China was not a friendly neighbor. It claimed nearly the entire South China Sea and all that lay beneath it. To enforce its claims, China deployed its maritime forces to sail the waters, seizing most any visible rock or reef, onto which it promptly dumped tons of old concrete and debris, transforming maritime features into artificial islands it then fortified and armed. Rock by rock, reef by reef, China was adversely possessing the South China Sea. It was an approach that invited conflict.

Krieger had competition for the waters, too. A Russian, Dmitri Yurchenko. Yurchenko’s paramilitary company was lobbying the Vietnamese to let Russian state oil giant Rosprom drill Vietnam’s oil claims, forcing China to either relinquish its claims to Vietnamese waters or take on Russia. Yurchenko was courting Malaysia with a similar deal, both arrangements bait awaiting a switch. For the right price, Krieger knew, Yurchenko would reverse his arrangements with Vietnam and Malaysia in favor of China. Once Beijing stepped in, Yurchenko’s Amur Tactical Resources would have a direct pipeline to Chinese leadership, and the most valuable military-services contract on earth. Krieger could not allow that, of course.

The Americans had their own interests to protect. The US Navy’s Seventh Fleet was sending destroyers, fighter jets, and surveillance aircraft through waters and airspace claimed by China, reasserting claims of the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, and others while demonstrating its own freedom to navigate the South China Sea—all the while bringing the world closer to war.

Krieger wasn’t ready for war yet. He offered China a businessman’s solution to its growing South China Sea problem.

“Don’t seize islands,” he told Ho. “Buy the far shore.”

Krieger presented Ho with a plan to acquire the region’s strategic ports, bury the ownership, and take control of the entire South China Sea without conflict. They started with Orviston Wharf in Darwin, Australia, a simple purchase in Australia’s forgotten north. For China, buying up foreign ports meant improved access to resources in the South China Sea without increased friction. For Krieger, it meant laying a snare around the world’s most valuable body of water.

•   •   •

His laptop buzzed. Krieger looked down at an image of his daughter, Blaze, in a corner of his screen. She was on board a dive boat, in her bathing suit, scowling. He hit accept. “How are the whale sharks?” he asked.

“They feed them whale shark candy on Cebu,” she said. “It makes them forget to migrate.”

“What’s whale shark candy?” he asked.

“Shrimp.”

“Isn’t that what they eat?”

“That’s not the point and you know it,” she said. “I’m not going back in the water.”

“Stand by.” He muted their conversation and turned to his assistant.

“Donsol,” Mapes said. “We can fly them there in about an hour.”

He returned to Blaze. “Pack up. You’re going to Donsol. They don’t bait them there.”

“Can you still meet us?”

“Before dinner,” he said.