Third World War (57 page)

'Taiwan?'

'Status quo. Nothing changes unless they change it,' said Fan. 'If they want us out of Cuba, we want them out of Taiwan.'

'Park Ho? If he is alive, the Americans will want him. The Japanese will want him.'

'He will not be alive,' said Chen.

'Memed? I understand Ahmed Memed has sought sanctuary here?'

'He stays here,' said Chen.

'If they connect him with the suicide bomb in Times Square?'

'He stays.'

The Chinese were skilful at pretending they did not have issues, and until that moment the three men could have been talking as if there was no substantive conflict between them. But now Chen was staring straight at Song, arms folded, unrelenting.

Fan waited for the new atmosphere to settle and then delivered the argument to support Chen's statement. 'If we give Memed sanctuary,' he said smoothly, 'he will deliver the loyalty of Iran and Saudi Arabia. He has influence in Central Asia and he can bring calm to Xinjiang.'

Song wondered if there were more issues that would now arise. But the other two fell into silence. They knew that only Song could deliver their message to Washington and argue on the television networks. And Song had now decided that however much ground he had lost, he would remain as president of China and lead the nation come what may. When his power was restored, he would move to eradicate those who disagreed with him.

'All right,' he said slowly. 'I anticipate the outstanding issues with the US will be Cuba and Memed. I cannot see them compromising on Cuba. On Memed, perhaps.'

'We stay in Cuba,' said Chen.

'Do we complete the missile shipment?' said Song, using the same bluntness. Perhaps here there was room for negotiation. Missile shipments stopped. US inspection of facilities. Warheads separated.

Chen closed his eyes and shifted in his seat. Song thought he had found a point of flexibility, but then Chen pushed back his chair and stood up. 'The Americans have smallpox. They have no strength left.'

Yan deftly had his coat ready and held it for Chen as he put his arms through the sleeves. Yan opened the door and called the lift. The owner of the building appeared, holding the lift while Chen stepped inside, then joined him for the journey down. Yan returned to the room, resuming his position as the silent adviser.

Fan was on his feet, too, dropping his pack of cigarettes into the top pocket of his shirt. 'You have a right to be angry,' he said with an edge of sympathy in his voice. 'You have lost your son. I am sorry. A father and a son have a sacred bond. You are a brave man to have called this meeting in your grief.'

Fan could have left the room then. But he was a more decent man than Chen. He had seen his own father killed in the Cultural Revolution and he understood that mob killing on the street was different from the slaughter of men on the battlefield.

'I do not agree with Chen's methods,' continued Fan. It was an unexpected admission. 'Whether he designed it like this, I do not know. The events that have brought us here are military. Yet we are men of politics and diplomacy. I do not like our allegiance to Park Ho. I do not approve of biological warfare. But I did approve of Memed's coming here because of his influence in the Islamic world. And I do agree with Chen's analysis. If we keep our nerve we will emerge from this stronger. Chen is right. It is not a time for compromise.'

'Thank you,' said Song. The reality he faced was ungraspable and he handled it by answering quickly and quietly. 'I will negotiate with Washington along the guidelines we have discussed.'

He took time underscoring the points he had noted down, while Fan put on his coat. Yan showed him out and pressed the lift button. Song got up and stood by the window, seeing his reflection in the glass, superimposed on a glimmer of dawn light in the sky. The owner of the building was not there. He watched Fan get into the lift. Yan shifted his weight. For a moment, Song thought that Yan would leave as well. But the lift doors closed, and Yan came back into the room, poured himself a coffee and sat down.

'I need to speak to Andrei Kozlov,' said Song.

'I'll arrange it.' said Yan. 'One hour from now?'

Song nodded. Yan pulled a phone from his pocket, but as he was about to dial a number, he noticed a warning light flashing and the phone vibrating.

'Yes,' he said sharply, glancing down to get a pencil and paper, then not bothering. 'We're on our way,' he said, ending the call and turning towards Song. 'That was Chen,' he said. 'North Korea has launched four Taepodong-2 missiles at the United States.'

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69*

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Washington, DC, USA*

'Confirmed, sir,' said Pierce, his voice barely a whisper but the sound carrying to everyone in the room.

'Warheads?'

'No way of telling.'

'Trajectory?'

'Not certain at present. The western seaboard,' said Pierce. 'Way beyond Hawaii.'

Jim West sat transfixed, staring at the screen in the White House situation room. His silence, lasting only a few seconds, was fathomless. Kozerski, Pierce, Newman, Campbell, Patton and others stood in a circle, but several feet behind him, giving him space to think. The screen flickered and picked up images of the missiles. It was unable to agree on data between radar and satellites, so the picture, jumping and blurred, was unsettled.

'Strike back,' ordered West.

'Launch,' said Pierce, shifting away, and issuing his instructions in a low voice. 'Malmstrom - five Minuteman 111s - yes. Toksong-gun, Dukchun, Kanggye, Mangyongdae and Kanggamchan.'

The screen divided. The pictures tracking the missiles remained unsteady. The cameras on the silos at Malmstrom Air Force Base, Montana, relayed images in clear colour.

'One hundred and five seconds,' said Pierce. 'Moving out of the boost phase.' He turned to West. 'We will not be attempting a boost-phase intercept. We have nothing in the area.'

To hit a missile in the boost phase, the interceptor missile needed to be within 150 miles of the launch site. Toksong-gun, embedded deep in a mountain range, was sixty miles from the nearest coastline, and no American-equipped warship was close.

The launch site was also only fifty miles from the Chinese border.

After the boost phase, the missile would take twenty-five minutes to reach its target. Satellite data from tracking the trajectories of the missiles was being deciphered and coordinated with information from long-range radars working out of the United States, Greenland and the United Kingdom. Computers were calculating the best early point to take out the missiles. If the first attempt failed, a second wave of missiles would be launched as a back-up.

The missile-defence technology had been debated and tested for more than three decades. It was still embryonic and it had never been used for real. The four missiles, travelling as if in a convoy, changed colour as they broke out of the earth's atmosphere. From silos in Alaska, sixteen interceptor missiles were launched against them.

'Decoys?' said West.

'We don't think there are any,' replied Pierce. 'They've thrown everything they've got at us.'

'Evacuations?'

'Rescue and health personnel are on standby,' said Patton. 'But they don't know what for.'

'Good,' said West. 'To evacuate would be to surrender.'

His attention turned back to the other screen, where a flare of light wrapped in smoke pouring from the ground indicated that the first Minuteman 111 was being launched. For a second it seemed to falter, hanging in the air, the flames lighting up the bleak, brown landscape around it. Then it picked up, becoming a speck trailed by a graceful arc of smoke. Three more Minuteman 111s launched, one after the other, their outer shells almost fifty years old but their software, engineering, guidance and fuel systems constantly updated and modernized. Never before had they been used to strike an enemy country.

'Thirty-three minutes,' said Pierce. 'These are single-vehicle with 5-kiloton warheads. Low yield, and only military targets.'

'Low yield,' repeated West, wondering if he was being too cautious again. Caution and compromise had brought things to where they were now. Each time, he had thought there was a way through, but each time his delay had escalated the risk.

'Tell the Chinese,' said West. He turned in his chair. 'Chris, straight through to their command and control. And the Russians.'

'Sir,' said Patton.

'Yes, Tom?'

'Six simultaneous suicide bombings.'

'Oh shit.'

'Baltimore. San Francisco. Denver. Elizabethtown, that's in Pennsylvania, Southampton on Long Island. Dallas . . . hold on.' West watched the missiles from Alaska reposition themselves towards the Taepodong-2s. 'This from Downing Street, sir. They have bombings in Piccadilly Circus, London, and Birmingham.'

'Smallpox?' asked West, as if a suicide bombing without the variola major virus would be fine - just an everyday event.

'Don't know yet - ' he listened to the incoming call. 'OK. Stand by. Mr President, we have an ID on the Times Square bomber. His working name is Hassan Muda. He escaped the Philippines with Ahmed Memed . . . OK, go on. Give me all of it,' said Patton. 'Get those pictures over here soonest. Yes. And Muda. Yes. Incontrovertible . . . Yes. No. It has to be something we can release to every government, every network, every . . . you got it. Good.'

Patton kept the line open, but concealed his voice from the caller. 'Ahmed Memed is in Beijing. He is under the protection of the Chairman of the Military Commission, Chen Jianxiong. He is inside Zhongnanhai. Muda is also the prime suspect in the mortar attacks on Mehta's house.'

'As soon as we've hit North Korea, I need to speak to Kozlov,' said West. 'What are the casualties, Tom?'

'Still coming in. Dallas, at least thirty dead. San Fransico, forty. Elizabethtown, three. Should know more in a couple of minutes.'

West's gaze fixated back on the screen, where the four North Korean missiles and the sixteen American ones were getting closer to each other.

'Kill vehicles primed,' said Pierce.

The image showed the small front end of the interceptor missiles breaking away from the rockets to seek out their targets. They would fly independently, guided by their own avionics, constantly updated by radar and satellite computer data. Their task was to identify the enemy warheads and destroy them.

'Three failures,' said Pierce. His tone was level, as if he did not expect the defence system to work perfectly. Three kill vehicles had failed to separate. The technology was still brand new, and at extreme temperatures, flying at five miles per second, this was one of the most common test problems.

'Thirteen left,' muttered West.

'What the--?' exclaimed Pierce, as four interceptor missiles veered off, away from the targets. He glanced down at West, but the President was absorbed in the screen. There was nothing he could do now. 'Back-up launched,' said Pierce.

'Strike one,' said Kozerski from the back of the room. The closest person to him was Lazaro Campbell and he slapped him on the back, looking round to see who else was joining in the brief celebration. Newman smiled. West didn't move. Patton, while missiles were heading towards American soil, was only interested in suicide bombings. 'Variola major detected in Elizabethtown,' he said. Kozerski and Campbell listened as if a knife had sliced through their euphoria.

Another interceptor knocked out a Taepodong-2. 'Strike two,' whispered Kozerski.

'Caroline . . . Tom Patton . . . Elizabethtown . . . Yes . . . Can you get there? Good. Let me know soonest. We'll alert the Harrisburg hospital, and we should assume it's in the other target areas.'

On the screen, two Taepodong-2 missiles remained in flight. 'A couple of minutes should give us a clear,' said Pierce.

'Any more launches?' said West.

'Negative, sir,' said Pierce. 'Third stage.' The main missile sections fell away, leaving the smaller third-stage solid-fuel rockets and the warheads moments away from re-entry into the earth's atmosphere. 'It's going to be close,' said the Defense Secretary.

'Oh my God,' said Kozerski.

All but two of the interceptor missiles veered off towards the now defunct second stage of the Taipodong-2s. Each of the four back-up missiles followed, taking a trajectory that would let them gain ground not on the incoming enemy missiles but on the interceptors.

'What's going on?' asked West.