Oh my God!
How do you even begin to describe this book? One of the most god-awful pieces of propaganda ever written, and the fact that almost all of Clancy's previous books were so well-written and thought out only makes this one that much worse.
The plot; is it even worth discussing? China (an complete communist dictatorship which somehow never made it out of the fifties) is made nearly bankrupt overnight by a trade embargo imposed by the U.S. and its allies, following a Tienanmen-style shootout. The Chinese therefore decide to invade Russia and steal all the oil, mineral and natural gas resources in Siberia for their own use. America stops them through high technology, plot over.
As I said, it's really not worth mentioning, because the war itself only starts happening about eight or nine hundred pages into the book. The first 1000 or so pages are dedicated to describing China-US relations and addressing every single issue on the Republican agenda.
The anti-Chinese sentiment in this book is probably the most offensive part of it, and don't start telling me it's only directed at the government. Dear China, how do I hate thee? let me count the ways. Every Chinese citizen in the book is a complete moron, brainwashed by Communism to be an inhuman machine, the one exception being, of course, CHRISTIANS!!! didn't see that one coming, did you? The average Chinese Joe out on the street still calls everyone "comrade" and dresses in Mao jackets, unisex dresses and generally fifties attire; no sense of style whatsoever. EVERY single Chinese person is an utter and complete moron, from the leaders who refuse to believe in any form of American power to the General who gets shot by a ninety-year old sniper to the office secretary who gets seduced by a pair of Western panties, the likes of which she has never seen even though most of them are, in fact, made in China. Oh! very important! China is STILL a completely communist country, like North Korea, never mind that their leaders are doing everything in their power right now to strengthen and invite capitalism; and of course, Chinese leaders have no idea how the world works, even though they're the ones who right now have the entire world eating out of their hands, including owning half of America's debt.
And of course, Chinese culture is thoroughly evil, only Christianity can save it. The phrase, "Marxism is inhuman, and Chinese culture doesn't value human life; put the two together, and you get the worst country in the world..." is used over and over and over again in the book until I was going, GET TO THE POINT! Are you telling a story or slandering 1.6 billion people.
So all in all, "disappointing" is probably the best word I could use for this book. Clancy's writing used to be a lot less fanatic. In old books, he showed respect for the people and cultures of enemy countries like Russia, Japan or Iran, and usually managed to create sympathetic characters on both sides of the fence; he also stated his principles in a more muted and respectable way. This book is nine hundred pages of non-stop rhetoric, a short bathroom break for the little war, and final pages in which all is set right, America all-powerful again, Russia too (though capitalist now, of course), and China relegated to its rightful place with a more pro-Western leader (though of course, China will now remain in the dark because, as Clancy in his wisdom says, "it is a country of great momentum rather than great thought").
Four words; Do not read this.