“Another inch cut from the dragon’s tail,” Djinn replied, setting his cup onto the low table that separated the two men. The two men were in the central sitting room of the combined Taiwanese/United Democratic Forces suite complex. It had been converted into an ad hoc security space for the delegations. Every inch of the room was swept hourly for bugs, and white noise generators purred in each corner. The curtains were kept tightly drawn and vibrator units had been taped to the windows, ensuring that a laser or radar beam could not be used to “read” any conversation taking place within.
“Quite so,” Duan continued. “However, we have also had word from our people in Peking. The Communists are reacting as we had feared. They are initiating their special operation.”
“Ah!” Djinn lifted his cup once more. “They see their future. They are afraid.”
“Speaking truthfully, Professor, so am I.”
“We knew that this eventuality would have to be faced sooner or later. The Communists have their plan. We have ours. The one shall block the other.”
“In theory.” The solidly built Taiwanese diplomat grimaced and set his tea aside. “I must confess that I have my reservations. I still wish we could notify the United States and the other Pacific Rim states.”
“No. They would have their suspicions about any pronouncement that we might make. They must make the discovery themselves. Anything less would take the edge off the peril.”
“But should they miss the sailing, what then? We may have little time before the Communists act.”
“We must trust in the technologies of the Americans to spot the departure. As for the time, that too may work in our favor. We wish for the Americans to act, not to think.”
“Trusts and theories,” Duan grunted, and sat back in his chair.
“We are playing a dangerous game with both your people and mine “
“With all of China,” Duan replied. The former professor from Canton emptied his cup and returned it to the table. A smile crossed his seamed features and he stiffly flexed his fingers once more.
“But then, the path to freedom is not necessary a safe one.”
19
“Yes?”
“It’s only Lieutenant Arkady, ma’am.”
“Come in.”
Amanda wasn’t in the office section of her cabin as Arkady entered. He could hear stirring beyond the curtained doorway that led to her sleeping quarters.
“Be out in a second,” she called. “Have a seat.”
Arkady set his flight harness and helmet down on the deck and dropped into the office space’s single guest chair. Tilting it back into the corner the couple of inches permissible within the cabin’s cramped confines, he braced one foot against the edge of the desk. Since coming aboard the Duke, he had lounged a lot of hours away in this position. As he always did, he explored the work space with his eyes, seeking for some new fragment of Amanda’s essence.
On the bulkhead behind her workstation, a row of sticky notes had been tacked up beneath the small oil painting of Amanda’s Cape Cod sloop. The corner of Arkady’s mouth quirked up. He had some fond memories of that little sail boat. Especially of a warm evening spent in its cockpit during their last layover in Norfolk.
On this cruise, the painting had been joined by a framed pen-and-ink sketch of a Navy Fleet ocean tug. Another gift from her admiral-turned artist father, the little vessel, the Piegan, had been Amanda’s first command. There was a small stack of books on the edge of the desk. Tilting his chair forward again, Arkady turned them so he could read the titles Regional reading a copy of Tuchman’s Stillwell and the American Experience in China and an English version of Mao’s Red Book. He didn’t recognize the third volume, a large green bound paperback titled “Can the Chinese Armed Forces Win the Next War.” Selecting it from the stack, he read the title page and learned that it was a Naval Institute Press translation of a Red Chinese publication.
He was leafing through the first chapter when Amanda Garrett brushed past the door curtain and entered the office. Her usual sober demeanor vanished for a moment in the bright flash of her smile. “Welcome home. How did the recon flight go?”
“No problems. Say, who is this Liu Huaqing guy, anyway?”
“They call him the Chinese Mahan,” Amanda replied, slipping into her desk chair and swiveling to face him. Slouching back, she comfortably matched Arkady’s posture. “During the 1980s and ’90s, Admiral Liu was a major voice for reform and modernization within the Red Chinese armed forces. He was one of the first to call for China to abandon its had fangyu naval strategy.” She formed the Mandarin phrase carefully.
“That sounds like the Chinese version of an extremely obscene suggestion had fangyu naval.”
Amanda chuckled “Jmhai fangvu means ‘defense’. Historically, the Chinese Navy has always been a small-craft coastal force. They have no tradition of open-ocean operations. Liu felt that for China to truly become a world power, they must develop that tradition and an effective blue-water doctrine to go along with it. Fortunately for us, things fell apart for the Chinese before they could implement many of his proposals.”
“Hmm, could I borrow this?”
“Be my guest,” she replied. “With the Chinese, we’re dealing with a vastly different culture structure. Whether they’re enemies or friends, we’re going to need to learn how to understand their worldview. Now, what did you find out there?”
“Things were real quiet.”
“Unusually so?”
“I dunno, babe. I stayed about thirty miles out and executed four pop-up sweeps above the radar horizon. Nothing on the scope. No guard ship. No shipping traffic. Not even any fishing boats.”
“Sub activity?”
“Nobody stuck up a periscope or a snorkel while I had my radar hot. I also ran a line of passive sonobuoys while I was out there without kicking up anything. That isn’t saying that there couldn’t be somebody lying on the bottom closer in.”
“Air? The signal environment?”
“Air ops seem to be just what we’ve been reading off the Aegis screens. No sign of a BARCAP off the coast. No surface searches up. No standing combat air patrol over the city.
“As for the signal environment, the Reds have a lot of air-search sites radiating around the Shanghai perimeter, but my threat boards reacted to only one surface-search radar. A single low-powered unit out at the mouth of the estuary.”
Amanda nodded thoughtfully. “Okay. Those are what your systems said. Now, what did your gut read?”
Arkady grimaced. “Instincts, huh? All right. Vibes-wise, I’m burying the needle. Little Miss. Chris is right — something unnatural is going on out there.”
She sighed and brushed her copper-brown bangs back from her forehead. “I was hoping that you would say that we silly females were just imagining things.”
“No such luck.”
“Do your vibes also say whether or not this recon pass tonight is going to be worth it?”
“If the Reds are up to something in Shanghai, it behooves us to find out what.”
“And if the Reds are up to something, attempting a probe of the Yangtze estuary now could be the equivalent of sticking our hand right into a hornet’s nest.” An introspective frown passed across her face.
The aviator had come to recognize the phenomenon. Amanda Garrett seldom ever had any difficulty in intellectually making a decision. Sometimes, however, she had to work a little bit to coerre her heart and soul into line.
Christine Rendino had instructed him in the proper protocol to employ at such times. Listen, and let her talk herself around. Arkady put his own spin on the procedure, however. Encourage the sense of perspective.