Even then, China could have straightened it out by investigating and punishing the killers, but they chose not to, and the world reacted—to what they did all by themselves.”
“But what is this all about? Why are they massing troops on the Russian border?”
“It appears that they want what the Russians have, the new oil and gold discoveries. Just as Iraq once invaded Kuwait. It was for oil, for money, really. It was an armed robbery, just like a street thug does, mugging an old lady for her Social Security check, but somehow, for some reason, we sanctify it when it happens at the nation-state level. Well, no more, Bob. The world will no longer tolerate such things. And America will not stand by and watch this happen to our ally. Cicero once said that Rome grew great not through conquest, but rather through defending her allies. A nation acquires respect from acting for things, not against things. You measure people not by what they are against, but by what they are for. America stands for democracy, for the self-determination of people. We stand for freedom. We stand for justice. We’ve told the People’s Republic of China that if they launch a war of aggression, then America will stand with Russia and against the aggressor. We believe in a peaceful world order in which nations compete on the economic battlefield, not with tanks and guns. There’s been enough killing. It’s time for that to stop, and America will be there to make it stop.”
“The world’s policeman?” Holtzman asked. Immediately, the President shook his head.
“Not that, but we will defend our allies, and the Russian Federation is an ally. We stood with the Russian people to stop Hitler. We stand with them again,” Ryan said.
“And again we send our young people off to war?”
“There need be no war, Bob. There is no war today. Neither America nor Russia will start one. That question is in the hands of others. It isn’t hard, it isn’t demanding, for a nation-state to stand its military down. It’s a rare professional soldier who relishes conflict. Certainly no one who’s seen a battlefield will voluntarily rush to see another. But I’ll tell you this: If the PRC launches a war of aggression, and if because of them American lives are placed at risk, then those who make the decision to set loose those dogs are putting their own lives at risk.”
“The Ryan Doctrine?” Holtzman asked.
“Call it anything you want. If it’s acceptable to kill some infantry private for doing what his government tells him, then it’s also acceptable to kill the people who tell the government what to do, the ones who send that poor, dumb private out in harm’s way.”
Oh, shit, Arnie van Damm thought, hovering in the doorway of the Oval Office. Jack, did you have to say that?
“Thank you for your time, Mr. President,” Holtzman said. “When will you address the nation?”
“Tomorrow. God willing, it’ll be to say that the PRC has backed off. I’ll be calling Premier Xu soon to make a personal appeal to him.”
“Good luck.”
We are ready,” Marshal Luo told the others. ”The operation commences early tomorrow morning.”
“What have the Americans done?”
“They’ve sent some aircraft forward, but aircraft do not concern me,” the Defense Minister replied. “They can sting, as a mosquito does, but they cannot do real harm to a man. We will make twenty kilometers the first day, and then fifty per day thereafter—maybe more, depending on how the Russians fight. The Russian Air Force is not even a paper tiger. We can destroy it, or at least push it back out of our way. The Russians are starting to move mechanized troops east on their railroad, but we will pound on their marshaling facility at Chita with our air assets. We can dam them up and stop them to protect our left flank until we move troops in to wall that off completely.”
“You are confident, Marshal?” Zhang asked—rhetorically, of course.
“We’ll have their new gold mine in eight days, and then it’s ten more to the oil,” the marshal predicted, as though describing how long it would take to build a house.
“Then you are ready?”
“Fully,” Luo insisted.
“Expect a call from President Ryan later today,” Foreign Minister Shen warned the premier.
“What will he say?” Xu asked.
“He will give you a personal plea to stop the war from beginning.”
“If he does, what ought I to say?”
“Have your secretary say you are out meeting the people,” Zhang advised. “Don’t talk to the