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Chapters (83)
  1. Cover
  2. ALSO BY TOM CLANCY
  3. PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS
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  83. What’s next onyour reading list?

Ryan smiled a little. “When I put it that way, the decision seems clear. It’s worth the risk, given the possible reward, even if it means another long damn airplane ride. Let’s do this.”

“I’ll contact the foreign minister directly and tell him that we’re interested,” Adler said.

“I’ve got a better idea. Arrange for me to speak with President Zhao directly. I want to take the measure of the man myself and show him I’m serious.”

Adler smiled. “That’s an excellent idea, Mr. President.”

Ryan stood, signaling that the meeting was over. The others stood, too. “Thank you all. I’ll be in touch.”

As the others shuffled out, Ryan poured himself another coffee. The Chinese could be handing him an opportunity for sure. But he also knew from boot camp that the bullet you didn’t hear was the one that took your head off.

8

BUILDING 19

PYONGYANG, NORTH KOREA

They met in the underground bunker deep beneath the drab and unassuming five-story granite building on the outskirts of the city, far from the central government district. Nominally it was the subheadquarters of the State Ministry of Fisheries, just another administrative organ in North Korea’s micromanaged, state-owned command economy.

Aboveground, harried black-coated technocrats exerted enormous bureaucratic energies administering the regulations and procedures of the vast ministry, which, unsurprisingly, had very little productive impact on North Korea’s fishing industry. Most of the bureaucrats’ work was designed to justify the generous food ration cards they received, the less cramped public housing they lived in, and the meager but regular salaries their privileged jobs paid them.

What these bureaucrats didn’t realize was that both their work and their lives were meant only as camouflage. Neither the building nor the ministry appeared to have any strategic significance and therefore would hardly qualify for targeting by American or South Korean military planners. But down here, in the nuclear-proof bomb shelter that served as one of the regime’s many secret conference rooms, the truly important business of the state was being conducted. Chairman Choi Ha-guk met with his most trusted civilian and military advisers. He trusted them only because they feared him. The three empty chairs around the long teak table were a grim reminder of the cost of failure.