Executive orders - Tom Clancy [253]
You did just fine, van Damm said. The stuff on TV was perfect, and the segment NBC ran with your wife was okay, too.
She didn't like it. She didn't think they used her best line, Ryan reported lightly.
Could have been a lot worse. They didn't ask her about abortion, Arnie thought. To keep that from happening, he'd used up a few large markers with NBC, and made sure that Tom Donner had been treated at least as well as a senator, maybe even a Cabinet member, on the flight the previous day, including a rare taped segment in flight. The following week, Donner would be the first network anchor to have a one-on-one with the President in the upstairs sitting room, and for that there was no agreement on the scope of the questions, meaning that Ryan would have to be briefed for hours to make sure he didn't step on the presidential crank. But for now the chief of staff allowed his President to bask in the afterglow of what had been a pretty good day in the Midwest, whose real mission, aside from getting Ryan out of Washington and so get a feel for what the presidency really was, was to have him look like a President, and further marginalize that bastard Kealty.
The Secret Service people were as upbeat as their President, as they so often drew their mood from POTUS, returning his smiles and nods with spoken greetings of their own: Good morning, Mr. President! repeated by four of them as Ryan passed, finding his way to the Oval Office.
Good morning, Ben, Ryan said cheerily, heading to his desk and falling into the comfortable swivel chair. Tell me how the world looks.
We may have a problem. The PRC navy's putting to sea, the acting National Security Advisor said. The Secret Service had just assigned him a code name, CARD-SHARP.
And? Ryan asked, annoyed that the morning might be spoiled.
And it looks like a major fleet exercise, and they're saying there will be live-fire missile shoots. No reaction from Taipei yet.
They don't have elections or anything coming up, do they? Jack asked.
Goodley shook his head. No, not for another year. The ROC has continued to spend money with the UN, and they're quietly lobbying a lot of countries in case they go through with a request for representation, but nothing remarkable about that, either. Taipei is playing its cards close to the vest, and not making any noise to offend the mainland. Their commercial relationship is stable. In short, we have no explanation for the exercise.
What do we have in the area?
One submarine in the Formosa Strait, keeping an eye on a Chinese SSN.
Carriers?
Nothing closer than the Indian Ocean. Stennis is back in Pearl for engine repairs, along with Enterprise, and they'll be there for a while. The cupboard is still pretty bare. CARDSHARP reminded the President what he had himself said to his President only months before.
What about their army? the President asked next.
Again, nothing new. We have higher-than-usual levels of activity, like the Russians said, but that's been going on for a while.
Ryan leaned back in his chair and contemplated a cup of decaf. He'd found on his speechifying trip that his stomach really did feel better that way, and remarked on it to Cathy, who'd merely smiled and said I told you so! Okay, Ben, speculate.
I talked it over with some China people at State and the Agency, Goodley replied. Maybe their military is making a political move, interior politics, I mean, increasing their readiness state to let the other people on the Beijing Politburo know that they're still around and still matter. Aside from that, anything else is pure speculation, and I'm not supposed to do that here, boss, remember?
And 'don't know' means don't know, doesn't it? It