“What’s the public reaction been?”

“Hundreds of thousands of people taking to the streets in Japan. The prime minister’s trying to calm them down, to tell people all the facts aren’t in yet, but about all that’s accomplished is to get people calling for his resignation. Of course, there are similar riots in China, but to their credit the leadership is trying to crack down on them. The question is whether it’s too little too late.”

He let his head sink into his hands. “I’m ordering two more carrier groups into the area, Fred. The Chinese are backpedaling and Sanetomi is calling for calm, but General Takahashi isn’t. He’s been on Japanese TV five times today with enough fiery rhetoric that I told the CIA to stop sending me translations. I talked personally with the prime minister but he’s completely lost control of the man.”

“Could he ask for the general’s resignation?”

“Not a chance in hell. Beyond being one of the wealthiest men in the world, Takahashi’s also one of the most powerful men in Japan. He’s been with their defense forces for more than forty years, and the leaks about the Chinese being behind the attempt on his life have given him even more credibility. The people trust him and according to our analysts, it’s for good reason. While they all agree that he’s a nationalistic bastard, they also agree that he’s a brilliant nationalistic bastard. After this, he could probably stage a coup and end up with a better approval rating than I’ve got right now. I swear to God I’m starting to wish that explosion had incinerated the son of a bitch.”

Klein frowned.

“What?” Castilla said, eyeing him.

“We’re getting some confusing information about the assassination attempt.”

“Confusing how?”

“We’re confident that Kaito Yoshima was the Chinese operative behind it and that he framed the Japanese Patriotic Front. What’s been leaked from Japan’s intelligence agency, though, relates to hired Eastern European mercenaries and we can’t confirm any of it. The whole story seems to have come out of nowhere. Another in a long list of pieces that just don’t fit.”

“That’s the least of my problems,” Castilla said. “This was bad before but now we’re looking at a potential full-scale war that the US is obligated by treaty to fight in. The secretary of state is on his way to Asia to sit down with both Sanetomi and the president of China. The hope is that we can portray this as a collision or some other kind of accident and that the Chinese will make enough concessions for everyone to save face and step away from the gun.”

“Do you think it’ll work?”