by David Capps
“Yes, Sir,” Billingsly replied. “We can’t allow them to complete this facility, Sir.”
“Can’t allow is an ambitious term, Admiral. What do you have in mind? Something short of declaring war on China, I hope.”
“There just has to be a way, Sir.”
“Any fault lines near the place?”
“No Sir. I already checked that out. The plateau is solid rock. Honestly, Sir, they couldn’t have picked a better spot for it.”
“Could the Russians be of any help to us with this?”
“Doubtful, Sir, first of all the Russians don’t even have any roads in the area. It’s pretty isolated. Secondly, with the political climate, the Russians would be more likely to help the Chinese rather than us.”
“Had to ask,” the Secretary of Defense replied.
“We could use the weather to at least slow them down, Sir.”
“If they are this aware of the technology, wouldn’t that likely piss ‘em off?”
It probably would, Billingsly thought, but at this point, what have I got to lose? “Don’t know, Sir, but it could buy us some important time to respond to this threat.”
The Secretary of Defense drummed his fingers on his desk. “Use your own judgment, Admiral, but keep me updated on any changes.”
“Yes, Sir.” So far, so good. Billingsly thought.
When he returned to his office he composed an order for the new facility in Alaska, now known as the Active Aural Antenna Array, or A4. The standard working procedure was to have the computer encrypt the message and send it by FAX. Once received, the A4 facility would decrypt and implement the order, then shred and burn the order along with all of the other classified material that went through the place on a daily basis. Just as before, no record would remain of anything that came from the Deputy Director of Covert Operations. Weather modification was used regularly to help cover covert military operations all over the globe. Storms and heavy rain drove people indoors, making it the perfect weather for Special Forces missions.
CHAPTER 13
Beijing, China
Two days later, Guang Xi was running his calculations and working with Junior General Fong. They had settled on a low level mini-nuke that could be adapted for deployment through a torpedo tube.
“How many of these will we need?” Fong asked.
“Thirty-five,” Guang Xi answered. “That places them a little over 18 ¼ miles apart. The timing will be critical, so it will need to be set at the time the mine is deployed to adjust for variations in distance and depth along the fault line.”
“And who is going to do that calculation?”
“I am,” Guang Xi stated.
“You realize that with the level of American technology and their underwater hydrophones, the probability of completing this mission is very low?”
“The Americans ended the life I had when they caused that earthquake. Look at me. I’m disfigured, disabled and alone. The life I had is gone. The only thing I want now is revenge, and nothing will please me more than to bring it to America personally.”
“As you wish,” Fong said with a slight bow. “I will make the arrangements.”
Dr. Huang entered the room. “Dr. Zheng is supervising the construction of the new facility in northern Manchuria. He says it has been raining there every day.”
“The Americans?” Guang Xi asked, looking over at Fong.
“Yes,” Fong answered. “All they can do now is make it rain. If they use anything more than that, we will make sure every country in the world knows that they attacked us without provocation. Politically there is little else they can do.”
Guang Xi turned to Dr. Huang. “Have you found out anything else about Meili?”
Dr. Huang hung his head. “I’m afraid she has moved back to Yantai to be with her family.”
Of course she has. Guang Xi looked at Fong, who simply nodded.
“And what is your plan?” Dr. Huang asked.
“We set the first device here, at the triple junction off the coast of California, which is generally unstable anyway. That will trigger the San Andreas Fault as well as the Cascadia Subduction Fault. Without close inspection, it will look like the San Andreas Fault triggered the Subduction Zone.” Guang Xi explained.
“How long will it take to place the mines?” Dr. Huang asked.
“Silent running speed of the submarine is limited to 8 knots,” Fong said.
“Which leaves us about 68 and a half hours to place all of the mines, and another 3 hours to get out of the zone.” Guang Xi added.
Dr. Huang turned to Fong. “Are there enough of these weapons available?”
“More than enough.”
“And if everything goes as planned?” Dr. Huang asked.
“The subduction zone quake will be somewhere between a 9.0 and a 9.5 magnitude,” Guang Xi stated. “The four major cities of Portland, Oregon, Seattle, and Olympia, Washington and Vancouver, will sustain extensive damage as will more inland cities, such as Eugene, and Salem, Oregon. The tsunami generated will approach 100 feet in height, and will inundate all of the lower lying land and river valleys up to eighty miles inland.”
“The seismic signature?” Dr. Huang inquired.
“Will look completely natural,” Guang Xi replied. “The explosive spikes will be small enough that they will be absorbed into the spreading and expanding subduction zone quake. They will be indistinguishable from natural sticking points and the random release of pent-up energy accumulated over the last 300 years.”
“What effect will the water depth and pressure have on the devices?” Fong asked.
“I’ve taken that into consideration,” Guang Xi said. “The devices, according to Dr. Zheng, operate by the violent compression of Plutonium, generated by shaped charges within a hardened steel shell. The 750 pound per square inch pressure of the water depth will add slightly to the explosive force of the shaped charges, making the compression more efficient, and the yield slightly higher than normal.”
“Radiation?” Dr. Huang questioned.
“At that depth, the detonation will not reach the surface,” Guang Xi replied, “but the uplift from the explosions should add significantly to the height of the tsunami. The radiation will gradually dissipate into the surrounding water over a period of two to four weeks. By the time the Americans recover from the earthquake and the tsunami, all evidence of what we did will be gone.”
“Will the leaders of America know this has been done to them deliberately?” Dr. Huang asked.
“Some will figure it out,” Fong replied. “Those who ordered the earthquake attack on us will realize what we have done. We want them to know. With our new facility in operation, no one will dare to attack us again. This is the whole point of what we are doing – so this will never happen to us again. America will finally have met its superior in the world, and it will change the standing of China forever.”
CHAPTER 14
Dolphin Beach, Oregon
Willa watched as Jason pressed a button on his remote. The video of Dolphin Beach started to shake. Buildings shattered and fell into jagged piles of debris. Nothing remained standing. Willa heard audible gasps from the audience as they reacted much the same way she did when she viewed the presentation privately earlier that morning. Her heart was urging her to tell everybody that what they had just seen was on its way in reality, but her mind held tight to the commitment she had made to keep that knowledge to herself.
Jason paused the video. “I have compressed the time factor to twenty seconds so you will get a feel for what we are facing,” Jason said. “What have you been told to do in case of an earthquake?”
“Duck and cover,” a man from the front row said.
“And that places you inside your building in most cases,” Jason replied. “You know where you live in Dolphin Beach. What does your house look like on the screen?”
Willa’s heart went out to her friends and neighbors in the auditorium as she watched the horror and shock i
n their faces. Willa had lived her whole live in Dolphin Beach and felt devastated at the prospect that it would all be destroyed.
“Duck and cover is an effective strategy for earthquakes in the 6.5 to 8.0 Magnitude range,” Jason said. “Anyone know what magnitude a Subduction Zone earthquake is likely to be?” No one ventured a guess. “Nine point zero or above. That’s ten times bigger than an 8.0 Magnitude and one hundred times bigger than a 7.0 Magnitude. What Dolphin Beach is facing is not a single disaster, but two disasters, back to back.”
Jason walked calmly across the stage. “Just so you will know what to expect, I’ve added sound and slowed the video to normal speed. This is how it will happen.” Jason pressed the button on his remote. Dolphin Beach appeared whole and complete again, viewed from the ocean. The time-lapse appeared in the lower right-hand corner of the video in red numbers, shown in increments of one tenth of a second. The reverberation started from the theater speakers and began increasing in intensity as the quake began. The older buildings fractured and splintered first, then the newer buildings. One by one, each building gave way, disintegrating first into a stack of rubble, then shifting and expanding, filling existing spaces and spilling into the streets. The excruciating cacophony seemed to continue forever as the devastation spread throughout Dolphin Beach. Eventually the cataclysm weakened and stopped. Jason paused the video.
“How many of you have actually been in an earthquake of any size?” he asked. Eight people raised their hands. “How long did the earthquake you were in last?”
“Five to ten seconds,” one lady said.
“Yeah, maybe twenty seconds,” a man said.
“Forty seconds,” another man said.
“That must have been a major earthquake,” Jason said, pointing to the man.
“Yes, it was,” the man replied.
“Because of the length of the Cascadia Subduction Zone, what Dolphin Beach is looking at is a 9.0 earthquake that will last for 4 to 6 minutes. Duck and cover will get you trapped in your house, buried under a ton of debris. Twenty minutes later, this will happen.” Jason pressed the button on his remote. This time a giant tsunami rose from the ocean. The impact swallowed up Dolphin Beach with the giant wave, washing the massive pile of debris up the side of the hill and then back out into the ocean.
“If you are trapped in your house, there will not be time to rescue you. The tsunami will wash you out to sea. Your chance of survival is zero,” Jason said. The audience erupted in conversation. Jason waited for the alarmed voices to calm some before continuing. “The real question is what can we do to improve your chance for survival?” He pushed the button on his remote again. Dolphin Beach appeared whole once more. Then the rattling started followed by the violent tremors. Jason stopped the video at the ten second mark.
“Which buildings are the most damaged?” Jason asked.
“My house,” a man stated sadly.
“How old is your house?” Jason asked.
“Built in 1938, by my grandfather.”
“Okay,” Jason said. “Here’s the rule – the older your house is, the less time you have to get out of it. For older buildings you have less than ten seconds to get out. The ground will be moving – hard. You will not be able to walk. You will have to crawl out. If you are on the second floor you will not be able to use the stairs. You will have to go out a window. Keep a two foot length of steel pipe below each window and a chain ladder in a box. If the window is not yet broken, break the window. Use the pipe to clear the broken glass from the window frame. Hook the chain ladder to the window sill, toss the ladder out and climb down. Whatever it takes, get out of your house.”
“What about single story houses?” a woman asked.
“If it’s an older house, keep a two-foot section of steel pipe under each window. Clear the broken glass and get out. Meet with everyone in your family in the street in front of your house. Don’t try to save anything other than your life. You don’t have time.”
The audience sat in bewildered silence. Willa asked, “What comes next?”
Jason used his remote: The street layout of Dolphin Beach as seen from above appeared on the theater screen. Blue arrows were on the streets pointing the way for evacuation. “Many of the ways you would normally go will be blocked by debris. Don’t get trapped in a dead end. This is the way to safety. I have individual sheets printed out with the new evacuation route marked in blue arrows. The old safety zone was up on Promontory Point, which will probably survive the first tsunami. The new safety zone is up here on the other side of Highway 101. You will have more than one tsunami. Based on the shape of the ocean bottom and the placement of the Subduction Zone, you will probably have four Tsunamis. The first one will not be the largest; the fourth one will be, which can arrive up to two hours after the first one. Once you are in the safety place, stay there. Do not go back into town.”
Willa stood and faced the audience. “I know you have questions; I certainly do. Jason will be here as long as it takes to get all of your questions answered. DVDs will be available at the city offices starting Monday, for free, with Jason’s video on them along with his complete presentation and answers to all of your questions.
Individual questions took up the next two hours as Jason patiently went over and over all of the information with everyone who wanted to know more. When the last person had left, Willa approached Jason. “That was overwhelming,” she said.
“This is nothing compared to actually being in one,” Jason replied.
“Well, at least this is done. Now what?” she asked.
“Now I have a huge request,” Jason replied.
CHAPTER 15
Washington, D.C.
Senator Bechtel sat across from Bob Schwartz in the small coffee shop on H Street.
“What I’ve got are rumors, gossip, innuendos and suspicions. Nothing official,” Bob said.
“I didn’t think there would be anything official, this is Washington, after all.”
Bob smiled and continued, “There’s a connection with the HAARP facility in Gakona, Alaska and several earthquakes around the globe. I’ve had a physicist friend of mine run some calculations. He doesn’t think the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Project in Gakona has enough power to do anything like generate an earthquake. The place is supposed to be civilian in nature, for research only, but it’s funded and jointly run by the Air Force and the Office of Naval Research.”
“The Senate Intelligence Committee has been informed that we have learned everything we need to know from the Gakona operation. It’s being shut down,” she said. She was intrigued by the grin on Bob’s face. “So what aren’t you telling me?”
“Rumor has it there is another facility – new and huge. Eighteen billion in earmarked funds for projects in Alaska didn’t end up where they were supposed to be.”
“Where did the money go?” she asked, unable to suppress a mischievous grin.
“Right now, it looks like it went down the magical rabbit hole and disappeared.”
She glanced around the coffee shop. This wasn’t a smoking gun by any means, but in Washington politics, it was close enough. She dug around in her purse and handed him a card. “This is a friend at the Internal Revenue Service. Let him know you’re doing research for me. That money’s going to show up on major contractor’s tax returns and I want to know who, and what they did for the money.”
“I’ll follow the money,” he replied. “Anything else?”
“Keep digging. If there is a new large facility they’re hiding, there’s more to the story than research. Find out what it is.”
* * *
Senator Bechtel’s office had called the National Reconnaissance Office in Chantilly, Virginia the day before for an appointment. It took 24 hours to get put on the official list of visitors. Even she couldn’t get past the front door without being on the list. An armed guard escorted her to an office, opened the door and motioned for her to enter.
“Where is she?” Becht
el demanded. “I had an appointment with the Director.”
“She’s busy. I’m Brigadier General Sid Beck. To what do we owe the honor of your presence today?” Beck was six-three, broad-shouldered and physically imposing in his uniform as he stood behind his desk. She had seen him on rare occasions when he testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee.
“We are investigating the earthquake in China,” she said. “As you are probably aware, all of our people have been expelled from China. I want to see everything we have.”
The General pushed a button on the intercom. “Send Rod in.” He motioned for her to sit in a chair and said nothing else until Rod Schneider arrived.
Rod spread the satellite photos out on the desk in front of her. “Here is where the fault erupted, along this line. As you can see, the damage was extensive not only to the buildings, but to the infrastructure as well. Here you can see the Chinese Army is still clearing roads. This area has not been reached yet, nor has any relief been provided to the area over here.”
She studied the satellite photos for a few minutes before she spoke. “Do we have any satellite coverage of the actual earthquake?”
“No,” Rod replied. “We didn’t have any assets in position when the quake took place. Sorry.”
You lying little piece of shit, she thought. Of course you had assets in place. She tried her best to suppress the smile that was trying to form on her face. “And who gets to see these photos?”
“The usual agencies – Central Intelligence, National Security, Defense Intelligence, the President,” Rod replied.
“The Senate Intelligence Committee?” she asked, the smile finally breaking forth.
“Sure,” Rod replied. “Just put in a request. I’ll bring them to you personally.”
“Anything new or unusual taking place in China?”
“Like what?” Rod asked.
“Any new movement or activity by their military?”
“There’s a lot of activity because of the earthquake. Is there something in particular you’re concerned about?”