Shadows of War

reservoir. They’ll have a hard time getting over the Da — you can hit the bridges, try piecemeal attacks. Get them a little at a time. And if you can get them to come after you, you’ll have a chance to use your dug-in defenses. They’re trying to avoid them. They’ve stayed away from all of your serious troop concentrations. This is a game plan straight out of Shock and Awe — our campaign against the Iraqis. They’ve been studying it for years.”

The general’s lieutenants started talking among themselves in Vietnamese. General Trung said nothing. He stood perfectly erect and motionless. While he couldn’t have helped hearing what they were saying, he didn’t react to it in the slightest way.

“What makes you think we could hold out against the Chinese?” asked another of the officers finally.

“I don’t know that you can,” said Zeus. “Maybe not without help. But you did hold out against us forty years ago. You won that one.”

None of the officers smiled. They continued discussing the idea for a few minutes until, one by one, they stopped and looked at the general.

“I have a question, Major,” said Trung. He pointed to the map, running his finger below the reservoir. “The people that die when the reservoir is flooded, the people who live in these villages here — what will I tell their families?”

“They died for Vietnam.”

General Trung nodded. Zeus’s answer had been automatic. In truth, he hadn’t thought of the civilians at all. He just assumed they could be evacuated in time.

Civilians were never a factor in the simulations.

“How soon can you blow up the reservoir?” the general asked.

“Me? The U.S.? I thought your army would — ”

“There are no explosives in place, and time is of the essence,” said the general. “How soon can you blow it up?”

9

Western Vietnam

Colonel Sun listened patiently as Jing Yo made the case for adding manpower to his team so he could pursue the scientist. The colonel did not require much persuasion. The premier himself had ordered that the scientist be found, and it would be foolish not to use any resource possible.

But Sun did not think the young lieutenant was heading in the proper direction. He wanted to go south rather than east — away from the path the others had taken, and indirectly toward the Chinese lines.

“You are overthinking this, Jing Yo,” he said finally. “You are acting as if you were facing another commando. You are not. The man you are pursuing is a frightened scientist. He can’t last in the jungle. You should have no trouble finding him.”

“I’m not sure how many people are still helping him,” said Jing Yo. “We’ve killed three and captured one. But there may be more.”

“Yes, yes, you said. Of course you can have the troops. I’ll have some assigned.” Colonel Sun waved at his aide, who was approaching with a fresh round of dispatches. “But you have to search east.”

“I believe — ”

“You are thinking too much. Here, let me see my map. He’ll head for the nearest village and look for help there. A Hmong village, I would imagine. Let me see from the reports which ones have not been abandoned.”

10

Washington, D.C.

President Greene leaned his chin on his hand. Though filled, the White House Situation Room was as quiet and silent as it had ever been during his administration.

“Mr. President?”

Greene looked up at the screen at the other end of the room. General Perry was participating in the videoconference from the ambassador’s secure suite at the U.S. embassy in Hanoi.

“You’re asking an incredible thing,” Greene told the general. “Using our missiles to blow up a Vietnamese dam.”

“That’s what they’ve asked us to do, sir. I couldn’t believe it myself.”

“I have been assured by the foreign minister that it is a serious request,” said Ambassador Behrens, who was standing next to Perry. “Time is of the essence, and they don’t have the proper munitions in place.”

“They can’t just put a truckload of dynamite at the base of the dam?” asked the defense secretary.

“I’m told it’s more complicated than that,” answered Perry. “The engineers have called for a set of exact explosions across the dam area. Translating that into Tomahawk hits, I’m told it would take at least six hits to cause a fissure, and at least eight to do the kind of damage that needs to be done.”

Greene leaned back in his seat. Not even in his worst days at the Hanoi Hilton had he contemplated doing something like this. “This is the best military plan we could come up with?”

“Sir, I can call the major over,” said Perry. “He’s working on the details with some of the Navy staff people. But yes, the answer is, this is his plan. I trust him, sir. If you want to talk to him yourself — ”

Greene waved his hand, dismissing the idea. There wasn’t time to second-guess the details of the plan. He had to give them either a go or a no-go.

The Vietnamese might very well turn around and use the attack against the U.S. Who would believe that they had requested it themselves? Especially if many of their own people died.

And at least a thousand people lived in the shadow of the dam.

A small number compared to the millions who would die if China continued its onslaught. But still…

“I want the area below the dam evacuated,” said the president. “That is my condition.”

“Sir, to be effective, the attack should be launched immediately. Even then —

“That is my condition,” said Greene. “When it’s done, I will personally give the order to fire.”

11

Northwestern Vietnam

The logging trail followed a seemingly endless series of switchbacks before arriving at a wide, hard-packed dirt road. The road wound through an area of fields, now temporarily fallow, which had been cleared from the jungle only recently. Within a mile, the view opened up, revealing an emerald green valley stretching for miles in the distance. It was a beautiful sight, so pretty Mara felt as if she were walking into a postcard.

The road was made of soft dirt. Mara glanced down and realized little bits of bright yellow clay were clinging to her boots as she walked. Even M? left light impressions in the road.

“We need to get off the road,” she told the others, erasing the tracks as best she could before joining them on the shoulder.

After they’d walked for ten minutes, the village came into view. The tin-roofed buildings glinted in the distance, six of them clustered close to the road at the center of the fields. These were large pole barns, open at the bottoms, used by the community to hold crops, machinery, and tools. The houses sat off to the side, on a small rise beyond a circular orchard of orange trees.

Lucas had told her it was unoccupied, but Mara wasn’t about to trust his surveillance. She angled for a wide streambed that ran in a semicircle around the village. Used to irrigate the fields, during the rainy season it was a wide and deep body of water, more a river than a stream. Now, though, the water flowed lazily across the rocks, no