War of Eagles

THIRTEEN

“Hello, Mike Rodgers,” Herbert declared as he took the call. “How are things deep in the heart of Unexus?”

“The company is doing well, and so am I,” Rodgers replied.

The firm for which Rodgers worked was located in Arlington, Virginia, not far from the Pentagon. The two men had last spoken a month before, when they met for dinner at the Watergate. The 600 Restaurant was one of Herbert’s favorites, as much for where it was located as for what they served. The hotel was a monument to presidential arrogance, to the notion that the nation was still a democracy. That thought gave Herbert a warm feeling. It reminded him of the values he himself had paid such a high price to uphold.

“Is there something quick and dirty I can help you with, or can I give you a shout in about an hour?”

“Both,” Rodgers said. “What are you hearing about China?”

Herbert had been playing with a loose thread on his cuff. He stopped. “Why do you ask?”

“We’ve got a very important project about to launch with Beijing,” Rodgers told him. “I was wondering if the explosion in Taipei is an isolated event.”

“Do you have any reason to think it wasn’t?” Herbert asked.

There was a brief silence.

Herbert smiled. Rodgers knew the drill. Herbert’s first obligation was to Op-Center. Their job was to put puzzles together, not provide the pieces for others. Not even for an old friend, a trusted friend. With Herbert that was not a territorial imperative. It was his definition of professionalism.

“All right. I’ll go first,” Rodgers said. “Unexus has designed a Chinese telecommunications satellite that is going to be launched on Thursday. The prime minister has asked the head of the Xichang space center to provide him with an overview of security operations. Director Lung says that has never happened before.”

“Is this the first job you’ve done with them?”

“Yes, but that does not seem to be what is driving the prime minister’s caution,” Rodgers told him.

“Will the telecommunications satellite be used for civilian purposes only?” Herbert asked.

“We don’t know,” Rodgers said.

“Plausible deniability,” Herbert replied.

Rodgers ignored the remark. “The prime minister has asked that the security information be sent by courier, directly to him. Ordinarily these matters are reviewed by the Guoanbu.”

“The Ministry of State Security,” Herbert said.

“Bypassing them in a review of this nature is very unusual,” Rodgers said. “Director Lung was also instructed to make sure that one of the guests be accompanied by a Xichang official at all times.”

“What guest?” Herbert asked.

“General Tam Li of the PLA,” Rodgers told him.

“Is the army involved with the launch?”

“Only as observers,” Rodgers said. “We hope to be doing more business with them in the future, though I’m not at liberty to say more than that.”

“Is there any reason at all to think that this General Tam Li is a threat?” Herbert asked.

“That’s why I’m calling,” Rodgers said. “The prime minister must think so.”

“When did the prime minister request the security plans?” Herbert asked.

“Saturday morning, Beijing time,” Rodgers said. “Now tell me. Is there anything you can add?”

“Is this for your ears only, or will it get back to the prime minister of the People’s Republic of China?” The question tasted like ash. But Mike Rodgers had new employers now, and he had always been a good and loyal officer.

“Do you even have to ask, Bob?”

“Unfortunately I do, Mike. You’re a good friend. You’re also a private citizen working with the government of a foreign power, possibly with the military of a foreign power. My boss would scowl at swapping spit with the enemy.”

“Tell Paul I am the same man I was—”

“Paul Hood is not my boss,” Herbert said. “Not anymore.”

It took Rodgers a moment to process the information. “What are you talking about?” he asked.

“I wish I knew,” Herbert admitted. “I came to work this morning and found out that Op-Center had a new director, effective immediately. General Morgan Carrie. Do you know her?”

“I know of her,” Rodgers said. “First woman to earn three stars.”

“That’s the one,” Herbert said. “From what I gathered, Paul was ‘invited’ to work for the president in some new capacity.”

“Classic occupation ploy,” Rodgers said.

“Excuse me?”

“The German army used to roll into a village and appoint a puppet government from among the population,” Rodgers said. “The new leaders and their families would get preferential treatment as long as they did Nazi dirty work, like ordering searches and ratting out resistance fighters. When that leadership had been squeezed dry, they would be executed.”

“I’m not sure I see the parallel, Mike.”

“The CIOC had Paul cut Op-Center back, then turned the knife on him,” Rodgers said.

“True, though I wouldn’t equate a West Wing job to being terminated,” Herbert said.

“Did Paul sound happy?”

“He sounded uncertain, dislocated—” Herbert said.

“That’s as good as it’s going to get for him,” Rodgers said. “If you’re not part of the inner circle to start, you aren’t likely to get in. That’s the same as a political execution.”

“I don’t know if I agree, and I don’t think Paul is concerned about that,” Herbert said. “He cares about the work.”

“Bob, that’s how the work gets done there,” Rodgers said. “Whether it’s at 10 Downing Street, in the Kremlin, in Beijing, or in Havana, it’s all about having the sympathetic ear of the core group. If I were to cold-call the CIA, do you think I’d get someone at your level willing to talk to me?”

“I hope not,” Herbert said. “You’re a patriot, but you’re still a civilian.”

“Exactly. It’s about access, Bob.”

“And trust,” Herbert reminded him. “Access gets a Bob Herbert on the telephone. Trust is what gets you information. And whatever I — we — think about Paul Hood personally, he has never been dishonest or unreliable.”

“No,” Rodgers agreed. “And Robert E. Lee disliked war. That didn’t prevent four years of ferocious bloodshed.”

This conversation was taking them down a rutted path Herbert did not want to travel. The men had never really discussed it because they did not want to let loose the resentment they both felt. But here it was, sneaking out the back door. Herbert had not approved of the cutbacks Hood had made or the effective dismissal of Mike Rodgers as deputy director. But those issues, those emotions, did not need to be on the menu right now.

“We can talk about precedent over a cup of joe,” Herbert told Rodgers. “Meanwhile, here is what I can tell you about the Chinese. It isn’t much, but I’m working on it. General Carrie called a meeting first thing this morning. She introduced herself and asked us to look into two, now three, incidents involving targets with a Chinese connection. The freighter that blew up in Charleston harbor, a sugar silo that was attacked in Durban, South Africa, and an explosion at an upscale brothel in Taipei that sent body parts sailing into the harbor.”

“Do you think those are all related?”

“Slave labor was involved in the harbor and brothel attacks,” Herbert said. “A spymaster, Chou Shin, apparently ran holdings in the sugar processing facility that was destroyed.”

“I’ve heard of Chou,” Rodgers said. “He’s a real hard-liner.”

“That he is. Have you heard anything else about him?”

“Not really. His name showed up a lot in a white paper on the Tian’ anmen Square uprising.”

“You remembered it just from that?”

“Oh yeah,” Rodgers replied.

“Why?”

“He was out there running plays for the police, pointing out individuals he wanted for interrogation,” Rodgers said. “They call him the ‘eagle’ because of the way he just looked down from a balcony and plucked people from the square.”

“I don’t understand,” Herbert said. “Why would a diehard Red invest in capitalist enterprises?”

“The Unexus think tank was all over that question when we got involved with the Chinese,” Rodgers told him. “There are parallels regarding Middle Eastern, Colombian, and Japanese investments. What we view as naked capitalism Beijing regards as a means of control. Think about it. How does a foreign country gain influence in the United States? Through real estate holdings, owning businesses, even laundering money through banks. They help to drive our economy. That helps elected officials stay elected. It gives you their very attentive ear. How does a foreign government make money for those often extravagant enterprises? They invest in something people will always need, like sugar or tobacco, diamonds or gold.”

“I guess that makes a kind of lopsided sense,” Herbert admitted. “As long as you don’t become what you seek to destroy.”

“You know as well as I do that a lot of sleeper agents and fifth columnists are seduced by a better life and a big bankroll,” Rodgers said. “That’s always been a problem when foreigners infiltrate the United States. They try to recruit sociopaths and ideologues, but those kinds of people tend to stand out.”

“Okay. I understand why Chou might have invested in a sugar refinery,” Herbert said. “What I don’t understand was whether this attack was against the silos, the investment, or Chou himself.”

“I have no idea,” Rodgers said. “I just don’t want to worry that our satellite is in jeopardy.”

“Do you expect China to be a big part of your business in the future?”

“We hope so,” Rodgers said. “But that’s not my biggest concern.”

“What is?”

“The satellite has an RTG,” Rodgers told him.

Herbert grunted. An RTG is a radioisotope thermoelectric generator, a lightweight, very compact system that provides energy through the natural radioactive decay of Pu-238. Though the plutonium is encased in a lead-ceramic alloy that would survive a crash or explosion, there was always the chance of an accident. One that could spread lethal radioactivity across a wide swath of the countryside.

“Is it a DoE component?” Herbert asked. Before plutonium-powered spacecraft were banned, the Department of Energy had built all of the RTGs used on American missions.

“No,” Rodgers said. “We built it.”

“So nuclear power is going to be a part of what Unexus offers in the future.”

“I can’t really talk about that, Bob.”

“I understand. It’s too bad you’re not tighter with the prime minister,” Herbert said. “You could put the question to him.”

“Do you think Paul might want to take a swing at that?” Rodgers asked. “You said he’s looking for something to do, and the White House has ways of communicating with the prime minister that we don’t.”

“Good point. Call him,” Herbert suggested.

“I will,” Rodgers said.

The intelligence chief did not want to phone Hood and say, “I was talking to Mike, and we were wondering…” That would seem like charity. It would carry more weight if Rodgers broke six months of silence with the request.

“Meanwhile, I’ll see what else Darrell and our overseas allies have come up with,” Herbert said. “Hopefully, the prime minister is just being cautious.”

Rodgers thanked him, and they made a dinner appointment for the following week. Herbert hung up feeling very strange. Here he was, doing his duty at Op-Center, while the guys who left were in a much better position to set the world on fire — one of them literally.

Obviously, doing the right thing is not the way to get ahead in the world, he thought. You had to leave government service and shit-can your friends to do that. But then you abandon the principles for which your wife died and you gave up your legs.

To hell with that. Bob Herbert picked up the phone and called Darrell McCaskey.

He had a job to do.