by Van Torrey
President Braxton was no rookie when it came to negotiating with adversaries, but he and his national security team calculated that this was the best chance for a breakthrough the tedious arms negotiations had seen for a long time, and despite the risks of the DPRK reneging on their promises, as they had in the past under the Chong regime, it was time to step up or continue to endure the tedious and unproductive status quo.
Braxton called for his Secretary of Commerce, Adam Kilgore, to join him and his national security team as they deliberated. “Adam, I think we have an opportunity for a win-win situation here, one that would benefit the American economy and the arms negotiations as well. The Chinese tell us the North Koreans desperately need to upgrade their agricultural infrastructure in order to become more self-sustaining. In response to their requests for concessions at the arms talks, I would like to propose sending them a couple of thousand tractors, earth-moving machines, and associated agricultural implements, as well as spare parts and training technicians. In addition, perhaps we could send a few thousand tons of fertilizer, seeds, and irrigation equipment to jump start their planting.”
“That would be wonderful, Mr. President,” replied Kilgore, “but who is going to pay for this? We’re talking maybe sixty-eighty million here, plus the other stuff.”
“This would be a small price for our government to pay to reach detente with the North Koreans on arms issues. And, by the way, Adam, I’m sure you are well aware that Japan or China would jump at the chance to supply this type of equipment as well. Better to get the Koreans hooked on American equipment, plus the follow-on spare parts and service, then to abandon this business to our competitors.” “Of course, sir. This could be a potential new market for us. It’s very exciting.”
“Adam, how about setting up a meeting here in D.C. for executives of the Big-5 equipment manufacturers and we’ll work out something so that everyone gets a piece of the pie? You might also suggest they all hire some people who speak Korean for the associated training and liaison work.”
Not surprisingly, the American offer of a large amount of farm machinery and agricultural supplies, as well as a pledge from all the other parties to the talks to supply North Korea with food and grains for the next several months was an offer General Fhang could not refuse, and their negotiators agreed in principle to an overall framework for a partial settlement. The five other parties would have preferred to get a commitment for at least a start to disarmament by the North, but everyone knew this was a bridge too far at this early stage. “It’s better to have a starting point we can build on than to simply live with these tensions consuming so many resources,” reasoned Braxton.
With a framework put in place over the next several weeks, President Braxton made the decision to seal the deal by personally traveling to Beijing in a show of good faith and to place his seal of approval on the proceedings.
*
Later in the day, Braxton assembled his National Security staff for an in-depth review of the proposal. Finding nothing objectionable, the group advised Braxton to follow up with a positive response. The American response had been pre-packaged and sent by courier to Beijing for delivery to Seth Bainbridge in the event that such a response was deemed appropriate. Since there were other parties to the talks, Bainbridge caucused with his counterparts from Japan and South Korea to brief them on the American proposal. The Russians were only peripherally involved and Bainbridge saw no reason to involve them at this point. Selling a large package of aid to those closest to the Korean nuclear problem, even though the bulk of it would come from the United States, would be difficult enough without allowing the Russians to interfere for the sheer sake of impeding progress.
Diplomatic agreements between nations are seldom based solely on the mutual goodwill of the parties involved. There is always a quid-pro-quo on the private agenda of each party that justifies the endpoint. For Jonathan Braxton this was the dramatic reduction in tensions on the Korean peninsula in which the United States had a significant stake. For Japan, China, and the South Koreans, it was largely the same, but in addition, a sign that the new leader of the DPRK was potentially a person with whom they could all find a common point of agreement in a tense and economically diverse geographic region. Finally, General Fhang, who privately had no intention of living up to the spirit of the agreement, was buying time while hoping to receive another substantial gift of agricultural equipment and supplies so sorely needed to feed his malnourished people.
*
In anticipation of a potential diplomatic breakthrough, President Braxton’s travel plans to Asia had been put in place weeks ago and now all that was necessary was the implementation. Secret Service advance teams were already in place in Tokyo and Beijing. Boeing executives, who had been briefed previously, were placed on standby to implement the contingency plans for Braxton’s trip.
As soon as there was general verbal agreement among the parties to the Arms Reduction Talks to the proposals of the DPRK and subsequent counter-proposals by the United States, President Braxton’s Press Secretary publically announced his trip to the media. Air Force One and the presidential entourage were in Chicago within a week picking up the Boeing executives for the initial leg of their journey.
Gone were the days when Presidential travel was announced weeks in advance. For security reasons, departures and arrivals were now often done on the spur of the moment and at isolated areas of airports or military airfields to prevent demonstrations or breaches of security. After a short stay in Chicago, the presidential party was on the way to Seattle. The next day, after a very well-publicized Boeing assembly plant tour, Air Force One was wheels up for Tokyo.
There had been so little news out of the Asian Arms Negotiations that there was scant media attention paid to them on a day-to-day basis. The plan of President Braxton’s team was to create a leak that some movement in the stalled negotiations might be imminent and to release the leak about the time the President arrived in Tokyo. This would give the world media an opportunity to react to the story and create some commentary concurrent with President Braxton’s arrival in Beijing two days later. In diplomacy, as in most matters, timing was everything.
*
Tokyo was the stepping-off point for the real mission of the presidential journey. True, the final destination of the trip coincided with the location of the ongoing arms negotiations, but the presence of the Boeing executives on the passenger manifest of Air Force One created a legitimate cover for President Braxton’s primary motivation for coming to Beijing. Unlike the old days, when Boeing had a lock on the international commercial passenger jet business, Airbus was a determined competitor with an excellent product aimed at the lucrative Asian-Pacific market. Therefore making this combination diplomatic and private industry promotion to Asia seemed entirely appropriate. The Boeing commercial jet sales promotion cover story was planned as an ancillary activity that would give credence to the White House’s explanation to a probing media that there were multiple goals of Braxton’s international travels.
Commerce Secretary Adam Kilgore was a high-profile member of the president’s entourage on this trip, ostensibly to be part of the Boeing-government team promoting Boeing’s products. Boeing executives didn’t need Kilgore to make their pitch to the Japanese and Chinese executives, but since the government was picking up the tab for a change, in the nuance-laced commercial jetliner sales promotion process, he was essentially the point man used to open the meetings with the Asian airline executives. To his credit Kilgore was a former Wall Street executive who knew his way around the international financial infrastructure and could step in with assurances of cutting governmental bureaucratic red tape if such matters as trade credits and international tariffs became potential barriers to making a deal. He was also a close friend and supporter of Jonathan Braxton.
Kilgore was ambushed in the hotel bar at the Peninsula Tokyo by a CNN White House correspondent two hours after Air Force One made its landing at Haneda Airport. Alex Jamis
on was a conniving digger of a TV journalist going back to his early days with CBS in Atlanta who never met a conspiracy theory he couldn’t embrace with cynical enthusiasm. Kilgore was wary of the gotcha minefield he needed to negotiate with Jamison, but also knew that journalists need a story and he didn’t dodge the reporter even after it had become obvious that he had been drinking.
“Can I buy you a drink, Mr. Secretary? No work until tomorrow and the company’s buying. I’m trying to make a little sense out of this trip.”
“Of course, Alex. I guess for the price of whisky in Tokyo, I can help you with a little background. Can we go somewhere a little quieter in the bar?”
The two men settled in a secluded part of the bar set aside for deal-making businessmen, various amateur and professional conspirators, and Japanese salary men meeting their mistresses. It wouldn’t be a five-star hotel in one of the world’s most cosmopolitan cities without such an amenity.
After the men were served their drinks by a properly demure waitress, Alex Jamison get directly to the point. “Thanks for all the background handouts, but this is my sixteenth trip with Braxton and I don’t need those cheat sheets any more. So tell me, Mr. Secretary, what’s the real deal with this trip? Boeing doesn’t need Braxton to peddle their papers in Asia.” Kilgore decided to try the obvious first. “Ever hear of Airbus, Alex? I see their ads on CNN all the time,” he said lightly.
“Of course, but I wasn’t aware there was a huge deal going down. Aviation Week would have been all over that, and this stuff usually breaks through them. No disrespect, Adam, but you’re usually holding down the fort in D.C. when Braxton is out and about like this. You gonna give me a scoop here?”
“To be honest, Alex, I don’t think anything’s imminent, but the Boeing 787 versus the Airbus A-350 competition gets everyone’s attention. The 787 product can do a lot for our trade deficit, particularly in Asia.”
“Okay, granted, but these old antennae of mine tell me something else is in the wind here. I don’t expect you to violate any confidences - well maybe after another single-malt you would - but that would set me back another forty bucks. I’m not a big believer in spending money on the come, so at least keep me in mind if you’re about to give us all in the media something. You know, first among equals, that sort of thing. It’ll make me look good in Atlanta and my contract is up for renewal soon.”
“Sure thing, Alex. You’ve always treated us fairly.”
“Not that I always wanted to,” replied Jamison, as he lifted his half-empty glass in a toast to Adam Kilgore and winked.
As Kilgore thanked his host and made his way out of the bar Jamison followed him with his eyes and thought to himself, not much there, but Kilgore has always been a cagey SOB. I still think this is not just about selling airplanes.
*
After two days in Tokyo during which the Boeing brass did some entertaining of their Japanese customers and President Braxton and his team did some obligatory fence-mending with the their diplomatic counterparts, Air Force One was outbound for Beijing and a rendezvous with history.
CHAPTER 10
THE UNTHINKABLE
“Distrust and caution are the parents of security.”
Benjamin Franklin
*
The cell phones of Raymond Rollins, Director of National Intelligence, and Christopher Worthy, Director of the Secret Service, went off at precisely zero-seven-twenty-two hours in Washington, D.C., coming from different sources. Within one minute a red crawl with white capital letters began to move across the screen of television network morning shows throughout the United States and Canada. Simultaneously, a dedicated video monitor in the Operations Center at CIA Headquarters in Langley, Virginia, gave off a series of beeping alarms and began displaying flash traffic that had not been heard since March 30, 1981, the day President Reagan had been shot.
REUTERS NEWS FLASH...THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES HAS JUST BEEN SHOT AS HE ATTENDED A DIPLOMATIC RECEPTION AND DINNER IN BEIJING, PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA. HIS CONDITION IS NOT KNOWN. HIS SUSPECTED ASSAILANT HAS BEEN SUBDUED AND IS IN CUSTODY OF THE CHINESE NATIONAL POLICE AND THE U.S. SECRET SERVICE. THE SCENE IN THE GREAT HALL OF THE PEOPLE WHERE THE RECEPTION WAS BEING HELD IS TOTAL CHAOS AND MORE GUNFIRE HAS BEEN HEARD...MORE...
Ten minutes later, simultaneous with a Marine Helicopter landing on the front yard of the majestic house at One Naval Observatory Circle in Washington, D.C., the official residence of the Vice-President of the United States, a convoy of black SUVs filled the driveway leading to the residence. In moments a phalanx of heavily-armed Secret Service agents surrounded the house and three agents made their way through the front door of the residence, barely knocking before entering.
Rachel Hunter was already hearing snippets of news about Jonathan Braxton as she stood in stunned disbelief in her second floor home office watching the TV news feeds, talking on her encrypted satellite phone to the Secret Service, and simultaneously on her personal cell phone with her Chief of Staff. A female Secret Service agent appeared at her office door with the head of her vice-presidential security detail and calmly said, “Madam Vice-President, we need to leave now to take you to the Secure Zone. That’s the protocol we have to follow until we get a clear update on the security situation with the President.”
One of the distasteful aspects of Vice-President Hunter’s security training had been the briefing on the security protocols surrounding any threats having the potential for interrupting presidential action or authority relative to his official duties. This threat against the President was some twelve-thousand miles away, the exact nature of the threat and the ultimate outcome was in doubt. Nevertheless, the protocol was the Vice-President and certain support staff would be taken to a secure location away from Washington to ensure continuity of the executive functions of government if necessary.
For efficiency’s sake, clothing and personal items for Rachel Hunter had been prepositioned at the Secure Zone so there was no reason for delay in leaving her residence. In five minutes she and her security detail were airborne in the Marine helicopter headed for the secret Secure Site in the Virginia Mountains.
Halfway there one of the Secret Service agents handed Rachel a satellite telephone handset and told her, “Ms. Vice-President, the Chief wants to speak with you. It’s secure.”
“Yes, Mr. Worthy,” said Rachel tentatively, thinking that this was definitive news, one way or the other.
“Madam Vice-President, I must inform you that I have received reliable information that President Braxton expired from his wounds just a few moments ago. I have this from the agents who were accompanying his body to a hospital in Beijing. There can be no mistake about this. I have to inform you, after you are sworn in, you will assume the Presidency. I am awaiting your orders, ma’am.”
“My God, Mr. Worthy, this is devastating news! Do we have anything definite about what happened? The news was full of all kinds of wild stories and speculation. CNN said the Chinese were clamping down on outgoing information? We need some answers!”
“Right now our agents are telling us it was a single man with a gun attending the dinner that got close to President Braxton and managed two shots to his left side before being subdued by police and the Secret Service. We’re still working the problem. I’ll have a better work-up when you land at the White House, ma’am.”
A cascade of conflicting thoughts and emotions momentarily rocked Rachel Hunter as she sought desperately to categorize and assign priorities to the packets of information flooding the communications systems in the aircraft and those of her aides that were rapidly becoming like aggressive dragons snapping at her from all sides demanding urgent attention.
Even though the source of information about President Braxton was impeccable, there was a part of her wanting independent verification. Rachel quickly set that aside as being irrational. Move on...we’re dealing with a fact now, not an uncertainty, she thought. Next, where to go now? We can’t just fly around in this helicop
ter...what’s the rational thing to do? Was her immediate assessment. “Agent Jacobs, conference Mr. Worthy, Mr. Rollins, and the SECDEF on the sat phone, please.”
In one minute Rachel Hunter was conferenced in with the Head of the Secret Service, the Director of National Intelligence, and Secretary of Defense Justin Roberts. “Gentlemen, this is the Vice-President in Air Force Two headed for the Secure Zone. Based on what I have just heard, I need to make some decisions. Can you assign a threat level to us domestically?”
Raymond Rollins spoke first, “Ma’am, I believe the threat is confined to President Braxton’s immediate environment in Beijing. As a precaution, Secretary Roberts ordered the readiness in the Continental U.S. to Defcon four, but I doubt this will continue to be necessary.”
Christopher Worthy also spoke up, “I concur, Madam Vice-President. Secret Service sees no unusual domestic threats.”
“Thank you, gentlemen. Given those assessments, I’m turning around and headed back to the White House. Please summon the Chief Justice and as many cabinet members as you can drum up. We’ll allow one common video feed that will go to all the networks for efficiency. I don’t want a chaotic jammed-up media circus, and I don’t want a private LBJ moment either. This will be live and dignified for everyone to see.”
“What about support staff, ma’am?” asked Worthy.