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    The Peking Incident
    The Peking Incident
    The Peking Incident
    Ebook1,505 pages23 hours

    The Peking Incident

    By Philip Bosshardt

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    In the fall of 1950, American troops faced disaster in Korea. Chinese forces have entered the war; the Allied Powers are in danger of being pushed off the Korean peninsula. MacArthur is furious with Washington’s strict rules of engagement and wants to extend the conflict into China, even Russia. The Supreme Commander approves a clandestine effort to divert five atom bombs intended for a Pacific test into the war theater, to threaten and ultimately break the Chinese juggernaut. One man, Army investigator Major Lyle Kitchens, discovers what is planned. Only Kitchens can stop the plot...but time is running out, world war looms and his greatest adversary isn’t the Chinese.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPhilip Bosshardt
    Release dateAug 26, 2014
    ISBN9781311644282
    The Peking Incident
    Author

    Philip Bosshardt

    Philip Bosshardt is a native of Atlanta, Georgia. He works for a large company that makes products everyone uses...just check out the drinks aisle at your grocery store. He’s been happily married for over 20 years. He’s also a Georgia Tech graduate in Industrial Engineering. He loves water sports in any form and swims 3-4 miles a week in anything resembling water. He and his wife have no children. They do, however, have one terribly spoiled Keeshond dog named Kelsey.For details on his series Tales of the Quantum Corps, visit his blog at qcorpstimes.blogspot.com or his website at http://philbosshardt.wix.com/philip-bosshardt.

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      The Peking Incident - Philip Bosshardt

      PROLOGUE

      Wednesday, November 1, 1950

      4:30 a.m.

      Six miles southeast of Unsan, North Korea

      The frozen ground shook with a thump as the mortar round plowed into a snow bank behind Delaney's head. When the rain of dirt, snow and rock had ended, he lifted his head cautiously, squinting into the dark night, trying to focus on something moving, anything, but there was nothing. He heard grunting in the distance--a shadowy form, then a deafening roar from Lieutenant Camille's M-1 right behind his left ear. Something fell heavily in the bush just ahead--they both heard it--and groaned.

      Jesus Friggin' Christ! Delaney muttered. The damn chinks were almost on top of them again. He hoisted his own M-1 up and propped the muzzle on a rotted out log, squeezing off several rounds. The clip was empty. Delaney angrily ripped it out and snagged another 8-round clip from his belt and rammed it into the slot. But it jammed--shit! second time tonight--He tossed the rifle away and motioned Camille up and back.

      Fall back, fall back! he yelled and the snow banks erupted into life as the survivors of Bravo Two Eight scurried off the hilltop and melted away.

      Camille?

      Sir?

      They humped it down the back slope of Hill 229, six miles below Unsan in the midst of a swirling blizzard and crashed stumbling through a narrow ravine before stopping for breath.

      Find Malone. I need that radio--pronto!

      Lieutenant Curtis Camille had been a platoon leader in Bravo Company, 8th Regiment of the First Cav only two hours before. But Third Platoon was gone now, the entire force killed or captured as wave after wave of Chicom infantry had overrun them on Bravo's left flank.

      We've gotta raise Bravo Five…get some mortar fire up on that hill. Jesus, the place's crawling with chinks.

      Malone's dead, sir. Reeves has the radio. .He was right--

      They hit the ground hard as the ravine was nicely bracketed by quadruple mortar round explosions, the force of the blasts gouging up seams of rock, dirt, tree limbs and a geyser of snow.

      Fuckin' 53s! Camille cautiously lifted his head, brushing snow from his eyes. A roaring in his left ear was soothed by a trickle of warm fluid--blood, he realized, streaming down the side of his face.

      Reeves was right behind me, sir! Camille yelled. Delaney crawled through the snow to what was left of the radioman. They found him half buried, his face blown away by the blast. The smashed remnants of the squad radio were scattered around in bits of glass, metal and wire.

      Delaney tried to think. Bravo Five's been overrun, most likely. That means we got no mortar support now.

      Camille nodded vigorously. And the ROKs already bugged out--I saw several platoons of them running like rabbits through that gully over there, not half an hour ago.

      Delaney slammed a fist into the snow. Jesus Christ, it was cold tonight. We're exposed as hell up here. I don't care what Regiment says--we gotta pull back now.

      They both ducked as a click and a whistle passed by scant yards overhead. The next barrage of rounds peppered the back slope of the ravine. The concussion knocked over a big tree, which cracked at the base of its trunk and came crashing, thudding down into the snow.

      The command post? Camille asked.

      Yeah. You go that way, round up any stragglers. Assemble at the hut in twenty minutes.

      Yes, sir. You need a weapon, sir.

      Delaney indicated the half-buried corpse of the radioman. I'll use Reeves'. Go, man, go!

      Camille scampered off, dodging small-arms fire as he scurried down the meandering gully. Delaney cringed at the sound--Chicom infantry with burp guns were crawling all over these hills. Scores of them, maybe hundreds. And if he didn't gather what was left of Bravo Two-Eight and get the hell out of Dodge fast, they'd soon be surrounded and cut off.

      Delaney didn't particularly relish the thought of spending Thanksgiving in a Red POW camp, or worse.

      He did a little reconnoitering himself as he angled his way up the next slope, toward the mud and thatch hut that served as company command post. Cautiously, he scrambled and squatted, listening, squinting, occasionally whispering as loud as he dared: Bravo Two-Eight, anybody there? Bravo Two-Eight, fall back! Fall back to the hut--

      And each time, his whispered entreaties were answered the same way. Staccato burp gun fire opened up--Chinese Type 51, 7.62-millimeter rounds slicing through the brush, spraying snow all around him. Delaney bit his lip…the Red bastards were everywhere. Two-Eight had simply disintegrated under the assault.

      Ten minutes later, Delaney had made the crude hut and ran right into a firefight. Outside the south perimeter marker--a teepee of ration cans strung together--he heard twigs snap and turned, just as a squad of Red infantrymen opened up from a ridgeline overhead. Delaney fell hard--his arm was on fire--several rounds had hit. He rolled over, trying to get his good arm free to squeeze off a few rounds of his own but the Chicoms were on him. He looked up wide-eyed as a bayonet flashed through the night but the Red never completed his lunge. Someone--it turned out to be Corporal Betters, one of Camille's men--had dropped him with a well-timed burst from the hut.

      For the next five minutes, in a driving blizzard, Reds and GIs dueled hand to hand, a rumble in the snow that had Delaney twisting and turning to keep from being bayoneted. He scrambled to his feet and pushed off a chink who had just been shot, dumping the body behind him. Another Red was six feet away, kneeling, just hoisting his carbine to fire but Delaney finished him with a neat burst to the forehead. The chink's head exploded like a watermelon and he crumpled.

      Get the hell outta here! Delaney yelled. How Able and I mean right now! Betters and Camille didn't have to be told twice. The three scampered away from the hut, as Delaney lit the thatch siding with a cigarette lighter. Flames licked up the siding and roof in seconds, lending momentary warmth to the air. Delaney peeled off to catch up with the others, hoping the fire would gut the command post and destroy anything useful before the Reds came back in platoon strength. There were maps inside and regimental orders, along with boxes of ammo and some frozen C-rations. But Delaney wasn't worried about any of that.

      They just had to get the hell off that mountaintop before it was too late.

      No John Wayne stands for this boy tonight, he thought, as he hustled to keep up with what was left of Two Eight.

      The Red Chinese had hit them hard, no doubt about it. Battalion strength, maybe more, Delaney figured, and the bastards had just materialized out of nowhere, rising like ghostly wraiths in the nighttime blizzard, covered in mustard-yellow quilted jackets, canvas shoes, a dull red star on their fur caps. For the past hour, Delaney had been trying to organize an orderly retreat, a pullback south southwest from Unsan, to consolidate with the rest of the First Cav. Those were the last orders Major Towns had given him, now several hours old. Was Towns even still alive? The whole company had gotten scattered in the Red assault and pinned down. Many units had been shredded and overrun. It was already nearly daylight and the men of Two Eight were cold, hungry, exhausted and frightened. More than one squad had simply thrown down their weapons and melted away southward, back along the narrow mountain passes.

      Delaney and his men spent the next hour reconnoitering the area, gathering up stragglers, trying to restore order to the withdrawal. After Delaney had torched the hut, they set out along the lower slopes of a barren, snowy ridgeline, darting from tree stump to boulder, trying to avoid Chicom fire. Chink infantry had infested all the hills in Two-Eight's sector like ants and they swarmed to the attack that way too, whistles and bugles and horns blowing like some mad symphony.

      They trekked on through pitch black lit with occasional flares--light snow was still swirling on a stiff Siberian wind--thumps of mortars still going off somewhere to the west. Delaney swore under his breath. Fuckin' idiots in Tokyo. He'd been skeptical from the beginning about MacArthur's orders: Roll north, boys, the Supreme Commander had intoned. All the way to the Yalu River. And the latest promise--Jesus!--our boys'll finish off the enemy this fall and be home for Christmas.

      Delaney wanted to puke. Three fourths of Bravo Two-Eight was never coming home.

      He had a general idea that he and Camille and Betters should head south-southwest. A few miles up the road from the town of Unsan was a small farm. Towns and the Battalion staff were there--if they hadn't already bugged out south. But two miles north of the farm, at a bend in the ridgeline, they ran into trouble.

      Camille went down first, mortally wounded in the face. Delaney did what he could for the boy. The young lieutenant's left cheek was shattered and his ear half shot off. Delaney used half-frozen oil rags from his sack to make a quick field dressing but the kid was losing blood too fast. Bullets whined overhead as Betters emptied clip after clip at the Reds not thirty yards in front of them. Finally, Delaney had to give up. He motioned to Betters.

      Let's try to flank 'em uphill.

      The two of them broke off the engagement and stumbled up icy and rocky ground, trying to keep the low scrubby bushes for what little cover there was. Only the blackness of the night kept them from being picked off. But they made the top of the ridge, amazingly enough. Delaney could hear motion below them--Reds were inching their way toward Camille's position.

      A few sharp guttural commands broke the quiet, then he heard the shots and knew Camille was gone.

      At least he didn't suffer long.

      Sick to his stomach, Delaney pressed on toward the winding frozen dirt lane that led to the farmhouse. He had an idea, if they could make the CP before the main Red force overran it.

      Battalion had a small issue of signaling flares--colored flares for tactical use. If he could get in quick, he could light off three red flares in quick succession, followed by three blue ones. If anyone from Third Battalion was still left in the surrounding hills, they'd recognize the pattern from maneuvers last spring--Fall back to the MSR (Main Supply Route). That way, there'd be at least a chance of regrouping and conducting some kind of orderly withdrawal.

      Delaney and Betters scrambled down the icy slope of the hill, crabbing sideways through broken rock and knee deep snow drifts. Somewhere behind them, they heard a welcome sound as the deep bass Booms! of 105s going off reverberated around the hills. First Cav had artillery support from several batteries dug in around Unsan itself.

      Delaney grinned at the prospect of 105-millimeter shells raining death down on the Reds.

      Fuckin' about time, sir, Betters muttered. Above them, a cold gray fog had set in, backlit now with the lightning flashes of the Unsan batteries to the south.

      Ahead of them, in between the thumps of mortar fire and the deeper, earth-rattling booms of heavier artillery, Delaney heard voices. He grabbed Betters by his poncho and slung him to the ground. They bellycrawled to an outpost of tree stumps and boulders and peered gingerly down slope.

      It was the Battalion CP all right, the rude clapboard farmhouse with the sagging roof. He could smell the latrine pots on the wind. But the whole clearing was thick was Reds, hundreds of them.

      In a wild frenzy, the Chinese infantry were tearing at ration boxes dumped on the ground, scattering cans of beans and Hershey bar wrappers everywhere. An overturned Jeep blocked the entrance. Beside it were sprawled several GIs. Two Red bastards were picking through their jackets while a third was struggling to pull a dead GI's boots off.

      Delaney boiled but bit his lip. There was nothing he could do for the poor sons of bitches now. Betters swallowed so hard it could be heard several feet away. And the signal flares were inside.

      Delaney froze. He'd heard something. Behind them. He listened, chopping Betters' arm to shut him up.

      There it was again. In between the mortar thumps and the heavier 105s, a quiet swooshing sound, light feet for sure, snow muffling the faint tread of--

      --and the whole side of the hill exploded in gunfire--

      Delaney had to think fast but he was tired and his reflexes were dulled with fatigue. He sprang forward for a narrow defile just as an entire Red platoon opened up on them. Rifle fire raked the tiny outcropping where he'd just been. He fell heavily and rallied to get his gun free. He rammed a fresh clip home--it was his last one-- and sprayed the hillside behind them wildly.

      A terrific explosion burned his eyes and face and he caught a vague sight of Betters--the lanky corporal from Oklahoma--cartwheeling in the air. Another explosion rocked the ground ten feet away and Delaney stared in numb disbelief as a chink potato-masher--a dud grenade--came tumbling out of the debris. It rolled and came to rest right next to his leg, wooden stick handle pointed straight up.

      Shouts filled the air. Delaney looked for Betters but he was gone. Bloody froth stained the snow. Delaney could no longer hear very well--the shouts were drowned out by a wild roaring river in his ears, his eyes dulled to slits by the concussion of the blasts.

      He could only think of one thing: somehow make it to the roadway junction several miles south of the farm. There was a split there, probably some MPs, a few Motor Transport pukes and Unsan was a short jeep ride away.

      He struggled to his feet but it was like swimming up river. The world danced and spun and he nearly pitched headlong down the hillside.

      Captain Mark Delaney, from Carson City, California, didn't get very far. Stumbling sideways across the slopes of the hill in the freezing dark, through blowing snow and sleet stinging in his face, he soon ran right into a Chicom ambush. In truth, for nearly an hour's struggle, he had only traveled a few hundred yards.

      The Reds pumped sixteen rounds into Delaney before he finally stopped twitching. For good measure, even before they went for his boots and his pockets, he was bayoneted in the gut and the thigh, but he felt no pain by then, only cold.

      In the final eternal seconds of his life, Delaney was quiet, even thoughtful. He thought he heard a plane somewhere overhead, a lone airplane, maybe on a recon mission, maybe waiting for dawn, ready to blast away at the Red hordes.

      If only that pilot had an atomic bomb, he thought. He remembered the trip he had made to Hiroshima in early '46. First Cav had been on its way to maneuvers somewhere in southern Kyushu. A flat rubble-strewn wasteland where only the wind and the rats dared move--that was all Hiroshima had seemed to him back then.

      He was sad now. And angry too.

      Goddamn it, we got the bomb! For Chrissakes, we ought to use it!

      CHAPTER 1

      Friday, November 24, 1950

      7:00 a.m.

      Tokyo

      The day after Thanksgiving had dawned cold, gray, and drizzly in Tokyo and Brigadier General Paul Craft, U.S. Army Far Eastern Command, pulled his olive-drab field jacket tighter as he took the steps into the columned entrance of the Dai Ichi Insurance Company building three at a time. He saluted the pair of MPs at the desk inside, flashed his ID badge and signed in. Security had been tightened recently at SCAP GHQ, General Headquarters Supreme Command Allied Powers. There were Communists and Red sympathizers all about the Japanese capital these days and the police action in Korea had taken a decidedly nasty turn recently. Craft went through another security barricade. The detail at the building's main entrance had been doubled in the past two weeks.

      The elevator sentry took him to the sixth floor and Craft endured yet another ID check before he was allowed into the warren of offices comprising Far Eastern Command and SCAP. Wood-paneled offices along one wall gave onto a small conference room outside of which a row of flags and banners hung on short standards. A white sign over the cornice proclaimed War Room. Beneath it, in large letters, another sign read Secret."

      Craft walked briskly to the war room, checking his watch. The air was heavy and quiet, like the weather outside. Inside, papers and maps were strewn among several tables.

      General of the Army Douglas MacArthur had just last night returned from a quick inspection trip to the front lines in Korea. Even to Paul Craft, who often went several weeks at a time without seeing the General in person, MacArthur seemed uneasy that morning. Craft knew from gossip around SCAP that the Old Man was dissatisfied with the situation in Korea, especially the slow progress of the Marines and the Eighth Army toward the Yalu. MacArthur fiddled with his corncob pipe as the staff gathered and settled themselves in. Promptly at 0700 hours, like a machine being turned on, MacArthur got to his feet and began pacing the small room. He paused at a tactical map of the Eighth Army sector in northwest Korea and tapped it with the stem of his pipe.

      Willoughby, what has G-2 got for me, this morning?

      Major General Charles Willoughby was intelligence officer for Far Eastern Command. He was a stocky, florid man, a long time member of MacArthur's inner circle, known to all as the Bataan Gang.

      General, we got more reports over night of increasing Chinese infiltration along the northern sectors. I've had to up my estimates to several divisions' worth now, based on POW reports.

      MacArthur chewed thoughtfully at his pipe stem, continuing to pace. You still think the situation's manageable?

      We do, sir. As of last night, there's still no convincing evidence the Chinese have moved anything more than a few volunteer regiments across the border. They're scattered, uncoordinated.

      But you just said division strength.

      Willoughby coughed. The General did not like surprises. Total strength across the front, sir. We're pretty sure we're not dealing with regular units of the People's Liberation Army. Volunteers, militia, that sort of thing.

      What makes you so sure?

      Willoughby straightened some papers in front of him. Our aerial reconnaissance would have detected anything bigger, sir. But we've seen nothing.

      MacArthur seemed mollified. Gentlemen, we need to keep an eye on the situation. Eighth Army is today starting its final offensive north. And the Marines are already encamped around the Chosin Reservoir. They're stalled for some reason. I'll have to light another fire under Ned Almond and Smith again. We have to push on, before the real winter sets in. MacArthur stopped pacing, just long enough to relight his pipe. I don't need to tell you that this Chinese business introduces some new and worrisome factors.

      Paul Craft listened to the discussion for a few moments. Attending a SCAP staff meeting was like having an audience with the King. And, as he scanned the assembled faces, he mentally ticked off all the King's men: there was Willoughby, Far Eastern Command G-2, and Brigadier General Courtney Whitney, nominally chief of SCAP's Government Section, also an original member of the Bataan Gang. Opposite Craft was a balding parrot named General Doyle Hickey, the King's Chief of Staff. And General Edwin Pinky Wright next to him. Wright was G-3 for Far Eastern Command, and Craft's boss. General Emmett Rosie O'Donnell, chief of Far Eastern Air Forces (FEAF) Bomber Command was sitting in, ready to detail the Air Force's recent interdiction campaign across North Korea's Yalu River frontier.

      There were a few others too: Colonel Kades, the deputy chief of staff, Colonel Bunker, MacArthur's staff secretary, furiously taking notes.

      And Craft himself, deputy to the G-3. He'd been invited to the daily staff briefing to outline a new plan for MacArthur. Reflexively, Paul Craft clutched tighter at the zippered notebook padlocked to a cuff on his wrist.

      The briefing continued. --all the way from Taechon to the Chong'chon River, Pinky Wright was saying. Now, if FEAF could give us some close air support--

      You'll get it, O'Donnell snapped gruffly. I can put two squadrons of B-26s over Unsan and Huichon, fully loaded with frag, HE and incendiaries by 1200 hours today.

      --as I was saying, Wright went on, with close air support, we can get Eighth Army off and running at a brisk pace. Including the 24th, provided they get their supply situation at Sinanju straightened out.

      MacArthur was pleased. Excellent, Pinky. That's the kind of news I like to hear. Hit the enemy hard and keep hitting him where he least expects it. General Craft, SCAP turned his attention to the zippered notebook. Pinky tells me you've got something.

      Craft unlocked the padlocked cuff from his wrist. Yes, sir. It's the plan I wrote a synopsis of last week for you, sir.

      MacArthur was intrigued. He sat down, steepling his fingers on the heavily varnished map table. Which plan was that, Paul?

      The plan I've drawn up, General, would completely sever the Chinese from this war. At the source. At Manchuria. If this plan is adopted and executed, the Red Chinese will not be a threat to anyone for a very long time.

      MacArthur's lips tightened. He was mindful of the running feud he had had with the Joint Chiefs about bombing Chinese bases in Manchuria, denying the enemy any sanctuary.

      I scanned your first brief last week. Go ahead.

      Craft took a deep breath. General, as we all know, the Chinese continue to increase their level of infiltration into the Korean theater. This plan, which I call Operation Gallant Flag, is based on the assumption that such infiltration and mobilization of forces continues, indeed that it may even increase. Without the ability to interdict such a flow of forces southward, the UN forces could soon face a very grave situation. This plan assumes we have permission for an extensive campaign, north of the Yalu River.

      For the next hour, General Paul Craft detailed the most daring, risky yet potentially effective plan imaginable. Craft proposed, much to the astonishment of the rest of the staff, that SCAP approve the organization, equipping, training and operation of a covert task force, to be known as Gallant Flag, to carry out high altitude, strategic atomic bomb strikes against selected targets in Red China. Most of the targets were in Manchuria. One, however, was Peking itself, targeting the military and political leadership of the newly proclaimed People's Republic.

      MacArthur was intrigued. When Craft was done, he and the staff spent the next hour trying to pick holes in the plan but it was apparent that Craft had done his homework.

      O'Donnell had the most serious objections. General, only the B-29 can carry atom bombs. Right now, all my Superforts are dedicated to interdiction up North. I don't think I can spare any for this kind of mission. And where do we get a few extra atom bombs anyway?

      MacArthur was calm. The Joint Chiefs have authorized preparations for an atomic strike, Rosie. He knew full well that was not quite true but O'Donnell could be a loose cannon sometimes. There was indeed such a proposal floating around the Pentagon. But no authorization had been issued. And only the President could authorize actual use of such weapons. Still, the theater commander had to prepare for any eventuality, didn't he?

      Craft reminded them, General, the Gallant Flag plan proposes several ways for atomic bombs to be transported into this theater. Given intelligence concerns about Russian and other spies in Japan, the normal routing may not be the best.

      What do you mean by that?

      With MacArthur's permission, Craft continued. There were, he informed them, a small group of like-minded officers in the Army and the Air Force who felt the Chinese threat needed to be neutralized before it could affect the war. In very general terms, these men were aware of ideas floating around to bomb the Chinese mainland, though not the specifics of Gallant Flag. Moreover, there was also a very small but influential group in the nuclear weapons community in the U.S. who were willing to help furnish nuclear devices, under cover of an upcoming nuclear test series at the Pacific Proving Grounds to make the strikes possible.

      Security considerations are critical, Craft said. If the Russians get any notion we're bringing atom bombs into the Korean theater--

      --we'll be facing a whole new ball game, O'Donnell finished the thought. Unless we bring 'em in for their deterrent value.

      MacArthur got up and started pacing again. We can't ignore what the Red Chinese are doing. I've told the President that the Chinese have already missed their best tactical opportunity to intervene and that was before Inchon. He pointed his pipe stem at Willoughby. If G-2 is right, then we're just facing a few regiments. Tenth Corps and Eighth Army should be able to handle them with no problem. More than likely, these are just Chinese militia detailed to Kim Il-Sung to protect a small base in the mountains for later guerrilla action. I've told Almond and Walker to smash all resistance before Christmas so we can get our boys out of there.

      And if G-2 is wrong, sir? General Hickey asked, warily eyeing Willoughby's reaction.

      MacArthur clenched the pipe between his teeth. Then the battle is joined, men, and we may as well be ready for it. As theater commander, it's my responsibility to run this war the best way I can, to be ready for anything. Any commander who does less is guilty of criminal negligence. SCAP paused at a map of the world, taped to the paneling behind the door. He knew he had no specific authorization from Bradley and the Joint Chiefs to bring atomic warheads into the combat theater. But he'd heard nuclear talk before from the Chiefs. Plans existed. Warheads were available. Hadn't Marshall himself cabled him not two months ago, saying, We want you to feel unhampered tactically in conducting operations north of the 38th parallel?

      MacArthur sensed his staff was expecting a decision from him. Like an actor with lines to finish, he could not disappoint them.

      The prevarication and lack of direction from Washington on this business of bombing China is criminal. The very purpose of any war is victory, not prolonged indecision. If we don't act on the situation now, the war will drag on for months, maybe years. And we'll pay for our indecision with the lives of American boys.

      MacArthur stood at the end of the map table. I can't countenance such negligence. Not and bear the title of Supreme Commander, knowing it's in my power to do something about it. General Craft?

      Yes, sir?

      I approve the initial phases of this plan, this Operation Gallant Flag. You've done excellent work here. But I'm approving with certain provisions. I'm reserving the right to cancel the operation at any time. You'll have any and all resources you need, with the full authority of this office behind you. Is that understood by everyone here?

      A chorus of nods and yessirs circled the room.

      Obviously, this operation is classified Most Top Secret. And I expect every man to give General Craft his full cooperation.

      Satisfied with the decision, MacArthur sat down and leaned forward across the table on his forearms.

      "Now, gentlemen, is the moment that History has given us. The battle we've been expecting is joined. This is the historic moment when Communism must be confronted and defeated on the battlefield.

      General Craft, you will provide my office weekly progress reports. When can Gallant Flag be ready to go?

      Without hesitation, Craft replied, January 1, 1951, sir.

      Very good. SCAP ended the briefing. A new year, a new beginning. And a new order in the world.

      11-23-50 (Thanksgiving night)

      9:45 p.m.

      Los Alamos, New Mexico

      As parties went, the Thanksgiving Day bash for stay-behind employees of T Division was fairly subdued. Held in the assembly room of the old Ranch School annex at the end of Central Avenue, the dinner, dance and piano playing seemed forced, even sad, to Dr. Albert Ranier. He sat out most of the late-evening festivities and hunkered down in a corner of the cramped, smoky room with several glasses of his favorite apple schnapps and a fresh pack of Lucky Strikes. While the others laughed and waltzed and joked across the parquet floor, Ranier smoked and sipped his schnapps, indifferent to all the gaiety swirling around him. For the better part of three hours, he became little more than furniture, a brooding fixture rooted to the darkest corners of the hall.

      Tolkach noticed him, several times. Two minutes after ten, he decided to do something about the dour Czech physicist who sat like a bespectacled Sphinx on a tattered bar stool.

      Albert, you've not danced a single minute with Galina. What's the matter with you tonight? It's Thanksgiving.

      Galina, Mrs. Ranier, was out of hearing, engaged in animated laughter across the room. Ranier sniffed at the dregs of his schnapps, wanting more.

      I'm bored.

      You're always bored at parties. Didn't you go to parties in Czechoslovakia? Why do you come, if you're bored?

      Galina drags me here, you know that.

      Tolkach counted five glasses. He clucked at Ranier. That's nearly a whole bottle, Albert. You leave any schnapps for me?

      Ranier snorted. You don't like schnapps, Edvard.

      Neither will you, in about two hours. You eat anything tonight? Got something on your stomach?

      Ranier shrugged and downed the last drops defiantly. He made an elaborate show of how precisely he could situate the glass with the others on the bar.

      Tolkach squeezed the physicist's shoulder. You've been plotting the end of the world again, haven't you?

      Ranier shrugged him off. I'm okay.

      Tolkach lit a cigarette, a Camel, and offered one to Ranier. He took it and lit up, blowing smoke hard through his nostrils.

      Let's go outside, Albert. It's cooler and the air's fresh with pine scent. Party's winding down anyway.

      The two of them squeezed through some diehard jitterbugging couples and went out into the backyard of the school, finding a wooden porch railing overlooking a parking lot. A faint Tommy Dorsey tune wafted on the chilly night breeze, a car radio at the end of the drive. Inside, two shadows moved languidly, embraced in love.

      Ranier's face glowed in the red light of the cigarette tip. He faced Tolkach and smoothed back the bushy side lobes of his hair.

      You know, Edvard, it's like I've said before: Stalin is the basic problem.

      Tolkach sniffed. Stalin is always the problem, isn't he? This has become an obsession with you. Let it go…what's done is done.

      Ranier exploded. How can I forgive the monsters who put my mother in prison? And then murdered her? You have no right to-- He stopped abruptly when several couples joined them on the porch deck, seeking cooler air.

      Tolkach nodded to Helmut Witmer, head of T Division's instrument lab and his pretty Danish wife Ingrid. Witmer nursed a cocktail, his eyebrows arching inquisitively. Did I interrupt something here? A serious technical discussion?

      Tolkach grabbed Rainier's elbow. Dr. Witmer. Mrs.Witmer. A pleasure to see you tonight. We were just on our way out for a little stroll. He guided Ranier off the porch and around the front of the Mechanics' Lodge building that now served as an assembly hall. They headed for Central Avenue. To their right, white gateposts of the main security checkpoint shone in bright floodlights. MPs lounged in Jeeps all about the entrance. Holiday traffic had dwindled to a trickle out the East Gate Road. The MPs paid them no attention.

      Tolkach and Ranier turned left, heading up the street past the old Fuller Lodge, now Technical Administration at Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory. Bathtub Row was mostly dark tonight as those who could had left the compound for friends and family elsewhere. At the 15th Street intersection, they made a left and strolled on in near darkness between rows of Quonset huts and aluminum shacks, past wooden signs labeled Machine Shop, Metrology Lab and Physical Chemistry. The heart of Los Alamos' technical area was normally awash in pedestrian traffic but on this Thanksgiving Day night, the shops were dark and the street empty. Only an occasional pool of yellow light from crude streetlamps disturbed the night.

      Ranier flicked away his cigarette and lit up another. I tell you, Edvard, something must be done. It must! We've all seen what Stalin's up too. No more Uncle Joe, eh? First, he liberates us with his Red Army. Then he kills all the decent politicians. His own thugs take over. When people have the audacity to protest, they're taken away and shot too. He's not going to stop, I'm telling you. Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland today. Tomorrow, who knows? Germany, France, who can say?

      Tolkach had heard all this before. Best to humor the physicist. And what are you going to do, Albert? Drop an atom bomb on the Kremlin?

      Don't mock me like that. In fact…it's not so far-fetched an idea--

      Come, come, now, you're drunk. You don't know what you're saying. He tried to drape a friendly arm around Ranier but the physicist shrugged it off.

      Listen to me, Ranier hissed. Stalin's not a god. He's going to die someday. There are people…there are plans. Assassinations can be accomplished. It's a technical problem, as Witmer likes to say. Like our atomic bombs. There are always solutions. We just have to find them.

      Albert…please, lets get you back to--

      No, listen to me, please. I've been working late at the lab. You know that.

      Yes, yes, on the instability problem. We've all--

      And other ideas. Ranier gave a sort of snorting half laugh. Yesterday, I told Galina I wanted to volunteer for the Army. Fight Communists in Korea.

      What did she say?

      The men paused as a pair of white-helmeted MPs sauntered by. They nodded, half-saluting, with the sort of smirk the physicists had come to expect. Soldiers thought Los Alamos was a freak show, full of funny-looking people with strange accents. Sometimes, Tolkach thought they were right. The MPs snickered and turned down an alley between two shacks.

      Ranier went on. She laughed. What do you think? In any case, it's not quite so impossible to drop an atom bomb on the Kremlin as you think. An interesting technical problem.

      A fantasy of a drunken physicist, I'm afraid.

      No, you're mistaken, Edvard. I've actually thought about it. I've actually made plans.

      Ranier and Tolkach reached the end of 15th Street. A wooden sign, hand-lettered and illuminated by crude spotlights said Ordnance Lab. High Explosives. Behind a wire barricade, the clapboard structure had been expanded several times, growing aluminum wings to either side, each one grafted onto the side of the main building, really a crude cottage was all it was. Behind the main structure, concrete barriers marked the test and handling cells for bomb detonating explosives.

      Tolkach steered Ranier in a wide circle. Let's go back. It's late. Galina will be worrying about you.

      Ranier stopped in mid-stride. Edvard, you understand what I am saying. Come. I want to show you something.

      Tolkach had come to regard Albert Ranier, brilliant though he was, with a growing mixture of amusement and pity. He'd become something of a caricature lately, and others on the staff weren't as charitable. Was he unstable, perhaps mentally ill? Hard to say. Tolkach knew how bitter he was about how the Communists had seized Czechoslovakia two years ago. Then, his mother imprisoned in Prague. Now, she had died, so the letter had informed Ranier the day before Thanksgiving. Ranier was like the Composition B that the technicians fabricated behind the Ordnance Lab. Fragile, unstable, ready to go off at the slightest touch.

      He needs help. Maybe Witmer--

      I wasn't bluffing about what I just said, Ranier blurted out. An atom bomb just for the Kremlin. A birthday present for Josef Vissarionovich himself. Let me show you something.

      Albert…it's late.

      No, no, only a minute, a quick detour. I promise you'll be intrigued.

      They hiked up an alleyway to a small aluminum shack, hardly more than a shed. The sign outside read: Calibration Facility. Somehow, Ranier had a key. He unlocked the front door--it was padlocked--pushed in and threw a light switch.

      Inside the shack was lined with shelves of meters, gauges, spools of wire, and assorted instruments. Ranier went to one shelf and pulled it away from the wall. Behind the shelf, painted to resemble the corrugations of the shack, was a small metal box. Ranier produced another key and opened it.

      Tolkach peered in. Albert, these are detonators. The box had four blasting-cap heads, squat cylinders with the DuPont tags still attached. Lead wires had been tied at the base of each one. What the--what on earth are detonators doing here? This isn't a secure area?

      Ranier nodded, a smirk on his face. Barometric switches too. And an air pressure type detonator, right over there.

      Tolkach stood up, puzzled. These devices should be in the vault, or in Ordnance. Or maybe over at J Division. Not here. What's going on?

      Ranier couldn't resist a smile. It's for Uncle Joe, like I told you. I'm putting together a birthday gift…a little present he'll have no trouble appreciating.

      Tolkach felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. This was madness. Albert, you're insane. This…is…it's lunacy. You can't be serious.

      Ranier pulled out one of the air pressure detonators and admired it. It's a simple device, don't you think? A thin strip of metal with a tiny bubble of extremely thin metal forged in the center. Placed directly underneath the very electrical contact that triggers the Comp B explosion. Just invert it when you set it in. When the bomb falls into the thicker part of the atmosphere, air pressure increases and the bubble snaps back to its original position. It simply strikes the contact, completes the circuit and sets off a chain reaction. Clever, don't you think?

      Tolkach felt his heart racing. He didn't know what to do, what to say, what to think. Albert was brilliant--no one doubted that--but at times, he seemed unstable. Even Witmer said Ranier should be watched, and he was right. But that was the Army's job, wasn't it?

      Albert, this is some kind of joke, isn't it? A sick joke. Look, you've had a bottle of schnapps and it's very late and--

      --and I'm quite lucid, Edvard, thank you. Ranier's smirk faded into a frown. Would it surprise you so much if I said there are others who agree with me?

      We all agree with you, Albert. No one disputes the evils of Communism. That's why a lot of us work here in the first place.

      More could be done, Ranier insisted. I am doing more. We're at war, Edvard. For God's sake, for humanity's sake, we're at war and we can't play by schoolyard rules. People are dying, careers are being ruined. Look… he put the detonator back in its box and closed the lid, latching the padlock. With his shoulder, he shoved the shelf back into position. …I've got friends, some of them you know, up at Hanford.

      Tolkach folded his arms. He glared out the open door of the shed. He didn't like listening to Albert's rantings but the man was becoming a menace. A security risk, for Christ's sake.

      --Whit Browning's one of them. You remember him from Metallurgy, when we all worked on the Gadget for Oppie?

      I remember.

      Browning's got a small group. We're all concerned. Browning's diverting a small quantity of plutonium every month. He's already stashed five ounces, by now.

      I suppose no one misses the stuff, either. Just throw it down the sink, eh Albert?

      Don't mock me. Browning accounts for the discrepancy by logging the diversion as 'impure, out of specification, to be disposed of.' In reality, it's bomb-grade material. He'll have ten ounces in another month.

      Preposterous. You're hallucinating.

      Ranier laughed. You think so? Ask yourself how many Czech and Austrian immigrants work here at Los Alamos? Or at Hanford? We're only a small group now, a small army. But we are waging war, Edvard, and before long, you'll have to decide for yourself. Think about that.

      At first, Tolkach was sure Ranier was making it all up. But the Czech physicist was adamant. He insisted Tolkach come to their office at T Division several blocks away. Both worked in a spartan cubbyhole in a small hut, covered with books and papers and chalkboard scribblings. The wooden floor creaked as the two men squeezed inside, between stacks of monographs. In one corner, Ranier had a small cast-iron safe. He spun the lock dial and opened it, extracting several handwritten pages. He insisted Tolkach read.

      He did so, scanning quickly, then more deliberately, becoming more and more alarmed as he read on. The pages were hurriedly scribbled notes but they detailed everything Ranier had been saying. The amounts of plutonium to be diverted every month, the location of initiator and tamper material, high explosive formulas, fusing and arming circuit diagrams, drawings of casing designs, everything needed to make a bomb. It was all laid out on paper, all of it TOP SECRET, or higher in classification. And he'd already seen the detonators Ranier had stashed away.

      Why are you showing me this?

      Ranier was firm. I need your help.

      This is madness. Absolute madness, Albert. You'll never be able to make a bomb and hide it.

      Ranier sat down heavily in the creaking wooden chair. Madness is facing a threat and doing nothing about it. That's madness.

      We are doing something, for God's sake! We are building atomic bombs here, you know!

      Ranier smiled again, patronizing. My dear, Dr. Tolkach, where do you think these bombs will go after we build them? Into storage. Into inventory. They will never be used for anything. It's all a big game. But I am not fooled and you shouldn't be either. We're fighting a war and you can't fight a war by withholding the very weapon that could end the war. That is immorality of the highest order. No less a man than General Douglas MacArthur has said so.

      Tolkach took a deep breath. His head ached and the pain had started radiating down into his neck. What do you want me to do?

      Ranier squeezed Tolkach on the shoulder, father to recalcitrant child. I know you have contacts. In the Army. The Air Force. You've been out to the Pacific Proving Grounds. I want you to arrange a meeting with some of these men. My idea--our idea--is simple enough: we are going to make a little bomb--nothing big. A few dozen kilotons is all. The bomb is to be dropped on Moscow. Or maybe somewhere in Korea. It doesn't matter. What matters is doing something, anything, to beat back the Communists before it's too late. Before-- and he was almost in tears --before others die. How many mothers, how many fathers and innocent people have to be enslaved before we act? That is my concern. I can't save my own family any longer. They're gone now. Maybe I can save others.

      These contacts--these men. You know that will take time. You have to go through channels.

      Nonsense. There are many others who think as I do. Six weeks ago, I met an Army officer, a General Craft. He came to the States for a meeting. In Washington. We met at the Pentagon. We talked. He too is a sympathizer and he said there were others in the Pacific. Far Eastern Command is full of them, men who hate Communism, men willing to do something about it.

      Tolkach felt only pity for Ranier. And embarrassment. Maybe if Witmer were less abrasive, the Czech physicist wouldn't have felt so isolated.

      Tolkach toyed briefly with the idea of alerting the Army. Maybe even filling out a security notice on Ranier but he just couldn't, out of respect and sympathy for the man. The two of them talked but Tolkach tried to humor him as best he could. He had already decided to talk with Witmer on Monday. Maybe some leave, a few days in California, would do the trick.

      Ranier was insistent and finally, reluctantly, Tolkach gave in. He agreed to call up an old Air Force wing commander he'd once known casually in Los Angeles, just to see what could be done.

      What's his name?

      Clayton LaSalle, Tolkach told him. I don't even know if he's in the States. Maybe there's an organization you can join or something.

      Good, good. Ranier rubbed his hands together. It's a step. You won't regret it.

      Mollified by Tolkach's half-hearted promises, Ranier pulled himself back together. The two of them left the tiny office and walked back through a cold wind and deserted streets to the remnants of the party at the Ranch School.

      Outside the Mechanics Lodge, huddled in scarf and fur coat, Galina Ranier stood waiting, squinting in the dark, hands on her hips. Her face was lined with worry.

      11-24-50

      10:30 a.m.

      People's Liberation Army Headquarters,

      Chang-an Street

      Peking

      If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.

      Sun Tzu

      c. 500 B.C.

      Mid-day morning in Peking was a seething riot of bicycles and pedicabs along Chang-an Avenue. A cold misty fog gripped the city, yet even in the depths of winter, the streetsweeper battalions were everywhere, brushing off the last vestiges of an overnight snowfall. Marshal Peng Dehuai noted their efficient symphony of motion with the satisfaction of an officer unaccustomed to such orderly parade-ground drill.

      If only the People's Volunteers were as well disciplined, he thought to himself. No enemy could defeat us, not even the Americans. But reality returned to the Marshal's thoughts as the staff car braked to a sudden halt, and was soon engulfed in the bicycle hordes. Not even the Great Helmsman himself could alter the capital's daily tidal surges of traffic.

      Marshal Zhu De, commander-in-chief of the People's Liberation Army, would simply have to start the staff briefing a little later than usual.

      Marshal Peng had seen many a Peking dawn and he was sure that no other city in the world could match it. At certain times of the year, commonly in the spring, occasionally in the winter, an almost imperceptible pall of fine dust lingered over the capital. It produced a quality of light, at once both gray and yellow, to be found only in this city and its surrounding Hopei province. The light was breathed as much as seen, and its effects were strangely equivocal; objects suddenly blurred or sharpened, as though some superhuman finger were tampering with the focus. Even in the grip of a late November ice fog, the same, hazy ethereal quality cloaked the labyrinthine alleyways and squares of Red China's first city.

      Peng was thoughtful, even appreciative of the scene. It took his mind off of what was sure to be a difficult staff briefing. Today, hard decisions would have to be made.

      After an interminable hour of fitful honking and braking, the black Cadillac staff car with the single red star emblazoned on its doors pulled into a damp courtyard in the center of a warehouse block. Less than half a mile to the west of the old grain bins and sorting rooms, the Forbidden City's massive stone walls rose though the bare branches of elm and linden trees but Marshal Peng paid them no attention. Briskly, he departed the car, snapped off a perfunctory salute to the Motor Transport detail and made his way into Command Headquarters. A ground level maze of hastily erected bullpens and partitions still clung with the faint odor of grain dust and animal waste. A few more rounds of salutes and curt nods and Peng found himself in what once had been the warehouse overseer's treasury room, and was now a map and conference center for PLA operations throughout northern China and her Manchurian frontiers.

      Marshal Zhu De rose from his writing table, saluted and greeted Peng with both arms.

      Comrade, at last, you've made it. I was afraid you might have been kidnapped by American agents.

      Peng grimaced, tossing his leather satchel of maps, codes and tactical orders on the table. Only caught in traffic, Marshal. The others are all here?

      Zhu nodded, pouring green tea into a porcelain cup for Peng. The Commander-in-Chief of the Chinese People's Liberation Army indicated several other officers: General Song Shilun, commander of the Ninth Army Group and General Li Tianyu, commanding the Thirteenth. Both men rose to greet Peng warmly. General Xie Fang, chief of staff, hovered over a huge map on the opposite side of the table. He added his greetings as well.

      Marshal Zhu waved everyone to the map table. An elevation and terrain detail of northern Korea was spread out before them.

      Comrades, this is the tactical situation today, less than twelve hours before the start of our Second Offensive. Zhu found a metal pointer and identified the enemy and Chinese units and positions from west to east. Our troop strength has now reached nine armies, some thirty divisions, over 380,000 men. We have over 150,000 men on the eastern front against the enemy's 90,000. We have 230,000 men on the western front, the enemy 130,000. We have superior forces on both fronts.

      Peng surveyed the carved wooden dragon's head icons symbolizing the Chinese divisions. Some imaginative staff officer had thought to depict the UN forces with carved wooden blocks that resembled miniature city skylines.

      The logistical problems still worry me, Peng told them. With the element of surprise, we can push the enemy back about halfway to Pyongyang, maybe to the Chongchon River at best. We don't have the supplies to push much beyond the 39th Parallel. In the spring, with more aid from our Soviet comrades, we may be able to go further south.

      Then, we'll fight with what we have, Zhu said. As we always have. General Xie, you may begin your briefing of our tactical deployments.

      Xie assumed a prominent position at the head of a table. Peng thought he looked like an old goat, squinty-eyed with a hint of a white beard.

      Comrades, we face the American Eighth Army in the west and the combined Tenth Corps in the east. The dividing line is the Taebeck mountain range in the center of the country. We have deployed five armies from General Li's Thirteenth Group. The 38th and 42nd Armies are making the major thrust against South Korean units on the right flank of the Eighth Army, the most vulnerable sector. We intend to drive southwestward and cut off the South Koreans north of the Chongchon River. After that, we can destroy the Koreans piecemeal.

      General Song grunted an interruption. The 40th is still defending in the Yongbyan-Unsan area?

      That is correct, comrade General, Xie admitted. Also, the 39th Army will deal with the Eighth Army forces around Taechon. And the 66th will drive down the coast.

      Marshal Zhu added, Mao has given his blessings to this general concept.

      Peng sniffed. The Great Helmsman is most wise. Zhu darkened at the sarcasm but let it pass. He indicated Xie should continue.

      Comrades, our biggest fight will be in the east, against the Tenth Corps, and particularly the First Marine Division. We have deployed General Song's 26th Army around the northern shores of the Chosen Reservoir for this task. The 27th and the 20th Armies have preceded them and are already in forward positions in the mountains around Yudam-ni, here and here. He tapped the map in several places.

      Song nodded grimly. My troops have already made probing attacks west of the reservoir. It appears that the American Marines are attempting to consolidate a strong push up from the Hungnam region on the coast, building supply bases, even an airfield near Hagaru-ri. The longer we let them dig in, the tougher they will be to dislodge. We're going to try and cut the supply route--a single narrow mountain road--at several places to isolate battalion-sized groups and then pick them off one at a time.

      And your supply situation? Peng asked. Is it any better now that I have assigned more pack animals and porters to the Ninth?

      Song shrugged. We have an active supply line all the way back to Linjiang but it's tenuous and hard to maintain with American warplanes constantly harassing our pack trains. Our biggest need is for winter clothing. The 26th Army especially. General Zhang's men were formerly deployed across the straits of Taiwan last summer. In five months, they have marched continuously northward but they still have only the summer weight outfits they had facing the Nationalist dogs. My men are suffering greatly from cold and frostbite.

      Peng nodded. He was pensive but guardedly optimistic. Comrades, we have to deal with the situation as it is. The Americans and the South Koreans are facing the same cold weather. Let me remind everyone--and he glanced over at Marshal Zhu in particular--that the offensive has limited objectives: liberating Pyongyang and driving the Americans south of the 38th Parallel if our supplies hold out.

      Zhu shifted restlessly. The Chairman and the Military Council dislike talk of limited objectives. I concur with comrade Marshal Peng but our Party leaders fortunately see things in a broader, strategic light. The ultimate aim of all our offensives is to drive the Americans right off the Korean peninsula.

      Peng snorted. Such grand ideas are impossible unless the present supply situation is fixed and soon.

      Zhu darkened. Peng could be gruff at times. Veterans of the Long March were like that. His tongue would get him in trouble one day, Zhu was sure of that. We should not succumb to defeatism at this late hour, should we, Marshal?

      Xie intervened diplomatically, with a suggestion. Perhaps, we should review the details of the initial assaults? Agree on tactical objectives, timing, force deployments, backup and contingency plans?

      There were murmurs of assent around the table and Xie quickly dived into the order of battle for both eastern and western sectors. Codes, ciphers and general orders were discussed and put into sequence. The precise phasing of assaults, down to the battalion-level was established. Peng made notations in a small black notebook he carried with him. After his meetings in the capital, he would journey by overnight train to the Manchurian city of Andong. There, he would relay decisions made today to his division commanders at an early morning staff briefing at corps headquarters.

      And, for his part, Marshal Zhu promised to press the Military Council for more coolies and porters to handle supplies from Manchuria.

      Marshal Peng, Zhu observed, checking his watch. It's time for our meeting with the Military Council.

      Peng agreed. The Great Helmsman himself would be there, as well as Chou En-Lai and Lin Piao, an old war-horse from the Long March days. Then we shouldn't keep them waiting. But I must be on the Andong train by 1400 hours. I've got a staff briefing at midnight with my division commanders.

      Zhu was already cramming papers into a small pouch. In that case, comrade Marshal, we better hope the Chairman has a sore throat. Otherwise--

      --we're in for a long afternoon of lectures and tall tales, Peng finished.

      They left the map room and were in the staff car, pulling out of the warehouse courtyard in less than five minutes.

      A half mile west of the Forbidden City, through the great open square of Tien an Men (The Gate of Heavenly Peace), a cluster of brick and cinder-block buildings gathered under the bare branches of elm and pine trees, only a few hundred yards from the ornate pagoda roofs and dull red walls of the Meridian Gate. The compound was austere, even dilapidated, surrounded as it was by piles of rubble from buildings demolished in the recent citywide cleanup. Peking had suffered heavily from years of Japanese occupation and civil war. Block after block of the traditional, slated-roofed hu'tung houses had been bombed, burned or razed to the ground in wave after wave of aerial and artillery bombardment. Only now, little more than a year after Mao Tse-tung had proclaimed the founding of the People's Republic at Tien an Men Square, was the city getting around to re-building its shattered districts and neighborhoods.

      The whole place looks like a war zone, thought Peng, to himself. Appropriate perhaps, since many Chinese expected the Americans to come calling when the People's Volunteers were finally unleashed in Korea.

      The cluster of cinder block and stone buildings formed a broad H-shape off the northern ramparts of an old crumbling Peking city wall that dated from the Han Dynasty. Peng knew the walls had been built over many decades of effort, to screen out Mongol and other invaders from the inner city of the imperial capital. Now only mounds of broken stone remained. Testimony, he supposed, to the mutability of all things human. Like war plans, he told himself. Even the best war plans seldom survived their first brush with the reality of combat. Peng expected no less in the coming Second Offensive.

      The Chairman maintained his day offices in the center of the H-cluster. Peng had heard rumors of an underground complex, a subterranean palace connected by tunnel to the Forbidden City itself, built in the Ming era, but he didn't know for sure. The staff car parked inside the heavily guarded compound and Peng and Zhu hurried through a biting frigid sleet across the cobblestones to a canopied entrance. Inside, they handed their greatcoats and caps to armed militiamen of the guard and escorted themselves through low vaulted arches to a drafty chamber harshly lit by floodlights sunk into the stone walls.

      The Chairman warmed himself by a fire crackling in a blackened fireplace in one corner. His weathered face beamed at the sight of his favorite commanders and he came over, pulling off heavy mittens as he extended a hand.

      Zhu and Peng bowed slightly and shook the hands of Mao Tse-tung warmly. Chou En-lai, now a key advisor, came up. And Lin Piao, Minister of Defense. For Peng, it was a reunion of old comrades.

      Mao was ebullient. Come, come, tell me your war stories. I'm hearing marvelous things about our offensive in Korea. We're really got MacArthur's Eighth Army on the run, don't we? The Americans and their capitalist dogs fight like old women. Lin Piao has a map of the front. Let's look…. He had an old Japanese railway map of Korea spread out on a small wooden table. Peng, Zhu and the others gathered around and explained the Ninth and Thirteenth Army Group deployments, the lines of advance, the tactical phasing and objectives.

      Mao listened gravely to Peng's synopsis of the Second Offensive operational plan. During the briefing, he smoked one cigarette after another--he preferred Red Lanterns--and sipped steaming hot green tea. When they were done, Mao rose and began pacing the room nervously, gesturing with his hands.

      "Comrades, I had a dream two nights ago. I've had the dream several times. Sort of an allegory, I suppose. In my dream, there is a small pond. Much like the Pond of the Golden Lilly, outside Meridian Gate. In

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