Dynasty

by Elegant, Robert;

  His dark hair threaded with gray and his pouched brown eyes mournful, the big American lounged in the coconut thatch-decorated barroom. Ignoring his colleagues’ chatter in eight languages, he divided his attention between his third prelunch martini and his search for a fresh approach to the over-reported crisis. The green-eyed colonel of the Foreigners’ Police seated at the bar drew only a bored glance; that Nationalist watch-dog constantly patroled the Friends of China Club. The big American rose when a stocky figure in a tan uniform marked by four golden stars entered.

  “General Sekloong,” Miller said, “I hoped to see you here. Your mother asked me to give you her greetings.”

  “Very good of you, Mr. Miller.”

  Thomas Sekloong concealed his irritation at encountering one of the few foreign correspondents he respected. It was necessary to talk to correspondents, since their reports could rally support abroad. He would, however, have preferred to talk with any other correspondent. Miller’s questions probed too deep, and he was, after Chungking, instinctively skeptical of all Nationalist statements.

  “Still around, I see, Mr. Miller,” Thomas added with heavy jocularity. “I thought you’d left us. You must be an Old China Hand by now.”

  “I guess Old China Hands never leave, General. They only fade away—eventually. Maybe we acquire a kind of Chinese toughness and resilience by osmosis.”

  “You grant us those qualities?”

  “Of course, General. Otherwise you Nationalists would’ve given up long ago. You, for one, would certainly be more comfortable in New York or Hong Kong. I admire your optimism. I wish I could share it.”

  “And have you seen the paradise the Communists say they’ve created on the mainland?”

  “Not yet,” Miller grinned. “Not for a while yet. The State Department’s finally said we could go, but Peking’s not having any.”

  “How extraordinary,” Thomas jibed.

  They fenced for half an hour. Miller tried to pry hard information from the Generalissimo’s aide. Thomas was determined to yield nothing, while maintaining outward cordiality. Yet it occurred to him that Miller could prove useful. The Americans wanted to veil the impending major operation, but the Nationalists’ interests would be best served by the fullest publicity.

  “Mr. Miller, may I offer a suggestion?” Thomas asked. “The Helena puts into Keelung tonight and leaves tomorrow. Her voyage could be interesting.”

  Two days later, the U.S.S. Helena, flagship of the U.S. Seventh Fleet, pounded south through the stormy Straits of Taiwan accompanied by two destroyers. When the dawn of September 8, 1958, broke early over the white-crested waves, the crew had been awake for hours, as had Dewey Miller. He had talked himself aboard the heavy cruiser, finally appealing to his old acquaintance, the Commander of the Seventh Fleet. The Captain’s refusal to take the correspondent on board had then been over-ruled by Vice-Admiral Wallace Beakley.

  “He’s here and he knows something’s up,” the Fleet Commander had decided. “Let him sail with us.”

  The small Admiral with the thrusting nose was an amiable host over the martinis prohibited by Navy regulations. Though he would face acutely critical decisions in the morning, he appeared the most relaxed man on the cruiser. Beakley’s chief-of-staff fretted over the operations plan and speculated on the catastrophic repercussions of that plan’s going awry. But the man to whom President Dwight Eisenhower had delegated final authority—and final responsibility—calmly discussed his own expectations with Dewey Miller in his mahogany-paneled quarters.

  “We’re resupplying Quemoy,” Beakley explained. “The Nationalist Navy can’t get through Communist artillery and air attacks, so the garrison’s running short. Helena will stay outside the twelve-mile limit, which we do not recognize. The destroyers will convoy Nationalist landing-craft to the three-mile limit off Quemoy we do recognize. Coincidentally, three miles off Quemoy is just twelve miles from the Communist shore. A simple operation.”

  “Very simple, Admiral,” Miller rejoined. “Just routine, isn’t it? And no back-up force?”

  “Well, a couple of flat-tops are lying off the east coast of Taiwan,” Beakley smiled. “They need sea room. I don’t want them trapped in the narrow Straits if something happens.”

  “Are they carrying nuclear weapons? Will you use them?”

  “Now, Dewey, you know you shouldn’t ask me that. All I can say is this: We have a variety of weapons in our arsenal, and we use those weapons appropriate to the tactical situation.”

  “But it’s a strategic decision, isn’t it?” Miller persisted. “If the Communists attack us and we use nuclear weapons, the Russians could come in.”

  “They could,” Beakley conceded. “Just figure that we’ll use all appropriate force—and no more. Now get out of here and let me get some sleep.”

  Shielded by the Marine sentry at the door of his cabin, Beakley slept well. Few others aboard the Helena did. Dewey Miller prowled the cruiser, chatting with officers and bluejackets until 3:00 A.M. before resorting to his stuffy cabin. He was on the bridge at 5:00 when the jagged hills of Fukien Province reared through the morning mist.

  Helena rolled heavily in a beam wind, and choppy seas tossed her eleven thousand tons. The cruiser maneuvered precisely, guided by the bright green images on her radar screens. Beside her slender length, slab-sided gray attack-transports lowered their landing-craft. When the small craft moved off, knife-prowed destroyers flanked the small convoy butting through the waves toward the smudge on the horizon that was Quemoy. Through his binoculars, Dewey Miller saw the sand-flecked, gray-black explosions of the Communist barrage. The pinnacle of Taiwushan was intermittently silhouetted by air bursts opening a hundred feet above the ground like red chrysanthemums. Water-spouts rose from shells exploding in front of the landing-craft.

  The loudspeaker of the Talk Between Ships circuit squawked metallically: “The landing-craft are in trouble. Seas are too high for them to run at speed. Artillery barrages on the beaches.”

  “Tell them to slow down,” the Admiral directed. “No point in trying to get there so fast they turn turtle.”

  “Landing-craft Three broaching to,” the TBS reported. “She’s going over.”

  “Slow down,” Beakley ordered. “I repeat: Slow down.”

  “Nationalist Combat Air Patrol overhead,” the air-defense officer reported from his post at the high-angle radar. “Thirty-six planes orbiting.”

  “Good,” the Admiral acknowledged. “Though I’d rather have our own planes flying CAP.”

  “Landing-craft two miles from the beach,” squawked the TBS. “Barrage slowing … lifting.”

  “Maybe we’re bluffing them out.” Beakley allowed himself a thin smile.

  “Twelve planes detached from Nationalist CAP,” the air-defense officer reported. “Making southwest toward Swatow.”

  “Tell those idiots to get back here,” the Admiral snapped.

  “No contact, Sir,” the air-defense officer reported after three minutes. “They don’t acknowledge our signals.”

  “The little bastards are looking for trouble,” the chief-of-staff said nervously. “They know damned well they’re supposed to be overhead.”

  “I have an unidentified flight on my radar,” the air-defense officer reported. “Twenty-two … twenty-four … thirty-two unidentified aircraft. Their course is northeast, estimated speed four hundred and fifty knots, range one hundred and sixty miles. They’re on an interception course. ETA twenty minutes.”

  “Tell Midway to fly off two fighter squadrons. They’re to orbit over the Pescadores. Bombers to load weaponry and start engines.”

  Just two hundred and twenty miles away, the 50,000-ton aircraft-carrier Midway was gilded by the morning sunlight reflected from the cliffs of Taiwan’s east coast. The carrier’s steam-catapults hammered, hurling three jet-fighters into the air each minute. Twenty-four silver jets streaked across the mountains of Taiwan toward their rendezvous over the Pescadore Islets, eighty-five m
iles east of Quemoy. They could be overhead in nine minutes if the Admiral ordered them to engage the Communists’ People’s Air Force. Their jet-engines whining, the heavier bombers straddled the flight-deck elevators that lifted light nuclear bombs from the Special Weapons Room deep in Midway’s hold.

  “Nationalist CAP engaging unidentified aircraft,” the air-defense officer reported flat-voiced. “They’re drawing the bandits toward our position, veering off and trailing their coats.”

  “Goddamnit,” the chief-of-staff exploded. “They want … they really want an incident.”

  “Prepare to launch bombers,” Beakley ordered. “Our fighters to orbit ten miles east of our position.”

  “Firing off beach intensifying again,” the TBS said tinnily. “Ranging toward the destroyers.”

  Beakley stared through his binoculars at the sandy splotch of Quemoy, which was obscured by water-spouts. The angular landing-craft tossed in the billows. The escort destroyers paced the invisible barrier of the three-mile limit, their guns elevated to hurl shells over Quemoy at the Communist batteries.

  “Nationalist CAP returning,” the air-defense officer reported. “They’ve knocked down four bandits. The rest are still approaching.”

  “Bring our fighters to five miles,” Beakley snapped.

  “Enemy artillery fire slackening,” the TBS squawked. “Landing-craft approaching the beach.”

  “Unidentified aircraft veering away,” the air-defense officer reported.

  “First landing-craft beaching now,” the TBS rattled.

  “We’ve faced them down,” Beakley exulted, displaying emotion for the first time. “It’s all over.”

  “Second landing-craft on the beach,” the tinny voice of the TBS said.

  “Unidentified flight going off my screen,” the air-defense officer reported.

  The chief-of-staff lifted his gold-encrusted cap from his bald head and mopped his red forehead with a blue handkerchief. A messenger shouldered deferentially through the throng of officers. He gave his clipboard to the Admiral, who flipped through the flimsies and handed the board to Miller without comment.

  PRIORITY COMSEVFLEET PERSONAL. [MILLER READ.] TASS REPORTS SOVIET PREMIER KHRUSHCHEV SAID IN MOSCOW SOVIET UNION WOULD COME TO THE AID OF PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA UNDER TREATY OF MUTUAL DEFENSE IF REPEAT IF CHINA WERE VICTIM OF AGGRESSION REPEAT AGGRESSION. ITEM ENDS GENERALISSIMO CHIANG KAI-SHEK AGREED IN PRINCIPLE WITH SECSTATE DULLES HE WOULD MAKE SOON PUBLIC STATEMENT RENOUNCING USE OF FORCE TO RETAKE MAINLAND. MESSAGE ENDS

  “The second item’s confidential, Dewey,” the Admiral admonished. “But both look good. We didn’t fire a shot, but Khrushchev’s walking away from this mess—and the Gimo’s finally giving us the pledge we wanted.”

  “Would you have used the bomb if they attacked us?” Miller asked.

  “You know, Dewey,” the Admiral replied deliberately, “I don’t really know. But the decision was mine.”

  Careless of Navy regulations, Dewey Miller lifted a silver flask of cognac to his lips. He had, he knew, almost seen the beginning of World War III. Anything could have happened if the Communist warplanes had not withdrawn after Peking was informed that Moscow would not support its assault on Quemoy. However, Chairman Mao Tse-tung had been deprived of the general war he said he wanted, while his ignominious disengagement would do him no good at home.

  The possible long-range consequences of that morning’s work were intriguing. It could prove an epochal turning point. Washington had shackled the hands of the Nationalist Chinese and Moscow the Communist Chinese in order to maintain the precarious balance of world peace. Relations between Washington and Moscow could, therefore, improve markedly.

  Moreover, Peking would reappraise its own strategy after Nikita Khrushchev’s humiliating public repudiation of his commitments to Chairman Mao. American firmness had been demonstrated by the Seventh Fleet’s escorting the Nationalist landing-craft, while American restraint would be demonstrated by compelling the Generalissimo to publicly renounce use of force against the mainland. Peking had, in turn, receded from direct confrontation with the United States by lifting its artillery barrage and withdrawing its warplanes. That morning’s events could in time lead to reconciliation between the People’s Republic of China and the United States of America, which had been vituperatively hostile to each other since the Korean War. But that time was still far distant.

  Although he felt the issue had been decided, Dewey Miller’s editors instructed him to remain on Taiwan while Peking staged a dramatic performance to save face. The Liberation Army bombarded Quemoy for several weeks, dueling with the resupplied Nationalist artillery. But the ammunition laboriously stockpiled for the Fukien Coastal Command’s mixed batteries of captured American and purchased Soviet guns were insufficient for a prolonged siege, even a mock siege. On October 25, 1958, Peking acknowledged the stalemate by announcing that Quemoy would thenceforth be shelled only on alternate days in order “to preserve the lives of our oppressed compatriots and to permit the farmers to finish harvesting their crops.” Despite their resentment at having been forced to renounce the reconquest of the mainland by force, the Nationalists rejoiced at having turned back the gravest Communist threat since 1949. American officers and diplomats oscillated between relief and bewilderment at the Communists’ half-about-turn and finally concluded that they just could not understand the Oriental Mind. Dewey Miller hooted in derision at his countrymen’s failure to comprehend the obvious—and wondered if he were losing contact with the Occidental Mind.

  In Peking, Deputy Chairman Liu Shao-chi, Premier Chou En-lai, and Defense Minister Peng Teh-huai turned their urgent attention from Quemoy to a nation in turmoil. Chairman Mao’s sycophants demanded the Defense Minister’s head in retribution for his failure to take Quemoy, while the Premier’s practical administrators contended that the Chairman must acknowledge the blatant failure of the Great Leap Forward and the Great People’s Communes. The opposing factions were united only in their wrath against the Soviet Union, but neither wanted a public quarrel with Moscow—just yet. Both factions were obsessed with passive resistance in almost every Commune and with violent resistance that verged upon revolt in many Communes.

  Wary of challenging the Chairman directly, the three most powerful men in China prepared for the unavoidable confrontation with the assistance of men who, like James Sekloong, were bound to them by personal loyalty. On the basis of his confidential agents’ information, James drew an ominous conclusion for Chou En-lai’s guidance. The Communist regime was in acute danger because the Chairman had exhausted the people’s faith. An unbridgeable gulf yawned between his visions and the reality his policies had created. The Chinese people were laughing at the government that had so spectacularly failed to attain either its internal or its external goals. Ridicule was breaking the Communists’ power.

  The Premier and Comrade Shao-chi pleaded with the Chairman to halt the rush to disaster. To their remonstrances Mao Tse-tung replied: “Man is a productive animal. He must produce!”

  “Man is also a consuming animal,” Chou En-lai later observed to James Sekloong. “If the people don’t eat, they won’t work.”

  “We must move soon.” James’s advice reflected the Defense Minister’s near despair. “Or we won’t be able to move at all.”

  “Not just yet,” the Premier cautioned. “But soon, very soon.”

  The fearful reality of enfeebled adults, exhausted children, rebellious cadres, mutinous troops, and wasted resources finally prevailed over Mao Tse-tung’s fantasies. Early in December 1958, the Communist Party’s Central Committee met to weigh the dire reports submitted by the Army’s Investigation Teams and by emergency conferences of local officials. The triumvirate finally prevailed, and the Central Committee ordered a halt to the quest after the illusory ideal society.

  Under intense pressure, Mao Tse-tung resigned as Chairman of the People’s Republic. Telephone lines and radio circuits crackled across the great breadth of China to
carry the news to local Party Bureaux. Stunned senior cadres mechanically replaced handsets and haltingly informed their subordinates that Chairman Mao would “thenceforth devote himself to theoretical researches.” The era of the Chairman’s absolute power had ended abruptly.

  Like all Hong Kong, the Sekloongs looked forward to a period of relaxation when on February 22, 1959, the New Year’s Festival saw out the Year of the Dog. Shaken by a new influx of refugees fleeing the Great Leap Forward, the Colony had been tensely apprehensive. Hong Kong’s people had feared for their kindred in China. The authorities had feared the Communists would reinforce their campaign against Quemoy by intensifying pressure on Hong Kong. Though the imagined threat had dissipated by late February, the Colony was still nervous. Tales told by refugees and complaints in letters from the mainland revealed aspects of the People’s Republic even the most ardent Nationalist adherents had not previously discerned—and the state of China governed Hong Kong’s fate.

  “At least there’s nothing they can do for an encore, no new lunacy those nuts in Peking can dream up,” Albert Sekloong remarked breezily to his grandmother. “They’ve shot their bolt.”

  Lady Mary was reluctant to agree. She feared that the illimitable ingenuity of the Chinese leaders, exacerbated by their insatiable passion for intrigue, would impel them to even greater and more destructive fantasies. She was, however, much more concerned with a more immediate and more personal matter. With heavy-footed indirection, Albert had indicated that his friendship with Kazuko Matsuyama, the daughter of the chairman of the Mitsubishi Bank, was no casual flirtation. Lady Mary was too wise to oppose the match as she had vainly opposed Charlotte’s marriage to Manfei Way in another age. She was, nonetheless, deeply troubled by the prospect of Albert’s marrying not merely a Japanese, but a daughter of the Mitsubishi empire that had allied itself with the Wheatleys before the Great War in the Pacific.