Brink of Chaos Read online

  Gavi strode up beside him. “Good thing the Taedong River is as deep … deep enough for a mini-sub to get in and exit to the Yellow Sea”.

  “What about North Korean sonar?” Joshua asked, but the answer visualized in front of him. As the mini-submarine surfaced quietly, Joshua recognized the gilt of metallic plates — almost like fish-scales — lining its exterior.

  Gavi smiled at him. “You remember J-Tech 100, the anti-sonar, anti-wake program for submarines?”

  Joshua smiled back. “Of course. The wave-cloaking sub skin …”

  “Well your Pentagon was kind enough to lend us the prototype for this mission. It was designed jointly by a couple of defense companies, but the real genius behind it was a New York – based defense shop called Jordan Technologies … just one more nifty military design by your outfit, Colonel Jordan. Too bad the project was cancelled after the initial prototypes were built, like the one in front of you … on loan from the United States DOD.”

  Joshua nodded and gave a sly grin. “Let’s hope my guys did their homework on this one.”

  Gavi addressed the group as the streamlined mini-sub continued to surface and a hatch opened on top. “Listen up, these will be tight quarters. I hope none of you are claustrophobic. I’ll go in last and secure the hatch. No talking, no noise, the minute you enter the sub. I’ll be communicating with our captain through my digital memo pad. Remember, absolute silence.”

  As Joshua followed Louder onto the metal topside of the sub, he passed Rivka. She looked as if she had something to say. Joshua wondered whether she was still thinking about his last comment to her and whether she was feeling caught in a prison of her own, the kind without bars.

  After Gavi had watched everyone else disappear down the small round hatch, he slipped into the opening himself. No sooner had he pulled the heavy metal hatch over himself and spun the locking wheel than the slender sub submerged into the Taedong River and disappeared from sight, leaving no more of a wake behind than a fish might as it trolls under the surface.

  Seoul, South Korea

  Ethan March fixed his bleary eyes on the large, wall-sized screen in the headquarters of South Korea’s National Intelligence Service, the NIS, in Seoul. On it was an illuminated map of North Korea, with the Taedong River snaking through it and leading out to the sea.

  A U.S. Army major with a red-dragon arm patch on his shoulder was in the room with the rest of the rescue detail. He sauntered over to Ethan. “You’ve been up for forty hours, Ethan. Why don’t you crash in the next room?”

  Ethan shook his head. “No, thanks. I’m staying right here. I need to see that blip on the screen with my own eyes.”

  Major Chung joined them. “If they’ve managed to slip by the patrol boats and get through the waterway locks — that’s the tricky part — then they should have passed by Ori-Som Island by now,” and with that, he directed his laser pointer to a tiny misshapen circle in the Taedong River. Ethan caught something in Chung’s explanation. “What’s tricky about the locks?”

  “The mini-sub had to tag a ride directly behind one of the big commercial vessels to clear the locks to avoid detection. Otherwise, the security system at the locks will close the water gate, and they’d be trapped.”

  “Tell me again,” Ethan said, surveying the big screen, “where you think the blip for their mini-sub will first show up?”

  Chung sent his red laser pointer to a point on the map beyond where the mouth of the Taedong River flowed into the Yellow Sea, directly under another small island. “Right here,” Chung said. “Assuming everything goes well, they are supposed to leave the river estuary and enter the sea. As they pass by Sangchwira-do on their starboard side —” Chung pointed to another circle, this one in the open water — “the mini-sub captain will engage his Sat-locator, and we’ll pick him up on our screen. Then we can get our aircraft to escort them out of there.”

  Ethan nodded as he eyed the area on the map where that lighted blip needed to appear. He stretched his shoulders and rotated his neck a little, trying to loosen up the stress. He turned to the major. “I get the impression that the Pentagon couldn’t join this thing officially.”

  “Just like I’m not here now,” the major said with a smile, “officially.”

  “Man alive, I can’t figure that out,” Ethan muttered.

  “Politics and poker, Ethan. That’s what we’re dealing with. My unit — the 501st Military Intelligence Brigade — would have loved to have manned this rescue mission from top to bottom. A U.S. Air Force pilot captured by the North Koreans? We’re stationed right here along the DMZ. We would have been the perfect group to spearhead this — would have been proud to do it. But the madam in the big White House on Pennsylvania Avenue wouldn’t commit. That’s what I heard from some of the Army brass.”

  A grin broke over the major’s face. “On the other hand, we’re glad to have lent our South Korean friends our mini-sub, our satellite service, our Defense Intelligence Agency data, and our clandestine service contacts inside Pyongyang — and outside too.”

  Ethan laughed. “Oh, is that all?” Then he realized that the Pentagon was pitching in some double agents inside the North Korean capital and had possibly helped to enlist the two Israeli Mossad agents as well. Things grew somber again as Ethan and the major stared at the screen. They looked at the spot where they hoped to see the lighted blip.

  Just outside North Korea proper was a little circle, a tiny island in the field of blue on the illuminated map, and beyond the island, the open sea — and safety. Ethan looked at it, trying not to blink, but his eyes were heavy. He felt himself swaying where he stood. He caught himself. His eyes closed. Just for an instant. When he opened them, he blinked once. Then involuntarily closed them from fatigue. When he opened them again, he saw it. The blinking light. Right under the island of Sangchwira-do. In the open sea. And freedom.

  Ethan leaped up, swung his fist in the air, almost striking the major, and yelled out, “Josh, you did it, man! You did it!”

  EIGHT

  Washington, D.C., the White House

  Standing behind the podium with the seal of the United States of America on it in the press briefing room of the West Wing, President Jessica Tulrude was trying to put an end to the press conference, but one reporter’s question seemed to go on forever. “Going back to the reason for this press conference in the first place,” the reporter said, “and the successful rescue of Captain Louder in North Korea, there are reports the Pentagon backed this mission but that you vehemently opposed it …”

  “False rumors,” Tulrude snapped. “I will never rest as long as I know one of our brave members of the military are in an enemy prison camp.” Then, as she blinked a few times and nervously adjusted the collar on her suit jacket, she added, “I supported the rescue effort plain and simple.”

  “And as for Colonel Joshua Jordan, a highly decorated former Air Force pilot who is the subject of a criminal prosecution by your attorney general, is it correct that Colonel Jordan actually helped in this rescue effort?”

  “What media group are you with?” Tulrude shot back.

  “AmeriNews,” she said.

  The president snatched her prepared statement off the podium and smiled generously to the room full of press. She wasn’t going to take any questions from AmeriNews, that newly formed media group spearheaded by Joshua Jordan, which seemed to relish every chance they got to expose what was going on in her administration, challenging her policies of bringing the United States under the blanket of international treaties. She knew what was good for America. She understood how a global society, a world system of government, was the future. Reactionaries like Joshua Jordan, his Roundtable extremists, and their AmeriNews project were practically ice-age creatures. She would be happy to help speed them into extinction.

  “Thank you, all,” the president announced without answering the last question. As she turned to exit out the side door, a reporter in the third row shouted out, “Any update on the conditio
n of former president Corland?”

  Tulrude whirled around and tossed out the answer, halting momentarily. “Still convalescing and permanently disabled —” she clasped her hands over her chest as if officiating at a funeral — “but while he can no longer serve America, I am sure you will remember him and reflect on what he meant to our great nation and place him in your warmest thoughts.” She was about to turn toward the exit, but she stopped and added, “And your prayers, of course.”

  President Tulrude strode out the press room and walked down the private access corridor through the West Wing. Her chief of staff, Natali Traup, was waiting for her. “Well done, Madam President,” she said brightly, though she had to jog to keep up with Tulrude who had just blown past her.

  “Did you hear that?” Tulrude snapped.

  “I caught it all on the monitor —”

  “I want that AmeriNews reporter barred from all future White House press conferences. In fact, no one from AmeriNews is allowed within a hundred yards of me.” Then she slowed down to issue the next directive to Natali. “And make sure AmeriNews doesn’t get an invitation to the holiday media party …”

  “You mean the White House press Christmas party?”

  Tulrude shook her head at her COS’s miscue. “Holiday party, exactly as I said.” As she swaggered down the hall the president added, “This is an election year. I won’t stand by while those AmeriNews morons launch torpedoes at me.”

  United Nations Headquarters, New York City

  At the weekly policy meeting, two men sat in the secretary-general’s office. They were the only two in his inner circle that he trusted. These two high-ranking United Nations staffers sat patiently in the overstuffed chairs as they waited for Secretary-General Alexander Coliquin to finish reviewing his agenda notes in his velvet wing-backed chair.

  Bishop Dibold Kora, the balding special envoy on climate change and global wellness, had a placid smile on his face, hands folded gently in his lap.

  The other executive, Ho Zhu, the deputy secretary-general, who managed Coliquin’s administration, was customarily expressionless, but as the minutes ticked by he occasionally glanced over at the engraved black-walnut grandfather’s clock in the corner to check the time.

  Finally Coliquin looked up. “The Israeli situation,” he said, “where are we on that?”

  Ho Zhu said, “Our special reporter is broaching the subject with Israel. We thought it best to approach it as a human-rights issue, moving it up the ladder in Jerusalem.”

  “Meaning?”

  “We believe Prime Minister Sol Bensky already knows we want to talk. We’re waiting for a response.”

  “Waiting, you said?” Coliquin snapped. His rhetorical question was designed to show the self-evident stupidity of Ho Zhu’s point. Coliquin, the handsome Romanian polymath, had little patience with his underlings — brilliant though they were — when they failed to keep up with his genius, particularly when it concerned his obsession with Israel. Of course, he was able to see things that they missed, but at least they should understand his priorities.

  “I want no foot-dragging on this,” Coliquin said, waving his hand in circles. “Timing is everything. Can you see that? Israel is in a unique position. On one hand, emboldened by the natural disasters that blocked the Russian-Arab incursion, yes, of course. Attributing their rescue to an act of God — and so, they have been basking in the sun ever since, like an overfed lizard. But at the same time, the people of Israel, deep down, fear further conflict. I know this to be true. They wish to avoid that kind of heart-wrenching drama again. There is a dread among the people at the prospect of further war. So very tired of conflict. Year after year, having to defend their homeland, yearning for some kind of permanent solution, which is exactly what I have for them — if they will only negotiate.”

  Coliquin raised a finger just then, as if he were playing the part of a history professor giving a lecture. “Never underestimate the effectiveness of human fatigue … and national weariness. Remember Joseph Stalin’s speech to the Politburo in 1939, outlining how Russia could advance into Germany and take it over after the defeat of the Third Reich. Stalin was counting on, even hoping for, a long and protracted war — so that England and France and the other allies — in his words — would grow weary, thus allowing the Soviet Union to seize Germany for herself. And in part it worked. It would ultimately become East Germany.” He repeated, “Never discount the weariness of your opponent. It’s a major strategic advantage.”

  Abruptly changing the subject, Coliquin asked Ho Zhu, “And the political situation in the United States, where are we on that? President Tulrude has been a strong supporter of our vision. We need her.”

  Deputy Ho bobbed his head, as if calculating the odds. “Our American sources tell us that President Tulrude is the favorite right now. She has the benefit of being the incumbent.”

  Bishop Kora chimed in, “But not elected — constitutional succession from her position as vice president when President Corland became disabled”.

  “Yes,” Coliquin said, “that may reduce the benefit of her incumbency. Look what happened in a slightly different setting to Gerald Ford when Nixon was forced to resign.” The secretary-general wasn’t happy thinking about that. “How strong is her opponent?”

  “Senator Hewbright is running an extremely aggressive campaign. He’ll get his party’s nomination. The race will be close, by a very small margin.”

  Coliquin then asked a question that wasn’t really a question. It had all the resonance of a mandate.

  “Things could happen to change that margin?”

  NINE

  Arlington, Virginia, Pentagon

  The little communications-center TV set hanging over the desk of Lieutenant Deborah Jordan was set to C-SPAN. Deborah’s eyes were trained on the screen. President Tulrude had just hung the Medal of Honor around Captain Jimmy Louder’s neck. Next to Louder, his wife, Ginny, a petite brunette, was beaming and dabbing her eyes with a handkerchief. Louder’s head was held high, his back straight, and his face now fuller than it was since the first pictures on the web newspapers that broke the story of his rescue from North Korea.

  Deborah made a private bet with herself as she watched. She knew that Medal of Honor winners were usually permitted to say a few words. But not this time, she mused. And she knew why. There was no way Tulrude was going to give Jimmy Louder the chance to publicly acknowledge Deborah’s father’s role in the rescue.

  And she was right.

  After President Tulrude shook Captain Louder’s hand, she stepped back to the podium and talked about Captain Louder. “This humble, likeable guy, Captain Jimmy Louder, patrolled the dangerous DMZ to keep that region safe and was shot down by hostile forces. He exemplified the most extraordinary strength, resolve, and bravery during his captivity — some of the finest conduct America’s military has ever seen.”

  Tulrude motioned to Captain Louder and applauded him, wrangling the applause of the attendees in the Rose Garden like a maestro. Then she quickly escorted Jimmy Louder and his wife into a private White House reception, away from the reporters who were calling out questions.

  Deborah shook her head silently, then turned the volume down on the TV. She returned to her work. Her office was located right next to the Press Operations Center in the titanic, five-sided fortress of the Department of Defense. The location of her desk was an anomaly because she hadn’t been assigned to the press center. As it turned out, nothing, including her desk assignment, had matched her expectations since her graduation with honors from West Point.

  As she resumed her review of a raft of bids for the new DOD computer software installations, she noticed someone standing, cap in hand, by her desk. He was a young red-headed fellow, a second lieutenant like herself. There was something familiar about him. Then Deborah pieced it together. She had seen him linger at her cubicle before as he had passed by.

  Deborah gave him a glance.

  “Lieutenant Jordan,” the young
man began, “just wantin’ to congratulate you on your father’s successful mission in North Korea. The folks around here all know about it and salute your father … even if the politicians don’t … if you get my drift.”

  “Thanks, Lieutenant.” She tossed him a half smile and eyed him more closely.

  “And I’d say — hooah, Colonel Joshua Jordan, if I may.”

  Her smile got bigger. “Yes, you may.” She glanced at his name tag — Lt. Birdow. “Soldier, you have a first name?”

  “Ye s, ma’am.’ Tom.”

  “I’m Deborah.”

  “Pleased to meet you.”

  Birdow cocked an eyebrow at her. “If I may ask, are you with the DOD press center?”

  “No. People just think that because my desk is here.”

  “Then you’re in the Defense Information Systems Agency unit like me?”

  “Right. Except …”

  He filled it in, “You didn’t get assigned to Fort Mead in Maryland where the rest of us in DISA are stationed.”

  “Nope.” She didn’t elaborate.

  Tom Birdow looked like he was going to follow up but decided against it.

  Deborah was enjoying the company — and the break from the tedium. “So what brings you to HQ?”

  “Just dropped off some papers at the E Ring.”

  She wanted to ask him why he had just couriered something to the inner ring of the Pentagon where the senior Army officials had their offices, but she didn’t pry. She didn’t have to. He explained, “This information coordination between DOD and Homeland Security for BIDTagging citizens is one big complicated system.”

  Tom’s last comment hit a sour note with Deborah, for intensely personal reasons. “I bet,” she said, dropping her smile. Now she was thinking about her mother’s defiance of the new government mandate and the risks she was taking. Her voice took on a formal tone. “Well, Lieutenant,” she said, “back to business.”