Debt Of Honor by Clancy, Tom

preciated the irony in the fact that Gant had it almost exactly right. He

himself could hardly have done it better. “Bottom line, it’s a major hiccup,

but no more than that.”

“Europe?” Ryan asked.

“It’ll be rougher over there because they’re not as well organized, but

their central banks have somewhat more power,” Gant said. “Their govern-

ments can also interfere more in the marketplace. That’s both a help and a

hurt. But the end result is going to be the same. It has to be, unless everyone

signs on to the same suicide pact. People in our business don’t do that.”

Fiedler’s turn: “How do we sell it?”

‘ ‘We get the heads of the major institutions together just as fast as we

can,” Winston replied. “I can help if you want. They listen to me, too.”

“Jack?” the President asked with a turn of the head.

“Yes, sir. And we do it right away.”

Roger Durling gave it a few more seconds of thought before turning to the

Secret Service agent next to his desk. “Tell the Marines to get my chopper

over here. Tell the Air Force to get something warmed up for New York.”

Winston demurred. “Mr. President, I have my own.”

Ryan took that one. “George, the Air Force guys are better. Trust me.”

Durling rose and shook hands all around before the Secret Service agents

conducted the others downstairs and out onto the South Lawn to await the

helicopter flight to Andrews. Ryan stayed put.

“Will it really work? Can we really fix it that easily?” The politician in

Roger Durling distrusted magic fixes to anything. Ryan saw the doubts and

framed his answer appropriately.

“It ought to. They need something up there, and they will surely want it to

work. The crucial element is that they have to know that the takedown was a

deliberate act. That makes it artificial, and if they believe that it was artifi-

cial, then it’s easier for everyone to accept an irregular fix to it.”

“I guess we’ll see.” Durling paused. “Now what does that tell us about

Japan?”

‘ ‘It tells us that their government isn’t the prime moving force behind this.

That’s good news and bad news. The good news is that the effort will be

poorly organized at some levels, that the Japanese people are disconnected

from the effort, and that there may be elements in their government very

uncomfortable with the undertaking.”

“The bad news?” the President asked.

“We still don’t know what their overall objective is. The government is

evidently doing what it’s told. It has a solid strategic position in WestPac,

and we still don’t know what to do about it. Most important of all-”

“The nukes.” Durling nodded. “That’s their trump. We’ve never been at

war against someone with nuclear arms, have we?”

“No, sir. That’s a new one, too.”

The next transmission from Clark and Chavez went out just after midnight

Tokyo time. This time Ding had drafted the article. John had run out of inter-

esting things to say about Japan. Chavez, being younger, did an article that

was lighter, about young people and their attitudes. It was |iisi il«- » in

write coherently at George Mason University.

“Northern Resource Area?” John asked, typing the i|iiesiiuii mi ilx M/ «•,!»».•

Indonesia, belonged to the Dutch back then, wan tin- Snuiheni Hi I,.M»,C

Area when they kicked off Big Mistake No. 2. Can- to i;m-\\ »li,n tin \,»ih

ern one was?

Clark just took one look and pushed the computer hack \ «> *a»

18:08 in Moscow and 10:08 both at Langley and in the White lluuu-, HIM!

Jack was just reentering his office after his time at the opposite I.MIM-I ••( thr

West Wing when his STU-6 started warbling.

“Yeah.”

“Ed here. We just got something important from our (H-ople in «unii>

The fax is coming over now. A copy’s on the way to Sergcy. too

“Okay, standing by.” Ryan flipped the proper switch and he .ml ilw la*

simile printer start to turn out its copy.

Winston wasn’t all that easy a man to impress. The VC-2 version l ihr

Gulfstream-III business jet, he saw, was as nicely appointed as Ins |H-I»OHU|

aircraft-the seats and carpet were not as plush, but the commuim iiimnn

gear was fabulous . . . even enough to make a real techno-wceme like Mark

happy, he thought. The two older men took the chance to catch up mi *lccp

while he observed the Air Force crewmen run through their pix-fli^ht i hei k

list. It really wasn’t at all different from what his crewmen did, hul K van luul

been right. It somehow made a difference to see military-type insignia