and the Politburo support President Kim Jong-il, they will not authorize an invasion of the South below the thirty- eighth parallel. Such an action will certainly create additional world condemnation and action by the United States.”
General Chin shook his head in exasperation. Chi glowered at him. “You need to understand, comrade, that the world is enchanted by a united Korea. That is a very, very powerful force. Our country is trying to regain its rightful place as a world power. As much as we may believe that the fall of Communist North Korea is a disaster to the people and our way of life, we must accept it because the world embraces it. Half the world even believes that the rocket attack against our troops on the border was justifiable; the other half believes it was wrong but nonetheless understandable and excusable. Simple retaliation will not be effective.
“No. We need a plan to strike at the heart of what is
“Its nuclear weapons, of course.”
“Of course,” Minister Chi said. “The world loves United Korea because they won their reunification, but they hate them for not giving up the captured nuclear weapons. We can therefore take away Korea’s nuclear weapons and not suffer world condemnation, yes?” A nod of heads around the conference table. “We have already determined that we cannot hope to take all of the weapons, but what is it we can easily take?”
“Kanggye,” General Chin said.
“Not just Kanggye,” Chi said with a pleased smile. “Ten years ago, perhaps, before we put the North Korean missile development program into full worldwide production. But today? You are now permitted to think bigger.”
“The entire province?” Chin asked excitedly. “Do you think the president will approve an operation to take Chagang Do province in its
Chi Haotian smiled. Kanggye Research Center was one of the former North Korea’s most sensitive weapons research centers. Only twenty miles south of the Chinese border, it was originally the site of a Russian-built nuclear reactor, similar to the doomed Chernobyl reactor in Ukraine, constructed shortly after the end of the Korean War. The plant produced some power for North Korea and Manchuria, but its primary purpose was as a uranium- processing plant. The plant had been built in North Korea so Manchuria could take advantage of Soviet nuclear knowledge while the dangerous reactor itself was in North Korea. When the China-USSR split occurred, the facility was taken over by Chinese engineers, with cooperation from Iranian and Pakistani weapons scientists.
Soon, most of Chagang Do province was converted to weapons research, development, testing, and construction. Chagang Do was the second largest province in the old North Korea and the most sparsely populated. Like the state of Nevada in the United States or Xinjiang province in China, the land was large and inhospitable enough and the population small enough so as to escape attention or scrutiny. Over twenty research centers, test sites, manufacturing plants, and dump sites made Chagang Do province almost totally uninhabitable and unusable except by the military — and a prime target for any power wishing to capture valuable nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons data.
Kanggye became one of Asia’s top weapons-grade plutonium-producing facilities. The plant was expanded to eventually include building nuclear weapons, from the massive three-megaton WX120 to the artillery-shell-sized ten-kiloton W18. Dozens of weapons had been built at Kanggye and exported all over the world. Brazil, South Africa, Indonesia, and Pakistan all had weapons or components bought from Kanggye’s laboratories.
“Of course,” Minister Chi said. “Not just the research facility, but we take the production facilities, all the laboratories, the processing centers, the test facilities, and the launch pads, and we capture and hold whatever bases the capitalists still occupy. We will have to secure these areas, of course, so the capitalists do not use them again to build more weapons of mass destruction — that means troops, at least three brigades, I’d imagine, for a province that size and with that terrain. We will need to strengthen the air support, set up air defense and surveillance sites, to supply all of our peacekeepers.
“Then, if Chagang Do province naturally becomes the center for anticapitalist groups forming in Korea — well, I would think that is part of the trials of any government,” Chi said, smiling. “After all, the proliferation of opposition groups, some armed, was bound to happen in a societal, governmental, and ideological transition that occurred so quickly and so underhandedly. Who knows? Perhaps a group strong enough and well armed enough will emerge from the wastelands of Chagang Do. Perhaps it will be President Kim Jong-il, perhaps someone with a little more backbone.”
The minister of defense looked around the conference table, his eyes deadly cold. “That is the plan I want, comrades. I want it on my desk before the midday meal, ready to present to the president and the Politburo. And I want you all to remember that thousands of our comrades have died at the hands of the capitalists, and we will do everything in our power to stop this cancerous growth on our frontier before any more of our comrades-in-arms perish.”
The lone soldier advanced quickly but carefully down the railroad tracks. The weather was the worst in days, with a freezing, driving rain and fifty-mile-per-hour winds. The weather made movement almost impossible, but it also provided excellent cover — because he knew the South Koreans were still looking for him.
It was actually only a matter of time before he was discovered, since there was only so much track in all of North Korea. The question was: could they launch their missile and then make it into northern Chagang Do province, at least another eighty kilometers, before being discovered by the capitalists? It was a race he could not afford to lose.
Kong Hwan-li, who still proudly considered himself a captain of artillery forces of the People’s Army of North
