wife Themes Debt of Honor was released during a time of American resentment towards the Japanese, which was further popularized by the publication of Michael Crichton's crime thriller novel Rising Sun in 1992. In this case, Clancy avoided "Japan bashing" that is evident in Crichton's work, and instead presented a balanced picture of Japanese society, its government, business practices, and values. In the novel, he also discussed currency trading, governmental corruption, car manufacturing and distribution, and power politics in the country. The novel also reinforces Clancy's belief that the recent downsizing of the military establishment after the Cold War "has so depleted our military resources that the country is vulnerable to aggression that can arise anywhere, anytime", according to Publishers Weeklys review of the book. Reception The novel received positive reviews. Publishers Weekly praised Clancy, who "spins out story threads in a rich but bewildering tangle of plot and setting, then vigorously weaves them together. Here, the heart-stopping climax is unexpected, but oddly appropriate." However, Christopher Buckley, in a review for The New York Times, called the book a "herniating experience", criticized its "racist" depictions of Japanese characters and judged that it was "as subtle as a World War II anti-Japanese poster showing a mustachioed Tojo bayoneting Caucasian babies". Legacy In later years, the novel was noted for its similarity to the circumstances surrounding United Airlines Flight 93, especially regarding its climax, where an embittered Japanese pilot crashes his 747 on a joint session of Congress in the Capitol. While researching for the novel's ending, Clancy consulted an Air Force officer and described his reaction: "I ran this idea past him and all of a sudden this guy's eyeballing me rather closely and I said, 'Come on General, I know you must have looked at this before, you've got to have a plan for it.' And the guy goes, 'Mr. Clancy, to the best of my knowledge, if we had a plan to deal with this, it would be secret, I wouldn't be able to talk to you about it, but to the best of my knowledge we've never looked at this possibility before.'" In April 1995, United States senator Sam Nunn outlined a scenario similar to the novel's ending, in which terrorists attack the Capitol on the night of a State of the Union address by crashing a radio-controlled airplane filled with chemical weapons into it. Nunn concluded that