“There’s cereal on the table.” David’s wife touched his arm, breaking his spell.
“Thanks.” He kissed her on the forehead, pulling her close and feeling the softness of her bathrobe. “You sleep at all last night?” The baby had been crying enough that Lindsay had ended up staying in the other bedroom.
“A little.”
David poured himself some cereal and milk. His wife had gone shopping at the commissary on base the day before. The shelves were sparse, but better stocked than the empty civilian grocery stores in town. And life on base was much better than the stories he’d heard about the emergency food distribution centers rationing bread and water around the nation’s worst-hit areas.
They were lucky that David’s job had put them on base housing at Eglin Air Force Base. A single-floor Florida-style home with two bedrooms and a quaint backyard. Running water and electricity were available upon arrival, which was more than much of the country could say right now.
David finished his breakfast, said goodbye to his wife, and walked a mile to his office building, arriving just after six a.m. He worked for an hour at his desk in the SILVERSMITH team’s new operations center before jet noise overhead told him that it was almost time for the morning brief. The fighter squadrons took off at the same time each morning, when the field opened.
Susan tapped on the top of his gray cubicle. “You coming?” A throng of team members walked by her on the way to the morning meeting, most carrying folders and cups of coffee.
“Yeah. One sec.” David grabbed his classified notebook. He had to check the notebook in and out of the document control office each day, but it helped if he could jot down important facts and figures at these meetings, all of which were classified.
David got up and walked with his boss.
“I saw in my inbox that we’re now connected to the Raven Rock data stream.”
“Yes. Most of the Pentagon leadership is working from there now.”
“ONI put out a request to our group on that channel. Something about a new class of Chinese warship?”
Susan glanced at him, impressed. “They must have sent a thousand requests over this morning, yet you always manage to pick out the most relevant bits. We’ll be working on that one. Our mission is evolving.”
“Yes, I imagine it would.”
“We’ll need to provide an evaluation on that Chinese ship. And there’s something else I’d like to bring you in on. A special project we’ve set up on the other side of the base.”
“Oh?”
“We’ll talk later.” She held the door for him, and they entered a classroom that was being shared with some of the F-35 training squadrons on the base. Now that David’s team was using the room, an NSA tech was doing a sweep for bugs every few hours. An Air Force Security Force sergeant checked IDs at the door. David held up his name tag, which the young man studied. The Air Force kid waved David through, and he took his seat.
General Schwartz and Susan sat up front. There were a lot of new faces around the room. With the China expertise on the team, SILVERSMITH was quickly becoming a premier resource for the brass. Whereas a few weeks ago, their job had been to prevent war, now SILVERSMITH was an analysis and idea factory. An information hub where top-level members of the intelligence community, military, and law enforcement shared what they knew and offered solutions up the chain of command.
The door shut, and everyone went silent.
The screen at the front of the room came on, showing a map of the US.
General Schwartz said, “Good morning, ladies and gents. Our INCONUS SOCOM task force is making solid progress. We now have over nine hundred Chinese INCONUS killed or captured, with an estimated five hundred remaining. Local law enforcement is sending tips to the regional military liaisons, which are forwarding their info to the SOCOM cell. Our hope is to destroy any remaining Chinese INCONUS units by the end of the week. Prisoners will be held in detention centers, where they will be interrogated.”
General Schwartz shot Susan a look that David didn’t understand. Did she have something to do with prisoner interrogations? It made sense that she would want to see any intelligence that was gleaned from Chinese prisoners.
A man sitting towards the front of the room raised his hand. “General, isn’t this ongoing Chinese INCONUS activity evidence that they aren’t abiding by the cease-fire agreement?”
“Obviously, yes. It is.”
“So… are we going to do anything about it? I mean, diplomatically speaking?”
General Schwartz said, “The State Department has raised objections through official channels on the continued presence and illegal activities of Chinese military units within the boundaries of the United States. The Chinese are denying the veracity of these claims. They say that they don’t have anyone here. The international community is in disagreement, and somewhat useless to us in this matter.”
Eye rolls and scoffs from around the room.
The man who asked the question said, “But if they’re violating the cease-fire—”
Susan spoke up. “Excuse me. We don’t want the cease-fire to end. The powers that be have decided that we’ve lost any realistic possibility of holding Korea or Japan, and negotiated a truce to remove our people from those nations. So, every day of this cease-fire is another day we can use to get Americans out of harm’s way.”
David knew she was right. Commercial aircraft and ships were packed with American servicemembers and their families leaving Japan and Korea.
Someone said, “Why would Cheng Jinshan agree to the cease-fire in the first place? I mean, if China is attacking the US…”
One of the CIA analysts said, “Two reasons. One, it allows him to get VIPs out of the US. Children of politicians and wealthy businessmen. That’s important for him to do because it helps him to keep the power brokers in China happy. Which helps keep him on the throne.”
“Why didn’t he just do that before the war?”
“It would have telegraphed his intentions.”
“What’s the other reason?”
David said, “Because he gets to keep Korea and Japan. He just moved the football forward, big-time.”
General Schwartz nodded. “Exactly.”
David said, “Sir, if I may? Cheng Jinshan’s ultimate goal isn’t just to take control of Asia, or even the Pacific. His ultimate goal includes taking control of the United States. This would eradicate his only real opposition to power around the globe. His ultimate goal is a world dominated by China.”
Someone said, “Russia know that?”
Susan narrowed her eyes. “What’s your point, David?”
“We all know that there’s a third reason for the cease-fire. Jinshan is using this lull in the fighting to his strategic advantage. He’s an extremely detail-oriented individual. There must be some reason he needs us to abide by these specific terms.”
General Schwartz said, “Well, Mr. Manning, that’s why we’re here. To identify enemy intentions and create ways to counter them.”
The general pointed at the young military officer manning the computer. The screen changed to a view of the Pacific. “The Chinese Southern Fleet, as it has been dubbed by our friends at the Office of Naval Intelligence, has traveled beyond the Luzon Strait and is now in the Philippine Sea. We have lost communications with two submarines in the vicinity of this fleet over the past few days. We believe they were sunk by assets from the Chinese Southern Fleet. There’s a high demand for ISR on this group. Right now, we have a rough idea of where they might be, but that circle of uncertainty is expanding.”
David thought of the message he had read on the possible new Chinese antisubmarine warfare capability. He thought about his family members out there right now. Without the US submarine advantage, the Chinese would be much more formidable opponents in a naval war.