The Mandarin Code (49 page)

So, thank you to:

Dr Hugh White, Professor of Strategic Studies, School of International, Political and Strategic Studies, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, for his wisdom, guidance and his book
The China Choice: Why America Should Share Power (Black Inc, 2013)
. You should buy it.

Dr Carl Ungerer, friend, former diplomat, intelligence analyst and adviser to Labor's foreign minister Bob Carr; currently an adjunct lecturer at Bond University.

Alastair MacGibbon, former Australian Federal Police agent, now director of the Centre for Internet Safety at the University of Canberra. Alastair was extraordinarily patient and generous, spending hours demystifying cyber-security and internet hacking.

The chapters on the USS
George Washington
could not have been written without the expert guidance of Admiral (Ret) Ronald J. (Zap) Zlatoper, a former Commander in Chief of the United States Pacific Fleet. Rear Admiral (Ret) Brian Adams, AO, a former deputy chief of the Royal Australian Navy made many astute corrections to the early draft. Kind advice also came from Admiral (Ret) Chris Barrie AC, a former Chief of the Australian Defence Force, and Rear Admiral (Ret) James Goldrick AO who, among many things in his thirty-eight years in the RAN, commanded the Australian Defence Force Academy.

A serving US Air Force pilot provided expert guidance to help us write the chapter on flying the B52 out of Guam to the Senkaku Islands. Our American friend selflessly gave several hours of his time in long Skype calls detailing flight procedures for the iconic airframe.

Patrick Siu was generous in helping the authors understand the beauty of Chinese calligraphy. He is a wonderful artist.

We would like to particularly thank Amanda O'Connell, our wonderful editor, whose patience and professionalism have made
The Mandarin Code
a much better read.

The writing of
The Mandarin Code
was guided by a number of books. These include:

The Dismissal: Australia's most sensational power struggle: the dramatic fall of Gough Whitlam
(Angus & Robertson, 1983) by Paul Kelly. Thanks to Paul, too, for kindly allowing us to reproduce a small part of his landmark tome.

Cyber War: The Next Threat to National Security and What to Do About It
(Ecco Press, 2012) by Richard A. Clarke with Robert K. Knake.

The Party: The Secret World of China's Communist Rulers
(HarperCollins, 2012) by Richard McGregor.

Party Time: Who Runs China and How
(Black Inc, 2013) by Rowan Callick.

This book already had a fictional head of the US National Security Agency in it (and was all but complete) before the
Australian Financial Review
's contributing editor Christopher Joye published his excellent interview with the retired NSA and Cyber Command head, General Keith Alexander, on May 8, 2014. But it proved, again, that some facts are stranger than fiction and we borrowed liberally from it.

Finally, we want to thank all those politicians, staffers, senior bureaucrats, members of the defence force and intelligence agencies, both here and in the United States, who enthusiastically offered ideas, stories and advice. Alas, many of you have begged to remain anonymous. But you know who you are.

More importantly, we know who you are.

STEVE LEWIS
arrived in Canberra in late 1992 and spent more than two decades tormenting the nation's political elite. He worked for the
Australian Financial Review, The Australian
and News Corp's big-selling metropolitan dailies. He currently works as a senior consultant with Newgate Communications. He is co-author, with Chris Uhlmann, of the best-selling
The Marmalade Files
and also works as a freelance journalist.

CHRIS UHLMANN
is a Walkley Award winning journalist and one of Australia's best known and most respected political broadcasters. His career in reporting began at the
Canberra Times
in 1989, after failed stints as a student priest, storeman and packer and security guard. He was editor of the
Canberra Weekly
before joining the ABC in 1998. As political editor for ABC TV, and now host of ABC radio's flagship current affairs program
AM
, he has earned a reputation for his fearless pursuit of the nation's politicians.

‘Seasoned political journalists Steve Lewis and Chris Uhlmann have come up with a satirical political thriller designed to tell a ripping yarn at the same time as it confronts issues to do with power and leadership, our relations with China and the United States, and the changing face of the media and political reporting'

Canberra Times

‘The book opens on a freezing morning after the 2011 press gallery midwinter ball, with world-weary journalist Harry Dunkley chasing a lead for a cracking yarn. It goes haywire from there to Beijing, Washington and back to Canberra, with no sacred cow left unmilked, no media outlet untainted and no character unbesmirched'

Australian Financial Review

‘Both authors are heavy hitters in the political scene yet scrupulously insist that their book is all harmless fiction. You've got to hope so. Imagine if these clowns and schemers really were running our country?'

Australian Women's Weekly

‘The Monument Men went to war on cultural barbarians whereas the Marmalade Men target political barbarians. Much more fun'

Phillip Adams

‘It's definitely fun. It's got sex, it's got politics, it's got spooks, it's got a transvestite disco. I table
The Marmalade Files
and commend it to the honourable members of
The Australian'
s readership'

The Australian

‘The book's blurb says it's a romp through “the dark underbelly of politics” and for once the blurb doesn't lie . . . the result is
The Marmalade Files
, a banquet of bastardry'

Daily Telegraph

‘The novel is regularly hilarious, inserting much fiction into a perfectly factual Canberra setting . . . and teases unmercifully the readers' perceptions of Australian politics and the secret world'

National Times

‘It is indeed a romp – often hilarious and always great fun'

Weekend Gold Coast Bulletin

An imaginative romp through the dark underbelly of politics by two veteran Canberra insiders.

When seasoned newshound Harry Dunkley is slipped a compromising photograph one frosty Canberra dawn he knows he's onto something big. In pursuit of the scoop, Dunkley must negotiate the deadly corridors of power where the minority Toohey Government hangs by a thread - its stricken Foreign Minister on life support, her heart maintained by a single thought. Revenge.

Rabid Rottweilers prowl in the guise of Opposition senators, union thugs wage class warfare, TV anchors simper and fawn . . . and loyalty and decency have long since given way to compromise and treachery.

From the teahouses of Beijing to the beaches of Bali, from the marbled halls of Washington to the basements of the bureaucracy, Dunkley's quest takes him ever closer to the truth - and ever deeper into a lethal political game.

Award-winning journalists Steve Lewis and Chris Uhlmann combine forces in this arresting novel that proves fiction is stranger than fact.

Click here
to buy
The Marmalade Files
.

Like all works of fiction, this story was inspired by events in the real world, but it is a work of fiction and none of the main characters in this book really exists and, more importantly, none of the acts attributed to these fictional characters ever took place. So please do not interpret anything that happens in this book as a real event that actually happened or that involved any person in the real world (whether living or now deceased).

Fourth Estate

An imprint of HarperCollins
Publishers

First published in Australia in 2014

by HarperCollins
Publishers
Australia Pty Limited

ABN 36 009 913 517

harpercollins.com.au

THE MANDARIN CODE
. Copyright © Steve Lewis and Chris Uhlmann 2014. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

The right of Steve Lewis and Chris Uhlmann to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the
Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000
.

This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the
Copyright Act 1968
, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

HarperCollins
Publishers

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195 Broadway, New York NY 10007, USA

Lewis, Steve.

The mandarin code / Steve Lewis and Chris Uhlmann.

978 0 7322 9475 5 (pbk.)

978 0 7304 9966 4 (ebook)

EPub Edition June 2014 ISBN 9780730499664

Journalists – Fiction.

Satire, Australian – 21st century.

Australia – Politics and government – Fiction.

Other Authors/Contributors:

Uhlmann, Chris.

A823.4

Cover design by Darren Holt, HarperCollins Design Studio

Author photograph by Gary Ramage, News Ltd