Man on Ice (Rake Ozenna thrillers) by Humphrey Hawksley

Author:Humphrey Hawksley [Hawksley, Humphrey]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Canongate Books
Published: 2019-10-02T16:00:00+00:00

TWENTY-THREE

The White House, Washington, DC

In the Oval Office, Stephanie listened to the playback of Holland’s call. He had shown both stupidity and impatience in demanding so quickly that China openly support the United States. He had irreparably weakened himself in the eyes of China. It was interesting that, unlike with Holland’s call to the Kremlin, she could hear both sides of the conversation. The Chinese would have known that the National Security Agency would be intercepting, and it meant they had not encrypted at their end because they wanted Swain to hear their response. She was with Prusak and Swain. Others were on their way.

‘What do you want to do, sir?’ asked Prusak.

‘Nothing openly.’ Swain sounded bullish and confident. ‘We handle it as they did during the Trump transition. We follow every move Holland makes. We intercept every call. Every time he takes a piss, we know it.’

‘They’ll react,’ said Stephanie. ‘China always tests a new President. The question is – with what? In 2001 with Bush, it was the collision of the spy plane; in 2009 with Obama, the harassment of the surveillance ship; in 2016 the taking of the submersible drone. Each was a challenge to your presence in Asia. My instinct is they’ll now ramp it up – currency, trade, military – and they’ll tie it in with the Russia crisis.’

Swain looked up as three key principals came in, Michael Pacolli from Defense, Thomas Grant from Treasury, and Peter Andrews from State. ‘Is Opokin still in the embassy?’ he asked Prusak.

‘Yes,’ answered Andrews. ‘He’s refusing to speak to the FBI. If he steps outside, we will arrest him.’

Swain moved from his desk to the two yellow pastel sofas facing each other in the middle of the room. He indicated that everyone should share the sandwiches, dips, juice, and coffee laid out on the low table in the middle. Stephanie picked up a plate of sandwiches and held it for Swain, then offered it to Prusak and ended up circling the sofas like a waitress as everyone took one. It was just past three in the afternoon; she remembered having black coffee and an energy bar hours ago and, like her, a few in the room might have napped, but none had properly slept.

‘I am not going to confront Holland directly,’ said Swain. ‘But let his people know that if he speaks to another foreign government without my permission I will use the Logan Act.’

Stephanie’s face creased with curiosity. ‘Is that the ban on private citizens negotiating with a foreign government?’ she asked.

‘Correct,’ said Swain. ‘It dates back to 1799, after Senator George Logan thought he could negotiate with France on behalf of the government.’

‘But is Holland a private citizen?’

‘He is. Only the President or those authorized by him is allowed to negotiate.’

‘It’s never had a conviction,’ said Prusak. ‘Remember in 2015, forty-seven Republican Senators told Iran they would scrap the nuclear deal. Obama got a three hundred thousand-signature petition asking him to prosecute them under the Logan Act.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.