missile of his own. Then everybody starts shooting. This F-16 jinks around one but walks right into another—see here, the pilot ejects, and we think he survived. But this element launches four missiles, and one of those acquires this airliner. Must have just barely made it all the way. We've checked the range, and it's actually two miles over what we thought the missile could do. By the time it caught up and hit, the fighters have all turned back, the PRC guys because they were probably bingo-fuel, and the ROC guys because they were Winchester—out of missiles. All in all, it was a fairly sloppy engagement on both sides.'
'You're saying it was a goof?' This came from Tony Bretano.
'It certainly looks that way, except for one thing—'
'Why carry live missiles on an exercise?' Ryan said.
'Close, Mr. President. The ROC pilots, sure, they're carrying white ones because they see the whole PRC exercise as a threat—'
'White ones?' It was Bretano again.
'Excuse me, Mr. Secretary. White missiles are war shots. Exercise missiles are usually painted blue. The PRC guys, though, why carry heat-seekers? In situations like this, we usually don't, because you can't turn them off— once they go they're entirely on their own, fire-and-forget, we call it. One other thing. All the birds fired at the F-16s were radar-homers. This one, the one that went for the airliner, seems to be the only heat-seeker that was launched. I don't much like the smell of that.'
'Deliberate act?' Jack asked quietly.
'That is a possibility, Mr. President. The whole show looks just like a screwup, classic case. A couple fighter jocks get really hyped on something, you have an instant fur-ball, some people get killed, and we'll never be able to prove otherwise, but if you look at this two-plane element, I think they were aiming for the airliner all along—unless they took it for a ROC fighter, and I don't buy that—'
'Why?'
'It was heading the wrong way all the time,' Admiral Jackson answered.
'Buck fever,' Secretary Bretano offered.
'Why not engage people heading right for you instead of somebody heading away? Mr. Secretary, I'm a fighter pilot. I don't buy it. If I'm in an unexpected combat situation, first thing I do is identify the threats to me and shoot 'em right in the lips.'
'How many deaths?' Jack asked bleakly.
Ben Goodley handled that one: 'News reports say over a hundred. There are survivors, but we don't have any kind of count yet. And we should expect that there were some Americans aboard. A lot of business goes on between Hong Kong and Taiwan.'
'Options?'
'Before we do anything, Mr. President, we need to know if any of our people are involved. We only have one carrier anywhere close, the Elsenhower battle group on the way to Australia for SOUTHERN CUP. But it's a good bet that this won't exactly help things out between Beijing and Taipei.'
'We'll need some kind of press release,' Arnie told the President.
'We need to know if we lost any citizens first,' Ryan said. 'If we did… well, what do we do, demand an explanation?'
'They'll say it was a mistake.' Jackson repeated. 'They might even blame the Taiwanese for shooting first and starting it, then disclaim all responsibility.'
'But you don't buy it, Robby?'
'No, Jack—excuse me, no, Mr. President. I don't think so. I want to go over the tapes with a few people, to back-check me some. Maybe I'm wrong… but I don't think so. Fighter pilots are fighter pilots. The only reason to shoot the guy who's running away instead of the guy who's closing in is because you want to.'
'Move the Ike group north?' Bretano wondered.
'Get me contingency plans to do just that,' the President said.
'That leaves the Indian Ocean uncovered, sir,' Jackson pointed out. 'Carl Vinson is most of the way home to Norfolk now. John Stennis and Enterprise are still in the yard at Pearl, and we do not have a deployable carrier in the Pacific. We're out of carriers on that whole half of the world, and we'll need a month at best to move another one in from LantFleet.'
Ryan turned to Ed Foley. 'What are the chances this could blow all the way up?'
'Taiwan's going to be pretty unhappy about this. We have shots fired and people dead. National-flag airline clobbered. Countries tend to be protective of those,' the DCI observed. 'It's possible.'
'Intentions?' Goodley asked the DCI.
'If Admiral Jackson is correct—I'm not ready to buy into that yet, by the way,' Ed Foley added for Robby's benefit. He got an understanding nod. 'Then we have something going on, but what it is, I don't know. Better for everybody if this was an accident. I can't say I like the idea of pulling the carrier out of the Indian Ocean with the developing situation in the Persian Gulf.'
'What's the worst thing that can happen between the PRC and Taiwan?' Bretano asked, annoyed that he had to ask the question at all. He was still too new in his job to be as effective as his President needed.
'Mr. Secretary, the People's Republic has nuclear-tipped missiles, enough to turn Formosa into a cinder, but we have reason to believe that the Republic of China has them too and—'
'Roughly twenty,' Foley interrupted. 'And those F-16s can one-way a couple all the way to Beijing if they want. They can't destroy the People's Republic, but twenty thermonuclear weapons will knock their economy back at least ten years, maybe twenty. The PRC does not want that to happen. They're not crazy, Admiral. Keep it conventional, okay?'
'Very well, sir. The PRC does not have the ability to invade Taiwan. They lack the necessary amphibious assets to move large numbers of troops for a forced-entry assault. So what happens if things blow up anyway? Most likely scenario is a nasty air and sea battle, but one that leads to no resolution, since neither side can finish off the other. That also means a shooting war astride one of the world's most important trade routes, with all sorts of adverse diplomatic consequences for all the players. I can't see the purpose in doing this intentionally. Just too destructive to be deliberate policy… I think.' He shrugged. It didn't make sense, but neither did a deliberate attack on a harmless airliner—and he'd just told his audience that had probably been deliberate.
'And we have large trade relationships with both,' the President noted. 'We want to prevent that, don't we? I'm afraid it's looking like we have to move that carrier, Robby. Let's get some options put together, and let's try to figure out what the hell the PRC might be up to.'
CLARK WOKE UP first, feeling quite miserable. But that wasn't allowed under the circumstances. Ten minutes later, he was shaved, dressed, and heading out the door, leaving Chavez in bed. Ding didn't speak the language anyway.
'Morning walk?' It was the guy who'd brought them in from the airport.
'I could use a stretch,' John admitted. 'And you are?'
'Marcel Lefevre.'
'Station chief?' John asked bluntly.
'Actually, I am the commercial attache,' the Frenchman replied—meaning, yes. 'You mind if I come along?'
'Not at all,' Clark replied, surprising his companion as they headed for the door. 'Just wanted to take a walk. Any markets around here?'
'Yes, I will show you.'
Ten minutes later, they were in a street of commerce. Two Iranian shadows were fifty feet behind them, and obvious about it, though they did nothing more than to observe. The sounds brought it all back. Clark's Farsi was not all that impressive, especially since it was over fifteen years since he'd practiced it, but though his speech might not have been terribly good, his hearing clicked back in, soon catching the chatter and bargaining as the two Westerners passed stalls on both sides of the street.
'How are food prices?'
'Fairly high,' Lefevre answered. 'Especially with all the supplies they shipped to Iraq. A few grumbles about that.' There was something lacking, John saw, after a few minutes of contemplation. Passing half a block of food stalls, they were now in another area—gold, always a popular trade item in this part of the world. People were buying and selling. But there wasn't the enthusiasm he remembered from before. He looked at the stalls as he
