2034 by Elliot Ackerman and James Stavridis

Published by Penguin Press on March 9, 2021

2034 is a geopolitical thriller set in — you guessed it — 2034. It blends diplomacy with military fiction to create the possibility of a nuclear apocalypse. Will the world end in nuclear strikes or will cooler heads prevail? I won’t tell, but I will say that I didn’t know how the story would end until it ended.

The primary boogeyman in 2034 is China. Russia and Iran and the United States contribute to the unnecessary escalation of hostilities while India plays a surprisingly central role after the war heats up. The tension begins as China continues to assert its false claim of sovereignty over all of the South China Sea. The US Navy is patrolling the area to minimize Chinese aggression when the Chinese reveal their cyber supremacy by disabling communications and most electronic systems on the Navy’s ships and airplanes. They also sink a couple of American warships and hack the communications systems of the US government. Meanwhile, Iran uses the same technology to take remote control of an American F-35 that has not-so-accidentally strayed into Iranian territory to test its new stealth capacity. Frankly, any country that breaks the rules to see if they can get away with it should have its toys taken away, but the American government obviously doesn’t see it that way.

A character with a John Bolton attitude toward American supremacy tells the American president to retaliate. Sandeep Chowdhury, a deputy national security advisor, is a voice of moderation in the administration but he doesn’t have the president’s ear. Lin Bao is a voice of moderation in the Chinese government, but he becomes a convenient scapegoat when things go wrong. Chowdhury’s uncle in India, Vice Admiral Patel, makes an informal attempt to act as peacemaker — as in, “you guys make peace or else” — leaving the reader to wonder whether good sense will prevail over an increasing escalation of strikes that will eventually assure the absence of winners.

Other notable characters include Major General Qassem Farshad, who doesn’t appreciate Iran’s role in this mess and is rewarded for expressing that opinion by being tasked with defending the Hormuz Strait islands against a Russian invasion. The pilot who lost his fighter to Iran, a man named Wedge who is the fourth generation in a family of Marine pilots, relishes the opportunity to lead a squadron of Hornets in an attack against China. The Hornet is the only available aircraft that can still be flown after all their electronic communications systems and computers are ripped out to prevent them from being hacked and hijacked. Sarah Hunt, the commodore of the squadron that mostly sinks in the initial conflict with the Chinese, does not relish her return to command after she learns that the war is about to become very ugly.

Road to Military Apocalypse novels have been around for decades. The plot’s familiarity does not detract from the story’s ability to engage the reader. The authors build tension by personalizing the story, showcasing characters who know what they stand to lose if hawks and despots prevail. It is, after all, the impact of events on people, rather than events themselves, that give a novel its heart. If Wedge comes across as a clichéd character, he is at least a likable cliché. Hunt could use an infusion of personality. Choudhury, Lin Bao, and Farshad are better characters simply because they each display more than one dimension.

While the action scenes are exciting — Wedge’s attempt to elude superior fighters in his stripped-down Hornet is a particularly entertaining segment — the authors made a smart choice by giving more attention to political conflicts than military battles. Spreading those conflicts across China, Iran, and the US (rather than focusing solely on American players) contributes to the story’s interest. The authors give the story a twist by making a convincing argument for India as a key global player. The anti-Chinese sentiment of Americans who don’t know the difference between a Chinese-American and a Chinese politburo member adds another nice touch to a story that, in the end, reminds us that America is about opportunity and unity, not supremacy and division.

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