Relaxing after a trying dinner meeting of Chinese/American dignitaries that brings an amount of accord, the powerful Chinese Standing Committee Chairman Keung Yang views by chance a TV program on tsunamis describing the disaster on associated countries that would follow collapse of a wall of Hawaii’s Kilauea Volcano. Associated discussion included the questionable stability of the western slope of Cumbre Vieja Volcano on La Palma of the Canary Islands off Morocco. He envisions what delivery of a series of tsunamis could do to the east coast of America if such a situation could be created. Although seemingly impossible, he consults with a brilliant oceanographer at a university and obtains data that marginally might deliver energy sufficient to cause such a catastrophic occurrence.
He discusses the possibility with his friend Chen Teng, the Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission. Skeptical, Chen agrees to provide the necessary equipment. Results are not as effective as planned in a ‘proportional response’ involving members of both countries.
Activity of these individuals until achievement of final resolution is engrossing with a prominent sub-plot – an internal struggle between the elitist faction that embraces the burgeoning industrial activity that is bringing China into world power espoused by Zhou and Dzhang, versus the populist faction championed by the idealistic Keung who abhors the industrial pollution affecting the population and the land. Constant and detrimental infighting among American and Chinese politicians/diplomats with prominent duplicity, deception and attempted/effective betrayal is prominent and well done.
In Summary: An author quite knowledgeable of Oriental as well as western philosophy and thought patterns has set forth a provocative scenario that makes Proportional Response a most enjoyable and captivating read.
