Henry said, “But their leadership is cooperating with us, right?”
“To an extent. But they’re looking out for themselves above all else. The government news agencies have said that Jinshan and Admiral Song’s trial is going to be live-streamed, if you can believe it.”
“No shit? Why would they do that?”
“Someone in the Chinese government must want to make sure that the coup is totally squashed.”
“Well, that’s good news at least. Gets rid of the loons.”
David picked up one of the blocks and placed it carefully on top of his daughter’s tower, studying it. “You know, my grandfather was at Pearl Harbor.”
“No kidding?”
“I know. Pretty incredible, right? He was on duty on one of the ships when the bombs began falling. I always thought it was amazing that one major power could surprise-attack another like that. I remember asking him about it when I was a kid, when he was still alive. I said, Grandpa, didn’t you know Japan would attack? I was just a kid. I didn’t know you weren’t supposed to say stuff like that.”
“What did he say?”
“He said there were plenty of signs that war with Japan was coming, but — how did he say it? — he said the people with the best view of a tsunami are usually the ones who are sitting on the beach.”
Neither said anything for a moment. Then David added, “Henry, here’s what bothers me most about this — if Jinshan was waiting for one big planned event to happen, something that would motivate the entire nation of China to want to go to war with the United States, what’s to say that this event isn’t still in the works?”
Susan Collinsworth didn’t have a good feeling about the message she was reading. She was the CIA’s senior operations officer in charge of the SILVERSMITH program — the interagency task force set up to counter China’s recent increased aggressive behavior. Susan was privy to a variety of restricted-handling materials being collected in the Western Pacific area of operations.
Her concern stemmed from the most recent message sent from an Agency asset placed high inside the Chinese government, code name GIANT. GIANT was the long-time assistant to Secretary Zhang, one of China’s powerful Central Committee members. His real name was Dr. Jin Wang. A Chinese citizen, he had been sent to school at UC San Diego in the late 1980s. He had been permitted to stay in the US to finish his education and received a PhD in economics from Berkeley, just before returning to China.
While in his PhD program, GIANT befriended an American — another Berkeley student in a program similar to his own. Unbeknownst to GIANT, this American student was also an operative of the CIA. CIA recruiters were looking for Chinese students who might one day flower into quality sources.
In 1989, just before GIANT finished his PhD program, Chinese troops with assault rifles and tanks killed several hundred demonstrators in Tiananmen Square. GIANT watched the American press coverage and was deeply disturbed.
When GIANT returned to China, he was not shocked by the stark difference in Chinese press coverage of the Tiananmen Square incident. But he was motivated by it.
His friend from Berkeley met him in Beijing a few months after he’d returned. The meeting, while appearing coincidental to GIANT, had been meticulously planned by the CIA. The friend had been hired by the US State Department, GIANT learned. He would be stationed in Beijing for the next few years.
The men continued their friendship. Over several private meals, the CIA operative carefully teased out GIANT’s strong feelings of distaste for the Chinese government. Eventually, the CIA man proposed that GIANT and he work together. Men like GIANT were needed, he was told. America needed back-channel communications. Windows into the minds of Chinese leadership. GIANT could help China to become a free and just nation, by becoming a confidential advisor to the American diplomatic and intelligence communities. Help create a China where another Tiananmen Square could never happen, he was told.
GIANT began spying for the US government shortly after, and continued to do so as his reputation and job title increased in prominence.
Because he had risen to such a high level in the Chinese government — the chief of staff of one of its most powerful policy makers — and because of the fierce counterintelligence operation in China, his reports were restricted to only a handful of personnel within the US government. That level of classification would protect him, and it would protect the uninterrupted flow of information from a reliable and well-placed source.
“Shit,” Susan muttered to herself, reading over his latest message.
Secretary Zhang and President Wu fear Jinshan’s coup and hostile operations may still be in progress. There is an ongoing power struggle as many Jinshan loyalists remain in important positions. Have heard rumors of unknown military training throughout regions in Guangdong and Liaoning provinces. Of particular interest is Liaoning training. Have recently learned that this covert camp holds special operations units conducting unique training. Intercepted communications have revealed that Jinshan held this camp as crucial element in his plans.
Susan tapped on her desk, thinking. GIANT’s information was always helpful in understanding what the hell was really going on inside the Central Committee. But this was not what she wanted to hear. Jinshan was in prison. He wasn’t supposed to be able to influence anyone there. Were things really so bad that President Wu was losing his political clout? This wasn’t something that her analysts had expected. Then again, neither was a Chinese false-flag operation that had conned twenty unwitting American defense experts into giving up national secrets. But that had happened…
She looked at her meeting schedule for the day. She had to sit in waiting during a Senate Intelligence Committee briefing while the deputy director for clandestine operations gave them an update on SILVERSMITH. Her role was to feed him information on any questions that he couldn’t answer.
The intelligence world was flipping out about their reduced satellite capabilities. Backup satellites were being launched, and patches were being installed to encrypted datalink networks. But it was a slow healing process — America could only launch so many satellites so fast. And many of the datalink networks were still considered security risks. The Chinese had crippled space-based reconnaissance and communications for months, if not years. Monday morning quarterbacking and cross-departmental finger-pointing were in full swing. And since SILVERSMITH was “the CIA’s special China program,” as one senator had put it, Susan was under a lot of pressure to fill in the intelligence collection gap.
Her desk phone was blinking. The special light. The director.
Double shit.
Since she had been put in charge of SILVERSMITH, the director had taken to calling on her at will for updates. That was understandable, given the gravity of the situation. But as a veteran of decades of fieldwork, Susan felt like a fish out of water here in headquarters. She hated the frequent in-person updates to leadership, the incessant worrying about political ramifications, and the chess matches between the massively egocentric career bureaucrats.
“Director Buckingham, how can I help you, sir?” she answered.
“Susan, you got a moment? Please come up.”
“Of course.”
It took Susan five minutes to reach the seventh floor.
The director had his jacket on and was standing behind his desk. “You read GIANT’s latest?”
“Yes, sir. I was just going over it now.”