Tom Clancy - The Bear and the Dragon

“Robert, have you seen-”

“Yes, we’ve all seen it,” the Vice President assured his father.

“And what are y’all going to do about it?”

“Pap, we haven’t figured that out yet. Remember that we have to do business with these people. The jobs of a lot of Americans depend on trade with China and-”

“Robert”-the Reverend Hosiah Jackson used Robby’s proper name mainly when he was feeling rather stern-“those people murdered a man of God-no, excuse me, they murdered two men of God, doing their duty, trying to save the life of an innocent child, and one does not do business with murderers.”

“I know that, and I don’t like it any more than you do, and, trust me, Jack Ryan doesn’t like it any more than you do, either. But when we make foreign policy for our country, we have to think things through, because if we screw it up, people can lose their lives.”

“Lives have already been lost, Robert,” Reverend Jackson pointed out.

“I know that. Look, Pap, I know more about this than you do, okay? I mean, we have ways of finding out stuff that doesn’t make it on CNN,” the Vice President told his father, with the latest SORGE report right in his hand. Part of him wished that he could show it to his father, because his father was easily smart enough to grasp the importance of the secret things that he and Ryan knew. But there was no way he could even approach discussing that sort of thing with anyone without a TS/SAR clearance, and that included his wife, just as it included Cathy Ryan. Hmm, Jackson thought-maybe that was something he should discuss with Jack. You had to be able to talk this stuff over with someone you trusted, just as a reality check on what was right and wrong. Their wives weren’t security risks, were they?

“Like what?” his father asked, only halfway expecting an answer.

“Like I can’t discuss some things with you, Pap, and you know that. I’m sorry. The rules apply to me just like they do to everybody else.”

“So, what are we going to do about this?”

“We’re going to let the Chinese know that we are pretty damned angry, and we expect them to clean their act up, and apologize, and-”

“Apologize!” Reverend Jackson shot back. “Robert, they murdered two people!”

“I know that, Pap, but we can’t send the FBI over to arrest their government for this, can we? We’re very powerful here, but we are not God, and as much as I’d like to hurl a thunderbolt at them, I can’t.”

“So, we’re going to do what?”

“We haven’t decided yet. I’ll let you know when we figure it out,” TOMCAT promised his father.

“Do that,” Hosiah said, hanging up far more abruptly than usual.

“Christ, Pap,” Robby breathed into the phone. Then he wondered how representative of the religious community his father was. The hardest thing to figure was public reaction. People reacted on a subintellectual level to what they saw on TV. If you showed some chief of state tossing a puppy dog out the window of his car, the ASPCA might demand a break in diplomatic relations, and enough people might agree to send a million telegrams or e-mails to the White House. Jackson remembered a case in California where the killing of a dog had caused more public outrage than the kidnap-murder of a little girl. But at least the bastard who’d killed the girl had been caught, tried, and sentenced to death, whereas the asshole who’d tossed the little dog into traffic had never been identified, despite the ton of reward money that had been raised. Well, it had all happened in the San Francisco area. Maybe that explained it. America wasn’t supposed to make policy on the basis of emotion, but America was a democracy, and therefore her elected officials had to pay attention to what the people thought-and it wasn’t easy, especially for rational folk, to predict the emotions of the public at large. Could the television image they’d just seen, theoretically upset international trade? Without a doubt, and that was a very big deal.

Jackson got up from his desk and walked to Arnie’s office. “Got a question,” he said, going in.

“Shoot,” the President’s Chief of Staff replied.

“How’s the public going to react to this mess in Beijing?”

“Not sure yet,” van Damm answered.

“How do we find out?”

“Usually you just wait and see. I’m not into this focus-group stuff. I prefer to gauge public opinion the regular way: newspaper editorials, letters to the editor, and the mail we get here. You’re worried about this?”

“Yep.” Robby nodded.

“Yeah, so am I. The Right-to-Lifers are going to be on this like a lion on a crippled gazelle, and so are the people who don’t like the PRC. Lots of them in Congress. If the Chinese think they’re going to get MFN this year, they’re on drugs. It’s a public relations nightmare for the PRC, but I don’t think they’re capable of understanding what they started. And I don’t see them apologizing to anybody.”

“Yeah, well, my father just tore me a new asshole over this one,” Vice President Jackson said. “If the rest of the clergy picks this one up, there’s going to be a firestorm. The Chinese have to apologize loud and fast if they want to cut their losses.”

Van Damm nodded agreement. “Yeah, but they won’t. They’re too damned proud.”

“Pride goeth before the fall,” TOMCAT observed.

“Only after you feel the pain from the broken assbone, Admiral,” van Damm corrected the Vice President.

Ryan entered the White House press room feeling tense. The usual cameras were there. CNN and Fox would probably be running this news conference live, and maybe C-SPAN as well. The other networks would just tape it, probably, for use in their news feeds to the local stations and their own flagship evening news shows. He came to the lectern and took a sip of water before staring into the faces of the assembled thirty or so reporters.

“Good morning,” Jack began, grasping the lectern tightly, as he tended to do when angry. He didn’t know that reporters knew about it, too, and could see it from where they sat.

“We all saw those horrible pictures on the television this morning, the deaths of Renato Cardinal DiMilo, the Papal Nuncio to the People’s Republic of China, and the Reverend Yu Fa An, who, we believe, was a native of the Republic of China and educated at Oral Roberts University in Oklahoma. First of all, the United States of America extends our condolences to the families of both men. Second, we call upon the government of the People’s Republic to launch an immediate and full investigation of this horrible tragedy, to determine who, if anyone, was at fault, and if someone was at fault, for such person or persons to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

“The death of a diplomat at the hands of an agent of a government is a gross violation of international treaty and convention. It is a quintessentially uncivilized act that must be set right as quickly and definitively as possible. Peaceful relations between nations cannot exist without diplomacy, and diplomacy cannot be carried out except through men and women whose personal safety is sacrosanct. That has been the case for literally thousands of years. Even in time of war, the lives of diplomats have always been protected by all sides for this very reason. We require that the government of the PRC explain this tragic event and take proper action to see to it that nothing of this sort will ever happen again. That concludes my statement. Questions?” Ryan looked up, trying not to brace too obviously for the storm that was about to break.

“Mr. President,” the Associated Press said, “the two clergymen who died were there to prevent an abortion. Does that affect your reaction to this incident?”