Meadows sighed, stretched, and took one last look out of the bridge window at the crystal clear waters under the bright blue sky.
It looked like it was going to be one hell of a nice day.
The room was large — too large, Tsang Feng thought, given the small amount of people who presently occupied it.
But as the Paramount Leader of the People’s Republic of China, a man who held the simultaneous offices of President of the PRC, General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and Chairman of the Central Military Commission, Tsang understood that he had a role to play, and a large part of that role was doing what was expected of him. And for the Paramount Leader, that meant meetings in huge, impressive, grandiose surroundings; surroundings that befit his position as leader of the world’s most populous country. It just wouldn’t be seemly to engage in meetings squirrelled away in tiny, windowless offices.
The décor was grandiose too; marble floors and pillars, gilt edging, antique porcelain. It looked incredible in the officially published photographs; you would have to get a lot closer to realize that most of it was fake, a mere façade constructed to impress the masses. Appearances, Tsang well knew, had to be maintained at all costs.
And so President Tsang ignored the vast empty spaces and concentrated instead on the men in front of him, the other members of the Central Military Commission.
There was the First Vice Chairman, Fang Zemin — as Vice President of the PRC and Secretary of the Secretariat of the Communist Party, the only other member of the commission who wasn’t a military officer; and then his other two Vice Chairmen, Generals Wu De and Yang Wanquan. The rest of the membership was composed of an assortment of generals and a single admiral, the commander of the PLA Navy.
In all, the men sitting in the huge room were responsible for the leadership of one of the world’s most formidable military forces, with over two million active service personnel split between the PLA Ground Force, Navy, Air Force and Second Artillery Corps, with nearly a million more in reserve and an additional million and a half making up the Chinese People’s Armed Police Force, which the CMC also controlled. Such colossal numbers were to be genuinely feared by other nations, Tsang knew, and now — at last — China’s military technology was starting to match her sheer manpower. It wouldn’t be long, he firmly believed, before she eclipsed even America’s legendary forces and became preeminent on the global scene.
But — despite the pleas of some on the commission — Tsang didn’t believe in power games and military posturing. He had no desire to enter into armed conflict with any nation, especially not the United States, and had welcomed the Mutual Defense Treaty with open arms, believing that it would make such a conflict even more unlikely. As for the other nations, Tsang was content that the sheer size and power of China’s military, in conjunction with her agreement with the US and Russian Federation, would ensure diplomatic negotiations would always swing her way. To ‘speak softly and carry a big stick’ was his chosen method of improving his country’s position in the world. If the stick was big enough, he knew he would never have to use it; the threat would be enough.
‘So my friend,’ Tsang addressed Admiral Meng Linxian, ‘you are happy with the forthcoming exercises?’
Tsang watched as Meng exchanged a quick, furtive glance with General Wu before answering, and wondered what it meant; he wasn’t aware that the two men had any close connection.
‘I am delighted,’ Meng said finally, ‘things could not be better. It will give us a chance to fully trial our own aircraft carriers and defensive systems, as well as to better assess those of the Americans.’
‘Indeed,’ Tsang said, still concerned about the look that had been exchanged between Meng and Wu. General Wu had proved himself to be an excellent addition to the commission, and was one of the men who had pushed for closer cooperation with US forces, including joint training exercises like this one. As the former commander of the Second Artillery Corps, Wu had been responsible for much of the nuclear arsenal which now resided underneath the Taihang mountain range between Hebei and Shanxi provinces. Labelled ‘The Great Wall Project’, tens of thousands of Army engineers had spent over a decade digging a five thousand kilometer network of tunnels which now hid China’s thousands of tactical and strategic nuclear warheads. It was a great success, and still all but unknown, even to their American partners.
Could General Wu be trusted?
Tsang scoffed at his own question. Could anyone truly be trusted? He had been around long enough to know the answer. And although he prided himself on his own ethical standards, it wasn’t quite true to say that he had achieved his current status and power without any recourse to morally questionable behavior. That just wouldn’t have been possible, would it?
And so the question of whether or not General Wu could be trusted was moot; nobody could be trusted and therefore, perversely, everyone had to be trusted lest the whole system come crashing down.
But Tsang still wondered what had passed between Meng and Wu, and what it could possibly foretell.
4
Lieutenant Colonel Hu Liangyu nodded his head as he listened to the reports from his chief surveyor and primary engineer. They were, it seemed, happy with the location and agreed that it would offer the support that the Dong Feng needed.
He turned to the control technicians, who had finished their own tasks, and they too confirmed that they were ready.
Hu once again nodded his head. It was time.
When he had received the order, he had been surprised, to say the least. It wasn’t a part of any long term strategy that he had ever heard about, although he would be the first to admit that he was unlikely to have been told of such a strategy were it to actually exist; such was the compartmentalized secrecy of his beloved nation. So, he understood, anything was possible; even this.
And the orders had come through the correct channels, using the correct procedure and the correct, most up-to-date code words; there was no doubt at all that this was what his masters in Beijing wanted to happen.
But why? What could they possibly hope to achieve?
That, he decided, was simply not his problem. He was a soldier; a senior one, admittedly, but a soldier nevertheless, and soldiers followed orders. Let the politicians worry about the effects such orders would have.
And as he gave the command for the launch module to be brought into position, he knew very well that such orders would have an effect.
Maybe even an effect that would change the world.
Cutting off such thoughts, Hu watched the olive drab metal launcher rotate on its mechanical base and contact the hard earth underneath, and waited with cold resolve to give the final command.
Manny Gomez was barely paying attention when the image first appeared on his screen, a high-pitched electronic alarm blasting through his earphones.
Gomez was the radar operator onboard the E2D Advanced Hawkeye, which was already flying off the seas near the Chinese coast ahead of the Ford carrier group, which had itself just entered China’s territorial waters. But despite his years of experience, he had temporarily switched off. It was the calm before the storm; he knew that as soon as the exercise started, he would be operating on all cylinders, and had allowed himself to relax ever so slightly.
He woke up instantly, tracking the image across his radar screen. What the hell was it?