Red Phoenix Burning

Chapter 7 — Maelstrom

The opening logo was the same one the network had used since the beginning of the crisis, a map of the Korean Peninsula with the part above the thirty-eighth parallel in jagged pieces, as if it was shattered glass. They’d modified it earlier that day, though, with the word “Liquidated” angled across the northern part in bright red letters.

The logo shrank and appeared to fall back, landing on the video wall behind CNN’s leading military correspondent, Catherine Donner, sitting at a long desk. The video wall showed a constantly moving mosaic of military hardware in action, buildings on fire, carefully edited sections of the now infamous death scene, and shots of cheering crowds surrounding a tall blonde reporter.

Ms. Donner was neither tall nor blonde. Her mid-length hair was more gray than brown, and a weathered face seemed to exist only to frame her trademark green eyes.

“Welcome to this special extended edition of the War Room. I’m Cat Donner and I’m here with our panel of political experts, and we’re pleased to be joined this hour by Dr. Mark Ulrich from the Nuclear Weapons Disarmament Council. He’s going to tell us about what we know, or more properly, what we don’t know, about the status of North Korea’s nuclear stockpile.

“Before we do that, we’re coming up to the six o’clock hour here on the US East Coast, but Korea is thirteen hours ahead of us. Most of us were drinking our morning coffee when we heard about Kim Jong-un’s very public death — no, assassination — by nerve gas, just as that country began its first night dealing with the incontrovertible proof of their absolute dictator’s demise. Now, it’s seven in the morning, a little after daybreak in Pyongyang.” She turned to a bearded man in his forties sitting with her at the desk.

“Dr. Russel Hayes is from the Brookings Institution, and the author of several books on North Korea. His latest is Criminal Kingdom, which was published last year. Doctor, virtually everybody on the planet that has access to the Internet has seen the images. It’s the first video on YouTube to get over a billion views. It’s not pleasant to watch, but is there anything in that clip that you feel has been missed, or that people should be noticing?”

Hayes had obviously been prepared for the question, because he answered immediately, “Almost as important as Kim’s death was the death of the others in the room, representing the upper two or three tiers of his regime — his reconstituted regime, I might add, since many of the original members were killed either in the explosion on the fifteenth, or in the violence since then.”

“Is the Kim regime wiped out, then?” Donner asked.

“No, although they are obviously weakened. Even with the coup attempt on the fifteenth, Kim’s faction had the advantage, because they were already in control. The next strongest group, the General Staff, had more raw power, but their lines of communication were broken at the top.”

Donner prompted, “And the Korean Workers’ Party was the third faction?”

Hayes nodded and answered, “They were actually the most numerous, with the most potential power. Everybody from a government economist to the street sweepers had to be a member of the party, and while technically loyal to Kim, the party organization has always been a law unto itself. Kim may have the steering wheel, but the party was everything else, from the economic engine to the infrastructure wheels to the workers in the gas tank. All three groups of course are corrupt, and are riddled with informers allied with the other two factions.

“When Kim reappeared, alive, many of the ringleaders of the other factions, who of necessity had been forced to reveal themselves, were arrested and shot. According to the refugees my contacts have interviewed, the arrests easily number in the thousands, while the executions before yesterday were in the high hundreds, all of leaders or important members of each faction.”

“And now Kim’s faction is leaderless as well,” Donner concluded.

“Which means it’s a mad scramble, with every man for himself. The diehards will remain, but anybody who can will try to get out or go to ground until the South Koreans get to them.” Hayes shrugged. “There are a lot of party officials that are watching the advance of the ROK Army the way the German civilians waited for the US and Britain in World War II.”

“And do the Chinese take on the role of the Russians this time?” she asked.

“No, the analogy doesn’t hold,” Hayes responded. “Beijing is very worried, and I wish I had a nickel for every Chinese press release reminding us that North Korea is a ‘sovereign nation.’ But as long as the US doesn’t go north of the thirty-eighth parallel, China can’t justify her own intervention.

“The challenge for the South Koreans will be to move quickly, before the giant that is China decides what it wants to do. If the PRC is presented with a fait accompli, it may simply accept Korean unification as a done deal. Because if China intervenes, then the US has to back up its ally, and unifying the two Koreas will no longer be the goal.”

“What takes its place?” Donner asked.

“Avoiding a nuclear war,” Hayes answered flatly.

Cho Ho-jin ducked into the angle formed by a collapsed wall and checked the GPS on his phone. The city had been so badly torn up by the fighting that many landmarks were gone, converted into rubble that covered the streets. Choking smoke from dozens of fires had mixed with the August heat and humidity to form a permanent cloud. Visibility in places was down to a hundred meters, sometimes less.

The phone was his lifeline. He reported by voice now, no coded messages. That took too long. The signal was heavily encrypted, and he doubted that the North Korean security services, even if there were anyone watching for unauthorized cell phone use, would try to track him down in the middle of a battlefield.

Every building bore the marks of combat, and Pyongyang could join Beirut, Karbala, and Sarajevo in popular memory as urban battlefields.

Since arriving at noon yesterday, he’d identified some of the army units fighting in the city, with troops from all three sides vying for the possession of the capital. He intended to pass that information on as soon as he found a more secure place to spend the night. Roving patrols made it dangerous to use his phone in daylight, as he had to have an unobstructed view of the satellite — a little hard to do when one was scurrying from one wrecked building to another.

His last report of two days ago was one of his more revealing observations. The Ministry of State Security’s troops had allied themselves with the Korean Workers’ Party faction. Although rated as a paramilitary force, he’d seen them with heavy weapons and armored fighting vehicles. His last order was to “identify the Kim and KWP factions’ leaders,” as if he was a journalist who could ask for an interview.

The key would be to find the respective headquarters for each faction, then surreptitiously take photographs of anyone who looked to be in charge. It was impossible, of course. His handlers either had a poor grasp of the situation in the North Korean capital, or had been watching too many movies.

He’d been on the move all night, watching tracers arcing over different parts of the city. The night offered some concealment for somebody moving with purpose in a place where everyone who moved was an enemy.

His last meal had been rations looted from the backpack of a dead soldier. He’d wolfed them down while he watched a rocket barrage that fell like a river of fire. It landed somewhere to the west. Cho had no idea of the identity of the firer or the target. The canteen on the corpse’s belt was only half full, and Cho was saving the last few swallows against dire need.

The Potong River lay a few blocks to the east. He’d considered heading there to refill his canteen, but the Potong and other rivers that ran through the city had become boundaries and defensive lines. Instinctively, he avoided the open ground near the water’s edge. Even at night, there was too great a risk of a sniper with a night vision scope.

Many of Pyongyang’s two dozen bridges were down, either collateral damage or dropped deliberately. The party faction held this side of the river, and a respectable swath of the city, but Kim’s faction occupied several key buildings to the north, and in spite of attacks by both the party and the General Staff, they fiercely resisted.

With the General Staff to the east and Kim’s people to the north, the party faction’s headquarters had to be somewhere south or west of here. It wasn’t much to go on, but he’d been living on luck so far. He’d just hoped he had a little more left.

An armored vehicle came up the street toward his position, rumbling on eight wheels across the rubble and cratered surface. Already hidden, Cho pulled back farther into the shadows and watched the soldier manning a heavy machine gun in a small turret on top. He seemed more worried about rooftop snipers than ground-level threats, because he kept looking up, and never noticed Cho. The vehicle passed, like a tiger in search of prey, and once it was out of sight, Cho left and headed one block west, and then south, keeping well away from any troops that might be dug in along the river’s edge.

Cho progressed slowly, sticking close to buildings, pausing and listening as well as looking before crossing any open ground. Shortly after he started, he heard machine gun fire behind him, in the direction the troop carrier had headed, followed by more weapons fire and explosions. He judged it to be moderately close, although he’d thought the battle lines were farther north. More incentive to go south, but he fought the urge to hurry.

For most of the time, he might have been moving through an empty city. Occasionally he’d see a flash of movement as he turned a corner, or a face in a window. Many residents had fled in the afternoon after the broadcast, or during the night, with the remainder either dead, arrested, or in hiding.

There were enough bodies on many streets, either in uniform or civilian clothes, although civilian clothes didn’t mark one as a noncombatant. Only very old or very young men, and women of any age, could be considered true civilians. He’d hidden from groups of heavily armed men that were not in any uniform, and even from individuals, whether they had visible weapons or not.

Moving in the morning daylight was definitely more hazardous than nighttime, and Cho became grateful for the smoky haze that cut the visibility, even though it made his eyes sting. A fine layer of dust and grit also coated his clothes and provided natural camouflage.

Cho’s only goal was to work his way south and look for troop concentrations, while avoiding being seen and shot at by said troops. A lot of soldiers in one area meant some sort of base, and if it wasn’t the headquarters, it might provide a clue to the headquarters’ location.

Careful and cautious, he covered ground, always moving in a southerly direction. He spotted more uniformed bodies, but they appeared disturbingly fresh, the bloodstains wet. They still had their weapons, but Cho easily resisted the temptation to pick one up. There was already a good chance of him being shot on sight. Carrying a gun made it a certainty.

He’d stopped to check the bodies for water or food, which meant first checking them for booby traps. With his attention concentrated on searching for hidden grenades or other hazards, he’d failed to notice the tank turning onto the street several blocks behind him to the north. At least, that’s what he’d told himself later, trying to comfort an ego badly bruised at being surprised by a tank.

The tank crew’s attention may have been attracted by his movements. They may have thought the enemy soldiers were lying prone, or they simply had orders to shoot up anything suspicious. Cho’s first warning was the deep cracking sound of the tank cannon, and the shell striking the building above and behind him. Luckily, the high-explosive shell didn’t detonate until it was inside the structure. Enveloped in a choking cloud of smoke and dust, battered by pieces of falling brick and masonry, he hugged the ground as machine gun bullets kicked up dust around him.

He heard a scream nearby, and at first thought one of the soldiers was not dead, but then realized it was from behind him.

He turned his head to look, still keeping as low as possible, and saw an opening in the building where the shell had blown the wall out. He could see into the ground floor and the basement below it. There was movement in the basement level, and people, and he heard more cries, of pain and fear.

The tank’s diesel engine and the sound of its treads were getting louder. In half a moment, the remaining smoke would clear and the tank crew’s aim would improve significantly. Cho considered playing dead, but was worried that he didn’t appear dead enough. He decided the basement represented a better option, at least in the short term.

He low-crawled backward, covering the five meters in what seemed to be a few swift movements, and half-slid backward down a pile of sloping debris into the basement. The dimness of the basement was enhanced by the cloud of cement dust that hung in the air. Unlike the outside, there was nowhere for it to go, and it divided the room into brilliant dust-filled sunbeams and opaque shadows.

Cho scrambled out of the light toward a dark corner and had to stop short, because it was occupied. A middle-aged woman hugged two children, while an older woman sat leaning against the wall. They were covered with dust, but he could see blood on one of the children’s arms, and on the mother’s shoulder — a lot of blood there.

Out of the sunlight, his eyes quickly adjusted and he could see two more people, a young couple, in another corner, both as far away from the new opening as possible. He agreed with their strategy and headed for a clear spot next to the wall.

The family near him and the couple in the corner looked at the newcomer suspiciously. Cho ignored them and hunkered down in the corner, moving a few pieces of masonry to make more room.

The machine gun fire had stopped, and he heard the tank’s engine as it ground ahead. Once it was past, he’d have to…

The tank had stopped again. It was much closer than before. And then he heard voices. He searched his memory. In that fleeting glimpse of the tank firing at him, had there been infantry following behind it?

He looked around the room more carefully. It appeared to be an office, with a few old metal desks, filing cabinets, and obligatory posters on the wall. Paper and scraps of paper littered the floor. Everything was layered with dust and grime, which made it hard to see any detail in the dim light.

There. A door, in the center of the same wall they crouched against. He almost leapt over the woman in his haste, and began shifting the debris that blocked it. He tried to be quiet, but every piece of rubble he moved caused others to fall. To Cho, it sounded like an avalanche.

“What are you doing?” the older child, a girl of maybe ten, asked curiously. Her high, piping voice pierced the dark and dust.

Cho, struggling to free the door, hissed, “Quiet, child!” He gestured with his head toward the opening above. The girl didn’t understand, but the mother did, and told her daughter to hush. She then struggled to her feet and gathered her family. Moving must have been painful for her, but by the time Cho was through the half-open door, they hurried after him.

Cho’s only thought was to get away from the opening to the street. The door had led them into a basement hallway, pitch dark. He was still trying to choose which direction to go when a loud WHAM echoed from behind him, followed immediately by another WHAM a few moments later that staggered him. The family group let out small shrieks of surprise and fear, and Cho decided the direction he was facing would have to do.

The hallway was clear, and they all stumbled along. His outstretched hand felt a corner in the wall, and he followed it, the family close behind. He paused for a moment to listen for any sounds of pursuit, but there were none.

The mother asked in a whisper, “Are they following?”

After a long pause, Cho answered, “No.” And then after another pause, added, “They probably think two grenades are enough.” They aren’t paying me enough for this.

“Thank you for saving us,” the mother said, and the older woman offered her thanks as well.

Cho shook his head — a silly gesture in the pitch dark — and replied, “I saved myself. You just followed.”

“A wise man shows his back,” the grandmother quoted. It was an old Korean folk saying that praised leading by example, with his followers behind.

Cho sighed, but they had common purpose, to survive and get out of this building. He took out his phone. The dim light from the screen was more than enough to navigate by, and he wanted to use the phone’s GPS to make sure they moved in the proper direction, but there was no signal this deep in the shattered building.

“What is that?” the girl asked curiously. Few North Koreans owned such elaborate cell phones.

“Something I stole.” Cho didn’t want her asking more questions, and in this chaos, stealing wasn’t necessarily a crime.

Cho used the phone’s light cautiously, illuminating a passage briefly and then hiding it before leading his small entourage forward to the next corner or junction in the hallway. The mother followed behind, supported by her daughter. The other child, a boy of five or six, clung silently to his grandmother’s skirt, ignoring a deep gash on one arm.

They followed one hallway that led to a larger passage, headed east — west. There were stairs at the west end leading up, but the steps were blocked by debris. East led back toward the street where he’d seen the tank. As he reluctantly turned to backtrack his route, the mother said one word, “Please,” and sank to her knees.

He heard the exhaustion and pain in her voice, and answered, “Rest. I’ll find a path out of here.”

“Thank you. What is your name?” Koreans were sticklers for proper introductions, and he automatically answered, “I am Cho Ho-jin, ajumma.” He used a form of address reserved for mothers and “mature” women. Calling a twenty something office girl “ajumma“ would have gotten him slapped.

Even though she was in pain, she said formally, “I am Cheon Ji-hyo. This is my mother, Gam Sook-ja, and my children, Go Shin-chang and Go Shin-ha,” pointing to the girl and the boy. The girl bowed. Cheon asked, “There was another couple in the room with us. Did you see what happened to them?”

Cho shrugged, and winced at the pain in his back. He’d had a rough day. “They didn’t come out behind you,” he answered. He left unspoken the conclusion that they’d been caught in the grenade blasts. “Did you know them?”

“No. We never learned their names.” She sighed sadly and settled herself more comfortably. “We will rest and wait for your return.” Her voice was weak.

Cho nodded and started to head east, but the girl, Go Shin-chang, began to follow him. He stopped and motioned for her to go back. “Stay here with your mother, child.”

“No. I’m quiet, and if something happens to you, we need to know.” She’ll probably take the phone, he thought, but if I’m dead, who would I call?

He couldn’t argue with her logic. They would die in this place if they didn’t find an exit. “All right, but stay back some distance.” She nodded, and they set out. She did stay back, three or four meters, and her footsteps were light. They navigated by sound, using the light from his phone sparingly. Cho was beginning to worry about the battery charge. He’d been using it heavily.

After about twenty-five meters, they came to a large cross-passage, equal in width to the one they were in. He turned south, and came into what looked like the main entrance. Although the doors could be opened from the inside, someone had chained them shut.

The two found a fire axe on the wall and tried to break the lock, without success, but searching the offices, they found a coat rack with an iron upright. Using it like a crowbar, Cho was able to twist the chain until the lock broke. Clearing the chain away, he cautiously opened the door, which led up to a small lobby and the main exit to the street. He didn’t open the outer door, but did look through the nearly opaque glass. He could see no movement, and it was quiet.

With the young girl in front, they hurried back to the other three. Gam Sook-ja, the grandmother, held the boy in her lap while the mother leaned against her shoulder, asleep. It took some care and effort to rouse her, and even a gentle shake on the uninjured shoulder caused her sharp pain. It took both Cho and the woman’s daughter to get her upright, and they moved at the best pace they could.

They had to half-lift the mother up the steps, and Cho had to stop the grandmother from just walking outside. Leaning Cheon against the wall, with Go Shin-chang keeping her from collapsing, Cho motioned the others into a corner, and after taking another look through the glass, opened the door just enough to look down the street, toward the street where the tank had passed.

With one direction clear, he opened the other door slightly and made sure that direction, to the west, was clear as well. He stepped outside.

The sunlight, even filtered by smoke and dust, was more than welcome. He watched and listened carefully while the others emerged, and reported to them, “There is fighting in the distance, but I can’t hear any nearby. Where will you go now?”

Go Shin-chang answered for them. “There is a foreigner living west of here, just outside the city. She runs a clinic. Our neighbors went there when they were sick. It’s a mission, with food and medicine. They can treat my mother and brother, and your back as well.”

“My back?” Cho’s back was sore, but that was understandable. A wall had fallen on him.

The girl took a step to his side and reached around to touch him, below his shoulder blade. She showed him a fingertip wet and red. “You’re bleeding in three places.” After a pause, she added, “Please come with us.”

Maybe that wall had some sharp corners. His orders took him south, but if west led to the chance of medical attention, that was an acceptable detour. Nodding agreement, Cho took the mother’s uninjured arm and put it over his shoulder, then faced west.

Besides, the mother wouldn’t last the day without some sort of medical care. She could die from blood loss and dehydration, and the boy needed stitches and antiseptic, or he would eventually lose the arm, and his life.

Cho’s hatred of North Korea did not extend to the general population. Only a fool blamed a farmer for the king’s crime. His father, Cho Hyun-jae, had been executed by the Kims for failing to win a war they started. Cho’s family had been punished beyond reason for this “offense,” as if losing his father wasn’t punishment enough. That was the first of many reasons that he had for hating the DPRK government.

Not that he was fond of his Russian employers. They’d fed and educated him, but only as a tool. He’d given good service, but now their orders were absurd. Were they ready to use him up?

Their slow progress had brought them close to a cross street, and rather than stop carrying the mother, he told Go Shin-chang to scout the intersection, and what to look for. The girl ran ahead.

He hoped the mission wasn’t far.

Kary Fowler heard the shout from Kwan all the way in the kitchen. “Fowler-seonsaengnim, come quick!” Kwan, alert but hobbled with a broken ankle, had volunteered to watch the front gate and serve as general lookout.

Others outside repeated the call, and she motioned to some inside as she left the dining hall. Whatever was going on out there, it sounded like Kwan needed reinforcements.

Thank heaven she hadn’t heard any pistol shots. She’d loaned Kwan Sergeant Choi’s gun, not only because he had sentry duty, but because he’d served in the army and might actually use it, if need be.

She burst out the front door of the dining hall, but had to clear the office building to see the gate clearly. She rounded the corner at speed and, glancing back, was relieved to see two other women in her trail.

The gate was still closed, and Kwan was pointing down the road. In the twilight, she could see a knot of people trudging unsteadily toward the mission’s gate. She hadn’t slowed down, and he opened the gate before she reached it.

She turned onto the road and hurried toward the group. She could tell they needed help just from the way they walked — exhausted, barely lifting a foot before putting it down again. As she got closer, she could see darker patches in the dirt and grime that covered them.

She called behind, to people still in the compound. “Ok, get a stretcher!”

An older woman was in front, leading a glassy-eyed little boy. A few steps behind was a girl, and a young man with an older woman on his back in a fireman’s carry. The girl saw Kary come out the gate and ran to meet her, calling, “Ajumma, please help us, my mother, my brother…”

Kary ran past the girl, then the woman and boy, and reached up for the mother. She could only hope the wound wasn’t as bad as it looked, because the upper part of her garment on that side was dark with blood. Even in the sunset’s light, the woman, perhaps a little over thirty, was dangerously pale. The man, his face streaked with dirt and perspiration, kept walking as Kary examined his passenger.

She was still alive, although her pulse was fast and weak. Lifting the corner of her bloody garment, Kary could see a round hole. She’d seen enough bullet wounds in the past few days, and could only guess what it had done to the bones in her shoulder. There would be a much messier wound in the front, although resting on her savior’s shoulder may have staunched the bleeding somewhat.

Two of her helpers arrived with the stretcher, and positioning it behind the pair, they gently leaned the woman back, and then level, before setting off at speed for the dispensary. The man nodded and wearily said “Thank you” before falling, first to his knees, and then face-first onto the road. His back was bloodstained as well, and the girl, pointing, said, “His name is Cho. He’s hurt, too.”

Kary called for another stretcher, then told the girl to follow the others with her mother. Taking Cho’s hand, she knelt down next to him and waited for help.