“To the citizens and government of the People’s Republic of China, I wish to speak to you directly: Through your cyber weapons you have degraded our ability to offer a more conventional, measured response. The path of war is not one we wish to travel, but if forced, travel it we will. We will honor our commitments to our allies. Turn your ships around, return them to port, respect the freedom of navigation of the seas, and catastrophe may still be avoided. However, a violation of Taiwan’s sovereignty is a red line for the United States. A violation of that red line will be met with overwhelming force at a time and place of our choosing. To stand with our allies and to stand up for ourselves, I have preauthorized the employment of select tactical nuclear weapons to our commanders in the region. . . .”
Wedge turned off the radio.
Traffic was flitting by them on I-95. Here and there, cars had pulled over on the shoulder with their hazard lights flashing into the darkness. Inside, Wedge could see the silhouettes of drivers and passengers leaning forward, listening attentively to the address on the radio. Wedge didn’t need to hear anything more. He understood what was coming. The master sergeant muttered, “Jesus, tactical nukes,” and then, “I hope they’ve got their shit wired tight at the White House.”
Wedge only nodded.
They drove a bit more in silence.
Wedge glanced down on his lap, to where he held the red binder with the citation for his Prisoner of War Medal, as well as the blue box that contained the decoration itself.
“Let’s see that medal of yours, sir,” said the master sergeant.
Wedge opened the box.
It was empty.
Neither he nor the master sergeant knew quite what to say. The master sergeant sat up a little bit straighter in his seat. He affixed his hands firmly at ten and two o’clock on the steering wheel. “No big deal,” he muttered after a moment, glancing once more into the empty box that rested on Wedge’s lap. “There must’ve been an oversight today at the White House. Tomorrow, we’ll unfuck it.”
4
Red Lines
01:46 May 22, 2034 (GMT+2)
Barents Sea
For the third night in a row, Farshad struggled to sleep. His cabin was right above the waterline and he could hear the ice floes glancing off the bow, hitting like the tolling of a bell—dong, dong, dong. All through the night, the noise was relentless. When he had arrived in Tartus weeks before, a set of orders had awaited him. He wouldn’t be assigned to liaison duties there, with the Russian Federation’s short-sleeved, sun-bronzed Mediterranean Fleet, but far to the north with its Baltic Fleet. When he had stepped off the plane at naval headquarters in Kaliningrad, he didn’t even have a winter coat. He assumed headquarters would assign him to one of the larger command ships, the Kuznetsov, or perhaps the battle cruiser Pyotr Velikiy. Instead, he found himself aboard the corvette Rezkiy, which rolled incessantly. Farshad found himself mildly seasick aboard this fast little tin can of a ship with its thin sides.
Dong, dong, dong—
He gave up and switched on the light.
His bed was cantilevered to the bulkhead of his cabin, which was so small that he couldn’t open his door until he stowed the bed, and he couldn’t stow the bed until he stripped it of its wool blanket, sheets, and pillow. This multistep process of putting away his bed, to open his door, to leave his cabin, was one of the myriad humbling routines that composed his life as a relatively junior liaison officer. Another was taking his meals in the cramped wardroom among his fellow officers, few of whom spoke anything but Russian and all of whom were at least a decade younger. This had caused Farshad to eat mostly between meals, or to eat midrats, which were the day’s leftovers placed out at around midnight by the messmen.
Over his pajamas he shrugged on his peacoat, a gift from a kindly supply orderly in Kaliningrad. The incessant noise of the ice floes banging off the hull kept him company as he padded down the red-lit passageway, staggering between the ship’s steel bulkheads, toward the wardroom where he hoped to scrounge a bite to eat.
Like Farshad’s room, the wardroom was an exercise in spacial economy. It was no more than a two-table banquette with a small galley attached. Sitting at the banquette was Lieutenant Commander Vasily Kolchak, the Rezkiy’s executive officer. He was nursing a cup of tea tapped from the wardroom’s samovar. A cigarette receded toward his knuckles as he read from a laptop. Behind him was the room’s only adornment, an aquarium populated by yellow-orange fish who poked their eyes from a novelty shipwreck at its bottom. The messmen had already laid out the midrats in two stainless-steel vats, one filled with a dark-colored meat in a brown sauce and the other filled with a light-colored meat in a white sauce. A placard sat next to each dish, but Farshad couldn’t read Russian.
“The white one is fish, some type of herring, I think,” said Kolchak in English, glancing up from his laptop. “The dark one is pork.”
Farshad paused for a moment, hovering over the two options. Then he sat across from Kolchak with an empty plate.
“Good choice,” said Kolchak. The only other sound was the aquarium filter running in the corner. He wore a gold signet ring on his right pinky. With his left hand he played nervously with the blond, almost snow-white hair that brushed the tops of his ears. His small, shrewd eyes were cold and blue, their color slightly faded like two precious stones that had been cut generations ago. His nose was long, sharply pointed, and red on its tip; it seemed as though Kolchak was battling a cold. “I don’t imagine you’ve seen the news,” he said to Farshad. Kolchak’s English accent sounded faintly British and old-worldly, as if Farshad were eavesdropping on the conversational mores of a previous century.
Kolchak clicked on a video from his laptop. The two of them listened to an address made a couple of hours before by the American president. When the video cut out, neither of them spoke. Finally Kolchak asked Farshad about his missing fingers.
“Fighting the Americans,” he explained. Farshad then pointed to Kolchak’s signet ring, which at a closer inspection he could see was adorned with a two-headed eagle. “And your ring?”
“It was my great-great-grandfather’s. He was also a naval officer, the Imperial Navy.” Kolchak took a long drag on his cigarette. “He fought in our war with Japan. Then the Bolsheviks killed him when he was an old man. This ring remained hidden in my family for many years. I’m the first to wear it openly since him. Time changes everything.”
“What do you think the Americans will do?” asked Farshad.
“I should ask you,” answered Kolchak. “You’ve fought against them before.”
This slight gesture of deference caught Farshad off guard. How long had it been since someone had sought out his opinion? Farshad couldn’t help it; he felt a certain measure of affection for Kolchak, who, like him, was the loyal son of a nation that had not always treated him or his family fairly. Farshad answered Kolchak by saying that American presidents had a mixed history when it came to the enforcement of self-imposed “red lines.” He wondered if the United States would be willing to resort to nuclear weapons—even tactical nuclear weapons, as the president had suggested in her remarks—to prevent the Chinese from annexing Taiwan. “The United States was once predictable; not so much anymore,” concluded Farshad. “Their unpredictability makes them very dangerous. What will Russia do if the United States acts? Your leaders have a great deal to lose. Everywhere I look I see wealthy Russians.”
“Wealthy Russians?” Kolchak laughed. “There is no such thing.”
Farshad didn’t understand. He mentioned their ubiquitous mega yachts in the Mediterranean and Black Seas, their ostentatious villas on the Amalfi and Dalmatian coasts. Whenever Farshad traveled abroad and he saw some resplendent thing—a villa, a boat, a private jet idling on the tarmac, or a woman bejeweled beyond measure—and he asked to whom it all belonged, the inevitable response was always some Russian.
Kolchak was shaking his head. “No, no, no,” he said. “There are no wealthy Russians.” He stubbe
d his cigarette out in the ashtray. “There are only poor Russians with money.”
While lighting another cigarette, Kolchak began to pontificate about the Rodina, his “Mother Russia,” how in its many iterations, whether they be tsarist, imperialist, or communist, it had never enjoyed the legitimacy of other world powers. “During the empire our tsars spoke French at court,” said Kolchak. “During communism our economy was a hollow shell. Today, under the federation, our leaders are viewed as criminals by the rest of the world. In New York City, or in London, they don’t respect any of us, not even President Putin. To them, President Putin isn’t the grandfather of our Federation; no, to them he is simply another poor Russian, a gangster at best, even though he has retaken our ancestral territories in Crimea, Georgia, and Greater Ukraine; even though he has crippled America’s political system, so that now their president doesn’t even have a party but has to run as one of these enfeebled ‘independents.’ We are a cunning people. Our leader is one of us and is equally cunning. You asked what Russia will do if the United States acts? Isn’t it obvious? What does the fox do in the henhouse?” Kolchak’s lips peeled back from his teeth in a smile.
Farshad had always understood, or at least understood intellectually, that his country and Russia had many shared interests. But with Kolchak, he began to understand the depth of their kinship, the degree by which their two nations had developed in tandem, sharing a trajectory. Both had imperial and ancient pasts; the Russian tsars, the Persian shahs. Both had endured revolutions; the Bolsheviks, the Islamists. And both had suffered the antipathies of the West: economic sanctions, international censure. Farshad also understood, or at least intuited, the opportunity now presenting itself to his Russian allies.
They had left their home port of Kaliningrad three weeks before. On the first week of their journey, the Rezkiy had tracked numerous ships from the US Third and Sixth Fleets, which aggressively patrolled the western Atlantic and these northern Baltic waters. And then, quite suddenly, their American antagonists had vanished. After the dual catastrophes in the South China Sea, the destination of the American fleet became obvious. Equally obvious was the opportunity presented by its absence. No fewer than five hundred fiber-optic cables, which accounted for 90 percent of North America’s 10G internet access, crisscrossed these icy depths.
“If the Americans detonate a nuclear weapon,” said Kolchak, “I don’t think the world will much care if we tamper with a few undersea cables.” He held Farshad in his gaze. “I also don’t think the world would say much if our troops seized a sliver of Poland, to unite Kaliningrad to the Russian mainland.” Kolchak pointed to a map on the wall. He traced out a corridor with his finger, which would give Russia direct overland access to its one Baltic port. Putin himself had often spoken about reclaiming this strip of land. “If the Americans detonate a nuclear weapon, they will become the pariah state they have always claimed we are.”
“Do you think they’d ever go through with it?” Farshad asked Kolchak.
“Ten or even fifteen years ago, I would have said no. Today, I am not so sure. The America they believe themselves to be is no longer the America that they are. Time changes everything, doesn’t it. And now, it is changing the world’s balance in our favor.” Kolchak checked his watch. He shut his laptop and glanced up at Farshad. “But it is late. You must get some rest.”
“I can’t sleep,” said Farshad.
“How come?”
Farshad allowed the quiet to settle between them, so that Kolchak could perceive the faint dong, dong, dong of the ice floes glancing against the hull of the ship. “I find that sound unnerving,” Farshad admitted. “And the ship constantly rolls.”
Kolchak reached across the table and grasped Farshad affectionately by the arm. “You mustn’t let either bother you. Go back to your room, lie down. The rolling you will get used to. And the noise? It has always helped me to imagine that the noise is something else.”
“Like what?” Farshad asked skeptically.
Dong, dong, a couple more ice floes glanced against the hull.
“Like a bell, tolling out a change in the time.”
* * *
23:47 May 22, 2034 (GMT+8)
South China Sea
A knock on his door.
Middle of the night.
Lin Bao groaned as he sat up. What can it be now? he wondered. Such interruptions to his sleep had become routine. Last night, the commanders of two destroyers in his battle group had a dispute as to their order in formation, which Lin Bao had to resolve; the night before that there had been an unexpected weather advisory, a typhoon that thankfully never materialized; then a missed communications window with one of his submarines; before that an excess of hard-water moisture in one of his ship’s reactors. The list blurred in his sleep-deprived mind. If Lin Bao stood on the cusp of a great moment in his nation’s history, it didn’t feel that way. Lin Bao felt consumed by the minutiae of his command, and convinced that he might never again enjoy a full night’s rest.
He did, however, feel a small surge of satisfaction that the complex mix of cyber cloaking, stealth materials, and satellite spoofing had kept his fleet well hidden. While the Americans surely suspected them of heading for the vicinity of Chinese Taipei, their old adversary had been unable to develop the precise targeting data required for a counter-maneuver. Eventually, the Americans would find them. But by then it would be too late.
“Comrade Admiral, your presence is requested in the combat information center.”
Lin Bao awoke to another knock. “Comrade Admiral—”
Lin Bao flung open his door. “I heard you the first time,” he snapped at the young sailor, who couldn’t have been more than nineteen, and who looked as sleep-deprived as the admiral. “Tell them”—he coughed—“tell them I’m coming.” The sailor nodded once and hurried down the corridor. As he dressed, Lin Bao regretted his outburst. It was a manifestation of the strain he was under. To exhibit that strain to his crew was to exhibit his weakness to them, and they were under a similar strain. For the past three weeks, ever since they had gone dark, the Zheng He Carrier Battle Group—along with the Navy’s three other strike groups, elements of special forces from the People’s Army, strategic land-based bombers, and hypersonic missiles from the air force—had all converged in a noose around Chinese Taipei, or Taiwan, as the West insisted on calling it. Although Lin Bao’s command remained cloaked, he could almost feel the massive American global surveillance network groping for his precise location.
The operation, as designed by Minister Chiang and approved by the Politburo Standing Committee, was playing out in two phases, each of which adhered to one of Sun Tzu’s famous axioms, the first being, Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt. As dramatically as the Chinese fleet had vanished, it would soon reappear around Taiwan, moving like that proverbial thunderbolt. Never before had a nation concentrated its military strength with such stealth. It would take weeks, or even as much as a month, for the Americans or any other power to position combat assets to counter it. The second phase of Minister Chiang’s plan was likewise based on Sun Tzu: The supreme art of war is to subdue your enemy without fighting. Minister Chiang believed that the sudden revelation of his forces off the coast would present the Legislative Yuan, the governing body of so-called Taiwan, with only one choice: a vote of dissolution followed by annexation into the People’s Republic. Not a single shot would need to be fired. When Minister Chiang had proposed his plan to the Politburo Standing Committee, he had argued that surrounding Taiwan so suddenly would result in a bloodless checkmate. Although skepticism existed among certain committee members, including Zhao Leji, the much-feared octogenarian secretary of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, ultimately the majority placed its confidence in Minister Chiang.
Lin Bao entered the combat information center and found Minister Chiang waiting for him via secure video teleconference. “Comrade Minister,” Lin Bao began,
“it is good to see you.” When the Zheng He had gone dark, the two had continued to email, but because of security concerns they hadn’t spoken. Upon seeing each other again there was an embarrassed silence, as if each were taking a measure of the other’s strain.
“It is good to see you too,” began Minister Chiang, who then proceeded to laud Lin Bao and his crew on their exceptional conduct, not only in maneuvering the Zheng He Carrier Battle Group into position—a complex task to be sure—but also for repairing their ship while underway, so that it stood poised to achieve a great victory. On and on the minister went. The more congratulations he heaped on the crew of the Zheng He, the more it unsettled Lin Bao.
Something was wrong.
“Late last night, the Legislative Yuan scheduled an emergency session,” said Minister Chiang. “I expect a vote for dissolution in the coming days. . . .” His voice began to peter out, to choke even. “Our plan seems to be coming together. . . .” He pinched the bridge of his nose and squeezed his eyes shut. He took a long, heavy breath, and then, in a more defeated tone, he added, “However, there is a concern. The Americans have threatened a nuclear strike—no doubt you’ve heard.”
Lin Bao hadn’t heard. He shot a glance at one of his intelligence analysts, who sat an arm’s length away. For the last twelve hours they’d been in a communications blackout. The young sailor immediately pulled up the New York Times home page on an unclassified laptop. The headline was in the largest, boldest font: WITH RED LINE DRAWN, NUCLEAR WEAPONS AN OPTION, SAYS PRESIDENT. The story had been filed several hours earlier.
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