What, then, had they spent all that money for? Take the long view? The long view was all well and good, so long as the immediate prospect was pleasant and uncluttered. Circumstances had permitted Japan the long view for nearly forty years. But today it no longer applied. On Wednesday, the Fourth, the day the Trade Reform Act cleared committee, the Nikkei Dow fell to 12,841 yen, roughly a third of what it had been in recent memory, and the panic in the country was quite real now.
" 'Plum blossoms bloom,
and pleasure-women buy new scarves
in a brothel room.' "
The words might have been poetic in Japanese—it was a famous haiku—but it didn't make a hell of a lot of sense in English, Clark thought. At least not to him, but the effect on the man in front of him was noteworthy. "Oleg Yurievich sends his greetings."
"It has been a long time," the man stammered after perhaps five seconds of well-concealed panic.
"Things have been difficult at home," Clark explained, a slight accent in his voice.
Isamu Kimura was a senior official in the Ministry for International Trade and Industry, MITI, the centerpiece of an enterprise once called "Japan, Inc." As such he often met with foreigners, especially foreign reporters, and so he had accepted the invitation of Ivan Sergeyevich Klerk, newly arrived in Japan from Moscow, complete with a photographer who was elsewhere shooting pictures.
"It would seem to be a difficult time for your country as well," Klerk added, wondering what sort of reaction it would get. He had to be a little tough with the guy. It was possible that he'd resist the idea of being reactivated after more than two years of no contacts. If so, KGB policy was to make it clear that once they had their hooks into you, those hooks never went away. It was also CIA policy, of course.
"It's a nightmare," Kimura said after a few seconds' reflection and a deep draft of the sake on the table.
"If you think the Americans are difficult, you should be a Russian. The country in which I grew up, which nurtured and trained me—is no more. Do you realize that I must actually support myself with my Interfax work? I can't even perform my duties on a full-time basis." Clark shook his head ruefully and emptied his own cup.
"Your English is excellent."
The "Russian" nodded politely, taking the remark as surrender on the part of the man across the table. "Thank you. I worked for years in New York, covering the U.N. for Pravda. Among other things," he added.
"Really?" Kimura asked."What do you know of American business and politics?"
"I specialized in commercial work. The new world's circumstances allow me to pursue it with even more vigor, and your services are highly valued by my country. We will be able to reward you even more in the future, my friend."
Kimura shook his head. "I have no time for that now. My office is in a very confused state, for obvious reasons."
"I understand. This meeting is in the manner of a get-acquainted session. We have no immediate demands."
"And how is Oleg?" the MITI official asked.
"He has a good life now, a very comfortable position because of the fine work you did for him." Which wasn't a lie at all. Lyalin—was alive, and that beat the hell out of a bullet to the head in the basement of KGB Headquarters. This man was the agent who'd given Lyalin the information which had placed them in Mexico. It seemed a shame to Clark that he couldn't thank the man personally for his part in averting a nuclear war. "So tell me, in my reporter identity: how bad is the situation with America? I have a story to file, you see." The answer would surprise him almost as much as the vehemence of its tone.
Isamu Kimura looked down. "It could bring ruin to us."
"Is it really that bad?" "Klerk" asked in surprise, taking out his pad to make notes like a good reporter.
"It will mean a trade war." It was all the man could do to speak that one sentence.
"Well, such a war will do harm to both countries, yes?" Clark had heard that one often enough that he actually believed it.
"We've been saying that for years, but it's a lie. It's really very simple," Kimura went on, assuming that this Russian needed an education in the capitalist facts of life, not knowing that he was an American who did. "We need their market to sell our manufactured goods. Do you know what a trade war means? It means that they stop buying our manufactured goods, and that they keep their money. That money will go into their own industries, which we have trained, after a fashion, to be more efficient. Those industries will grow and prosper by following our example, and in doing so they will regain market share in areas which we have dominated for twenty years. If we lose our market position, we may never get it all back."
"And why is that?" Clark asked, scribbling furiously and finding himself actually quite interested.
"When we entered the American market, the yen had only about a third of the value it has today. That enabled us to be highly competitive in our pricing. Then as we established a place within the American market, achieved brand-name recognition, and so forth, we were able to increase our prices while retaining our market share, even expanding it in many areas despite the increasing value of the yen. To accomplish the same thing today would be far more difficult."
Fabulous news, Clark thought behind a studiously passive face. "But will they be able to replace all the things you make for them?"
"Through their own workers? All of them? Probably not. But they don't have to. Last year automobiles and related products accounted for sixty-one percent of our trade with America. The Americans know how to make cars—what they did not know we have taught them," Kimura said, leaning forward. "In other areas, cameras for example, they are now made elsewhere, Singapore, Korea, Malaysia. The same is true of consumer electronics. Klerk-san, nobody really understands what is happening yet."
"The Americans can really do this much damage to you? Is it possible?" Damn, Clark thought, maybe it was.
"It is very possible. My country has not faced such a possibility since 1941." The statement was accidental, but Kimura noted the accuracy of it the instant it escaped his lips.
"I can't put that in a news story. It's too alarmist."
Kimura looked up. "That was not meant for a news story. I know your agency has contacts with the Americans. It has to. They are not listening to us now. Perhaps they will listen to you. They push us too far. The zaibatsu are truly desperate. It's happened too fast and gone too far. How would your country respond to such an attack on your economy?"
Clark leaned back, tilting his head and narrowing his eyes as a Russian would. The initial contact with Kimura wasn't supposed to have been a substantive intelligence-gathering session, but it had suddenly turned into one. Unprepared for this eventuality, he decided to run with it anyway. The man before him seemed like a prime source, and made more so by his desperation. Moreover, he seemed like a good and dedicated public servant, and if that was somewhat sad, it was also the way the intelligence business worked.
"They did do it to us, in the 1980's. Their arms buildup, their insane plan to put defense systems in space, the reckless brinksmanship game their President Reagan played—did you know that when I was working in New York, I was part of Project RYAN? We thought he planned to strike us. I spent a year looking for such plans." Colonel I. S. Klerk of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service was fully in his cover identity now, speaking as a Russian would, calmly, quietly, almost pedagogically. "But we looked in the wrong place—no, that wasn't it. It was right in front of us all the time and we failed to see it. They forced us to spend more, and they broke our economy in the process. Marshal Ogarkov gave his speech, demanding more of the economy in order to keep up with the Americans, but there was no more to give. To answer your question briefly, Isamu, we had the choice of surrender or war. War was too terrible to contemplate…and so, here I am in Japan, representing a new country."