Red Phoenix Burning

by Larry Bond

  WARNER BOOKS BY LARRY BOND AND PAT LARKIN

  Red Phoenix

  Vortex

  Cauldron

  Enemy Within

  Day of Wrath

  FORGE BOOKS BY LARRY BOND AND CHRIS CARLSON

  Dangerous Ground

  Cold Choices

  Exit Plan

  Shattered Trident

  Lash-Up

  Fatal Thunder

  FORGE BOOKS BY LARRY BOND AND JIM DEFELICE

  Larry Bond’s First Team

  Larry Bond’s First Team: Angels of Wrath

  Larry Bond’s First Team: Fires of War

  Larry Bond’s First Team: Soul of the Assassin

  Larry Bond’s Red Dragon Rising: Shadows of War

  Larry Bond’s Red Dragon Rising: Edge of War

  Larry Bond’s Red Dragon Rising: Shock of War

  Larry Bond’s Red Dragon Rising: Blood of War

  Red Phoenix Burning

  By

  Larry Bond & Chris Carlson

  RED PHOENIX BURNING

  All Rights Reserved © 2016 by Larry Bond and Chris Carlson, and Patrick Larkin

  eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher.

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Published by Larry Bond and Chris Carlson

  Map by Erik Carlson

  Dedication

  This book is dedicated to the people of the Koreas and their long struggle for a free and united homeland.

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Authors’ Note

  Dramatis Personae

  Prologue

  Chapter 1 - Warning Flares

  Chapter 2 - Fog of War

  Chapter 3 - Plunge

  Chapter 4 - Reconnaissance

  Chapter 5 - Breeze

  Chapter 6 - Whirlwind

  Chapter 7 - Maelstrom

  Chapter 8 - Unleashed

  Chapter 9 - The Murder of Pyongyang

  Chapter 10 - Nightmare

  Chapter 11 - Exodus

  Chapter 12 - Shock and Awe

  Chapter 13 - Precipice

  Chapter 14 - Second Battle of Pyongyang

  Chapter 15 - Parley

  Chapter 16 - Reaction

  Chapter 17 - Juggernaut

  Chapter 18 - Confrontation

  Chapter 19 - Reality Check

  Chapter 20 - Strange Bedfellows

  Chapter 21 - Stronghold

  Epilogue

  Korean Language Terms

  Glossary

  Acknowledgments

  Our deepest thanks go to Dr. Andrew Erickson and Ms. Jean Hyun for taking the time out of their busy schedules to review the manuscript. We greatly appreciated Dr. Erickson sharing his Chinese political-military expertise, and Ms. Hyun for helping us get the cultural aspects correct. This novel is better because of your efforts.

  Authors’ Note

  This book is a sequel to the novel Red Phoenix, written by Larry Bond and Patrick Larkin, and published by Warner books in 1989. It described a hypothetical invasion of South Korea by the North, an oft-discussed scenario on that troubled peninsula.

  The world has changed in many ways since Red Phoenix was published, but the two Koreas remain, a fossilized relic of the Cold War and the East-West polarization that touched many parts of our lives before the fall of the Soviet Union.

  At the end of Red Phoenix, the invaders were defeated by UN forces and retreated back across the 38th parallel, with the cooperation of the Chinese, who supervised a caretaker government. Kim Jong-il, the “Dear Leader” who had ordered the invasion was assassinated, and his young son Kim Jong-un was installed by the Chinese as the new leader of the country under the tutelage of his aunt and uncle who acted as regents.

  Thus, the North Korea described in the world of Red Phoenix does not differ too much from our real world, except that there was no invasion of South Korea in late 1989.

  With this bit of fictional background, you can read this story without having to have read Red Phoenix first. If you have read it, you will find familiar names, both of original characters and the next generation.

  We hope you will enjoy their story.

  This time, I worked with my long-time partner, Chris Carlson, to describe a different but equally dangerous scenario. Chris’ knowledge and storytelling ability were vital in making this the best story we could, and the only reason my name comes first is that “B” precedes “C” in the alphabet. I will refuse to claim any passage as mine, or point to one and say Chris wrote it. We could have each written a story based on the same scenario, but together, we’ve created one much better than either of us could have done alone.

  Dramatis Personae

  American Characters

  Carter, Randall Lieutenant General, commanding officer, US Seventh Air Force

  Christopher, Tony Brigadier General, vice commander, US Seventh Air Force

  Dougherty, Jeff Team leader, North Korea section, Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)

  Fascione, Thomas General, commanding officer, Combined Forces Command and US Forces Korea

  Fowler, Kary Aid worker, Christian Friends of Korea

  Graves, Andrew Colonel, commanding officer, Eighth Fighter Wing, US Seventh Air Force

  Jenkins, Rick Commanding officer, USS Hawaii (SSN 776)

  Yeom, George CIA-NIS liaison, CIA

  Little, Kevin Colonel, commanding officer, Headquarters and Headquarters Battalion, US Eighth Army

  Miller, Mike Lieutenant Colonel, commanding officer, Joint Security Area battalion

  Mitchell, Ralph Commanding officer, USS Gabrielle Giffords (LCS 10)

  O’Rourke, Dan Major General, chief of staff, US Forces Korea

  Olsen, George Brigadier General, intelligence officer, US Forces Korea

  Sawyer, Chris North Korea senior analyst, CIA

  Tracy, Robert Lieutenant General, commanding officer, US Eighth Army

  Waleski, Gabriel Rear Admiral, commanding officer, US Navy in South Korea

  Wallace, Joshua Lieutenant Commander, executive officer, USS Hawaii (SSN 776)

  Wyman, James President, United States of America

  South Korean Characters

  An Kye-nam

  President, Republic of Korea (ROK)

  Guk Yong-soo Lieutenant, Ninth Special Forces “Ghost” Brigade, ROK

  Gung Ji-han Lieutenant, Ninth Special Forces “Ghost” Brigade, ROK

  Ji Sang-hoon General, commanding officer, ROK Air Force

  Kwon Major General, commanding officer, Special Warfare Command, ROK

  Lee Joon-ho Major, operations officer, UN Command Security Battalion

  Ma Corporal, Ninth Special Forces “Ghost” Brigade, ROK

  Moon Su-bin Volunteer nurse, Christian Friends of Korea

  Oh Master Sergeant, Ninth Special Forces “Ghost” Brigade, ROK

  Park Joon-ho General, deputy commander, ROK-US Combined Forces Command

  Rhee Han-gil Colonel, commanding officer, Ninth Special Forces “Ghost” Brigade, ROK

  Sobong Lieutenant Colonel, Mike Miller’s second-in-command

  Sohn General, commanding officer, Third Army, ROK

  Yeon Min-soo General, chief of staff, RO
K Army

  North Korean Characters

  Cheon Ji-hyo

  North Korean refugee, mother of two children

  Cho Ho-jin North Korean citizen, Russian intelligence asset

  Choi Sung-min Sergeant, neighborhood supervisor, Ministry of Public Security

  Gong Kyeong-pyo Vice Admiral, KPA Navy

  Kim Jong-un Supreme Leader, DPRK

  Koh Chong-su Vice Marshal, Chief of the General Staff, Korean People’s Army (KPA)

  Lee Ji-young North Korean defector, daughter of Lee Ye-jun

  Lee Ye-jun Senior Politburo member, DPRK

  Maeng Sergeant, special forces, KPA

  Ri Il-chun Deputy Chairman, Second Economic Committee

  Ro Ji-hun Captain, special forces, KPA

  Ryeon Jae-gon Captain, aide to General Tae, KPA

  Sik Chol-jun Colonel, bodyguard to Kim Jong-un

  Tae Seok-won General, Sixth Bureau, General Staff Department; then commanding officer, Thirty-Third Infantry Division, KPA

  Yang Major General, deputy commander, Thirty-Third Infantry Division, KPA

  People’s Republic of China Characters

  Long

  General, deputy commander, Southeast Security Force

  Shu General, chief of staff, People’s Liberation Army

  Wen Kun President, People’s Republic of China

  Yu General, defense minister, People’s Republic of China

  Russian Characters

  Malikov, Alexei Fedorovich

  Deputy Director, Directorate S, Russian Foreign Intelligence Service

  Telitsyn, Pavel Ramonovich Asian Department chief, Directorate S, Russian Foreign Intelligence Service

  Map

  (Erik Carlson Large Scale Map of the Korean Peninsula)

  Prologue

  20 July 2015

  Heungnam Union Fertilizer Plant

  Hamhung, North Korea

  A gust of wet wind blowing off the Sea of Japan sent acrid vapors from the plant’s tall stacks swirling through the maze of rusting sheds, massive steel piping, and storage tanks. For a brief moment, the scarred, treeless slopes rising beyond the tangle of industrial buildings were visible. But then the wind shifted back, and the desolate hills were blotted out again.

  General Tae Seok-won coughed, hacked, and then spat to his right, narrowly missing the highly polished shoes of the dapper, middle-aged man at his side. Even a brief exposure to the Heungnam plant’s caustic fumes made his eyes water. Some of the substances manufactured here—precursors and stabilizers for Sarin nerve gas—were used for the chemical weapons he controlled as chief of the Sixth Bureau of the General Staff Department.

  The others, heroin and crystal methamphetamine, were essential to him and to many others in the hierarchy of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Money from the sale of these drugs in China, Japan, and other countries around the world helped pay for the luxuries enjoyed by Pyongyang’s military and political elites—Mercedes sedans, gourmet food, and elegant furnishings for their spacious apartments and country homes. Making sure this plant ran smoothly was a vital task.

  Vital or not, Tae felt uncomfortably exposed. This facility was dangerous in its own right, as the annual toll of fatalities from industrial accidents and exposure to toxic chemicals attested. And if one of his rivals decided to strike at him here, this labyrinth of pipes and tanks could easily be turned into a deathtrap.

  He scowled. In ordinary times, he could have deployed a full battalion of security troops to guard against sabotage.

  But these were not ordinary times.

  “You seem uncomfortable, Comrade General,” a smooth voice said quietly, barely audible over the background noise of clanking machinery, pumps, and the blare of patriotic music from the loudspeakers.

  Tae forced a smile as he glanced at the dark-suited man beside him. Ri Il-chun was the deputy chairman of the Second Economic Committee—the group in charge of coordinating North Korea’s military production and procurement. Ri was not a friend. On the other hand, he was not an open enemy, either. Their political and economic interests often coincided. Amid the ever shifting, complicated, and covert war waged between Pyongyang’s competing factions, this made him almost an ally.

  Many in the West looked at North Korea and saw a monolithic tyranny dominated by the “Supreme Leader,” Kim Jong-un, and his cadre of close supporters. That was a façade, as Tae and his peers knew all too well. The political turmoil and economic stagnation of the past three decades had fractured the monolith.

  Cold-eyed Kim Jong-un and his ruthless cronies presided over a precarious balance as the many factions within the Korean Workers’ Party and the armed forces struggled for wealth and influence. Whenever any one group seemed on the edge of amassing enough power to be truly dangerous, Kim could rely on jealous rivals to pull it down and tear it apart.

  The system worked, however imperfectly and inefficiently, but it depended entirely on the maintenance of a rough balance of terror among those contending for power.

  And now Tae knew that balance was threatened. This was why he and Ri were “inspecting” this foul-smelling labyrinth of poisons, so far from the convenience, and the constant surveillance, of their respective offices in Pyongyang.

  He turned to face the other man squarely. “Comfort is not a concern of those who serve the Supreme Leader . . . and the state.”

  Ri smiled slyly back at him. “Aptly expressed, Comrade General.” He shrugged. “That is good, because the news I bring is not especially comforting.”

  Tae frowned. “The rumors were accurate, then?”

  “Completely accurate,” Ri confirmed, his lopsided smile fading. “General Chu will be appointed as the head of the Department of the Economy.”

  “When?”

  “A few weeks, at most.”

  For an instant, Tae stood frozen in place as he contemplated a future filled only with catastrophe. It was as though he were trapped on a sheer cliff, condemned to helplessly watch the avalanche of ice and rock roaring down the mountain toward him.

  Ri’s report confirmed what his own sources had conveyed earlier. Chu and those in his circle were among the bitterest enemies of the factions to which Tae and Ri belonged. Chu’s old post as the head of the State Security Department, the secret police force enforcing the Kim family’s preeminence, had made him dangerous enough. His spies and agents were seeded throughout the military and the government, a constant threat to those with whom his interests clashed.

  But control over the Department of the Economy would magnify Chu’s power exponentially. This new bureaucracy was a recent creation of Kim Jong-un. Tasked with tightening the party’s control over every aspect of the North’s economic life—including the shadowy trading companies that ran drugs and exported weapons—its chief could pry into the secret finances of any enemy, any rival, exposing all the illegal payoffs, bribes, and kickbacks that were the common currency of every transaction in the DPRK.

  With that kind of information at his disposal, Chu could break anyone he desired, consigning them, their wives, and their children to torture, firing squad, or exile to a death camp almost on a whim. And he would not show mercy to anyone he deemed a competitor.

  Tae felt his hands tighten into fists. Previous directors of the Department of the Economy had been relative nonentities, easily swayed and easily frightened into ineffectiveness. What madness had possessed Kim Jong-un to hand so much power to someone like Chu? And this wasn’t the first unwise decision by the young Kim. He seemed even less stable than his father.

  Tae forced himself to speak calmly. “Can anything be done?”

  “Officially?” Ri shook his head. “No. The Supreme Leader’s decision is final.”

  “And unofficially?”

  Ri hesitated for a long moment. He glanced over his shoulder, making sure that no one else was in earshot. “Others are . . . concerned,” he admitted softly.

  “Who?” Tae demanded.

  He listened intently
as the other man quietly ran through a list of names. Tae knew them all. Some he could tolerate. Others he despised. Some he feared. All held high positions in rival factions within the party and the military, with many commanding the allegiance of units in the Pyongyang Defense Command, the Guard Command, the III Corps, and the State Security Department—the interlocking security apparatus of the regime and the Kim dynasty.

  The general felt cold. Even hearing this list of names could mark him for a lingering and infinitely painful death. Were Ri and these others serious? Or was this a trap, designed to ensnare him and others like him? A way for Ri to curry favor with Chu and his allies?

  He looked up to find Ri watching him closely.

  “You are wary,” the other man said. “That is wise. This is no time for rashness.” Then his voice hardened. “But neither is it a time for hesitation or cowardice. Like the rest of us, you must decide. And soon.”

  Tae nodded stiffly. “I understand.”

  Ri handed him a small sheet of rice paper. “There are two futures, Comrade General. The choice is yours.”

  Tae glanced down at the paper. On one side, it bore the words 큰 위 험, “Great Danger.” On the other, it carried the message 기회, “Opportunity,” and a telephone number. He looked up again.

  Ri nodded slowly. “That number is secure...for now. But do not delay too long, Tae.” With that, he turned on his heel and walked toward the black limousine waiting to take him back to Pyongyang.

  General Tae Seok-won stood silently, watching the bureaucrat as he got into his car, unconsciously flipping that single small scrap of paper from one side to the other.

  Chapter 1 - Warning Flares

  15 August 2015

  The Demilitarized Zone

  Korea

  The dead were everywhere, huddled at the bottom of the trench. Some had been shot. Others had been bayoneted. Some of the soldiers lay curled up, frozen in the agony of death. The rest stared up at the gray, cloud-covered sky with unblinking eyes and white, bloodless faces. Smoke from burning bunkers drifted slowly in the still air.