The Third World War: A Terrifying Novel of Global Conflict

35

Through the secured glass, Park Ho watched as two overweight middle-aged Caucasian men negotiated for their lives. Three guards lifted the British ambassador to his feet, walked him to an area next door, unlocked his handcuffs and pushed him inside. Bob Robertson, who had been posted to Pyongyang only two months earlier, tripped but managed to block his fall against the wall. A door slid across to secure the area into a separate room.

Jozsef Striker, the second man, was kept back, handcuffed to a chair. He had been in North Korea for more than five years. Park used to meet with him regularly. As Striker pleaded with the guards, Park heard his name mentioned: Park was the man the guards should contact to secure his release. If Park had been a sadist, he would have gone through and taunted the Hungarian ambassador. But he was not. He was a tactician, and inadvertently and unfortunately Striker had become a cog in the wheels of Park's war.

Robertson had been chosen to go in first because he was younger and fitter, although neither man was in good shape. He steadied himself and leant against the wall. The room created for the experiment was a mix of strange objects: bed sheets, writing paper, kitchen utensils; different flooring of concrete, tiles, carpet and other materials; a wardrobe of clothes; a tube of toothpaste; poured glasses of whisky, water and beer; and other examples of everyday life in the West.

Robertson tentatively stepped around the room, touching and examining. 'There'll be comeback, you know,' he shouted, his head automatically turning up towards the ceiling, where various curtain fabrics had been hung. 'Whatever you're doing violates every international law. We'll throw the book at you for this.'

'Just relax, Ambassador,' said Li in softly spoken, accented English. 'We have to conduct some more medical tests, then, of course, you can return home.'

'Bullshit,' muttered Robertson. He flung himself into an armchair, and stared at the wall as if he could see right through it. 'If you're going to execute me—' he whispered, not finishing his thoughts.

The nozzle of a household aerosol can was inserted in the partition. But just as Li gave the signal for it to be sprayed into the room, a radio crackled, calling Park Ho urgently to the telephone. Park raised his hand to delay the experiment and took the call.

The call had been directed to Park on a military line from the Chinese city of Yanji close to the northern border with North Korea. 'Mason is being sent to the United States to be interrogated with sodium pentothal,' said the caller.

'Thank you,' said Park, ending the call. If anyone had succeeded in knowing the general intimately, they might have detected a look of satisfaction.

Park himself had ordered the theft of a bioterror agent from a country where the rule of law remained intact and effective. Not only would Park get his hands on IL-4, but also he would sow confusion among the Western democracies. Yes, they would trace telephone calls and interrogate suspects. The more they suspected, the more the international media would play up the need for a military strike on North Korea. And, then, the more reason he would have to defend his nation.

'Go ahead,' he said to Li, pushing back the chair and standing up as the aerosol spray was released into Robertson's prison cell. By the time the virus took effect, the ambassador would be tired of his own whimpers and threats. Park would return shortly before rashes were due to show. If the IL-4 formula was working, that would be in less than a day. Once the rashes had broken out, Robertson, at his most contagious, would be put back in with Striker.

Key to the experiment would be the speed with which Striker was also infected. If it took several days, then the IL-4 agent would only be effective for the primary infection. But if Striker fell sick within twenty-four hours, the agent would remain with the virus, through secondary and tertiary infections and beyond, and Park would have at his disposal a genuine weapon of mass destruction.

Park had chosen smallpox precisely because it represented the dark unknown of bioterror. In 1995, after years of planning, a Japanese religious cult released the chemical nerve agent Sarin on the Tokyo subway. But only eleven people died, not exactly wholesale slaughter. In 2001, after the 11 September attack on New York, highly contagious military-quality anthrax was sent through the post to a senior politician and journalists. Only five had died.

The initial smallpox outbreak itself might be enough to paralyse America and Europe's health-care systems. If it spread, tripling and quadrupling from infection to infection, Park would regard it as an added bonus.

But at which stage should he hand over the vaccine? He was undecided. He was sure only that Robertson should be given it at the earlier stage, because he would need his testimony of both the brutality of the disease and the swiftness of the cure. Striker would get it later. And if it was too late, so be it. His English was heavily accented and would not be so well understood on television.

Deep in thought, Park took the lift and walked across the hotel lobby, alone and ignored by guests and staff. One day, he would be recognized. But at the moment, it was more important that he be proved right.