The Poksu Conspiracy (Post Cold War Political Thriller Book 2) Read online

  "I also talked with Kingsley Marshall," Nate said. "For the past month, his people have had a KH-12 reconnaissance satellite picking over South Korea like a dog after fleas."

  The KH-12 was essentially a large telescope in orbit that could be aimed by remote control at particular spots on earth. The views it saw were scanned by electronic sensors that converted the images into numeric values. These digital readings were transmitted back to a ground satellite receiver, then to a computer that re-converted the numbers into visual images. The CIA's photo interpreters studied the views picked up by the telescope to determine the uses being made of the facilities and equipment it observed. The KH-12's optics were so powerful it could have read some of the big headlines in a newspaper kiosk during the Persian Gulf War.

  "Have they found any fleas?" Burke asked.

  Nate shook his head. "The results have been disappointing. They targeted military installations, industrial areas, and out-of-the-way facilities that might be hiding a nuclear site, but no apparent weapons projects turned up. There's some unusual activity around a nuclear power station called Kanggu, but they aren't sure what it means. Apparently it involves an industrial plant adjacent to the power station. Could be some kind of expansion. They reported the Taesong power station appears about finished. That's not news to us. It's the one Bartell Engineering is building. A lot of vehicle activity was observed around an underground facility owned by the Reijeo Business Group. Actually, it's built into the side of a mountain. They couldn't tell what's going on underground, of course, but the place has been there for several years."

  "Any signs of missile activity?" Jerry asked.

  "They have some launch sites in the northern part of the country. We helped them back when North Korea was working on improvements to the Scud. We know they've been trying to develop a cruise-type missile with a conventional warhead. The Agency doesn't think they've mastered the guidance technology yet. The satellite did pick up a new facility in the south they think is a missile training base."

  Burke took out his pocket appointment book and jotted down the changed departure date. "It sounds like the bulk of the effort is still going to be on our shoulders."

  "You're right. And Kingsley says the sooner you can get some answers the better. General Thatcher is getting antsy. You fellows will be the frontline troops."

  Let's hope we don't get shot at any more than the troops in Desert Storm, Burke thought. Maybe the satellite watchers at Langley would still turn up something useful. For now, however, sophisticated technology would have to give way to the same old techniques that had been around since the days when David had pulled off a covert operation among the ranks of the Philistines. He and Jerry would have to put together a probing operation and follow wherever it led.

  Taesong, South Korea

  Chapter 16

  The tall, rangy American stepped out of his small green Hyundai and looked across the broad parking lot toward the monstrous concrete cooling towers. Lifting his white hard hat, which was labeled "R.M. Steele" in block letters, he wiped the sweat from his brow and squinted his eyes against the bright October sun. Though the view was a bit different now, the warm and summerlike conditions reminded him of a much hotter day back in June when he had been pressured to have the first unit of the Taesong Nuclear Power Plant on line in barely seven months instead of a year.

  Mitch Steele was on the far side of fifty, a hard-eyed, hard-jawed, hard-headed engineer with a reputation for accomplishing the improbable with relative ease. This one bordered on the impossible. The plant, called Taesong for the small coastal community nearby, was the last of the current crop of nuclear power stations under construction in South Korea by Kepco, or Korea Electric Power Company, the government-owned utility. Politics, Steele thought sullenly. That's what this speedup was about. The country had a brand new president and he and his cronies wanted to go balls out on important developmental projects like this one. Steele had grown up in Louisiana, a state noted for its ofttimes seamy political maneuverings, and he had learned to loathe those who practiced what he considered a dark and sinister art.

  He strode into his office in the reactor building and found the sober visage of Moon Dong-sun, whose round face seemed a good fit for his name. Moon was the new distribution specialist for Korea Electric Power sent from Seoul to keep track of progress on the project. Steele moved across to the large, plasticized six-month schedule chart on the wall annotated with various colors of grease pencil to show planned and completed phases of the project.

  "As you can see, we're on schedule for the December power-up," Steele said. "There are still a few things to be finished on the outside, but most of the work is now taking place indoors."

  "It had better be ready," Moon said with an officious stare. "The Ministry of Energy and Resources plans to pull the single unit at Kanggu off-line by the end of the year. They want Taesong to pick up the load."

  "I recall Mr. Chi saying something about pulling Kanggu off line." Chi was the affable Kepco contact that Moon had replaced.

  Kanggu was located on the coast north of the big industrial city of Pohang, where blast furnaces roared day and night at one of the world's largest steel mills. It lay east of Mt. Chuwangsan, a rugged range of stark granite peaks and deep gorges.

  "Yes, it has been in the plan for a while," Moon said.

  "As I recall, Chi said some kind of research facility is scheduled for Kanggu. He'd heard they were hauling a lot of material and equipment up there."

  Moon's frown hardened. "Such loose talk is probably why he was replaced."

  As the sullen Korean sat beside his desk to read through the construction logs, Steele recalled Chi's last visit to the project. It had been a rainy afternoon when the youthful-appearing Kepco representative walked in with water dripping from his coat.

  "You look like a kid who just took a shower with his clothes on," Steele said.

  "I've done that. It's much more fun to take your clothes off, though. Then lather up with a pretty girl. What is it you say, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed?"

  The engineer rumpled his brow. "Don't you think of anything but sex, Chi?"

  "Sure." He spread out one hand and began counting on his fingers. "There's drinking, carousing—"

  "Never mind. What info do you have about our fuel?"

  "It will be coming from the Kanggu site. That's now the central fuel storage facility as well as the waste storage site."

  "You ever hear any more about what's going on up there?" Steele asked.

  Chi shrugged. "It's obviously a hush-hush affair. Who knows? Dr. Nam had a meeting in our conference room the other day with some people from Kanggu. I was surprised to see an old classmate of mine going in. He's some sort of manager with a division of Reijeo."

  "Why were you surprised?" Steele asked.

  "He's in their Explosives Division. They make dynamite and TNT, things like that. They don't have anything to do with nuclear power generation."

  It sounded curious. Dr. Nam U-je was the head of Korea Electric, who received Chi's progress reports on the Taesong reactor. Dr. Nam, like Steele, was an electrical engineer. But where Steele had an additional degree in nuclear engineering, Nam's doctorate was in nuclear physics.

  "Next time I see that guy from Kyonki High," Chi said, "I'm going to ask him what the hell business Reijeo has with Korea Electric Power. Old classmates aren't supposed to keep secrets from each other."

  Steele glanced across at Moon Dong-sun. He had professed to know nothing about where Chi had gone. Next time he was in Seoul, he'd have to ask around.

  Seoul, South Korea

  Chapter 17

  In the central part of Seoul where the glitzy hotels and night spots languished, late evening was a celebration of sights and sounds. An international babel of chattering voices and the constant clink of glasses were juxtaposed with the blare of music and the glare of footlights. But at eleven o'clock among the warehouses and small industrial plants of a drab, dusty outlying sectio
n of the capital, it was as hushed and deserted as a graveyard. Mr. Chon maintained a studied silence as the shiny black Kia sedan rolled down the quiet street. He watched for the sign that would indicate they were nearing the entrance to So Chi-ho's fenced-in scrap metal yard. Then he spotted it.

  "We turn through the gate in the middle of the block," he told Kim Yong-man, who was driving.

  "The high fence on the left?"

  "Correct. The gate will be unlocked. We should pull around to the rear entrance of the building."

  "Why did he want to meet you this late at night?"

  "So has his own agenda," Chon said. "He is not one easily rationalized."

  Chon would have preferred being at home at this hour, but he had given his word to Captain Yun. Then there was the matter of a large fee to be earned. Much of it would have to be shared with So, of course. He didn't like So, but he had no other choice. That dislike, oddly, was based largely on moral grounds, though Chon did not delude himself that his was any great moral cause. He acquired information wherever it could be found, and sold it to customers whose aims might be either noble or sinister. But he adhered to his own moralistic code of conduct, which specified that he did not deal with those who chose to deliberately harm innocent people. He would have nothing to do with drug traffickers, for example. He pragmatically accepted the necessity of bribery on occasion. And he made one critical exception to his code of conduct, the NSP. They had the power to put him out of business on no more than a whim. Indeed, they could make him disappear any time they chose. As a consequence, he fed the NSP bits of information on occasion, enough to keep them off his back.

  Nevertheless, Chon strongly disapproved of the NSP and its methods. He did not take a much more favorable view of So Chi-ho. Junk dealers, which was how he classified So, possessed an inverted sense of values. They prized trivia much more highly than the important things in life, things that included loyalty, integrity and, indeed, life itself. Chon was quite sure that So would sell his soul to the highest bidder. But he was a clever one and had access to unique sources of information that Chon found indispensable.

  Chon and So had both used their entrepreneurial skills to accumulate significant wealth, but there the similarity ended. So lived in an expensive house in the same district as the late hotelman Yang. He owned several cars and enjoyed flaunting his status in the kisaeng houses and on the golf courses. Chon, who was of a different generation, lived in the same modest home where he and his wife had brought up two daughters. His major regret was in not having sired a son. In Korean tradition, adulthood for a man occurred when he became the father of a boy. Fortunately, his daughters had provided him with grandsons. He owned only this late model Kia, and his lone extravagance was to handsomely pay his elder daughter's son, Kim Yong-man, to serve as his chauffeur and man Friday. A stocky young man of twenty-four, deliberate in his actions and content with his karma, Kim revered his grandfather like a postulant in the presence of the Lord Buddha.

  Chon experienced a momentary concern as Yong-man opened the gate to the scrap yard. He recalled the nervousness he had detected in So's voice when they had spoken earlier in the day, making arrangements for the meeting. He also recalled how, a couple of days ago, So had been no more happy than he at receiving a request for additional information on the assassin Hwang.

  The yard was lighted by only a few anemic bulbs that left much of it shrouded in shadow. They drove slowly around to the rear of the building and parked near the back door, which contained a barred window. A shaft of light fanned out through the window, sliced by the bars into a pattern of yellow and black squares like a giant, warped chess board. Yong-man hopped out nimbly and hurried around to open the door for his grandfather. As the old man stepped out, he detected an indistinct movement several feet to the right of the building entrance. Immediately he heard two quick, muted plops, and Yong-man crumpled beyond the car door.

  Chon instantly realized what he had heard. A silenced pistol. A glance down at the prostrate form of his grandson showed two holes in the back of his jacket. Holes that were beginning to turn crimson. A feeling of intense sadness gripped chon as he realized there would be no more leisurely chats, no more efforts to instill of sense of the past into the boy. With agonizing bitterness, he accepted there was nothing he could do for his grandson. But he knew there was no time for reminiscing. By instinct, he shifted his feet and arms into a defensive stance, as if that could provide protection from a bullet.

  "Relax, old man," said a mocking voice from the shadows. "I heard you were a t'ai chi master. I think you're getting a bit old for that. Anyway, I don't believe your chi can ward off a 9mm projectile traveling at 425 meters per second."

  Chon saw a figure dressed in black emerge from the doorway to a darkened storage room. He realized the initial movement of the door was what he had seen as he stepped out of the car. He could barely make out the features, but he had no doubt of whom he faced. He began to breathe slowly and deeply, forcing the anger, all the emotion out of his system, removing the tension from his muscles, allowing his chest, his lungs to relax. He could feel his chi, the life-giving energy that sustained him in times of crisis, begin to flow throughout his body like a surge of power, working its way through the marrow of his bones.

  "You should not have killed my grandson, Hwang Sang-sol," he said in a flat voice, betraying no emotion.

  Hwang circled around, holding a pistol with a long silencer attached, until he had Chon silhouetted against the light from the door. "Very good, old man. So now we know each other. I require a few answers from you, then you can take your grandson and leave."

  That was lie number one, Chon thought. There was no way Hwang intended to let him go, and at the moment he saw no options that might allow him to thwart the assassin's plans.

  "Move toward the door," Hwang commanded. "Open it. Leave it wide open and step inside, very slowly."

  "Where is Mr. So?" Chon asked. "Have you disposed of him, also?"

  "Don't worry about So. He knows how to survive."

  That meant So had told him everything, the old merchant acknowledged. "And what do you want of me?"

  The room they were in contained two desks, a few chairs and a counter. Hwang had moved one straight-backed chair into the center of a cleared area. He pointed to it with his pistol. "Sit down. Let your arms hang down at your sides."

  Chon smiled. "You cannot question a dead man, Mr. Hwang." He took a fighting stance and started to circle his opponent.

  Startled at first, Hwang quickly regained his composure. With a swift, smooth move, he slid the automatic across the floor behind him so that it was well out of reach of both men. Then he joined Chon in the stalking movement, slowly narrowing the gap between them. Chon watched carefully, anticipating when the younger man would make his move. Sensing what was about to come, without so much as a flicker of his eyes that might signal his intentions, Chon lashed out with a sudden kick. In the old days, it would have been aimed at the jaw. Now his target was somewhat lower.

  Hwang, already into his own thrust, was caught by surprise but managed to block the kick, though it threw him off balance. Chon followed with two quick blows, one of which caught Hwang on the side of his head. Though it rattled him, he was able to counter with a punch that rocked the old man backwards.

  Hwang wiped the back of his hand across his mouth and saw a smear of blood. "You fight well for an old man," he said. Then he grinned. "But the fight has just begun."

  "Perhaps I can teach you a little respect for your elders," Chon replied without rancor.

  "You wish me to observe the filial piety of your Confucianist virtues, eh? Believe me, old man, Confucius was a busy-body."

  As they circled again, Hwang abruptly reversed directions, turning with a sudden kick toward Chon's face. The old man felt it coming and dodged to one side, parrying with a forearm. But Hwang was too fast. He came back with a flurry of kicks. One caught Chon in the chest and toppled him backwards. Hwang pressed his advant
age and leaped forward to launch a double-punch that dropped the old man to the floor, stunned.

  When Chon regained his senses, he found his arms handcuffed behind his back. He struggled to sit up and cast a hostile look at his assailant. But the fight was over. He had lost.

  "Let's begin with these," Hwang said lightly, dangling a crowded key ring in front of him. "Which of these goes to your Namdaemun fruit stall?"

  Chon knew he was a dead man. This was just the beginning. Hwang would soon demand to know who had sent him with the drawings and questions about movements. He would refuse, of course, and the systematic torture would begin. In the end, the assassin would kill him. He spotted an apple sitting on the counter in front of him, probably left over from some worker's lunch. It looked full, red and juicy. He began to concentrate on the apple, allowing his mind to float beyond his body. Let Hwang do as he wished. Chon would cancel out the pain with his concentration. And with appropriately snide remarks, heavily laden with sarcasm, he would goad the assassin into killing him quickly. He was determined not to divulge the identity of Captain Yun Yu-sop.

  Chapter 18

  For Pak Tong-hui, a lucrative business deal was always a cause for celebration. And celebrations were meant to be shared with good friends. Pak was not an educated man, but he had a born trader's knack for negotiation. A short, bushy-haired sprite in his late forties, he resembled an abbreviated Oriental version of Larry in the Three Stooges. He had signed a terrific deal earlier in the day with a manufacturer of fabrics. Mostly overruns, some seconds, the varied supply of piece goods he was buying should eventually net him something in the neighborhood of seven and a half million won, which translated to about ten thousand dollars. Pak marketed his wares in a Namdaemun stall just up the alley and on the opposite side from Mr. Chon.