By threatening to join the Group of Seven nations, the president was undermining the foundations of Mao’s China. Expanded trade with the West would flood the motherland with decadent, wasteful consumer items.
Rock and roll, television, and violent Hollywood movies would destroy China’s youth, as it already had America’s and was rapidly corrupting Japan’s. Indeed drugs, moral corruption, and blind materialism were already on the rise in China’s larger cities. With additional exposure, this incurable blight would all too soon reach the countryside. Once the country’s greatest asset, its rural population, was infected, China’s doom would be sealed.
Now was the time for strength, not weakness! Decades of sacrifice had made this day possible, and Liu was not about to just sit back and watch his beloved country destroy itself.
Satisfied that he had done his best to set a plan into motion that would yet save the People’s Republic, Liu’s glance returned to the harbor, where the salvage ship was preparing to get underway. Liu himself had written this vessel’s new orders, directing it southward to the Spratlys, where the operation’s all-important first phase had already been implemented.
4
Vince Kellogg managed to get home shortly after sunset, just in time to pick up Kelly and Josh and head for National. Kelly’s sister Julie was arriving at 8:30 p. m. from St. Louis, and they arrived at the gate just as she was deplaning. The youngest of three sisters, Julie would be staying with them for several weeks, while she worked on her doctoral thesis in economics at the Library of Congress.
As it turned out, the timing of this visit couldn’t have been better.
Vince was scheduled to leave early the next morning for New York City, where he’d be boarding the QE2 for a planned midnight sailing. Four and a half days at sea would follow, and he had a six-day stay in the United Kingdom to look forward to, before he’d be returning home on Air Force One. He’d feel more comfortable on the trip knowing his wife and son weren’t alone.
As usual, Vince was unable to share the nature of his afternoon visit to the Federal Executive Branch mail-sorting facility with his family.
They had learned long ago not to ask questions, and he was content to go about his business as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred.
He wolfed down a cold, barbecued chicken breast, spent a half hour with Kelly and Julie getting caught up on family gossip, then excused himself to tuck in Joshua and complete his packing. His wife and sister-in-law were still gabbing away on the patio when he slipped into bed shortly after 10:00 p. m. 4T The next thing he knew, the 5:00 a. m. news was whispering from the clock radio. The lead story was about the summit, and before getting up, he listened to a group of reporters discuss the virtues of this history-making meeting of the world’s top leaders.
As soon as the report ended, he switched off the radio so that the second alarm buzzer wouldn’t awaken Kelly, and rose to get on with his morning routine. A half hour later he was stretched, showered, shaved, and fortified by a mug of black coffee, ready to hit the road.
Though he had intended to leave his car at the airport and have one of his associates drive it back home, he was surprised to find Kelly dressed and waiting for him at the front door. Not even morning sickness would keep her from personally delivering him to the terminal.
One of the benefits of living in Alexandria was its proximity to National. The traffic was still light, and they arrived with plenty of time for Vince to leave Kelly with a proper hug. Next year would be their twentieth wedding anniversary, and during that time, they had certainly experienced their fair share of airport goodbyes. Yet perhaps because of her pregnancy — a surprise, to be sure, but a wonderful one — this goodbye lingered much longer than usual, and Vince had to reluctantly break their embrace to make the 6:30 shuttle.
He made it to the gate with a whole two minutes to spare. This gave him just enough time to grab a copy of USA Today before boarding. The plane took off soon afterwards, and it seemed that he barely had time to eat a standard airline box breakfast and read the newspaper before the pilot announced they were initiating their descent into New York.
He had saved the top news story of the morning, the summit, for last.
It was supplemented by a four-page special section that documented the upcoming summit, and included a full-color picture of the QE2 and a detailed map showing the transatlantic route the ocean liner would be taking.
Although he had previously read a detailed, thirty-six page briefing paper about the G-7 that had been circulated within the Treasury Department, Vince nevertheless found the newspaper feature extremely interesting. He particularly enjoyed the story on the G-7’s history.
A fairly modern event, the first G-7 summit was born as a result of the monetary crisis of the early 1970s. In the summer of 1971 the United States recorded its first trade deficit. Growing economies in Japan and Europe caused this deficit to continue to deteriorate, and President Nixon vainly attempted to control it with a series of drastic monetary devaluations.
The outbreak of the Yom Kippur war in 1973 led to the first serious Arab oil embargo — within three months the price of petroleum quadrupled, while the supply was cut by 20 percent. Unable to react with a united response, the Western nations found themselves at the mercy of economic conditions over which they had little control.
To address this dangerous situation, France’s Giscard d’Estaing and Helmut Schmidt of Germany proposed the creation of a flexible, unstructured economic summit of the Western leaders. Informality, and the need to promote a totally free exchange of ideas, was the key, and the American President, Gerald Ford, somewhat reluctantly accepted an invitation to travel to Chateau de Rambouillet, deep in the French countryside.
The first G-7 summit was thus convened on November 15, 1975. Though hampered by large staffs, the secluded location and excellent fall weather created the perfect ambiance. Many of the informal meetings took place around the fireplace. They touched upon a wide range of topics including monetary policy, international trade, relations with developing countries, and the continued energy crisis.
The final results were encouraging, and a decision was made to hold another summit in June of 1976, in Puerto Rico. Held in an isolated resort outside of San Juan, this meeting led to a joint trade agreement designed to avoid uncontrollable economic expansion and stem the creation of additional trade barriers.
Yearly gatherings of the Group of Seven had continued ever since. They took place in a wide variety of locations, and were dedicated to such difficult subjects as nuclear arms control, international terrorism, and a desire for continued monetary and trade regulation.
Only recently had Russia joined the United States, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and Japan as a full time summit participant.
And with the additional presence of the People’s Republic of China, the summit was continuing to evolve as an economic and political institution.
Vince was well aware that what made these annual meetings unique were the personal interactions that took place. Where else could the world’s top leaders hold personal discussions on a broad spectrum of concerns, all in a relaxed, trusting environment? And although the most recent summits displayed an increasing tendency to have large personal staffs present, there was a move underfoot to halt this trend.
The upcoming summit at sea aboard the QE2 was the perfect way to return to the isolated, idealistic setting first envisioned in 1974. Only a single personal representative would be allowed on each leader’s staff, with the sessions themselves structured to be as informal as possible.