Chimera

The satellite also picked up dozens of large smoke clouds west of Golmud that had almost dissipated away, allowing for effective battle-damage-assessment of the Chinese missile brigades. The imagery was processed and investigated at the Aerospace Command by the attached DIPAC officers.

But as the radar imagery continued to update on the wall-mounted screens in front of him, Air-Vice-Marshal Malhotra put his hands behind his head and let out a long breath…

NEW-DELHI

DAY 15 + 1200 HRS

“You want to strike them inside Tibet?” Chakri asked as Iyer finished outlining his nuclear counter-strike.

“Wait a minute here!” Ravoof added as he understood what Chakri was talking about as well.

“There is no other choice!” Iyer replied. “If you want to stop the 15TH Corps dead in its tracks, then you have to hit them where they are! And they are in Tibet right now; just south of Gyantse, as a matter of fact.”

“We can’t do that!” the PM said as he dismissed Iyer’s assessment. “We will end up killing thousands of Tibetan civilians and undoing everything that has existed between India and Tibet! They will not forgive us for this for generations!”

“If Beijing allows that many Tibetan generations to survive their genocidal activities there to start with,” Chakri added quietly.

“That is not the point!” the NSA retorted. “If you want to strike them, do it over Chinese soil! The 15TH Corps can be handled by conventional means. We have enough forces in the valley under General Suman now that the two enemy Divisions there have collapsed.”

“I don’t want to use our nuclear weapons at all!” the PM said. It got him a frown from all others in the conversation except Ravoof.

“We have already been struck!” Chakri said forcefully. “Bhutan is our responsibility and our paratroopers have died there in the hundreds thanks to the Chinese nuclear strike! General Potgam just lost two Para battalions along with hundreds of regular army and air-force personnel. Our men! Tens of thousands of Bhutanese civilians are dead as well! And had we not detected those launchers in time we would not even be alive! Beijing deserves everything we can throw at them at this point!”

“And then they will respond to our strikes with strikes of their own,” Ravoof replied. “And then we will do it again to them and the cycle goes on! Where does it stop? When both India and China have lost all of their major cities and millions of their citizens? There has to be another way here, Chakri! Striking military targets inside China with nuclear weapons is one thing. But become too successful at it and they will respond against our cities?”

“We cannot not respond to the Chinese attack!” Chakri shouted.

“No,” the PM said, “what we can’t afford is to throw away the conventional victory in Tibet for our lust for Chinese blood. The whole reason they attacked us with nuclear weapons was to force us to do the same and help them dilute the sharp nature of their defeat in Tibet. This is why they didn’t go after our cities. This is also why there were no more launches from them in the last few hours. It was a lure to drag us into a fight we cannot win and away from a fight we did win! We need to look past that lure and see what we have accomplished. Now that their launchers in Tibet are destroyed and their forces in the Chumbi valley and Bhutan are defeated, we have the upper hand. Especially after the hit on their command center. That constitutes an advantage I am willing to use!”

“Do we even know who’s in charge in Beijing now?” Ravoof asked.

“Hard to say,” the NSA added, “but probably somebody from the military. We will know more soon enough. In the meantime, let’s keep an eye on their DF-31 missiles. Movement on those units will mean a follow up strike against our cities is in play, and that will be the point at which we will launch our counter-response.”

“So what is our response in the meantime?” Iyer asked.

KORLA

NORTHWESTERN CHINA

DAY 15 + 1310 HRS

“Confirm, Korla-tower. We are beginning approach in one minute.”

“Pattern is clear.” The radio squawked.

The Lieutenant-Colonel piloting the aircraft had his right hand on the throttle as the engine whine decreased slightly. His left hand was on the controls as he and his co-pilot brought the KJ-2000 down below the gray cloud cover over Korla. The view from the cockpit was negligible as they broke through the clouds. After a few seconds the aircraft cleared under them and the partially snow covered ground around Korla was visible.

The co-pilot pressed the button for lowering the undercarriage. The aircraft shuddered discernably as the large wheels of the modified Il-76 lowered themselves and locked into position. The pilot also lowered the huge wing flaps. The flaps lowered with a constant humming noise.

“You see it?” the pilot asked as he looked out from the cockpit glass.

“To your left, twenty kilometers,” the co-pilot replied as he spotted the concrete runway at Korla.

“I have it.”