Gambit

by Karna Small Bodman

  Unfortunately, when India was threatened by a bunch of Islamic militants from the Kashmir area a few months ago, everyone was afraid that the group would attack their capital city So Raj had spirited a copy of her Q-3 software out of the country in the diplomatic pouch of one of the Indian ministers assigned to their DC Embassy.

  The FBI found out about it, arrested Raj, and he was immediately deported. When Cammy had been sent to New Delhi with Hunt right after that incident, she had requested that Raj be allowed to help them with Q-3, and the president reluctantly agreed. The Indian government, now chastised for stealing the program, was anxious to make amends. They sent Raj over to work with Cammy again, and together they had forestalled the attack.

  Now Cammy figured that if she could just get Raj and some of his Indian technicians to come to Taiwan, they could all work together again and get the system up and running. Since she had gotten to know the Indian ambassador when she stayed at his embassy in DC, she had decided to call him and explain the situation.

  He had said he would contact his government immediately to see if they would agree to help Taipei. She knew that India had been at odds with China recently over a whole host of issues from competing for energy contracts to filing complaints about copyright infringement. So she was hoping New Delhi would agree to her proposition.

  On the other hand, she figured that if they did send over a team, and the Chinese found out about it, it might cause some complications. But she didn’t want to think about that possibility. She had to concentrate on deploying Q-3.

  She tried to explain all of this to Jayson who sat staring at her with unconcealed anger.

  What the hell am I going to do with this woman? He thought. First, I think she’s going to save the world with her technological brilliance. Next I’m afraid she’s going to start World War III with her meddling. He tried to get a grip on himself, but he was seething.

  “Cammy. This isn’t the way we conduct our foreign policy. You can’t just make random phone calls asking one nation to come to the aid of another nation. Especially when it’s not your nation! Holy shit, this could blow up in our faces.”

  The vice president took a drink of water and turned to her, barely controlling his temper. “Listen here, young lady, we are enmeshed in a whole host of complicated relationships right now. We need China on our side in dealing with North Korea. In the Mid-East, China and Russia are constantly vetoing our proposals for dealing with Iran and Syria. In South America, it’s China versus us when it comes to Venezuela, and, in a separate challenge, China and India have been having a feud over land and activities in the Himalayas.

  “Then you’ve got China exchanging technology with Pakistan while Russia is befriending India,” Jayson went on in an exasperated tone. “We’re trying to keep Pakistan on our side in the war on terror while we sell military hardware to their arch rival, India. And in the middle of this mess, you’ve got Taiwan trying to become independent. Jesus Christ, Cam, we’re involved in so many balancing acts I feel like a flying Wallenda while you’re out there dropping the net.”

  Cammy leaned forward in her chair, undaunted, and pressed on. “But look, maybe this could work. I simply reminded the Indian ambassador about how our president had agreed a few months ago that Raj could help our team in New Delhi. And that was after we knew he was acting as a foreign agent and after we had deported him. He helped us once. Why couldn’t he help us again? Besides, the Indians are geniuses when it comes to computer software, and I knew they could handle Q-3 in a heartbeat. They’ve had it for a couple of months, so undoubtedly they’re all experts by now. Besides, what would be wrong if India offered some help to Taiwan? We wouldn’t even be involved.”

  “But Q-3 is an American system, or had you forgotten?” Jay said with a wave of his hand. “And one other thing. A big thing. Since we put you into the Indian Embassy for protection, and since this little venture of your going to Taiwan is sanctioned by the White House, the ambassador probably thinks we’re using you as a back channel.”

  “A back channel?” she asked, looking somewhat bewildered.

  “Unofficial contact.”

  “Well it was.”

  “Not the right kind. Jesus! I’ve got to think about this.”

  He was silent for a long moment while Cammy sat still and wondered what she should do next. Okay, so maybe she over-stepped her bounds by making that phone call. But she was on a tight time-table now. And she could use all the help she could get. She looked over at Jayson who was sitting there, his arms folded, staring up at the ceiling.

  Finally, Jay gave an audible sign and said, “I’m really afraid this whole cockamamie idea of yours could cause an international incident.”

  “But we don’t know whether the Indian government did in fact contact Taiwan,” Cammy said. “And we don’t know whether they offered to send Raj or any of their other technicians. And even if they did make the offer, we don’t know if anyone else knows about it.” Cammy sat up straighter. “And if New Delhi does want to help, couldn’t we ask them to keep it quiet? I mean, just make it a secret trip of a small delegation? Don’t countries do that all the time?”

  Jayson eyed her and wondered again how she could be such a brilliant scientist and such an impossible meddler all at the same time. He checked his watch and figured out that it was already the middle of the night in Washington. He had to talk to the president, but he’d better wait a few hours. In the meantime, what the hell was he going to do with this exasperating woman? The more he thought about it, the madder he got. How in the world was he going to dig out of this mess? He looked at Cammy again and when he saw what looked like a smug expression on her face, he bolted up from his chair and stormed out of the cabin.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  TAIPEI, TAIWAN

  The city was amazing. As Air Force Two came in for a landing, Cammy pressed her nose against the window to take in the sight of a huge city situated in a basin with two rivers running through it.

  She spotted a towering building the color of an aquamarine spiraling above everything else against a backdrop of the nearby mountains and figured it must be “Taipei 101,” one of the tallest buildings in the world.

  She knew that Taipei was a busy city of some three million people, but she wasn’t prepared for the panorama below. Hundreds of impressive structures were spread out before her eyes. Many were white. Some were the color of sandstone and several had roofs that looked like the skin of a tangerine. Wide boulevards were punctuated with rows of trees. There were also large bands of forests throughout the city.

  The place was quite green, gigantic and gorgeous. As she thought about it, she mused about Melanie who often asked her if she wanted to write press releases filled with her alliterations. She wondered how Mel was doing with Derek Winters and whether there had been any more fallout from his noisy hearings. She’d been so busy at Travis that she hadn’t had time to check the news very often. If she got a break here, maybe she could make a quick call to her best friend and get an update. She wanted more details than she could glean from an exchange of texts.

  Cammy hadn’t spent much time with the vice president after his outburst. She had gone out and sat down where the crew was gathered so she could have dinner with them. Jay had gone back to his lounge, and he’d basically ignored her for the rest of the trip.

  She knew she’d screwed up by contacting the Indian ambassador and asking for Raj Singh’s help. But after the crash at Travis, she was desperate to find extra advisers to set up the Q-3 system, and it did seem like a rather creative idea. Now, she wasn’t going to dwell on it. As for Jay, she hoped that after he thought about how she was only trying to help Taiwan, he’d get over it.

  When the plane came in for a smooth landing, the vice president, surrounded by his group of Secret Service agents, got off first. They were greeted by a line of diplomats and military brass. He was then whisked off in a long motorcade. She watched the scene out the window. Seeing the line of highly polishe
d cars, she thought to herself that it looked like a Mercedes dealership out there.

  She gathered her carry-on luggage, her laptop and shoulder bag and went down another stairway toward the back. She had her own welcoming party made up of several military officers and a couple of people from the American Institute in Taiwan, diplo-speak for a huge office that does everything an embassy does, but since the United States has to play the balancing game with China, they give it another name.

  A colonel from the office of National Defense stepped forward to shake her hand. “Dr. Talbot. Welcome to Taiwan. We are honored by your visit and grateful that you would come to help us in the deployment of your amazing missile defense system.”

  Cammy took his hand, gave a slight bow and smiled. “I’m glad I can be of service. At least I hope I can be. There will be more team members from Bandaq arriving tomorrow with all of the equipment, but I’m looking forward to seeing your set-up here and getting to know your engineers and technicians.”

  “But, of course. I have arranged for you to come with us to Defense headquarters where you will meet our entire staff. Then we will go to the site where your Q-3 systems will be deployed.”

  He glanced down at her luggage and asked, “Did you have a good flight? Were you able to get any rest? We can delay our meeting if you would rather go immediately to your hotel.”

  “No, I’m fine,” Cammy said, pushing some strands of hair back behind her headband. “I can rest later. Now, I’d like to get started. I hear that we may not have a lot of time.”

  The colonel frowned. “I pray that isn’t so. However, everyone knows that the military exercises are proceeding on schedule, and we feel we must be ready for any eventuality.” He pointed to a number of cars parked near by. “We have already taken care of the immigration papers, so if you will please follow me, we will be on our way.”

  “Raj! You’re here,” Cammy exclaimed as she walked into a conference room. A tall, thin man with hair the color of mahogany jumped up from the table and rushed to greet her.

  “Yes. When we heard you needed help here, we put a team together and flew over as quickly as we could.”

  “We?”

  “I mean our minister of defense and others high up in government circles in New Delhi. They called me in, and we all decided that I should come.”

  “Thank goodness,” Cammy said, though she wondered if Jay knew about this. “Uh, was there any controversy about your coming?”

  Raj gave her a broad smile. “Let’s just say we didn’t issue any press statements.”

  “Good move.”

  They all worked together for several hours going over the basic elements of the satellite and radar systems and the software programs Cammy had developed.

  During a break for lunch, Cammy noticed a young Chinese man in what looked like an airman’s uniform, wheeling in a cart with coffee, tea and dessert cakes. He took quite a bit of time clearing the dishes and straightening things up and then went around the table to take orders for coffee or tea.

  During this process, the colonel asked Cammy, “How long will you be able to stay with us?”

  “It all depends on when Jay … uh … Vice President Keller is finished with his mission to Japan.”

  “Ah yes, we know that is where he went after greeting our president. You have no idea how pleased we are that your vice president would go to Japan to put together a mutual defense pact. This means a great deal to us.”

  “Yes, I know,” she said. “I hope it works out because Japan is so much closer than my country’s forces could be in case China made a move.”

  “Of course we realize you are moving two of your carriers closer to the Straits, and that is a good thing. But they won’t be able to stop missiles should there be an attack. On the other hand, we were notified about the additional deployment of two of your Navy vessels equipped with the Aegis missile defense system that will be arriving bit later. I can’t tell you how much their presence in the area gives us additional confidence that any attack could be repelled. One by cruise missiles, at least. But back to the vice president’s travel, you say that you can stay until Vice President Keller has achieved his goal in Japan?”

  “Yes,” Cammy said. “You see, when I’m finished working with the technicians here, he will pick me up, and we’ll head back to the States.” She stopped and glanced nervously around the table. “But my travel plans are not to be publicized. Will you please keep my itinerary just within this room?”

  They all nodded, and the colonel added, “We all know too well that the first cargo plane carrying your Bandaq colleagues was attacked. Please be assured that we will do everything in our power to be certain that no one knows of your visit here, nor your return plans. You can count on us.”

  Cammy smiled at the colonel. “You see, I can only stay here a few days to help set up. But with Raj Singh here and the other Bandaq engineers arriving tomorrow, you’ll have plenty of tech support. I have to get back to California pretty soon because I still have a lot of work to do there on my other project.”

  The young airman was just to Cammy’s right. He leaned down as she finished talking and asked what she would like to drink with dessert. Cammy whispered that a cup of coffee would be fine. He nodded and moved back to his cart to pour it for her.

  “And is your other project the one to protect your airliners from further attack?” the colonel asked. “We read about that.”

  “Yes. I guess everyone knows about that now,” Cammy said, accepting the coffee and adding some cream and sugar. “We have high hopes that our new system will be effective against any type of missile that the terrorists are using.”

  “That would indeed be a blessing,” the colonel said. “But you still don’t know who is shooting down the planes, is that correct?”

  Cammy sighed, “Not yet. No group has come forward, our markets are down again, nobody wants to travel and, well, you’ve read the headlines, I’m sure.”

  “Yes, we are used to bad news here as well. I suppose you saw that once again the People’s Republic has managed to keep us from joining the United Nations. They’ve done it over a dozen times now. They just keep appointing committees to study the issue.”

  “But that’s ridiculous,” Cammy replied. “You’ve got, what, twenty or thirty million people on this island, don’t you? And your products are sold all over the world.”

  “Correct. And when you consider that we have a population larger than sixty percent of the U.N. member states, you can see how frustrating it is to be stymied at each and every turn by the Central Committee on the mainland.”

  “Has China ever controlled Taiwan?”

  “Not since we were founded in 1949. And yet they want to treat us like you treat Hawaii. A distant state, but nevertheless a part of the mainland.”

  “But Hawaii asked to be admitted to the United States. You want to be on your own because you’re totally different,” Cammy said.

  “Ah yes. We are a democracy. We have regular elections, free speech, freedom of religion. All the things that your own country has. And yet we are not allowed to join the United Nations. But Nauru is a member.”

  “Nauru?” Cammy asked.

  “It’s basically a rock in Micronesia. But you see what I’m trying to say here.”

  “I most certainly do.” Cammy glanced at her watch. “Colonel, I have another question for you.”

  “Yes?”

  “Since we’ve gone over the materials on Q-3, and since we can’t do much more until the cargo plane arrives tomorrow, I wonder if you would let me go see the system that Sterling Dynamics sent over here?”

  “The one that doesn’t work?” the colonel asked.

  “Yes. I wanted to see if Raj and I could have a look at it. Maybe we could figure out what went wrong.” Cammy didn’t have any idea what was wrong with Sterling’s system. And she didn’t want to save that company from financial ruin. In fact, she had done everything in her power to compete with them ever since she h
ad taken the job with Bandaq. But here she was in a country that was facing a possible attack, and they needed every possible arrow in their quiver right now.

  The colonel looked around the table at the other officers. Some were shaking their heads. Others were avoiding his stare altogether. “I don’t know. I’m sure there are proprietary considerations. After all, that system belongs to a different company and their patents …”

  “I’m not trying to steal a patent, sir. I just want to see if we might be able to make it work. I can see that we’re all under tremendous pressure, and since Sterling doesn’t have any engineers over here, I just thought that we might be able to help. That’s all. Besides, my system is a defense against cruise missiles. Sterling’s is a defense against ballistic missiles, and China has both. Not that they would use them … but still …”

  The colonel sat back in his chair and rubbed his chin. He was silent for several moments. Finally he said, “You are right about the pressure, and you are right about Sterling not having any of their people here. So I don’t see why we couldn’t show you the system. It is still set up at the missile defense site where Q-3 will be deployed. It is right along the coast. If there is any way you could figure out what went wrong during the test phase, I’m sure that Sterling would be grateful. In fact, my entire government would be grateful.”

  Cammy gathered her things and pushed back from the table. “Then let’s go.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

  NORTH OF GUANGZHOU

  “Look at this!” Colonel Tsao exclaimed, shoving a print-out into his boss’s hand. The general was seated at the long folding table in the hangar, going over maps and plans for a barrage of missile strikes followed by an amphibious landing at the end of the military exercises.