`Thank you, Marty,' said the President. `What exactly are you saying?'
`China sells cheap weapons to the Middle East. A Russian MiG-29 fighter costs around $25 million. A Chinese F-7M is no more than $4.5 million. It secures a relationship with oil-producing countries to ensure supplies for the 8,000,000 barrels a day it will need to import by 2010. It calculates that the relationship with the Islamic countries will withstand international pressure for sanctions against it. In the UN it uses its veto, as we know. With those blocks in place it takes over the South China Sea. After the 1996 stand-off during the Taiwan election, the PLA realized that it could not defeat our navy in battle, and wouldn't even be able to even equal it until around 2020. But it knows we can't handle two conflicts at the same time. So it ensures that Iran has the capability to start a diversion if we try another 1996 battle group deployment.'
`Do you know this will happen?'
`As I said, Mr President, our HUMINT is not good. We don't know what the leadership is thinking. But they don't want to fight us. They want us to lose our nerve and get out of the Pacific. In a normal world, all our concentration would be on this mess on the Korean peninsula. As it is, our resources are deployed against China and we're mostly using Japanese intelligence on North Korean troop and naval movements. If we're going to stay there with any credibility we have to do it in an alliance with Japan as a military and nuclear power which can face down China and keep her at bay.'
Major Lon stared gap-mouthed as Lieutenant Claude Joffe of the French Army Signals Division set up his laptop computer. A French corporal orientated what appeared to be a satellite dish, but instead of heavenwards he pointed it south to Hanoi and the French Embassy there. Soon the exact location of all Chinese units presently flooding across the border would appear on Lieutenant Joffe's screen. The clouds over the battlefield had parted, giving the French spy satellite ideal conditions for monitoring troop movements 100 kilometres below.
300 kilometres to the north-west, in Nanning, a Chinese battlefield manager, Qiao Xiaoming, was engaged in much the same task, at much the same time. He was using a Thomson-CSF Star Burst battlefield information manager which enabled him to communicate electronically and through radio with officers in the field who had mobile versions of his equipment. The graphic display was functioning perfectly. Each armoured division and infantry battalion was illuminated on the screen before him. The images were not photographs, they were more schematic, but with the aid of a computer mouse he could zoom in on any unit and know its strength and capability and exact location in the jungles and on the roads of Vietnam to within 1 metre.
The humble camera had come a long way: it was now digital and connected to a high-speed computer and transmitter: but the satellite the French had stationed above the battlefield did more than just take photographs, process them, and instantaneously send them to an earth receiver. It also possessed a powerful transmitter for other equally secret operations. Like the Americans and the British, French arms manufacturers of `intelligent' weapons liked to stay in control of what they sold to foreign governments, so they wired into the hardware of each piece of military hardware a device that could be activated remotely to render it useless. It could be turned on and off at will, suggesting to the unwary that it was suffering a malfunction. It was insurance, taken out on the basis that today's client might be tomorrow's enemy, or the enemy of a friend. The beauty of it was that the interference could not be traced back to the manufacturer — the Trojan Horse was wired into the silicon chips that in this case animated the Star Burst system.
As Qiao Xiaoming watched 50,000 Chinese troops flow across the Vietnamese border, supported by 250 battle tanks and numerous trucks and lighter vehicles, he was not sure whether to marvel at the wonders of modern science or give in to a sentimental feeling of pride at the activities of his comrades. He did not have time to mull the decision. His screen flickered and then the images upon it dissolved before his eyes. He hit it but it did not respond. He pressed an emergency call button, and then he turned the Star Burst system off and then on again. It seemed to right itself for a moment and then went blank. By the time it did that, half a dozen senior PLA officers were standing around with a look of horror on their faces. To a man they knew that their ability to manage the attack on Lang Son had just slipped from their grasp.
Noburo Hyashi had been waiting all his political life for this moment — the day when he would lead Japan into complete independence and freedom. The NHK television crew was busying itself in his office with lights and leads for microphones. Frank Lloyd Wright, the American architect, had designed the official residence of the Japanese Prime Minister, which was situated in Nagatacho, near the Diet (parliament) building. While Hyashi had no particular liking for Americans as such he had grown to like his official residence. Lloyd Wright's use of blond woods was particularly attractive. He also put big windows in the walls which let in light and enabled Hyashi to look out on one of the most perfectly maintained small Japanese gardens in Tokyo. From his office he looked straight into a plum tree in full blossom. Prime Ministerial addresses to the nation were rare in Japanese politics. The usual practice would be for the Prime Minister (flanked by his cabinet three steps behind) to stand at a lectern in an anonymous white-walled room, make a small speech, and then take overlong questions from reporters. His Private Secretary cleared most of the papers from his desk. A tilted plastic autocue was placed directly in front of the desk, below the line of sight of the camera but high enough so it looked as though Hyashi was looking at the camera when he spoke.
`My fellow Japanese,' he began. `I have requested the opportunity to speak to you today to explain the current situation and the government's response to it. As you know the government of the People's Republic of China launched an unprovoked air attack on the Republic of Vietnam on Sunday. At the same time it instituted a blockade of the South China Sea, denying to Japan and other peace-loving peoples in Asia the use of a vital waterway, and this morning China launched an invasion across the Vietnamese border. We are also trying to assess the fresh outbreak of violence on the Korean peninsula and determine to what extent that also threatens long-term peace in the Pacific. Since 1960 Japan has enjoyed a military alliance with the United States. Part of the requirements that treaty places on its two signatories is for one to come to the aid of the other when its national interest is threatened. Your government decided that such a threat to Japan's survival was created by China's actions on Sunday and through diplomatic channels we sought to invoke our treaty with the United States. Sadly, we could not agree that such a threat existed.
`The government concluded that to all intents and purposes the military alliance which we had with the United States had ended. This left Japan little choice but to act independently. The first part of that independent action occurred this morning when our military forces tested a small nuclear device. I fully understand that given our own tragic experience of nuclear weapons, many of you will be saddened by news that we too possess such weapons. Some, indeed, may be even angry. To those who are I can do nothing more than offer my sincerest regrets.