The Mandarin Code (2 page)

Now here he was in the Oval Office, the epicentre of world power, an unrivalled, near-mythical place. The heart of the American empire. The new Rome.

Jackson turned to the three bay windows behind the desk carved from the timbers of the British ship, the
Resolute
. He looked through bulletproof glass to the South Lawn, dusted with snow, imagining the Republican lions who'd stood here before him. Ted Roosevelt, Ike, Nixon – the weight of the world on their shoulders. A cancelled phone call had given him exactly five minutes to himself. He interlocked his fingers and lifted his hands above his head, pushing his palms towards the ceiling, stretching his shoulders and back. He rocked his head from side to side. It helped relieve the stress in his neck, which was already stiff and sore. If it got worse, his head would be thumping by day's end.

What would Reagan have done?

It was one of his regular mind games, imagining how his favourite president might have reacted to a difficult challenge. It was based on the question his strict Presbyterian mother had frequently asked him: ‘What would Jesus have done?'

Despite serving eight years as Governor of Mississippi, he was ill-prepared for this role, Leader of the Free World, the most powerful man on the planet. Trained for a life of law, he had risen steadily, though unspectacularly, through the Republican ranks to chair the deeply conservative Rankin County, Mississippi district, and had been picked as an observer during the controversial 2000 Florida Presidential re-count. He'd risen to public prominence in a referendum battle over the State flag: the last in the union to have the battle cross of the Confederacy emblazoned on it.

A 2001 court ruling had opened the door for civil rights activists and local businessmen to move to expunge the Civil War remnant from the standard. That outraged Jackson and he was a man made for the fight. A direct descendant of General Thomas Jonathan ‘Stonewall' Jackson, he was not about to stand by as his heritage was airbrushed to appease liberal do-gooders.

Never an original thinker, Jackson lifted his rallying cry from the National Rifle Association: ‘You can have my flag when you peel it from my cold dead hands.' It appealed to and amplified the many prejudices that fortified his natural constituency. It also helped that the proposed alternative was a circle of stars, suspiciously similar to the European Union banner: ‘The Euro fag flag,' Jackson called it.

It was a fight he couldn't lose. The flag was retained with a two-thirds majority. Three years later, he was elected Governor. His charisma, crisp-good looks, folksy yet polished style of public speaking and impeccable Conservative credentials were a heady cocktail and he emerged from the pack to storm the 2012 Republican primaries.

Jackson went into the presidential poll a rank underdog but he surprised the pundits, tapping into American trauma over the financial crisis and growing anxiety about the nation's diminishing global authority. The people were hungry for a return to past glories so that's what Jackson promised them.

In a twist on the Reagan
Morning in America
campaign, Jackson's crusade anthem was the theme from
Star Wars
and his slogan the aspirational ‘The Empire Strikes Back.' It was an aggressive mix of hope and xenophobia, which blamed outsiders and their liberal allies within the US for the nation's decline.

In a stroke of genius Jackson built a cartoon version of a rising China to replace the Axis of Evil as America's new enemy-in-chief. He toured the rust belt, pointing to manufacturing jobs that had been ‘stolen' by the emerging communist power. ‘Every “Made in China” tag you see is a pink slip handed to an American worker,' was his mantra on the stump. ‘Every dollar you spend on foreign trinkets is money taken from American pockets and food taken from our children's mouths.' His campaign centrepiece was a solemn promise to declare China a ‘currency manipulator', if he won office.

Against the advice of every sane Republican, that's what he did. And from day one in the Oval Office, his foreign policy battles began to rival his considerable domestic woes.

The President checked his watch. ‘Lesley. . .' he bellowed.

His efficient PA pounced on the intercom. ‘Yes, Mr President?'

‘Send in my eleven o'clock.'

‘Yes sir. Coffee?'

‘No. I've had enough. Thanks.'

Jackson stiffened as a high-powered group strode through the door: the cream of his national security team, accompanied by the Secretary of Treasury. He already knew that the CIA and the State Department were in rare agreement: his decision to declare China a currency manipulator had knocked over a domino and others were falling.

China had responded belligerently. It declared currency to be a sovereign issue and called the US stance an act of aggression. It cancelled the annual meeting of the joint economic strategic dialogue and recalled its Ambassador to Beijing for ‘briefings'.

Eight Chinese warships had then sailed through the twelve-nautical-mile zone, off the disputed Senkaku Islands, and the Japanese were threatening retaliation. China's riposte was to schedule missile tests for the Taiwan Strait, something it had not done for nearly two decades. There was no way of telling how far the sabre-rattling would go.

The President surveyed the room then motioned to the director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

‘Mr President,' Travis Manning spoke as directed. ‘As I explained in our last meeting, when I suggested we move slowly on the China front, the problem is that we don't yet have a clear idea of the temperament of the new leadership. At almost the same time you were elected, the Communist Party's 18th Congress appointed the people who will lead China for the next five years. As I said in January, we needed time to let them settle in and for us to get some feel for just who we are dealing with. There's a growing view that this new team is more deeply nationalist, and more dangerous, than the last.'

‘And as I told you, I am not going to break a pledge I made to the American people on my first day in office.' Jackson spoke more loudly than necessary, meeting reason with volume. His tone dropped as he searched for an argument. ‘And for God's sake, Clinton declared China a currency manipulator in '94 and things didn't go to hell in a handbasket then.'

The Treasury Secretary jumped on the opening. ‘Mr President, China's Gross Domestic Product in '94 was $500 million. Ours was $7 trillion. Today, China's GDP is $9 trillion, closing on our $15 trillion. Based on these growth rates, their economy will surpass ours before the end of the decade. And in 1994 we did about $10 billion worth of trade with China. Now it's over half a trillion and rising.

‘In 1994 China was an insignificant player in the government bond market. It now owns more than $1 trillion worth of our bonds. To put that another way, Mr President, only the Federal Reserve controls more US Government debt than China.'

‘The point is: pissing them off is a bad idea,' interjected Manning. ‘And there's more. George has come back from Beijing with some disturbing intel.'

George Blake, the CIA's Beijing station chief, was a hardened intelligence careerist, and he knew China, its nuances and instincts better than anyone.

‘Sir, the new Chinese president, Meng Tao, was billed as continuing the market-oriented reform of Deng Xiaoping. But we have reason to believe his sympathies actually lie with the New Left, which is pushing back against growing inequality in China and wants the party to return to its Maoist roots.'

Blake reached into his folder for a one-page briefing note and handed it to the President.

‘We intercepted a conversation between Meng and one of his allies, Jiang Xiu. It's clear that they know your currency declaration is a domestic political ploy and could easily be negotiated in financial forums. But they see an opportunity to play Chinese public opinion against the US by painting us as an aggressor that's trying to strangle Chinese growth before it becomes a threat.'

Blake paused for a moment to allow Jackson to absorb the brief before continuing. ‘China is mobilising its considerable assets: military, financial and virtual, opening the way for serious retaliation. I believe they will rub up against their neighbours to test our will. They might even be looking for an opportunity to roll back economic and social reform under cover of a “national emergency”. We could be playing right into their hands. They sense we are weakened by a decade of war and economic decline. Sir, they are looking for an excuse to demonstrate that they are the rising global power.'

The Secretary of State tagged in, determined to pressure Jackson into relenting.

‘We urge you, Mr President.' Henry Wilenski leaned forward to press home his appeal. ‘Make it plain, today, that you do not intend to proceed with the next steps of your currency declaration. Make a statement saying you won't be imposing tariffs and restrictions on Chinese goods. You can make a credible argument that your warning has been heeded and that talks should come before any more action.'

Jackson rose to his full 6 feet 3 inches and slammed both hands on the desk. ‘Except that's not what I said. I said I would impose tariffs on Chinese goods within ninety days of the declaration if China did not lift the value of its currency and level the goddamn playing field.'

He turned his back on the group and looked out the window, the defiant gesture of an insecure man.

‘Mr President, that would not be wise.' Wilenski was pushing hard. ‘This will not help American workers and it threatens the peace at a time when we are in no shape to fight.'

Jackson raised his hand and turned to eyeball the group.

‘I need to think about this,' he said. ‘We'll talk again tomorrow. That's all for now. Thank you, gentlemen.'

Dismissed and disgruntled, the group shuffled out.

As the door closed, the President picked up his phone. ‘Lesley, get Big Mac on the line.'

Canberra

They ran squealing down to the lake's turbid waters, a tangled knot of excited children, two-dozen playful pups and their handlers. The year six class from Birchgrove, a smallish public school in Sydney's inner west, was on its annual pilgrimage to Canberra.

Fuelled on fast food and pre-teen adrenalin, they'd spent the morning at Questacon, mixing fantasy with science. It was now time for a picnic lunch on the shores of Lake Burley Griffin before continuing to the National Museum.

‘Slow down and be careful. Maddie, watch the muddy banks,' a teacher bellowed.

Several errant boys were creeping stealthily towards a bushy thicket by the water's edge, intent on slipping from their handlers' gaze, courting those moments of freedom every schoolboy yearns for. Corey, a tousle-haired blond with attitude beyond his years, spotted it first. Half-submerged, the body was maybe ten metres from shore. Corey called his mates over to make sure he wasn't imagining things. From the bank, they couldn't see a head or even a pair of feet, but there was no mistaking that this was a corpse. Playtime was over.

The senior teacher called the police as the others shepherded the children away, comforting several distraught girls. A small crowd was gathering, drawn by human fascination with the macabre, wanting to catch a glimpse of the body in the shallows.

Ten minutes later the police arrived, two constables who donned waterproof clothing and set about their work, all purpose and professionalism. Their first task was to ensure they were not the victims of a hoax, then, if necessary, to call for assistance.

Aidan Steele, with five years experience in the ACT Policing branch of the Australian Federal Police, took charge initially, working with his junior colleague, who answered questions from a
Canberra Times
reporter. Steele had never before seen a body in Burley Griffin, but he was familiar with the lake's unfortunate habit of giving up the dead: the headless body of '79; the female torso washed up near Scrivener Dam in '93; the Nigerian diplomat whose corpse was found in 2005, bloated and disfigured, a homicide that remained unsolved.

He cast his eyes over the still water.
What was it about this drowned landscape?

Like the capital, the lake was placid on the surface, but beneath its coffee-coloured water lurked hidden danger. The remnants of the eucalypts that once crowded the Molonglo riverbanks before the dam was built lay in wait below the lake's smooth skin: a trap for the unwary and the foolish.

There was no pulse. Steele reckoned the body had been submerged for more than a few hours. He also knew police procedure; it was time to call in the top dogs.

Within the quarter-hour, six of the ACT's finest had arrived and had begun to take statements from witnesses.

Four hours later, the initial forensic examination had been completed, the body having been gently hauled from the lake by the ACT water police.

The body was an Asian male, likely aged in his thirties. Of slender build, he was clothed in plain trousers and a lightcoloured shirt. A pair of joggers weighed down his spindly legs. And that was it. An initial search had turned up nothing else – no wallet, no ID, no jewellery or other personal items.