| “ | You know who won World War II? It wasn't the generals or the admirals. It was the economists. More tanks, planes, ships. And all that spending lifted this entire nation out of poverty. Freed the world from tyranny. A big country needs big enemies. The best enemy we ever had was the Soviet Union. Our fear of them unified our people. Gave us purpose. The problem today, John, is half the country thinks the other half is its enemy because they have no one else to fight. So... we gave them a real enemy. | „ |
| ~ Thomas Clay |
Thomas Clay is the main antagonist of the 2021 action thriller film Tom Clancy's Without Remorse, the first installment in Amazon Prime's Rainbow Six film series.
Clay is the corrupt and treacherous US Secretary Of Defense. In an attempt to unite the country and boost the economy, Clay attempted to instigate a false-flag provocation between the United States and Russia, causing each side to think they were being attacked by the other. In his initial plan, he framed Russian involvement in the deaths of SEAL team members following a fake rescue mission in Syria, leading to Clay's eventual undoing by the vengeful John Kelly.
He was portrayed by Guy Pearce, who also played Leonard Shelby in Memento, Fernand Mondego in The Count of Monte Cristo, Kendall Duncan in Bedtime Stories, Peter Weyland in Prometheus and Alien: Covenant, Charlie Rakes in Lawless, Aldrich Killian in Iron Man 3, The Reverend in Brimstone, Ebenezer Scrooge in the 2019 A Christmas Carol miniseries and Emil Harting in Bloodshot.
Biography[]
Thomas Clay was the United States Secretary of Defense, who became convinced that to boost the economy and foster national unity, the country needed to identify a common adversary. To this end, he orchestrated a series of criminal actions amidst a global conspiracy by manipulating the CIA to initiate a war with Russia. He ordered a SEAL team to extract a CIA operative in Syria, knowing Yuri Zelin, the son of the head of the FSB, was occupying the hostage compound. Clay intended for the death of Yuri to be seen as justified retaliation, escalating tensions between the U.S. and Russia.
Clay organized a team with FSB connections to further fuel the conflict, led by a deep-cover CIA operative named Viktor Rykov. He ordered them to assassinate members of the SEAL team, resulting in the deaths of several individuals. John Kelly survived these assassination attempts, although his pregnant wife Pam was killed in the crossfire. While Kelly was incarcerated for his involvement in the death of a Russian diplomat (who identified Viktor Rykov as the commander of the FSB team who shot Pam), Clay leaked intelligence documents to worsen U.S. and Russian relations. Realizing he could dispose of Kelly by sending him on a false mission to capture Rykov, Clay allowed Kelly to participate in the mission to capture him in Murdansk.
Clay escalated the situation by leaking intelligence documents to the public about recovering Rykov, intending it to fail and spark a war. However, the plan went awry as the recovery team, who included Kelly and Robert Ritter, survived a plane crash and encountered Rykov without being discovered by Russian authorities. Rykov later killed himself in a suicide bombing to avoid capture. Despite initially suspecting Ritter of being a traitor within the U.S. Government, Kelly and others deduced Clay's involvement as the traitor from Rykov's testimony before his suicide.
In the end, Kelly confronted Clay, who confessed to his crimes after Kelly threatened his family, justifying his belief that economic factors played a significant role in determining the outcome of wars. He wanted to establish Russia as a clear and common enemy to unify the country. Kelly recorded this admission and plunged Clay's SUV into the Potomac River, leaving Clay behind to die. Kelly framed Clay's death as a drowning-suicide; Clay's death was officially reported as such, which Kelly used as blackmail to change his identity to John Clark, and subsequent recruitment into the counter-terrorism unit Rainbow.
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Trivia[]
External Links[]
- Thomas Clay on the Jack Ryan Wiki