Without Warning Part 28

Culver thought the admiral might as well have asked, "Why should we keep going?" He couldn't imagine what was holding together a fighting force that had nothing to fight for anymore, and increasingly lacked the money to do so.

Immediate survival, he supposed. But if and when the immediate peril was no longer, what then? A nation of ten million people-that was the rough estimate of living, breathing American citizens left in the world-a nation that small could not sustain a military even a fraction the size of the one it had at the moment. Especially not with most of the country sealed off behind an impenetrable and utterly mysterious barrier. Frankly, Jed doubted whether the area that remained unaffected on the continent was viable in the medium term anyway. He grunted almost imperceptibly as he briefly thought of all those people stuck in Seattle and just across the border in Vancouver. None of them could be certain some natural fluctuation in the event horizon wouldn't consume them in the blink of an eye, although by that measure, of course, n.o.body on the planet could really feel safe.

You had to wonder how much of the chaos wrapping itself like giant bat wings around the world was due to the effect of that uncertainty rather than the unsettling effect of simply removing at one stroke the ma.s.sive political ballast represented by America. Oh, screw it. It was undergrad bulls.h.i.tting, all of it. The only thing that mattered was fixing the problems he could fix, and for now that meant stabilizing the remnant power of the United States and securing the immediate future of his family.

He flipped open his laptop and began to compose an e-mail to Ritchie. He wanted to bounce a few ideas off the admiral before the conference call in the afternoon.

He typed very deliberately, using the informal style of address he'd cultivated in his dealings with the navy man.

Hey Ritch, You asked for my thoughts on the line of succession before I wrote them up for the reference group. Well, I'm thinking the only way to punch through all this is to go back to first principles. We've got us a const.i.tutional boondoggle. We need us a const.i.tutional convention to stamp it flat. A short, sharp, b.u.t.t-kicking convention.

Normally you'd require a vote of two-thirds of the state legislatures just to get everyone together. It's the only amendatory process available in the absence of a functioning Congress and Senate. The intent of the relevant section of the Const.i.tution, Article 5, is that the "two thirds" would be "two thirds" of all of the states, but that is impossible under present circ.u.mstances.

The only available option would be for the three surviving states to declare themselves the only three states and to then call a convention or, more likely, to declare themselves Trustees for the "missing" forty-seven states, and vote those states' interests at a convention called to address the current emergency. The result is the same and is the only mechanism available in my estimation to reconst.i.tute a federal government within the letter of the Const.i.tution.

Jed stopped tapping keys and stared out the window at the pa.s.sing scenery for a moment. They had turned onto the freeway, which was largely deserted, save for a few Hummers heading downtown from Pearl, and the National Memorial Cemetery was slipping by on the right. He had a great-uncle buried up there. Uncle Lou, on his mom's side. He'd meant to visit the grave site sometime during his vacation but had never made it. He was sure his forebear would understand. Lou Stafford had been killed on Wake Island, the same day the j.a.panese bombed Pearl Harbor. He'd fought when all seemed hopeless. Given his life so that Jed and his kids could live free. You had to wonder what the old guy would have made of all this, thought Culver, before reminding himself that Lou Stafford was only nineteen when he died. Not much of an old guy, really. The lawyer nodded a quick greeting, which would have to do for now.

He went back to his screen, wondering about the difficulties of a.s.sembling a convention along the lines he was proposing. The very nature of the three surviving states might pose problems. Hawaii and Washington, particularly the western half of the state, were very liberal, Democratic-leaning, and, in the case of the latter, not particularly pro-military. Seattle he found notoriously smug and self-righteous, although that might have changed by now. The eastern, agricultural portion of Washington, right up to the event horizon, was heavily Republican, although many of those people had already relocated into temporary shelters in Seattle. Hawaii had no oil, no real agriculture, and no industry, but it did have a strong military presence. The maritime power alone concentrated here was still greater than that of any other country in the world. Washington had agriculture, industry, and refining capacity but no oil. Alaska had no agriculture, plenty of oil, and decent refining capacity but very little else, particularly people, and what people it did have tended to be very conservative, libertarian Republicans.

He just didn't know whether they could all get together.

With Ma.s.sachusetts and Mississippi gone, you could award a blue ribbon to Alaska and Washington for taking the "polar opposites" prize. Jed figured that Washington, with its much larger population and resource base, would resist Alaska having a virtual veto over any measures necessary to act within a const.i.tutional framework. And Alaska, for its part, might well see itself as the last bastion of rugged individualism, and would have limited interest in submitting to a drastically revised federal system highly tilted toward nanny-statism.

It was going to be worse than the First and Second Continental Congresses, that was for certain. It was going to make the argument over issues like the Articles of Confederation and how much of a person a slave represented look like a middle-school debate cla.s.s. There wasn't any George Washington around to hold the delegates together or come up with the various compromises they'd need. Any const.i.tutional convention with the three remaining players was going to be a first-cla.s.s WWE smackdown cage match.

He sighed, already exhausted at the prospect of tying all this together in a neat package with a bright bow that everyone would want to own.

The trick to making this work, he wrote to Ritchie, will be to cram all the wildcats into the bag before they know what's happening.

The key, he thought to himself, is George Washington. If a modern George Dubya didn't exist, Jed Culver was going to have to invent him.

PACOM HQ, Hawaii

He was an operator, possibly a crook, and definitely not to be left alone with the small-change jar. But Admiral James Ritchie couldn't help but warm to Culver the more time he spent with him. There was no reason they should get along, a patrician New Englander from old money with a long family history of n.o.blesse oblige, and a scheming carpetbagger from the bad end of the bayou. Certainly naivete didn't come into it. Thanks to Colonel Maccomb of the 500th Military Intelligence Brigade, Ritchie was well aware of what kind of a creature Jed Culver was.

A fixer.

He was the operator your troubled multibillion-dollar company called in to quickly and quietly clean up the mess left behind by your recently departed and grotesquely incompetent CEO. He was the man who procured the difficult export license in the hopelessly corrupt but fabulously oil-rich Third World s.h.i.thole. Or the development approval for your six-star resort on the ecologically fragile tropical island. Or the seemingly impossible negotiated truce between the warring stone-age tribes that was interfering with the profit margins of your hardwood logging operations in the New Guinea highlands. If that didn't work, he hired the heavy hitters who protected your oil-drilling operations in Africa without cutting too deeply into your budget.

Jed Culver was a rolled-gold son of a b.i.t.c.h.

That said, Ritchie had a gut feeling that when the big questions were asked, this glad-handing sack of s.h.i.t would actually give you a straight answer, especially if that answer was something you didn't want to hear. Perhaps he was a bit like old Joe Kennedy in that way. Ritchie, an avid reader of historical biographies, thought he recognized something in Culver that FDR might have seen in the old bootlegger when appointing him to head the SEC way back in the Depression-a thief you could trust.

The admiral kept all these thoughts to himself, of course, as Culver walked around his office, speaking from notes with his expensive jacket off, shirtsleeves rolled up, and tie raffishly askew. Was the ruffled, big-doofus thing just part of his routine? Probably. With a guy like Culver you had to figure that everything was part of the routine. But still, he seemed blessed, if that was the right word, with a frightening appreciation for the worst aspects of human nature, and how they might still be turned to everyone's advantage.

"The only intact chain of command we have left," said Culver, in his soft Southern drawl, "is, of course, your own. But by const.i.tutional tradition, your entire chain remains subordinate to civilian rule and, let me just check back with you, ladies and gentlemen ..."

Culver looked up from his notes and smiled at the small group of military officers in the room. "Y'all ain't planning a coup d'etat, are you?"

From anyone else it would have been a dangerous gamble, an insult to people who had pledged their lives to defending the Const.i.tution, but Culver had a way of smiling and somehow twinkling his eyes that added an unspoken, "Naw, of course you ain't, you're good old boys and gals. The Best."

Ritchie even noticed a smile attempting to creep around the corners of the deeply fissured face of General Murphy, the senior army officer on the island. But, for professional reasons, Murphy had long ago banned any semblance of a sunny disposition from his person, and he managed to crush the small grin stone dead. It had no discernible effect on Culver, who carried on.

"Fact is, though, folks, given the scale of disaster we face, precise legality will have to give way almost immediately to practicality. As the esteemed Justice Jackson pointed out in Terminiello v. Chicago, the Const.i.tution is not a G.o.dd.a.m.ned suicide pact. If we are going to survive we need good government and quick. And given that n.o.body is much interested in fashioning a military dictatorship out of the ashes of the old Republic, I would suggest that for practical purposes it will initially resemble a patchwork of small-and bigtown mayors, the surviving political and administrative leadership, law enforcement, and perhaps ... no, definitely, some religious and community leaders with a large following. Whatever government comes into being out of this nightmare has to arise from the ground up, rather than be imposed from above."

"Fine words, Mr. Culver," rumbled Murphy. "Brings a tear to the eye. But we're in deep s.h.i.t, and we need to dig ourselves out of it, muy p.r.o.nto. Adapt, overcome, and drive on."

There were nine military officers in the room. The senior marine nodded in agreement with Murphy's brusque comment. Again, however, Ritchie watched with sneaking admiration as the lawyer let the rebuke wash over him, even turning it around.

"d.a.m.n straight," said Culver. "We need this done yesterday. h.e.l.l, we needed it as soon as that energy thing crashed down on top of us. But we have to accept that, as scared and f.u.c.ked up as people are right now, especially those poor b.a.s.t.a.r.ds who are close enough to the Wave to be able to see it, they will adapt. There will come a day when it's not the first thing they think of when they wake up in the morning. And they will go back to the old ways of doing things, of each against the other and d.a.m.n anyone in between. It's just our nature. So whatever we set up now has to have the elegance of our first const.i.tutional principles. It has to allow for the better angels of our nature to sing, because Lord knows the demons are going to be a ma.s.sed f.u.c.king choir over the next little while."

"What exactly are you suggesting, Mr. Culver? Could you take us through your proposal? Step by step."

"Of course, Admiral," said Culver. "Basically, some laws are going to get bruised, if not broken, but even Jefferson would have been cool with that. You know his purchase of my home state, Louisiana, was, to put it bluntly, completely illegal and he knew it. But he also knew that the strict observance of the written law, while one of the high duties of a good citizen, is not the highest."

Culver stood up straight and appeared to stare off into the middle distance, obviously quoting from the third president of the United States.

" 'The laws of necessity, of self-preservation, of saving our country when in danger, are of higher obligation. To lose our country by a scrupulous adherence to written law would be to lose the law itself, with life, liberty, property and all those who are enjoying them with us; thus absurdly sacrificing the end to the means.' "

Having finished, he leaned forward and placed his hands on the edge of the conference table where they all sat.

"What that means, ladies and gentlemen, is that we are gonna crack some heads together. And fast. And by 'we' I mean the American people, what's left of us."

"I think it might be better if n.o.body showed up in uniform, flashing their medals and ... what d'you call that stuff... fruit salad?"

Culver gestured toward the campaign ribbons on Ritchie's uniform. He didn't wait for the admiral to reply.

"Fact is, we already got blood spilled in Seattle. People are skittish. Yeah, you guys are the only outfit with the chops to put boot to a.s.s and get it all done, but I promise you that anything that looks even halfway like a military takeover will mean the end of everything."

Ritchie clamped down on his surging frustration. Only he and Culver remained in the office, all of the other attendees having returned to their duties. He was hungry and tired, and didn't see himself being able to do anything about either any time soon. The austerity measures he'd ordered for every military establishment in Hawaii were not merely window dressing. Food shortages would become dangerous if strict rationing was not enforced. The islands' airfields were running around the clock, shuttling aid in and people out, but a cascading series of economic crises ripping through global money markets was beginning to bite hard in the real world. Both the Chinese and j.a.panese governments had quietly ordered container ships loaded with food and medical aid bound for Hawaii to turn around and head home in the last twenty-four hours. Ritchie had savored his cup of coffee at breakfast this morning with sad relish because he wasn't sure when he might get another one.

"Yes, I understand, Mr. Culver," he said, still refusing to give in to the lawyer's insistence that he was just "plain ol' Jed." "But I am fighting an illegal war. Men and women are going to their deaths on my say-so and not much else. Why are they doing that? No reason. No good reason anyway. We're there because we're there and we can't get our sorry a.s.ses out in good order. h.e.l.l, we can't even turn to the United Nations for guidance."

"I know you got pressures, Admiral. I know ..."

"Do you? Really?" Ritchie stood up and walked over to the window. He stared out at the afternoon sunlight, took a deep breath, and turned on Culver.

"I have bagmen from every tin-pot, oil-drenched Dark Ages dictatorship in the Middle East, including the ones we're fighting at this very minute, all banging on my door demanding to know what the U.S. government policy toward them and their vile little country is now. Doesn't matter how many times I tell them I'm not the president, not the government. They don't care. They won't listen. To them, I am the man with my finger on the trigger of what is still a very big gun. Big enough to blow them to h.e.l.l and back. And the worst of it is, I can't just tell them to f.u.c.k off because some of them at least I need. I cannot get our people out of there without the help of the Saudis and Kuwaitis and Turks and half a dozen others. But of course, none of them want us to go because they know the whole place will melt down three minutes later. I need clarity, Jed."

d.a.m.n it. You're losing it, he thought. Get your bearing back.

"... I need orders from a properly const.i.tuted executive. I need to get my people out of that septic mess in the Gulf. I need to know what role we're going to play here, in CONUS, wherever we end up. I need to know what resources we'll have. I need to get on the phone to Tommy Franks and give him and his people some hope."

Culver absorbed the mini-tirade with equanimity, waiting him out. When Ritchie was finished he nodded, slowly.

"Okay then. That's what you need. Now this is what I need to get it for you."

Dealing with Culver's Machiavellian schemes was enough to bring his headache roaring back from the dull, middle distance where he'd banished it with a couple of Advils. Ritchie was not at all comfortable being so closely involved in political maneuvers, but the lawyer was right. The United States had been gutted, and one of the very few working and half-intact inst.i.tutions it had left was the military. He was also right that it would be an intolerable violation of the country's founding principles if the republic became a militarized autarchy in the mad rush of a catastrophe. And then, in mocking contrast to these high ideals, there was brute reality.

"The Israeli envoy is here, Admiral."

Ritchie popped another painkiller and washed it down with a mouthful of tap water from his beloved old VF-84 coffee mug.

"Send him in."

The man who entered the room carrying a briefcase was relatively short, and his gray, wiry hair had retreated at least halfway back over his head. Tel Aviv had dispatched him as their new amba.s.sador, but Ritchie was adamant that he could not be addressed as such because he had not yet formally presented himself to the president. He had flat refused to stand in for the role himself. Nonetheless, Asher Warat was the chosen representative of his government , and as such was deserving of good manners and what few diplomatic niceties Ritchie could extend him.

"Admiral." He smiled, lighting up his wide brown eyes. "Thank you for seeing me. I understand that the demands on your time must be horrendous."

Ritchie gestured for him to take one of the two armchairs directly in front of his desk. The Israeli did so, placing the briefcase by his feet. Through the windows behind Warat the old sailor enjoyed a sweeping view from Halawa Heights down to the harbor, which looked magnificent under a high sun. A few wisps of clouds drifted across a hard blue sky, and the waters of the base sparkled bright silver on dark blue. Stare at it long enough and you could almost believe nothing was wrong with the world. The long, drawn features of his visitor, sitting smack in the middle of that view, indicated otherwise.

"Everyone has their own troubles, Mr. Warat. I'm sure yours are as difficult as mine in their own way."

Warat bobbed his head up and down, and his eyes seemed even more watery and forlorn, which was saying something.

"Life is trouble, Admiral. Especially these days. And I am afraid I am about to make more for you. Much more. Or less, maybe."

Ritchie was instantly alert, the fatigue of the last week sluicing off of him. The small adrenaline surge didn't help with his headache, however. That just grew worse.

"How so, sir?" he asked guardedly.

Warat checked his watch and seemed to hesitate. He rubbed his fingers together and shifted nervously before checking the time again.

"You will be aware, Admiral, that the strategic circ.u.mstances faced by my country have declined precipitously due to the cataclysm, the absolute cataclysm that befell your own."

"Yes," said Ritchie as his heart seemed to slow down and grow to about twice its normal size, pressing painfully against the confines of his chest. Warat hitched his shoulders and chewed at his lower lip. The man was a veritable Wal-Mart for nervous tics and tells.

"Your own forces in the region have come under attack from Saddam, from the mullahs, and from a wh.o.r.e's parlor full of opportunists and crazy men. Hamas. Islamic Jihad. Al-Qaeda."

Ritchie nodded but said nothing. Just that morning they'd lost the USS Hopper and two hundred men to a swarm of jihadi suicide attackers on Jet Skis. You don't lose an Aegis destroyer every day, and he wasn't certain when he'd get a replacement. Probably never. It was the sort of thing that would have made headlines all over the world before the Wave. Now it was a minor irrelevancy to most news agencies, obsessed as they were by the accelerating collapse of their own societies. The Israeli envoy glanced quickly at his watch again.

"Your plans to withdraw coalition forces from Iraq and Kuwait, and U.S. forces from the region in general, are understandable," he said, "if shortsighted, in the opinion of my government."

"Well, sir," said Ritchie. "I am afraid the withdrawal is an operational necessity, at the moment. It is not U.S. government policy, as you would be aware. I would characterize it as a tactical withdrawal, not a strategic retreat."

"Or abandonment," said Warat.

"No," agreed Ritchie. "I would not call it abandonment. But right now, our presence there is making things infinitely worse, and I shouldn't have to explain to you, sir, that we cannot sustain our forces even in the short term. Our base is gone. Every missile we fire, every ship we lose, every soldier or sailor or airman who dies is a true loss. They cannot be replaced."

Warat shrugged and sighed. "We understand, Admiral. We have lost, too. America was our a.r.s.enal, and we find ourselves in the same position. Unlike you, however, we can stage no tactical withdrawal. We are trapped within our borders, with nowhere to go. The barbarians are at the gate. You will be aware of that. We are already fighting them. It will be a war of annihilation for one or the other."

Ritchie ceded the point with a wave of the hand, an almost preternatural dread creeping up on him. It was a physical sensation, something he could feel crawling through his body like ice water rising from his nuts. The diplomat checked his watch one last time. He squared his shoulders and looked Ritchie in the eyes without flinching. His voice firmed up, losing the quaver and uncertainty that had haunted it until now.

"Twelve hours ago, we received a secure data package from our highest-placed source within the Republican Guard. His information was so critical that it was cross-checked independently, even though doing so revealed the ident.i.ty of other sources we had cultivated within the Hussein regime and the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. I am afraid those sources have now been exposed and eliminated. Before losing them, however, we were able to confirm that a convoy of civilian vehicles crossed the border with Iran and traveled without a military escort, but still heavily guarded, to a warehouse on the outskirts of Mosul at 0300 hours local time yesterday. If you will excuse me, Admiral ..."

Warat leaned over and picked up his briefcase, popping the lid and pulling out a sheaf of papers, which he handed across to Ritchie. Photographs mostly, with a few pages of printed material that appeared to be chemical a.n.a.lyses. The pictures were obviously close surveillance shots, taken covertly by somebody at the warehouse.

"The vehicles you can see in these pictures are standard commercial vans. Two Scania transports, a Volvo truck, a Mack truck, and a Hino heavy diesel truck. The utility vehicles, SUVs I believe you call them, provided the escort. The Hino truck carried a shipping container in which was stored an unknown quant.i.ty of uranium hexafluoride. I am afraid we have lost track of it. The other trucks, which we were able to track from the border, to Mosul and onto an Iraqi missile battery, contained weaponized anthrax and botu-linum."

Ritchie glanced briefly at the typewritten pages, but he was not a chemist and they meant nothing to him. He a.s.sumed that they somehow attested to the contents of the trucks.

"We have no sources within the Iraqi battery, and the exposure of our other a.s.sets will have caused Hussein to alter his plans anyway. But we must presume that we now face the mortal danger of a missile strike on Israel with biological agents. Our policy in the face of such threats has always been stated clearly. We will not just retaliate. We will strike preemptively."

Ritchie placed the doc.u.ments very carefully on his desk. His hand was shaking, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

"So, my government hereby informs you, as the commander of friendly forces in the region, that as of one hour ago, the Israeli Defense Forces have commenced Operation Megiddo. I am informed by my government that Israeli air force units are currently en route to twelve centers. I have here a list of the targets."

The amba.s.sador pa.s.sed across a single sheet of paper that Ritchie took with a trembling hand. The Israeli, he noticed, seemed abnormally calm by comparison. He'd apparently done all of his sweating and shaking when he first came in. The list was divided into two parts, labeled "Counter Force" and "Counter Value." The former was a catalogue of military bases and suspected WMD sites such as the Iranian Revolutionary Guard training facility at Hamadan, long suspected also to be the Guards' princ.i.p.al WMD depository. The latter was a short list of cities.

The American officer found it hard to breathe. Baghdad, Tehran, and Damascus were slated for destruction within hours.

"You can't do this," croaked Ritchie. "You'll kill millions, tens of millions of innocent people."

Warat's face was ashen and drawn, but firm.

"Yes, Admiral. We will. It is either that or millions of our people will die."

"But..."

Ritchie found it hard to speak. Blood rushed through his ears, and dark spots bloomed in front of his eyes. Warat sensed his difficulty and pressed on.

"We have drawn up the target list in such a way that it should not expose your forces to significant radiological effects, and it will not be necessary to fly through airs.p.a.ce controlled by the coalition. This will not be like 1991, Admiral. We will not require IFF transponder codes; however, the range of some of the longer strikes means that without midair refueling, our planes cannot return home. My government therefore requests the cooperation of the U.S. Air Force in a.s.signing such in-flight refueling a.s.sets as we would require to successfully complete all of these missions without needlessly sacrificing our personnel. For many of them it will be a one-way trip."

"Are you mad?"

Ritchie stared at the man, who had the good grace to look embarra.s.sed.

"My government did not expect to receive a positive response to this request, but instructed me to make it anyway."

"Mr. Amba.s.sador ..." Ritchie faltered, forgetting that Warat had not been formally received and confirmed as amba.s.sador. "Mr. Warat, I am afraid I cannot allow this plan to go ahead. Your government must call its planes back."

"I am afraid they will not do that, Admiral. Under any circ.u.mstances. My government is convinced that we face annihilation as a people if we do not act immediately."

"You will be annihilated if you do," protested Ritchie.

Warat nodded glumly.

"Anything is possible these days, Admiral."

Ritchie's heart was still thundering in his chest, but his head was at last clearing of the shock and disorientation. He took a deep breath and leaned back in his chair.