buffoonery's Full Review: Tom Clancy - Debt of Honor
This is another entrant in my ongoing epinions on the novels of Tom Clancy. Today we turn our attention to "Debt of Honor", which follows "The Sum of All Fears" in the Jack Ryan saga.
Let us begin with a trivia quiz:
a) What do West Virginia, Tennessee and Maryland have in common?
b) Who was Nagumo?
c) Who was Tibbetts?
If you're smart, you'll say:
a) They were all U.S. battleships sunk at Pearl Harbor.
b) Commander of the Japanese strike force (Kido Butai, FYI) at Pearl Harbor, who committed seppuku on Saipan in 1944.
c) Commander of the Enola Gay, which dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima (he's still alive and kicking, last I heard).
Good try, but wrong. Read on.
If you haven't guessed it yet, this one has the U.S. against the Japanese, with trade rivalries exploding into undeclared war. And it isn't bad, either. It's too long, like most of the post-"Clear and Present Danger" books, but doesn't seem as long its two successors because it actually has a plot.
There is a lot happening in this one. At heart is an outbreak of Japanese ego with an industrialist seeking to recover Saipan and other islands that Japan lost after World War II. The Japanese plan combines a very clever financial assault on the U.S. stock and treasury markets with a sneak attack on U.S. carriers and submarines in the Pacific, using a trade war as a pretext. Their objective is to establish Japan as a world power equal to the U.S.-and they have the nukes to back themselves up. The Indians and Chinese are in cahoots and have their own agendas.
While these things are developing, Jack Ryan has been dragooned back into government service, this time as National Security Advisor to the new President (his predecessor having resigned, after nearly blowing up the world in "The Sum of All Fears"). (Ryan is the hero of this long series of novels, for those unfamiliar with Clancy's books.) Ryan, naturally, has a good Kissingeresque grip on things, and is the right-hand man who keeps outwitting the Japanese moves while the President fumbles around on domestic issues. Of course, he's a conservative with an instinctive grasp of realpolitik, unlike his naïve liberal opponents.
Once you suspend your disbelief about the general plot (I'll get to the ending in a moment), this is a pretty good thriller-although you had better enjoy lots of technical detail. The action occurs on many different levels-espionage, air and electronics warfare, submarine action, and (not least) economics. There are some good air combat sequences as U.S. forces try to penetrate Japanese air defense over Japan. The attack on U.S. markets is OK, too, although a bit dated in light of the increasing globalization of markets. The book is a bit slow in the beginning, and Clancy probably could have edited out a hundred pages, but it's a good page-turner. Clancy's also setting up future novels, with problems with the Indians and Chinese clearly in the cards.
There is the usual combination of right-wing politics and political correctness. Clancy takes every opportunity to vent his views on free trade and national security, and while his protagonist is nominated for vice-president, his working wife gets a top medical award. Yawn. He can't write dialogue between husband and wife to save his life. And then Clancy names the subs that take part in the U.S. counterattack after battlewagons sunk at Pearl Harbor and one of the top Japanese negotiators after the guy who led the Japanese attack, and gee whiz, the U.S. op to take out the Japanese nukes is named after the guy who dropped the first bomb. OK, Tom, I read military history, too, and I get the irony already.
The incredible (but entertaining) nature of the plot is exceeded only by its conclusion. In the interest of not spoiling the ending for people who haven't read this yet, let me merely say Jack Ryan has always been Clancy's alter ego and that I saw this coming three novels ago but am still dumbfounded by the way Clancy decided to bring it about. More on that in my "Executive Orders" review, coming soon.
Anyway, four stars for fans, three stars for non-fans who have patience. This is not for the Jackie Collins bunch.
And for you purists out there, OK, OK, the Tennessee and Maryland were just damaged at Pearl, I know.
Here is a complete listing of my Jack Ryan reviews:
Clancy takes a bold look at what our nation's leaders are calling "the new world order". A world at peace, where yesterday's enemies are tomorrow's al...More at HotBookSale
Clancy takes a bold look at what our nation s leaders are calling the new world order . A world at peace, where yesterday s enemies are tomorrow s all...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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