Thunder in the Morning Calm

by Don Brown

  Their daily midafternoon dalliance had started two weeks ago. They would slip into the small sleeping room down the hall, ostensibly on their lunch hour. Sometimes he would return in an hour. Sometimes he would not.

  Everyone knew. Even the colonel’s wife knew, they said.

  The only secret was what Mang Hyo-Sonn didn’t know. When the colonel grew tired of her, and he would, she would be shipped off to another facility — if she was lucky. One of his four mistresses wound up a few miles from the prison with a bullet in her head.

  Pak prayed that Mang Hyo-Sonn would be especially distracting today.

  She walked across the outer office, through another door, and into the office of the colonel-warden himself. More photographs on the wall showed the colonel in Pyongyang. Several showed the colonel standing between the Dear Leader, Kim Jong-il, and his son the madman heir apparent, Kim Jong-un. Others showed Kim’s father, the “Eternal President” of North Korea, Kim Il-sung.

  With a feather brush in hand, Pak dusted the colonel’s desk, then his chair, and then along the inside of the barred windows looking out onto the courtyard. Finally she darted into the small bathroom next to the office and pushed the door closed behind her. After turning on the faucet to muffle the sound, she pulled open the door to the medicine cabinet.

  The colonel normally kept several bottles of aspirin on the bottom shelf. But the bottom shelf was empty.

  She reached up and felt on the second shelf. A razor. Another razor. A bar of soap. “Please, Lord Jesus, help me find something,” she whispered. Her hand moved to the top shelf. She felt two plastic bottles. She took the bottles off the shelf and examined them. Aspirin. Penicillin.

  She heard the sound of boots walking in the outer office. A door closed.

  Cold panic rushed through her body. She had planned to take just a few pills. No chance of that now. She put the aspirin back on the shelf and stashed the penicillin bottle in her pants. She turned off the running water in the sink.

  What could she do? Climb through the window into the courtyard? That is crazy, she thought. One of the guards would see me. Or the colonel would come in here. She muttered a fast prayer, put her hand on the doorknob, turned it, and opened the door.

  “Colonel!”

  He stood there in the office, an angry look on his face. Fear gripped her at the sight of him. She noticed his vein-bulged neck, his drab-green officer’s uniform resplendent with all his medals pinned upon his chest. His look was cold, his glare menacing. “You are still here?” he asked.

  “Yes, Colonel. I was cleaning in your bathroom.”

  “You always clean this late?” He pressed his hand against his forehead.

  “I was just finishing, Colonel.”

  “Very well,” he snapped.

  “I must attend to other duties,” she said. “Please excuse me.” Without awaiting his permission to be excused, she walked past him, past the large desk in the outer office, and out into the hallway.

  Her heart was pounding like a battering ram. She quickened her pace down the long hallway, praying that she would not hear his footsteps behind her. The empty offices along the hallway were closed and dark in this antiquated facility that now had more guards than prisoners.

  A door on her left creaked open.

  Pak saw the young woman in the drab brownish-green North Korean uniform step out into the hallway.

  The colonel’s mistress eyed Pak as she walked by. But Pak ignored Mang and, pretending not to see her, kept looking straight ahead and walked briskly toward the door at the end of the building. A moment later, she pushed open the door. The air temperature had dropped since the morning. Swirls of snow greeted her as she stepped outside. She walked down the four concrete steps, then glanced behind to see if she had been followed.

  Nobody was there.

  Thank God.

  She headed up the hill toward the concrete barracks that housed the prisoners. The front door would be unlocked this time of day. Everyone knew the old men in the barracks could not get through the fence surrounding the compound even if they wanted to.

  Three armed guards in long greenish-brown trench coats stood in a circle about a hundred feet from the barracks, smoking cigarettes and laughing and chatting. A fourth stood a few feet away, smoking on his own.

  She prayed again as she approached the door of the prisoners’ barracks, then she stepped into the barracks and closed the door behind her.

  The old prisoner named Keith was sitting on a wooden chair at the bedside of his sick friend. He was holding a wet towel to his friend’s forehead. The other prisoner, Frank, was lying on his cot, watching Keith sponge Robert’s head.

  “Pak.” Keith stood up.

  “Shhhhhhhhhh! I bring medicine,” she said. She pulled the bottle from her pocket and thrust it into Keith’s hand. “Penicillin.”

  He looked at the bottle. His old eyes gazed into her face. “God bless you, Pak.”

  “I go. I must go.”

  “Thank you,” he said. Then he turned to his friend. “Robert. There’s good news. We’ve got medicine. I need you to try and lean up for a second.”

  Pak started to walk out, but turned and looked back. The sight stopped her in her tracks. Keith was cradling Robert’s head in his arm and, almost like a father cradling a baby son, he was speaking tenderly to his old friend. “Here, open up.” Robert opened his mouth, barely, and when he did, Keith dropped a penicillin tablet onto his tongue. “Hang on, I’ll get you some water.”

  Propping his friend’s head with his left hand, Keith reached for a tin cup half full of water. “Here, drink this.”

  A splash spilled down the side of Robert’s face. Keith poured a little water into his mouth. The old man coughed twice, then swallowed.

  Keith looked at Pak. “Thank you.”

  She stepped back out into the thickening snowfall.

  Now what? Stay and finish cleaning? Perhaps. But, of course, no one would know if she left now. Unless … if the colonel noticed … Her instincts took over. She took a scarf from her pocket and draped it over her shoulders. Through the thickening snow, she walked a straight line across the camp toward the front gate.

  As she approached the gate, two stone-faced guards stood at the entrance. Were they looking for her already? Her breathing quickened.

  The wind whipped up and blew cold snow against her face. The first guard seemed to lock eyes on her.

  Walk straight. Look normal, she told herself.

  “Leaving early today, Pak?”

  “Finished already.” She smiled, nodded, and kept walking.

  The second guard stared at her, then, without saying a word, swung open the gate. She walked straight through and hurried onto the road in front of the prison camp. Across the road, two steel poles rose perhaps ten feet into the air, and five bicycles were chained to them. She reached for her bicycle and felt for the combination lock.

  Her hands shook as she fidgeted with the combination: 14 – 16 …

  “Pak! Halt!” boomed a voice from the guard shack.

  She looked back. One of the guards, his rifle strapped on his back, was marching toward her through the wind and snow.

  The colonel has discovered me, she told herself. They will shoot me for rendering aid to the enemy.

  “Wait!” he ordered, now so close that she could hear his jackboots clicking as he walked. “Something is missing?”

  “I do not know what you are talking about, Sergeant.” She felt herself shaking.

  The sergeant extended his hand and held the scarf out to her. “You walked so fast through the gate that it blew off your shoulder. You did not notice.”

  She reached out to take it, hoping he would not see her panic. “I did not notice. Thank you, Sergeant.”

  “The snow is getting worse. You should go before the road gets too icy.” He nodded at her bicycle. “We will see you tomorrow.”

  “Thank you, Sergeant.” She turned back to the combination lock: … 18 – 27.
<
br />   The lock opened and the chain fell off the post. She unthreaded it from around the wheel, put it in the basket, and pedaled off into the wind and snow.

  CHAPTER 3

  USS Harry S. Truman

  the Yellow Sea

  sixty-five miles west of the North Korean coastline

  The long flight from the East Coast across eleven time zones was the perfect recipe for jetlag. Back out on the carrier on station in the Yellow Sea just off the Korean coast, Gunner was somewhat relieved to be back aboard the ship but still trying to force his body to readjust to the local time. He swigged steaming black coffee as he stepped out onto the sun-drenched observation deck.

  The great ship plowed through rolling waters, and an odd mix of cool and warm breezes whipped off the sea. Scattered white cumulus clouds waltzed across the morning sky, and from them wind whistled over the flight deck and swirled around the ship’s one-hundred-fifty-foot control tower that looked like a giant steel-and-electronic beanstalk.

  The odd breezes grabbed the red-and-white pennant hoisted just under the Stars and Stripes, setting it to flapping and snapping, proclaiming the great ship’s battle cry, “Give ‘em Hell!” — the phrase immortalized by the man for whom the ship had been named.

  Gunner gazed almost hypnotically at the furiously flapping pennant, and his conscience raged within him. Did he really want to risk his career? Perhaps even his life? Maybe start a war? Leaning on the railing high above the flight deck, Gunner squinted against the glare of the morning sun, then slipped on his sunglasses.

  “Lieutenant Commander McCormick to the flag bridge! Lieutenant Commander McCormick to the flag bridge!”

  “That’s my cue,” Gunner said to himself as he checked his watch. He stepped from the observation deck onto the flybridge, which was the highest navigational bridge on the carrier, and then descended two levels, first past the operational bridge, then down to the flag bridge, the admiral’s command post. Rear Admiral James S. Hampton Jr., the highest-ranking officer aboard the Harry S. Truman and the commander of Strike Force Ten, was Gunner’s boss.

  Two Marine guards were posted outside the door of the flag bridge. “They’re waiting for you inside, sir,” one said.

  “Thank you, Staff Sergeant,” Gunner said as the Marine opened the door. Gunner stepped inside and stood at attention. “Lieutenant Commander McCormick reporting as ordered, sir.”

  “At ease, Gunner.” Admiral Hampton was standing with his arms crossed, two silver stars glistening from each collar.

  “Thank you, sir,” Gunner said.

  The other officers on the bridge were all seated. Awaiting his report were Captain Tony Farrow, Hampton’s chief of staff; Captain Charles Harrison, commanding officer of the Harry Truman; Captain Mark “Maverick” Garcia, the carrier air group commander, or CAG; and Lieutenant Jim Porter, the junior intelligence officer and Gunner’s assistant.

  Porter was holding an envelope with the words TOP SECRET in bold red ink. Porter had done what Gunner had told him to do. He had brought with him the papers Gunner had retrieved from Suitland.

  “How was your trip to the States?” Captain Harrison asked.

  “Excellent, Skipper,” Gunner said. “After my briefing at Suitland, I managed to get down to Virginia for a day to spend some time with my mother, who just about hog-tied me to keep me home for Thanksgiving. She isn’t feeling too kindly toward the Navy just now.”

  The admiral chuckled. “I expect not, Gunner. But I understand this briefing couldn’t wait.” The admiral switched to his let’s-get-down-to-business tone. “What do you have for us?”

  “Lieutenant Porter, would you please pass out a packet to each of the officers?”

  “Aye, aye, sir.” Porter began retrieving packets of information from the top-secret envelope and handing them out.

  Gunner waited until the admiral had received his packet, then began his report.

  “Lieutenant Porter is passing out operational packets that I obtained on my trip to Suitland three days ago. As you gentlemen go through the packets, I’ll begin with a summary of our operational orders.

  “The government of South Korea has requested the United States conduct joint naval exercises with the South Korean Navy in the Yellow Sea.

  “This request is made as a result of increasing acts of belligerence on the part of North Korea in recent months. Tensions between the two countries have continued to rise, and as you know, as recently as November 2010, North Korea fired dozens of rounds of naval fire into Yeonpyeong Island in the Yellow Sea near the North Korean coastline.

  “Yeonpyeong lies near the Northern Limit Line, which as you know is the maritime boundary between North and South Korea in the Yellow Sea, set forth by the 1953 armistice agreement, which brought about a cease-fire in that war. The Northern Limit Line extends out into the sea as an extension of the Military Demarcation Line dividing North and South Korea roughly along the 38th parallel.

  “Lieutenant Porter, could you get a chart of this up on the Power-Point?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  A few moments later, a nautical chart of the area flashed up on the screen.

  Northern Limit Line with Yeonpyeong Island

  “Gentlemen, on this chart, which is included in your packet, you can see what I’m talking about. The Northern Limit Line is marked very clearly in the solid dark line. That line marks the extent and the border of North Korea’s maritime claim, as set forth in the 1953 Armistice Agreement, which North Korea signed. Anything outside that is international waters. Starting in the mid-1990s, however, Pyongyang reneged on its agreement and claimed the waters out to the dashed line, which is twelve nautical miles off the coast.

  “If you’ll note from this chart, there are five islands in this disputed zone, from Paengnyong-do in the northwest corner of the chart, all the way to Yeonpyeong to the east.

  “Yeonpyeong, where the attack took place, is only seven and a half miles from the North Korean coast. The armistice agreement specified that those five islands, including Yeonpyeong, would remain under South Korean control.

  “North Korea now claims a border farther south that encompasses all five islands and valuable fishing grounds. In other words, while North Korea has not to date claimed Yeonpyeong or the other islands shown here, it is claiming the waters around them. North Korea’s claim is not accepted in the international community. Not even the Chinese, who are Pyongyang’s principal benefactors, accept it.

  “Of course, lack of support in the international community has never stopped Dear Leader from saber rattling. He has a history of firing missiles on the Fourth of July to defy the United States. He fired a barrage of missiles on July 4, 2006, and then on July 4, 2009, he fired at least seven missiles over Japan, toward Hawaii. Fortunately, those missiles fell harmlessly in the Pacific.

  “On November 23, 2010, North Korea shelled Yeonpyeong Island, and the South fired back. This shelling set buildings ablaze and left dozens of homes damaged. Two South Korean Marines and two civilians were killed. Eighteen others were wounded. All this hit the international news. You may recall seeing images of billowing black smoke coming from the island.”

  “I remember it well,” Captain Harrison said. “Looked like the Korean War was going to reignite.”

  Admiral Hampton added, “I was just finishing my stint as naval attaché to our embassy in Seoul. They extended me another sixty days. We thought the roof was about to blow.”

  “Well, the South Koreans are concerned that the roof may be about to blow again,” Gunner said.

  “How’s that?” Hampton asked.

  “Well, this is the reason they called me back to Suitland, sir. If you gentlemen would have a look at Exhibits 4, 5, and 6 in your packets.” Gunner waited for a moment as the senior officers shuffled through their classified documents.

  “Looks like satellite photos of troop movements,” Captain Farrow said.

  “More like troops massing in a concentrated area,” Hampton said.

&
nbsp; “You are both right,” Gunner said. “These are satellite photos, filmed by US spy satellites, of North Korean army units amassing along the Yellow Sea coastline just a few miles from these islands. North Korea does not maintain a separate marine corps, but it operates two amphibious sniper brigades. These units are a cross between our Marine Corps and our SEAL units, although they cannot match the firepower or training of either our SEALs or our Marines.

  “Still, they could be deadly against South Korea. Their mission is to infiltrate and attack targets such as military bases, ports, and infrastructure, like nuclear power plants and industrial centers. Ordinarily, the North Koreans station one of these brigades on the east coast, to guard the Sea of Japan, and the other on the west coast, guarding the Yellow Sea. But in these photos, both amphibious sniper brigades are stationed in close proximity to one another and are drilling with regular army units.”

  “Hmm,” Captain Harrison mused, flipping back and forth between the satellite photos in his packet. “And I suppose that both these units are amassing along the Yellow Sea with regular army units for a friendly turkey shoot between them with the winner buying the loser a Big Mac.”

  “They’d have to defect to buy a Big Mac,” Admiral Hampton quipped. “And they’d get shot by their own guards if they came within two miles of the DMZ.”

  “You got that right, sir,” Captain Garcia added.

  “Okay, Gunner,” Admiral Hampton said, “what’s the scoop? Let me guess. Suitland thinks, based on these photos, that the Communists may be planning something.”

  “Actually, sir, not just based on these photos. We’ve intercepted encrypted message traffic that the North Koreans are planning an amphibious invasion of the five islands, including Yeonpyeong.”

  No one said a word. The senior officers exchanged glances.

  “That could tip the balance,” Hampton observed.