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“An interesting man, your President. So easy to underestimate. I did that once myself.”
“And Daryaei?”
“Formidable, but an uncultured barbarian.” Mary Pat could almost hear the man spit.
“Quite.”
“Tell Ivan Emmetovich to think the scenario through, Foleyeva,” Golovko suggested. “Yes, we will cooperate,” he added, answering a question not yet asked. “Fully.”
“Spasiba. I will be back to you.” Mary Pat looked over at her husband. “You have to love the guy.”
“I wish he was on our side,” the DCI observed.
“He is, Ed.”
THE DOG HAD stopped barking, they noted in STORM TRACK. The three corps they were trying to observe had stopped using their radios around noon. Zero. As sophisticated as their computer-aided ELINT equipment was, nothing was still nothing. It was an obvious sign, and just as often overlooked. The direct lines to Washington burned constantly now. More Saudi officers were coming in, demonstrating the increased-alert state of their own military, which was quietly deploying to the field around King Khalid Military City. That was some comfort to the intelligence people in the listening post, but not much. They were far closer to the mouth of the lion. Being spooks, they thought like spooks, and by consensus they decided that the events in America had somehow started here. Elsewhere, such thoughts engendered a feeling of helplessness; here they had a different effect. The rage was real, and they had a mission to fulfill, exposed position or not.
“OKAY,” 1ACKSON SAID on the conference line, “who can we deploy?”
The answer was a brief silence. The Army was half the size it had been less than a decade before. There were two
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heavy divisions in Europe, V Corps, but they were quarantined by the Germans. The same was true of the two armored divisions at Fort Hood, Texas, and the 1st Infantry Division (Mechanized) at Fort Riley, Kansas. Parts of the 82nd at Fort Bragg and the 101st at Fort Campbell were deployed’to support National Guard units, but the units that had been kept back at their bases had soldiers who’d tested positive for Ebola. The same was true of the two stateside Marine divisions, based at Lejeune in North Carolina and Pendleton in California.
“Look,” FORCECOM said. “We got the 11th ACR and a Guard brigade training up at the NTC. That base is totally clean, we can move them out as quick as you can whistle up the airplanes. The rest? Before we can move them, we have to sort everybody out. I don’t dare move them before we’ve tested every soldier for this damned bug, and the kits ain’t out everywhere yet.”
“He’s right,” another voice said. Every head on the conference line nodded. The pharmaceutical companies were racing to produce them. Millions of test kits were needed, but only a few tens of thousands were available, and those were being used for targeted people, the ones who showed symptoms, relatives or close associates of known cases, truckers delivering food and medical supplies, and most of all, the medical personnel themselves, who were the most exposed to the virus. Worse still, one “clear” reading wasn’t enough. Some people would have to be tested daily for three days or more, because although the test was reliable, the immune systems of potential victims were not. The antibodies could start showing up an hour after a negative test reading. Doctors and hospitals throughout the country were screaming for the kits, and in this case the Army was sucking hind tit.
The UIR is going to throw a war, J-3 thought, and nobody’s going to come. Robby wondered if some hippie from the sixties might find that amusing.
“How long on that?”
“End of the week, at best,” FORCECOM replied. “I have an officer on it.”
“I got the 366th Wing at Mountain Home. They’re all
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clean,” Air Combat Command reported. “We have the F-16 wing in Israel. My European units are being held hostage, though, all of them.”
“Airplanes are nice, Paul,” FORCECOM said. “So are ships, but we need soldiers over there in one big fucking hurry.”
“Cut warning orders to Fort Irwin,” Jackson said. “I’ll have the SecDef authorize their release within the hour.”
“Done.”
“MOSCOW?” CHAVEZ ASKED. “Jesu Cristo, we are getting around.”
“Ours is not to reason why.”
“Yeah, I know the second part, Mr. C. If we’re going to the right place, I’ll take that chance.”
“Your carriage awaits, gents,” Clayton said. “The blue suits are turning the airplane over for you.”
“Yeah, that reminds me.” Clark pulled the uniform shirt out of the closet. In a minute, he was a colonel again. Five minutes after that, they were off for the airport, soon to leave the Sudan to the ministrations of Frank Clayton and memories of “Chinese” Gordon.
THERE WAS AN aspect of schadenfreude about it. O’Day assembled a team of FBI agents to go over the personnel packets of every Secret Service agent who got close to the President, both the plainclothes and Uniformed Division officers. There were quite a few. Ordinarily some would have been tossed for obvious no-hit indicators–a name like O’Connor, for example–but this case was too important for that, and every file had to be examined in full before it could be set aside. This job he left to others. Another team was examining something not widely known. There was a computerized record of every telephone call made in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area. Legal in a strict sense, the program, had it extended farther afield, would have excited Big Brother-ish outrage from even the most extreme law-enforcement hawk, but the President lived in Washington, and America had lost Pres-
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idents there. It was almost too much to hope for. By definition, a conspirator in the Secret Service would be an expert on security measures. Their target, if there was one, would be one of the boys. He might stand out in professional excellence–you had to, in order to make the Detail–but nothing else. He’d fit in. He’d have a good service reputation. He’d tell jokes, bet on ballgames, have a beer at the local hangout–he’d be just like all the others who would willingly guard the life of the President as courageously as Don Russell had done, O’Day knew, and part of him hated the rest of him for having to treat them like suspects in a criminal investigation. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. But then, what was?
DIGGS CALLED BOTH colonels to his office to give them the news: “We have warning orders to deploy overseas.”
“Who?” Eddington asked.
“Both of your units,” the general answered.
“Where to, sir?” Hamm asked next.
“Saudi. We’ve both been there and done that before, Al, and here’s your chance, Colonel Eddington.”
“Why?” the Guardsman asked.
“They haven’t said yet. I have background information coming into the fax machine now. All they told me over the phone was that the UIR is getting frisky. The 10th is mating up with their POMCUS gear right now–”
“BUFFALO FORWARD?” Hamm asked. “No warning?”
“Correct, Al.”
“Is this related to the epidemic?” Eddington asked.
Diggs shook his head. “Nobody’s told me anything about that.”
IT HAD TO be done in Federal District Court in Baltimore. Edward J. Kealty filed a suit naming John Patrick Ryan as defendant. The substance of the complaint was that the former wanted to cross a state line, and the latter wouldn’t let him. The filing asked for summary judgment, the vacating of the executive order of the President (strangely, the complaint named Ryan as President of the United
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States) immediately. Kealty figured that he’d win this one. The Constitution was on his side, and he’d chosen the judge with care.
THE SPECIAL NATIONAL Intelligence Estimate was now complete, and irrelevant. The intentions of the United Islamic Republic were totally clear. The trick now was to do something about them, but that was not, strictly speaking, an intelligence function.
54
FRIENDS AND NEIGHBORS
THEY DIDN’T SEE IT coming, and it did get their attention. By dawn the next day, all three ground squadrons of the 10th Cavalry were fully deployed, while the fourth squadron, composed of attack helicopters, needed one more day to get up to speed. Kuwaiti regular officers–their standing army was still relatively small, with the ranks fleshed out by enthusiastic reservists–greeted their American counterparts with waving swords and embraces in front of the cameras, and serious, quiet conversation in the command tents. For his part, Colonel Magruder arranged for one of his squadrons to assemble in parade formation with standards flying. It was good for everyone’s morale, and the fifty-two tanks massed together looked like the fist of an angry god. The UIR intelligence service expected something to happen, but not this, and not this fast.
“What is this?” Daryaei demanded, allowing his deadly rage to show for once. Ordinarily, it was enough that people knew it was hidden there, somewhere.
“It’s a sham.” After the initial shock, his chief of intelligence had taken the time to get a feel for the reality of the situation. “That is a regiment. Each of the six divisions in the Army of God has three–in two cases, four– brigades. And so, we are twenty to their one. Did you expect that the Americans would not respond at all? That is unrealistic. But here we see they have responded. With one regiment, moved in from Israel, and sent in the wrong place. With this they intend to frighten us.”