Red Phoenix

by Larry Bond

  A roar swept through the chamber at his words, a roar of outrage, shock, and shouted disbelief.

  “Mr. Secretary General!” The Soviet representative was on his feet now, all pretense of uninterest tossed aside. “This is outrageous. My country will not tolerate such preposterous allegations, wherever they may originate from!”

  “Mr. Vlasov” — the Secretary General’s voice was firm — “you are out of order. The American representative has the floor at this time. You’ll have ample opportunity to respond when it’s your turn to speak.” He looked at Bannerman. “Please continue, Mr. Secretary.”

  Bannerman dipped his head in gratitude. The Secretary General didn’t always see eye to eye with American foreign policy, but he was always scrupulously fair. Bannerman scanned the chamber and then focused his eyes on the Soviet ambassador.

  “Despite the protestations of the Soviet representative, my government is most assuredly not making wild or unfounded allegations. We have proof. Categorical and undeniable proof. Proof that Soviet pilots have engaged in combat with American planes in both international and South Korean airspace. We’ll play this evidence for you now.” He gestured to a technician standing by the audio equipment.

  The man flicked a single switch and the tape began playing, translated simultaneously into the five official languages of the United Nations. First, a flat American voice identified the source of the sounds that would follow. “The radio transmissions on this tape were made by aircraft engaged in combat with U.S. Navy warplanes over the Yellow Sea at thirteen fifteen hours on one January.”

  Then the voices came on — urgent Russian voices carrying warnings of missiles or American planes and triumphantly reporting kills. All in the Security Council chamber sat quietly, listening intently to the entire recording. Only the Soviet ambassador paid scant attention, scribbling a note that Bannerman saw passed to the Chinese representative. The PRC’s ambassador read through it impassively and handed the note back to an aide without comment.

  When the Rivet tape ended in a faint wash of static, Bannerman let the silence build. He was surprised to find himself actually enjoying this. It took him back to his days as a junior prosecutor, long before he’d stepped into the murky world of politics. He leaned closer to the microphone. “Fellow members of the Security Council. What you’ve just heard isn’t a fake or fabrication. It is a matter of the utmost concern to us all. By its actions, the government of the Soviet Union has involved itself in direct hostilities against American forces serving under U.N. auspices.”

  Bannerman pulled a sheaf of paper out from the stack in front of him and adjusted his half-frame reading glasses. “Accordingly, the United States moves that the Security Council adopt the following resolution…” The language of the resolution was as dry and legalistic as all U.N. documents always were, but its meaning was clear. By adopting the resolution, the Security Council would find the Soviet Union in violation of the U.N. Charter and of previous Security Council resolutions. Such a finding would authorize individual members of the U.N. to take any and all actions necessary to force the Soviets to end their support for North Korea’s invasion — actions up to and including economic and military sanctions. Bannerman secretly doubted that the resolution could achieve that end, even if it were passed.

  U.N. resolutions usually weren’t worth the cost of printing them. But it would be an undeniable slap in Moscow’s face, a slap that might awaken some of the less militaristic members of the Politburo to the risks they were running with this Korean adventure.

  He finished speaking and sat back to wait for the Soviet ambassador’s response. It wasn’t long in coming.

  “The Americans have spoken of proof and played a paltry few minutes of cassette tape as if that were sufficient. But is it? I ask you to ask ourselves this: What have you heard? A few voices speaking Russian. Some static. And a claim that all of this came from planes engaged in combat.” The Russian paused, and Bannerman had to admire his poise. Vlasov’s earlier show of temper had faded as completely as a summer storm, and now his narrow, handsome face showed only good-natured amusement.

  “The Americans have a saying, my friends, ‘Is it real or is it Memorex?’ ” Vlasov continued, having deliberately misquoted the well-known ad line. “Well, I suggest that what we have all heard tonight is Memorex — a tape of deliberate falsehoods created by the electronic specialists of the American CIA and NSA.”

  Bannerman started to object, but the Russian held him off with a waved hand. “No, no, Mr. Secretary. You’ve had your turn at this. Allow me mine.”

  Bannerman shrugged and sat back in his chair. He had a ready response to the Soviet allegations of forgery. Some snippets of the same transmissions had also been picked up by Japanese radio listening posts, and the Japanese government had assured Washington that it was prepared to back American claims that the Soviets were intervening in the war.

  “But even if these unfounded allegations were true, it would not matter, and this Security Council would not be justified in adopting the absurd resolutions proposed by the United States.” Bannerman started, suddenly realizing that Vlasov had stopped speaking off the cuff and was now reading from a prepared statement. He frowned. The implications of the switch were clear and unpleasant. Moscow must have been ready for its involvement in the fighting to become public knowledge. And that suggested that the Politburo’s hard-liners were prepared to go a long way to back Pyongyang’s war.

  “Even if individual Soviet citizens were engaged in actively defending a fellow Socialist state against South Korea’s aggression, their efforts as volunteers would have nothing whatever to do with the Soviet Union itself. The precedents are clear, and I need hardly remind the United States of some of the more obvious ones — for example, the service of the American Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the gallant struggle against fascism in Spain.”

  Vlasov smiled unpleasantly. “In any event, the position of the Soviet government is clear. We are not in any way involved in this struggle, but our citizens are perfectly free to do as they wish.” He looked up from his written statement and spread his hands. “That is, after all, the essence of a free society, is it not?”

  Then, abruptly, he finished. “The Soviet Union urges the defeat of this ridiculous and insulting resolution forthwith. We stand ready instead to work for a real and lasting end to this imperialist aggression against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.”

  Bannerman was astounded. The Soviets were not only virtually admitting their involvement, they were practically daring the Security Council to try to do something about it. He’d expected them to make a more prolonged argument in an attempt to confuse the issue.

  His chief aide leaned forward from the seat behind and touched his arm. “Looks like they’ve got the Chinese veto in their pockets.”

  The Secretary nodded. No U.N. Security Council resolution could pass without the approval of its five permanent members — the United States, the Soviet Union, France, the United Kingdom, and the People’s Republic of China. Both the U.S. and the Soviet Union were parties to this dispute and therefore ineligible to vote, and both France and Britain clearly intended to side with the U.S. That left the PRC as the swing voter on the Council.

  No measure it voted against could pass. And clearly the Soviets were confident that, in this case at least, they had China’s support. So confident that they didn’t feel it worthwhile to prolong debate.

  Bannerman wasn’t surprised by that. China hadn’t openly sided with Kim Il-Sung’s war, but it hadn’t been very discreet about: its munitions shipments to him either. His Pacific Region specialists back at State had estimated the probability of a Chinese veto at around ninety percent. Only that NSC man, Fowler, hadn’t been so sure. At Fowler’s urging, they’d decided to avoid embarrassing China by dropping all references to the PRC’s support for North Korea in the proposed resolution or in his written statement. Well, thought Bannerman, the President’s new fair-haired boy was finally going to be
proved wrong about something.

  He turned his attention back to the debate. It didn’t last long. Two of the Soviet Union’s surrogates, Cuba and Poland, made fiery but pro forma denunciations of the resolution — denunciations that Bannerman found it easy to counter. Other countries around the circle made their customary speeches counseling the superpowers to show patience and restraint. And that was that. Neither side saw any advantage in a prolonged, confusing debate or in the intricate negotiations that often produced compromise resolutions without meaning or force. The United States wanted a straight up-or-down vote on its motion, and the Soviet Union saw little to fear in that.

  The Secretary General looked bemused, as well he might, thought Bannerman. Chairing the Security Council emergency session must often seem more like running a marathon than supervising a debating society. But not tonight.

  “Does any member wish to speak further on this issue?… No? Well, then, the question now arises on the resolution proposed by the United States.” The Secretary General arched a single, white eyebrow, obviously waiting for someone to object to his haste. No one did. The silence lasted until he began the roll call. “Brazil?”

  “The Federative Republic of Brazil votes aye.”

  “Poland?”

  “The Polish People’s Republic opposes this needless and irresponsible resolution.”

  Bannerman’s aide kept a quick, scratch-pad tally as the vote went on.

  “The United Kingdom?”

  “Her Majesty’s government votes aye.”

  That put them over the top with nine votes. Now only China’s veto would stop the resolution from carrying. He folded his hands and waited for it. At least he’d gained the President a solid propaganda victory. And Bannerman knew that was about all the U.N. was good for these days. The Harvard-educated internationalist in him regretted that. The realist schooled in Washington, D.C.’s corridors of power knew such regrets were meaningless.

  “The People’s Republic of China?”

  Bannerman looked across the circle at the Chinese ambassador, a tall, spare man clothed in a fashionable gray suit and red tie. The man’s dark eyes met his as he spoke. “China abstains. We shall neither oppose nor support this resolution.”

  The American secretary of state felt his jaw dropping open and closed it hurriedly. The room around him was in an uproar as the observer’s gallery realized what had just happened. The resolution had passed. He felt one of his aides clap him on the shoulder and saw the others grinning. He could also see the consternation on Vlasov’s face as the Russian grabbed one of his assistants and started working his way through the crowd toward the Chinese delegation.

  Somehow the Secretary General’s soft brogue cut through all the hubbub in the Council Chamber. “The vote being nine to four, the motion is carried and the resolution is adopted. The Council will reconvene tomorrow evening at the same hour to consider its implementation.”

  The Chinese ambassador stood calmly and began making his way out through the crowded aisles, ignoring the pandemonium all around him — a mass of shouting reporters, TV cameras, and stunned fellow diplomats. Bannerman watched him go and saw a broad-shouldered Chinese security guard shove Vlasov’s messenger bodily out of the way as the Russian tried to get closer.

  Bannerman sat motionless in his chair, his mind working furiously despite all the commotion surrounding the American delegation. He’d felt the pieces in the international diplomacy game shift under his hands just now. Not because of the resolution. That was only a simple scrap of paper — devoid of real power. But China’s abstention… now that was something real.

  THE OLD EXECUTIVE OFFICE BUILDING, WASHINGTON, D.C.

  Blake Fowler agreed wholeheartedly with the secretary of state’s assessment — something that would have surprised and disconcerted both men had they known of it. China’s position on the war seemed to have changed, however imperceptibly, and that had to be followed up.

  He leaned across his desk and snapped off the small, portable TV perched precariously on one of his bookshelves. That done, he dropped back into his chair and rolled far enough away from the desk to poke his head out the door. “Katie, would you get Bob Gillespie, Harry Phelps, and that new guy, Kruger, up here right away? Say in” — he looked at his watch — “ten minutes or so?”

  His secretary stopped in midyawn, nodded, and reached for her phone.

  Fowler rolled back into his office, stopped, and then rolled back out. Katie was just starting to punch the Gillespies’ number into her phone. She paused as he stuck his head through the doorway again. “Yes?”

  “Ask them to bring everything on the PRC they’ve got easily to hand — political data, economic status, military readiness, all that kind of stuff.”

  “Right.”

  Fowler went to work preparing for the meeting. It was tough to concentrate. His thoughts were jumping from one possibility to another and back again in a rapid, whirling sequence. He’d had an instinct about China and now it might really be panning out. He started paging through a pile of recent State Department, CIA, and academic analyses on China’s internal politics, but something nagged at him. Something he’d left undone.

  It took him a few minutes to figure out what it was.

  He got up out of his chair and leaned around the door. “Oh, Katie? Thanks.”

  She smiled briefly and turned away to finish logging in another stack of NSA intercepts. Blake went back to work, doggedly trying to cram a mass of data on China into his overtired brain, information that he’d ignored while concentrating on South and North Korea for all these months.

  Something important was happening inside the PRC’s carefully guarded government buildings, and he’d damned well do his best to find out just what exactly was going on.

  JANUARY 3 — PARTY HEADQUARTERS, PYONGYANG, NORTH KOREA

  Kim Jong-Il could smell the man’s fear and relished it. Its sickly sweet odor was a welcome reminder of the power he still wielded. It had helped him control the terrible wave of anger that had overcome him when the news from New York arrived. It had been news of a betrayal of the blackest sort. Kim clamped his lips together tightly at the thought. He must be careful, he knew, careful to control the rage surging just below the surface.

  At least until he had a worthy target for his hate. It wouldn’t do at all to prove his foolish doctors right by suffering a heart attack — not during this most crucial of times. His political enemies would take full advantage of any weakness he showed.

  Kim grimaced. He didn’t have time for these wasted thoughts. He stared at the man waiting rigidly at attention. “Well? Speak up. What is it?”

  His aide’s voice quavered. “Your pardon, Dear Leader, the ambassador has arrived for his meeting.”

  Kim nodded abruptly. “Show him in. And tell Captain Lew to stand ready. One cannot be too careful when dealing with creatures of this kind.” He dismissed the aide with an impatient gesture and concentrated on the matter closest at hand — Colonel General Cho’s latest report from the front.

  “The ambassador from the People’s Republic of China.”

  Kim heard the Chinese diplomat ushered in, but he kept his eyes focused on the report in front of him. Let the swine wait. Let the man stand, stewing in the shame that rightly belonged to his whole mongrel country.

  The news from the front was good. The jaws of his trap had swung shut below Seoul, and Cho’s troops were pursuing the beaten imperialist armies as they fled south. Casualties were heavy, of course, but that had been expected. In any event, individual lives were of little importance in the greater scheme of things. No, the news was very good, and Kim almost smiled as he skimmed through the report.

  But then he heard a delicate cough from the other side of his desk and his good humor vanished. Everything was going well, save on the international front. One cowardly act by the damned Chinese had unnecessarily embarrassed his Soviet allies and had made it somewhat more difficult for them to give him the aid he required. He kept r
eading.

  At last he snapped the report binder shut with a single decisive motion. The crash it made seemed to hang in the still air of his silent office. Slowly Kim Jong-Il raised his head to stare at the diplomat waiting quietly in front of his desk.

  He was disappointed. The Chinese showed no signs of fear or shame. Not even embarrassment or anger at the rude treatment he’d been accorded. Instead, the man stood calmly, his legs splayed apart as if he were some sort of peasant lounging at rest. Again Kim felt the anger rise up inside him. The insolent bastard. How dare this so-called ambassador stand there without showing the slightest sign of contrition for the treacherous actions of his nation.

  “Well? What is your business with me? I’m busy, as I’m sure you can see.”

  The ambassador inclined his head, more a nod than a bow. “I’m grateful for your time, Comrade Kim. My premier and Politburo have instructed me to deliver this.” The ambassador stepped forward suddenly, coming right up against the desk with something held out in his hand.

  Kim half-reached for the panic buzzer by his knee and then stopped. It was a piece of paper, nothing more. He took it and ran his eyes over the major headings: Munitions, Armored Fighting Vehicles, Artillery. He pursed his lips. Why, this was a Chinese proposal to dramatically increase its logistical support of North Korea’s war effort.

  “What is the meaning of this?” Kim demanded. “This directly contradicts your government’s refusal to support us in the Security Council.”

  The Chinese ambassador shrugged almost imperceptibly. “I assure you that my country’s actions in the United Nations were not directed at your nation, Comrade Kim. We simply had no wish to be linked so closely with a Soviet indiscretion. Our support for your war of liberation is as strong as ever.”