Tom Clancy answers the question “What’s next?” It’s hard to have an action hero that gets constant Secret Service protection, so it was fairly obvious that former president Jack Ryan was finished as a protagonist for his books. I saw a few tentative starts with some net police stories and some other stuff, but nothing with any legs.

Well, I have my answer, now. Remember the son born during an earlier advanture? He’s all grown up, now, and is stepping in to the family business, so to speak. Father doesn’t exactly know about it at the moment, but he and a couple of his cousins have now become assassins, working for a quasi-non-governmental secret organization which spies on the government and is dedicated to doing that which the government cannot do, because people might find out.

The new direction isn’t one I cotton to, exactly, so it’s possible that my Clancy collection stops here. He appears to have bought into the old saw that to beat your enemy, you must become your enemy. My reaction to that has always been “if that’s the case, what’s the point of fighting in the first place?” It’s the same kind of non-think that spawned the more egregious parts of the PATRIOT act (political aside: parts of the aforementioned act I could possibly support, but not at the cost of the rest of the baggage it brings; it was a perfect example of how hasty action makes for bad laws). He tempers it a bit with the idea that only a few have to do that, leaving the rest of us unaffected, but I don’t buy that. I think any action taken in my name will eventually have its effect on me.

The premise is simple: if you knew the location of people who had been a part of actions taken against your citizens, would you quietly kill them as and where you found them? There’s a certain Old Testament flair to it, I grant. It’s hardly a new idea, even in reality. Israel embarked upon such a quest after the Olympics in Munich. When the hit in Sweden went bad, however, they dialed down the retaliations. And, given the current climate in Israel, I don’t see how anyone can suggest it was more than minimally effective.

But reality notwithstanding, Clancy carries off the premise, and the tale, with his usual aplomb: good pacing, good characters, nice climax. Good read, even if the whole idea is a bit dicey. Whether you’ll like it depends upon your suspension of disbelief. If you can’t get past the politics, even for a few hours, don’t bother.

I have, BTW, two good memories of Clancy, non-book related. First, of course, is his line about computers, back during the Mac vs PC wars: “Never ask a man what kind of computer he drives. If he drives a Mac, he’ll tell you. If he doesn’t, why embarrass him?”

The other one was his appearance on The O’Reilly Factor. O’Reilly was on one of his favorite hobby horses, using the military to patrol our borders and catch illegal immigrants. And, given the politics in Clancy’s books, he assumed he get an easy agreement from his guest. (Making the assumption proves that O’Reilly doesn’t read closely, or at least critically.) Clancy shut him down in no uncertain terms, and repeatedly told him, much to our host’s dismay, that he didn’t know what he was talking about and that it was a Bad Idea. Maybe it’s a distinction that only us ex-mil types can see, but it was good to see someone handle that pompous windbag as well as Clancy did.