Kompromat

CHAPTER NINE

Consisting of seven men, the Standing Committee of the Politburo of China’s Communist Party is effectively China’s ruling body. As usual, the committee met that May morning in Beijing’s Zhongnanhai district, the exclusive area next to the Imperial City, which houses not only the president’s office and other organs of state, but which also provides residential quarters for China’s most senior politicians and officials.

There was a time when Zhongnanhai had been open to the public, but since the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 security had been greatly increased. Access had been closed to the general public, with numerous plain-clothes military personnel patrolling the area on foot.

If the Standing Committee of the Politburo was a closed grouping in the most literal sense, it was also closed metaphorically. For the most part its members had spent their lives in the service of the party, often in far-flung provinces. The grandest of all were those who had links by blood or by marriage with the Party’s now almost mythic heroes, men whose fathers or grandfathers had been on the Long March with Chairman Mao.

President Liu Wang-Ji called the meeting to order.

‘Comrades,’ he began, ‘I thought I would start today’s proceedings by reporting on my recent trip to St Petersburg.’

For the next twenty minutes he recounted some of the details of his encounter with other world leaders at the World Tiger Summit, organized and presided over by Russia’s president Igor Popov. His assessments were frank and pithy.

‘I was intrigued – and I must confess rather alarmed – by the German chancellor, Helga Brun, and her apparent closeness to President Popov. Of course, she speaks Russian fluently and he speaks German. That helps. I am told that our security services are in the process of making a full assessment of historic and other links between President Popov and Chancellor Brun.’

He nodded across the table in the direction of Zhang Fu-Sheng.

‘Is that not so, Comrade Zhang?’

‘Yes, that is so, Mr President,’ Zhang Fu-Sheng agreed.

In the official handout entitled ‘Composition of the Standing Committee’, Zhang’s functions were simply listed as Deputy Leader of the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms, but within the standing committee itself and the upper echelons of government it was well known that Zhang was responsible for Ministry of State Security. As one of the most powerful and most active Chinese intelligence agencies, the MSS’s main objective was to keep track and neutralize ‘enemies’ of the Communist Party of China.

‘Our sources in Berlin,’ Zhang continued, ‘indicate that Chancellor Brun appears to be distancing herself from some of the previous policies of the EU regarding Ukraine and NATO and so on. Apparently she may soon be pushing the EU and the US to drop the sanctions over Crimea.’

President Liu Wang-Ji took a sip of the sweet green tea served at all meetings of the Standing Committee. Gaily decorated thermoses were conveniently placed on the table for those who wanted a top-up.

‘Most interesting,’ he said. ‘Your mention of the United States, Comrade Zhang, reminds me to report also on Ronald Craig, presently one of the leading Republican candidates for the Presidency.’

In the old days, before the Chinese government banned spitting in public places, there would have been strategically placed spittoons in the Standing Committee’s meeting room. Veterans could launch a glob of spit with unerring accuracy over a distance of twenty paces. But spittoons had gone from modern China, much as the practice of binding women’s feet had gone.

So instead of spitting, Liu limited himself to an expression of mild disgust.

‘Pah! I only spoke briefly with Mr Craig but I was alarmed when he told me that he did not necessarily support the One China policy and might even visit Taiwan!’

There was an explosion of dissent around the table. Comrades present made it clear that they had never heard a more disgusting idea in all their lives. Taiwan was part of China and always would be. The day was coming when the lost sheep would return to the fold and the United States would just have to lump it.

Wang Tao-Yu, China’s premier and the Politburo’s Number Two member in terms of seniority, chipped in:

‘If Ronald Craig becomes the official US presidential candidate, and if he wins the election, I fear we are going to have trouble in the South China Sea.’

Of course they all knew what he was talking about. China had recently been boosting its foothold in the Spratly Islands, a disputed scattering of reefs and islands in the South China Sea more than 500 miles from the Chinese mainland. They had been moving sediment from the seabed to create artificial reefs. So far they had constructed port facilities, military buildings and an airstrip on the islands. Recent imagery showed evidence of two more airstrips under construction. Unfortunately, the Japanese had long regarded the Spratly Islands as their sovereign territory. Up till now, the US had looked the other way. With a new president in the White House, things could change and the US might decide to come down firmly on Japan’s side, making a confrontation virtually inevitable.

The discussion continued. More tea was drunk. After a while, President Liu summed up the feeling of the meeting:

‘We all seem to agree, comrades, that a major geopolitical shift could be in the offing. New alliances seem to be in prospect. And there may be new adversaries too. I say let’s stick to the old Chinese proverb, “new friends good, old friends better”. United Europe has been good for China. Don’t let it go down the drain!’

Once again, President Liu looked across the table to Zhang.

‘Comrade Zhang, please note our conclusions on this point. If President Popov’s objective – heaven forbid – is to achieve the break-up of Europe with or without the assistance of the United States, our objective must be to save it. It will not be the first time that China has found itself on the opposite side of the table from Russia, and it will not be the last. I am glad to know that you and your people are already taking steps to avoid any unfortunate outcomes. Please double and redouble your efforts.’

Rounds of applause were very seldom heard in the standing committee of the Politburo. That was not the way they did things usually. But the applause which greeted President Liu’s last remark was long and heartfelt. The China–US relationship, ever since Kissinger and Nixon first came to China back in the early 1970s, had been crucially important. But that relationship might be about to change. In that case, the China–EU relationship, which was almost equally important, might need to be seen in a whole new perspective. Not merely an optional extra, but a vital element in the new world order. Provided of course that the EU itself didn’t go down the drain. And that surely couldn’t be allowed to happen.

President Liu had one last point to cover before bringing the meeting to a close.

‘Comrade Zhang, please tell us your conclusions in the matter of the Amur tiger.’

Zhang shuffled the papers in front of him. ‘The hour is late, comrades, and you have the detailed report from the director of forestry and wildlife of Heilongjiang Province in front of you. We are quite clear that the tiger, which has recently crossed over from Russia into China and whose movements we are following closely, is indeed the tiger which President Popov claims to have darted. But it was not in fact darted by President Popov. It was already darted, back in 2014, and has been in the database since then.’

‘Comrade Zhang, please come to the point.’ President Liu couldn’t stand people who beat about the bush. ‘If Popov didn’t shoot the tiger, who or what did he shoot?’

‘Mr President. Khabarovsk, as you know, is literally on the China–Russia border. We have many intelligence assets there as you can imagine. Our Russian friends are constantly complaining about illegal migrants from China arriving in their frontier regions. Some of those migrants, I can confirm, work as orderlies and nurses in Khabarovsk General Hospital. We know from our sources that the American Ronald Craig was taken to the hospital on the afternoon of May10th. Apparently he had a wound which needed treatment.’

‘What kind of a wound?’

‘Nothing important, as we understand. But it needed looking at.’

‘What exactly needed looking at?’ President Liu Wang-Ji persisted.

‘The wound was in Mr Craig’s backside, I believe. The left buttock to be precise, according to the information we have.’

‘Oh dear!’ There was a pause and then President Liu wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes. He was as ready to enjoy a joke as the next man. The trouble was, being the leader of a nation of almost one and a half billion people was a pretty serious business. Good jokes didn’t come along very often.

‘You’re not telling me that the president of the Russian Federation shot the possibly next president of the United States in the backside with an anaesthetizing dart!’

Zhang was miffed. ‘Yes, Mr President. That is indeed what we believe.’

‘But why would he do that?’

‘That is precisely what we are trying to find out.’

By then, President Liu had regained his composure. ‘Please keep us posted, Comrade Zhang.’

And with that he brought the meeting to a close.

Later that day, back in his office at the ministry of state security near the Old Summer Palace in Beijing, Zhang Fu-Sheng summoned his senior staff.

He addressed them in sombre tones. He knew quite well from President Liu’s not so subtle warning that his job was on the line.

‘We need to know several things,’ he began, ‘and we need to know them now.’

He ticked off the key intelligence requirements, as he saw them, one by one. ‘We know from our sources in Moscow and elsewhere that President Popov is determined to achieve, or at least hasten, the break-up of the European Union. We know that he has been following closely the progress of the Referendum campaign in Britain, which still has a few weeks to run, and is determined that the UK should vote to Leave, not to Remain. I can assure you, comrades, that such an eventuality is not, repeat not, in China’s interests.

‘So what do we do? I am going to invite Comrade Deng Biao-Su, head of our intelligence and analysis bureau, to give us the benefit of his thinking.’

‘Thank you, Comrade Zhang.’ Deng Biao-Su stood up. ‘To take the first point: what is Popov aiming at? In a nutshell, we believe, as Comrade Zhang suggests, that Popov sees the current Referendum campaign in Britain as an unparalleled – and indeed unexpected – opportunity to achieve an almost seismic change in the world’s geopolitical arrangements. Indeed, one could argue that not since Genghis Khan led his hordes from Asia into Central Europe in the twelfth century has such an opportunity presented itself. Our sources in the Kremlin have cited numerous instances of President Popov talking about the “new domino theory”, whereby a vote for Brexit in Britain sets off a chain reaction. One event encourages, indeed precipitates, the next.

‘A Brexit vote in Britain will be a devastating blow to the European Union, since Britain is such a major player there, and – incidentally – the second largest contributor to the EU budget after Germany. It will also help to ensure Ronald Craig’s victory in the forthcoming American presidential election. And both events, taken together, will kick-start a great wave of popularism in Europe – first in France, then, in Italy, then the Netherlands and – who knows – maybe in Germany itself, that bed-rock of the European Union where, as I understand it, the strength of the parties opposed to Chancellor Helga Brun is growing day by day. That wave of popularism is based on the idea that the people themselves will and must “take back control”. We will see a resurgence of the “Europe of the nations”, not the United Europe that the founding fathers like Monnet and Schuman aimed at.’

‘And how, specifically, is President Popov seeking to achieve the result he hopes for?’ Zhang asked. ‘In the first instance, for example, how will he, or can he, help the Leave side to win in the current Referendum campaign? My information is that the Leave side is at the moment far behind in the opinion polls. The UK prime minister, Jeremy Hartley, is deploying all the resources at the government’s command to try to ensure that the Remain side wins. How can Popov tip the balance in the other direction?’

Deng thought long and hard before answering that question.

‘We believe that Popov has an agent at the highest level in British government circles. It could be none other than the charismatic Edward Barnard, former Secretary of State for the Environment. Precisely when any such recruitment took place we don’t know for sure. We suspect it would have occurred very recently, when Barnard was in St Petersburg for the World Tiger Summit. Indeed, I believe Mr Barnard, and our own beloved leader, President Liu Wang-Ji, exchanged some brief words on that occasion.

‘We also don’t know for sure precisely what instructions and support Barnard would have received but we can be absolutely sure that he will not be playing the game with an empty hand. I need not stress that from China’s point of view the collapse of the European Union, kick-started by Britain leaving the EU, will be very damaging indeed. It will certainly dramatically strengthen Russia’s influence in the world. Huge swathes of Central Asia and Eastern Europe could come under Russian domination.’

‘And would the United States sit idly by while that happened?’ President Zhang asked.

‘Our assessment at this point in time is that the United States will not be much concerned by the break-up of the European Union. They gave lip-service to the idea of a United Europe, but deep down they were never keen on seeing Europe as a rival power-centre in the world. And if Ronald Craig becomes president we might easily see some kind of de facto alliance between Russia and the United States. You scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours. And none of this would be good for China.’ Deng paused. ‘Perhaps I could call on Comrade Li Xiao-Tong at this point, as the head of the counter-intelligence bureau.’

‘Of course, go ahead, Comrade Li.’

‘Thank you, Chairman.’ Li Xiao-Tong, an athletic-looking young man with black horn-rimmed spectacles, took up the tale:

‘We have decided, comrades, that in this case, as so often, attack is the best form of defence. The Russians appear to have recruited an important asset in their efforts to help the Leave campaign win a victory in the forthcoming UK Referendum. We are going to “turn” that asset and use it to our advantage, so as to ensure that the Remain side win the vote, and the threat to the future of the EU is thereby diminished if not entirely removed.’

There was a sharp intake of breath around the table. ‘Turning a major asset’, in other words, picking up the enemy’s agent and making him or her serve your purposes rather than those of the other side, had always been one of the big challenges in the field of espionage and counter-espionage. Thrillers had been written on the topic by men like John Le Carré, Frederick Forsyth and Robert Harris, and these were authors who knew their onions.

‘And how are you going to “turn” Mr Edward Barnard?’ Zhang intervened. ‘As I understand it, the gentleman’s not for turning. He’s a family man. Loves horses and dogs. Went to a good school. On to Oxford. That kind of thing.’

‘Don’t worry, comrade. We’ll find a way. You just have to pick the right spot to pierce the armour. Even your classic English gentleman has his weak spot if you know where to look.’

Li Xiao-Tong looked around the room. Colleagues from all twelve bureaux of the MSS were present that day. He had known many of them during that first period of training, at the agency’s own university: The Institute of International Relations, in Beijing. And then they had met up again learning ‘tradecraft’ at the Institute of Cadre Management in Suzhou, not far from Shanghai.

‘As a matter of fact, comrades,’ Li’s smile turned into a leer. ‘We think we’ve already found a way.’