The task of explaining America's hidden policy lay with Marty Weinstein, the National Security Adviser, whom the President summoned as soon as he had finished reading the article. He asked for an explicit memorandum addressing the points raised by the Guardian, and an opinion poll among those who had read the article to gauge the public level of support. Weinstein explained that while Martin Miller was broadly correct, there had not been an administration policy to help Japan build a nuclear bomb. American nuclear scientists simply wanted to keep abreast of technological development in a field for which Congress had cut off funds. No American laws had been broken. Without the cooperation of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Japan would still have nuclear weapons today.
`Marty, explaining away secrets doesn't worry me. We do that all the time. But before sending a task force to blast the Chinese out of the South China Sea, I need to decide whether we should now condemn or cooperate with Japan. Which course would save American lives and protect our national interests?'
`I believe we should opt for cooperation, Mr President. At the end of the day Japan is an ally. We have no conflict of interests.'
`All right. But spell it out, Marty. As I will have to spell it out to the nation.'
`Let's promote it as burden sharing. American cannot indefinitely police the world. So, let's look first at the threat and then with whom we are best allied. In Europe, we can absolutely rely on the British and usually on the French. They are the grown-ups of the security alliance. They're nuclear. The others waver. We have no major unbreakable alliances in South Asia or the Middle East. India would be a natural ally. But historically it's suspicious. It has its own superpower aspirations. Our friends in the Middle East such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia have domestic political considerations to take into account. In the long term the danger is similar to that of China. The Islamic political and cultural system does not blend with ours. The values and aspirations are different. There is only so far a relationship can go. In East Asia, the ASEAN nations will waver. They know they can't take on either China or Japan. They prefer us but sense our time is up. They are pragmatic people. Their focus is on trade and development. They will accept a new order in China or Japan as long as it doesn't jeopardize trade. And we have the wobble of Russia. No one knows what will happen there. Russia is nuclear.
`Over the next fifty years or so Russia, China, and India will jostle for superpower position. Fine, none is a rogue state.'
`Marty,' interrupted the President, `China has attacked Vietnam, taken over sea lanes to the Pacific, and sunk one of our warships with a huge loss of life.'
`Mr President, I'm talking from the viewpoint of history. We can sanction and bomb Iraq, Libya, Panama. We know their leaders are despots. China is not in that category, and I believe we must approach this from that angle. Look what's happened at the UN Security Council. Beijing vetoes every proposal we put forward.'
`OK. Go on.'
`We might have a public policy to fight two major campaigns at once, but as I said, it's becoming impossible because of budget cuts to the military. If we commit to the South China Sea, we will leave another flank wide open. For example, the Sixth Fleet has a long-term NATO commitment in the Mediterranean. Iran, Iraq, and the Gulf remain areas of tension where we cannot afford to withdraw our forces. If Iran watched us at a stand-off with China, if we began to pour supplies into Vietnam or the Philippines as we did for the Gulf War in the 1990s, and then if Iran decided to flex its muscle in the Gulf, we couldn't handle it, Mr President. By that I mean we wouldn't be defeated in battle, but the costs, the body bags, the Middle Eastern and Oriental enemies on the television screens would turn the American people against what we're trying to achieve.'
`Like in the Vietnam War.'
`Precisely. We win on the battlefield but lose in Congress.'
`Are you speculating or do you know something, Marty?'
`I'm speculating with fact. China makes serious money out of selling weapons. In the last five-year period it came to more than $10 billion. Ninety per cent of that comes from the Middle East. Its closest relationship right now is with Iran, which, incidentally, is how they financed the sudden purchase of two very nasty warships from Russia in the past two years. They've bought the Sovremenny class frigates Vazhny and Vdumchivy, which we believe cost them a quarter of a billion dollars. These ships are armed to the teeth and what they carry isn't pretty, it's brutal stuff, Mr President. They scared us to hell in the Cold War days and they've now come back again to haunt us sailing under another flag. China's got missiles and nuclear technology. Iran's got oil money. Russia's got the toys.
`The Chinese violated the Missile Technology Control Regime [MTCR] accord which they signed in 1987. It bans the sale of missiles or technology for missiles that can carry a payload of more than 500 kilograms a distance of more than 300 kilometres. A year later, China sold thirty-six intermediate-range CSS-2 missiles to Saudi Arabia, which paid more than $3 billion for them. It was also working on a deal to sell its newly developed M-9 missiles to Syria. It's been involved with Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and a few others. The common factor uniting those countries, Mr President, is that they are Islamic.
`We first put pressure on China in 1987 when it sold Silkworm missiles to Iran. Then it got worse. In 1989 and 1991 Chinese and Iranian companies struck what in public looked like a commercial deal. But the product was nuclear electromagnetic separator for producing isotopes and a mini-type reactor. The Chinese said it was being used for peaceful purposes; for medical diagnosis and nuclear physics research.
`Atom bombs can be made using a concentrated uranium isotope. That particular deal was dropped, we think because the Russians came up with a better one. But let us assume that Iran is about where Iraq was in the early nineties. It's exploring the nuclear path, but isn't there yet. The next thing we know is that China's sent over what we call calutron equipment, which is needed to enrich uranium. Our intelligence also finds evidence of China supplying Iran with chemical weapons material, thiodiglycol and thionyl chloride, both of which are very nasty substances. The upshot is an aspiring nuclear enemy, possibly with an additional arsenal of mass-destruction chemical weapons. But so far Iran's delivery capability is limited.
`Then we spotted two convoys carrying twenty-six missiles as well as launchers and other accessories moving through the outskirts of Beijing over a three-day period. They went to the main northern port of Tianjin. We believe they were East Wind 31, an intercontinental ballistic missile with a range of 8,000 kilometres. They're propelled by solid-fuel rockets, can be moved around by trucks and fired quickly. We can't detect them easily and they're pretty accurate.'
`And Iran might have them in its arsenal?'
`We're pretty sure it has, Mr President. They're not the best China has. The East Wind 32 was tested in 2000. It was fired from Xinjiang in the far west and travelled 3,000 kilometres overland and into the South China Sea. Its range is 12,000 kilometres. Its payload can be a 700 kilogram nuclear warhead. If fired from Chinese soil, Mr President, the East Wind 32 could get to Alaska or Western Europe. We also believe they're working on a new submarine-launched ICBM. If they get one of those into the Pacific, they could attack Washington and New York.'