The cost in American lives. Putting our people under the command of
foreign officers is nothing short of a military disaster waiting to
happen.”
She seemed to consider this for a moment, then turned and spoke softly
to one of the aides flanking her. The man reached inside a briefcase and
produced a manila folder. She accepted it, leafing through several pages
inside before finding what she wanted. “Admiral, it seems to me that our
current policy of supporting UN operations but maintaining separate and
distinct lines of command and communication offers an even better
opportunity for ‘military disaster,’ as you put it. You’ve seen this?”
She slid the paper across the table. Scott barely glanced at it and did
not pick it up. “Of course, Madam Secretary.”
“Gentlemen,” Reed said, addressing the entire room. “Two days ago, as
any of you who watch cable news is well aware by now, one of our Navy
jets shot down a U.S. Army helicopter that was flying a UN mission. No
one was killed, fortunately, but the incident has pointed up the flaws
in interservice operations. There were breakdowns in communication up
and down the entire chain of command. It seems that the naval personnel
making the decisions in the carrier battle group had not been notified
that Army helicopters were operating in the no-fly zone and had not
received the computer codes that let their radars recognize those
helicopters as friendly.
“The day before that, this same carrier group sank a Russian submarine,
again by accident. At least fifteen Russian nationals were killed.
“Now, it seems to me that putting all of our forces under one command
infrastructure would be the best possible way of avoiding unfortunate
mistakes like these in the future. Placing our forces under UN command
will simplify the lines of communications. It will simplify intelligence
and ensure that our military forces know who is in the area and what
they are doing.
“I must say, it also sets a worthwhile precedent for the future. If we
start putting larger numbers of troops under UN authority, it would give
the organization some real teeth. That would save the United States from
more embarrassments like Somalia and Haiti.”
Magruder resisted the urge to speak up, to argue against what he saw as
a blatant misuse of American military forces. His position was an
unusual one. At the time of the Norwegian War he’d held the post of
Director of Operations for the Joint Staff, but during that crisis and
the Russian Civil War that followed it, the President had come to depend
on him as a personal military adviser. Now he was attached to Admiral
Scott’s personal staff, a position that gave him access to these
high-level meetings but no real authority. Anything he said now would be
viewed as a “Me, too” echo of Scott’s position.
Damn it, he wished the gold on his shoulder boards and jacket cuffs
counted for something in this roomful of career politicians. For years
globalists had been talking about increasing the authority of the United
Nations and giving it control over larger and more powerful military
units. They pointed to the organization’s complete helplessness during
the Cold War era and to the fiascoes of the early days of the New World
Order as good reasons to stiffen UN power and prestige with troops,
equipment, and armaments controlled by the Security Council. They
pointed out that UN attempts to engage in nation-building in Somalia in
1993 had been derailed by the U.S. decision to withdraw all ground
troops from the nation after a firefight where American troops had been
killed and their bodies dragged through the streets in front of TV
cameras for all to see. And UN Haiti policy had never quite gelled
because of vacillating American leadership.
But the thought of handing over a sizable portion of American military
power to the United Nations was, for Magruder, a chilling one. If the UN
could send Americans into Georgia. .. or the Crimea. .. how long would
it be before they sent troops into Los Angeles to quell the next round
of rioting? Or into American homes to search for handguns? Or to arrest