The miniature airplane on the gyro
was flying to the left of the vertical needle. Kelly made a small
correction to the right, but with the lurching plane and bouncing needle
it was hard to judge where the center of the instrument was. Finally, the
tiny aircraft symbol centered on the vertical needle, and she adjusted
throttle slightly to hold speed.
She pushed the nose down, over
compensating, and the aircraft symbol dropped too rapidly. The sudden
change startled her. Like a beginner, she began oscillating above and
below the glide slope.
"Patch in Washington, too. They should
all see what’s going on. Ask 'em to contact the Chinese Embassy and find
out if there's a declaration of war. We've sunk eleven of their submarines
and forty-six of their torpedo boats. Tell 'em we have another sub
targeted inside our screen. If they don't want it destroyed, they'd better
tell him to surface and surrender. Otherwise, we sink him."
Through the rain, she concentrated
on three critical parameters: the meatball on the left side of the ship
for glide-slope, the centerline of the deck for lineup, and the
angle-of-attack indicator in the upper left corner of the instrument panel
for airspeed. She had to juggle these parameters to land safely.
Every muscle in her body tensed as
the deck sped up toward her. Instrument lights in the cockpit were
duplicated on the external nose-wheel landing-gear door and clearly
visible to the LSOs positioned near the ramp. Orientation of the lights
told them whether she was fast, slow, or on speed. Any significant
deviation would cause the LSO to trigger the red flashing lights and she
would be forced to abort. Taking a deep breath, Kelly concentrated on the
deck speeding toward her.
Kelly reluctantly followed the
yellow-shirt's signals forward, where he was going to spot her hanging
over the water. She felt helpless, at the mercy of the yellow-shirt.
"Damn, I hate that," she
said to herself. Her nose wheel was inches from the edge of the deck.
She'd be sitting out over the water as the ship rolled toward those
eight-foot waves.
*
* *
Greg saw the flaming gas ball rise just before the shock
wave picked him up and slammed him against the bulkhead. He saw his
roommate leap over the side of his burning Banshee. He had to be a goner;
no one could survive that fireball! Gripped with fear, Greg picked himself
up.
The mushroom cloud of
gasoline rapidly expanded, as it appeared to consume everything. The
"hot papas," encased in their white-helmeted fireproof suits,
moved in from all directions with foam. Greg didn't see how they could
survive, let alone subdue the fire. This was no place for him.
Turning, he took one
giant step to the ladder inside Deck Control that led to the decks below.
He headed for the Ready Room to get his Mae West life jacket, in case he
had to abandon ship. As Greg turned the corner on the ladder, he took
another big step down and caught a "white hat" squarely in the
chest with his foot.
"I'm sorry about your wingman,"
Greg said.
Kelly just sipped the steaming
coffee.
He watched her struggle for
control. The battle had obviously drained her. A treacherous recovery in
foul weather. Now this.
"First tour?"
"Uh huh. The weather and turbulence were awful; deck
tossing, and low ceiling almost down to the white caps. He didn't have
enough traps or time in type to handle an instrument approach in weather
like that. He was unlucky. If it had been a training exercise, we'd have
been recalled before the weather got so bad."
Greg groped for words to
soften Kelly's grief. But no mere words could do that.
"Papa," Kelly said, finally her
voice tentative. "You know I'm in the promotion zone for lieutenant
commander, possibly selection to command."
"I heard
that." Greg hoped she could hear his pride reflected in those three
words. His granddaughter was already a lieutenant commander. She could go
as high as she determined to go.
"I'm not sure I
want to consider command."
What! She doesn't
want command? Greg's mouth dropped. It took a moment to compose
himself. "Why?" he asked.
"Leadership. Papa, I
don't know how to lead."
"I'm not sure I'm up to this new era
of leadership. Or even want to be," Kelly fumed. "How do I cope
with vague accusations of ogling, leering, touching? Or how do I handle
racial and ethnic slurs? Real or imagined."
You're probably the best woman
strike pilot, if not the best strike pilot, in the Navy. Why are you so
worried about being screened for XO?"
"I'm afraid I don't have
the aptitude or people skills."
***
There was another threat they faced that night --
a steely yellow-eyed demon with long, sharp, pearly white teeth that
shared the cockpit with every strike pilot. Every yappin frappy nugget had
heard about the "night thing" that sucked lift off wings, turned
boats backward during the landing approach, and created sinkholes at the
back of the boat seconds before the plane came over the ramp for a night
trap.
The red battle lamps illuminated the deck
and the eerie group of ballet dancers. A yellow-shirted plane handler
appeared from the wisps of steam blown aft from the catapults to lead a
pilot to a parking space. Kelly watched as the reddish-yellow figure swept
his lighted wands wildly over his head like some wild island fire dancer.
Through the night-vision
goggles, Kelly and Curly had moved out of one scene from Dante's Inferno
into another. They watched arcs of fire signal the pilot to fold his wings
and maneuver his Hornet into a tight space among the rest of the planes.
Flick the external light master switch
with your left hand. Instantly the Growler was transformed from a
dark-gray machine into a glowing red-and-green Christmas tree. The jet
strained against the holdback fitting, restraining the two 22,000-pound GE
turbofan engines roaring at full power beneath her. Now she'd find out
whether the demons were pleased with her.
Sheng looked out at the
sunset. The whiffs of cirrostratus were ablaze with reds, oranges, and
tints of purple. Vibrant greens rimmed the edge of the clouds. The
intensity was so great he had to look away. When his glance returned, the
sunset's blaze of color had faded to shades of purple. The sky darkened
rapidly and he donned his night goggles.
Kelly looked down at the empty expanse of
ocean that surrounded her, then up at the brilliant display of stars and
galaxies. The goggles cast a green pale over the scene. Over land was
relaxing, because you always had lighted cities, towns, villages, and
highways as a reference. Flying over open ocean with no landfall in sight
invited night demons into the cockpit.
What if I lose an
engine…my instruments…in a rough sea? I'd be agoner if it weren't for
two engines. Somewhere in that dark abyss of endless ocean was a
carrier they had to find and land on before the fuel ran out. At some
point they would have to shift their attention and put their faith into
finding that four-and-a-half acres of flight deck that had long since
disappeared. Imagine, Kelly thought, I've staked my life on the
signal that controls that little arrow on the navigation compass.
A close-in encounter was unlikely at night,
but anything was possible. If it happened, she wanted to just point her
head at the target and fire a Sidewinder. That possibility always gave her
a rush. In an over-the-horizon attack, she knew she could count on
launching an AMRAAM, no matter what direction the attack came from or what
attitude the plane was in. Once she fired an AMRAAM, she could forget
about it and turn her attention to the next target. Its sensors would hunt
the target down without her help.
* * *
At thirty-five, Mike was the chief executive
officer for the GE appliance manufacturing plant located near GE's large
research center in Shanghai. A clean-cut, up-and-coming star in the GE
empire, he was well connected among the party's fast-track young
executives, not only here on the mainland but in Hong Kong and Taiwan as
well, which made him a valuable ally. Wan's principal purpose, however,
for cultivating him was to use him to determine how serious the U.S was
about defending Taiwan. As Lenin had so aptly said, hang the capitalists
with the rope they sell us.
"Shi's a hardliner strategist for the
party who watches political trends in Taiwan. Shi says Beijing emphasizes
blood ties between Taiwan and China. He argues that Taiwan's national
identity and drive for self-determination depends on socialization, not
blood ties. He thinks education plays the strong roll."
"I think going to war
over Taiwan is a strategic mistake."
Wan raised his eyebrows.
"Taiwan's thrust for independence ebbs by the day. Don't you realize
there's a mass migration of professionals and investors to the mainland?
Where do you think all those people come from that live in Kunshan,
outside of Shanghai?" Kunshan was home to 30,000 emigrants from
Taiwan, with their own schools, country clubs, and villas. It was the
production and research and development base for Taiwan's largest
companies. Over a half-million people from Taiwan out of a population of
23 million lived and worked in China. "You're a naive fool, my
friend."
"The only problem we have is old China
is wary of capitalist China." Old China was skeptical of this new
breed of young elitists. There was no social safety net for the unemployed
or for medical benefits in China, so their welfare had to be taken into
account by these brash, young entrepreneurs. The challenges for the joint
venture partners were immense. Officials were wary that creative
destruction of old China and its inefficient state enterprises would be
handled poorly and blamed on them. Labor protests and outrage erupted the
same in China as it did anywhere else in the world and the old China
bureaucrats feared anything that rocked their boat.
Mike looked at Wan. "You remember how
we talked about the two things that had to be changed to make a market
economy work: state-run enterprises and state-run banks? China's done a
good job of opening the state-run enterprises, but I'm afraid China has
dragged its feet too long on opening state-run banks to private
enterprise." Mike twirled the stem of his brandy glass. "The
world banks fear that if you open your banks, they won't be able to
compete and your entire domestic banking industry will collapse."
"Nonsense! We'll
create the same success opening private banks as we did opening private
enterprises. But it will be on our timetable."
The Chinese Director of
Intelligence sat in the back seat nervously tapping his fingers on the
armrest. Wan was tense and upset. It was an elaborate game of chess that
he played with the capitalists, full of the complexity that his analytical
mind enjoyed. Lure the Westerners into business relationships that seemed
rich with potential profit. Seduce them with the prospect of that great,
sleeping giant known as China, and entice them with all the opportunities
that a market of more than one billion consumers might provide. Then, when
the capitalists had sold their souls, the taking of Taiwan would be
easier. The greedy pigs would persuade Washington to look the other way
when the annexation happened so that their investments would be protected.
And, if things went wrong, those same capitalists could be enlisted to
protect China or else risk the chance of their business dealings being
made public in a messy congressional hearing. Wan sensed these Americans
were extremely gullible. Don't they have any notion that China's
strategy is to diminish U.S. influence and presence in the Pacific by
pushing U.S. influence out of Asia, undermine U.S. alliances through
maritime intimidation, and then take advantage of U.S. stretched resources
from continuous conflict in the Middle East?
Wan had escaped the Cultural Revolution and
purges of the '70s. He had studied engineering at Beijing's prestigious
Oinghua University and been selected to attend the Central Party School at
the Imperial Summer Palace. Wan pointed at the newspaper on his desk.
"I see you are the featured lecturer this month at the
university."
Tan looked surprised.
"A series on comparative political systems. Comparing our unique form
of Chinese fascism with other political systems."
"Should elicit a
good response from students."
"Since scrapping
the communist economic system, students want to know why we haven't
embraced capitalism."
"And --"
"They also question
management and shareholders holding government jobs at the same
time."
"How did you
extract yourself from that conflict of interest?"
"I admitted it
leads to bribery and graft," Tan replied. "Then, there are
always questions about why China maintains a single party
dictatorship."
"We have to control
a large diverse society. Of course, you told them we can not tolerate
Western-style freedoms and democracy."
Wan reviewed the details with Tan. An
announcement would be made in the UN on the following day that would be
designed to be received as a Chinese appeasement. Stop hostilities while
the two parties attempted to reach a peaceful resolution over Taiwan. Of
course, no peaceful resolution would be reached. China would use the delay
to attack Taiwan.
* * *
"My concerns are the same as yours
were," Kelly said. "Am I doomed by history to make the same
mistakes? I don't want a career of buildbust cycles, policy mistakes.
Coming out of WWII the U.S. was invincible. What changed? Korea? How did a
third world power nearly defeat us? Then came Vietnam, the Cold War, Gulf
War, Balkan wars, terrorist wars, and Iraq. Why have all these wars been
so indecisive?"
"Indecisive?"
"MacArthur was the Supreme Allied
Commander in Japan. He saw himself as the last imperial leader of the
twentieth century. Japan was his empire. He ruled Japan and reasoned that
because Japan crushed China, he had no reason to fear a bunch of
third-world communists in China and Korea. His arrogance set the stage for
complacency, while he cleverly built up a cult of personality around
himself."
"It's hard to believe MacArthur would use
the media to bolster his hero status."
"No, it isn't. He was a politician doing
what politicians do to raise poll ratings." After the U.N. forces
beat back the North Korean Army, MacArthur was repeatedly warned by the
Joint Chiefs not to press toward the Yalu River. The Chinese warned the UN
they would attack in force if MacArthur moved the UN forces across the
Thirty-Eighth Parallel, north to the Yalu River. "He's the epitome of
the military leader we need to avoid. He was permitted to acquire too much
power. Achieved imperial prominence through a cult of personality. I blame
it on the media and civilian leaders." The Korean War was an endless
tale of policy mistakes. "We stumbled at nation building initially in
both Korea and Iraq, but we persevered in Korea and we’ll persevere in
Iraq."
* * *
The light rain turned into a downpour. One at a time, enlisted men armed
with large umbrellas appeared at the bus to escort the senior officers
from the Politburo, Central Military Commission (CMC), General Staff, and
other commands. The men shed their raincoats and hats in the expansive
front hall and joined the PLA Army, Navy, and Air Force officers assembled
in a large conference room. Senior officers made their way to designated
places at the long conference table, leaving junior officers to find
chairs along the walls. The room had the dingy appearance characteristic
of old government buildings. The dull yellowish walls were the backdrop
for portraits of the party's luminaries, Mao to Jiang Zemin and the
current President, Hu Jintao.
Major General Wan stood
patiently at the end of the conference table while the group formally
greeted one another. He was tired and tense from a long meeting with the
Party earlier in the day. The Director of Intelligence motioned for
attention and continued in a strong voice. "Tonight's mission will be
a massive saturation raid on the American Battle Group. Air Force Bombers,
attack aircraft, and mobile land-based launchers armed with the new
version of the Sunburn cruise missile will carry out the attack."
"How many cruise
missiles are we talking about?" Captain Anderson asked.
"Five
hundred." Ernie's reply produced instant shock. Shoulders and mouths
dropped.
"My God! How do we
defend against a saturation raid of that magnitude?" the admiral
demanded.
"We don't know.
We've never faced a threat like this," Ernie said sheepishly.
The Chinese officers all staunchly supported
saturation defense against a massive force. The concept had its roots with
Sun Tzu, who had written The Art of War more than twenty-five hundred
years earlier. The Chinese, and Japanese samurai as well, considered this
book their bible for strategy, not only for war but also as a philosophy
for warriors to live by.
***
White segments suddenly flashed on the outer rim of Kelly's CEC screen.
Her heads-up helmet display indicated three Flankers locked on her. The
awful sound of the radar-warning receiver startled her. She began to
hyperventilate. She was targeted.
When she turned onto the boat's centerline,
the night demon appeared on the windshield and taunted her with its steely
yellow eyes. She imagined the boat turned backward. Touches of vertigo
made her feel the lift being sucked off the wings. The sky suddenly
darkened. She had an impulse to squeeze on more power as she approached
the fantail where the sinkhole lurked. Doggedly, she fought off the
demon's bidding.
***
The air battle was over. For weeks, CNN and the broadcast channels
analyzed it. Analysts collected on PBS's News Hour, voicing their acclaim
for the Battle Group's success. The claim that a Navy Battle Group with a
single large-deck carrier possessed more firepower than the tenth largest
air force in the world was not lost on the world's TV viewers.
President Bush put the
UN and its members on notice that the conduct of the Iraqi regime was a
threat to the authority of the UN itself. If the members of the body
couldn't muster the fortitude to do something about Iraq, then U.S. action
was unavoidable. Bush pointed to the UN's founding after generations of
deceitful dictators, broken treaties, and squandered lives. Would the UN
serve the purpose of its founding or would it prove to be irrelevant? The
response was yet another resolution that dispatched weapons inspectors.
Diplomacy failed. With no other option left, the U.S. went to war with a
small but significant coalition of "the willing." Now, the UN
was meddling again, in an American initiative to stop China, the
neighborhood bully, from invading one of the world's most important
emerging democracies.
"Damn the Security Council!" Kelly
couldn't keep the venom from her voice. "Every time we take an action
to defend weak countries, we’re blocked in the UN. Terrorist countries
like Iran or neighborhood bullies -- like China." Her voice rose, her
face flushed, and her words splattered over her grandfather. He was
obviously surprised at her rage.
"America's problem
is trying to determine how to perpetuate and expand its power effectively
around the world without offending 190 member countries."
Kelly sat up straight. "That's easy. Get
rid of the UN."
"At the end of the Cold War there was
a period of euphoria. Then terrorists began to strike all over the globe.
That galvanized the U.S. It was time to reform the post-World War II
model, revise our alliances and demand reform in institutions like the
UN."
"What's wrong with
our alliances?" Kelly asked.
"They're offshoots
of regimes that emerged from the collapse of colonial empires after World
War I and World War II. Many of these regimes have no democratic
foundations, like rule-of-law, and are governed by abusive monarchies,
dictators, tyrants, warlords, and psychopaths. They're the legacy Europe
left for the rest of the world to repair. Europe's wealth and resolve to
help these regimes vanished long ago. The U.S. has to sort through the
carcass to find constructive alliances."
Kelly wanted her quality of life, as well
as the rest of the crew's, to be fulfilled. If up and down the ranks their
expectations were satisfied, the war-fighting machine would survive and
their careers would be advanced. Was that a childish, idealistic kind of
thought? "Everyone in today's world knows tedious, repetitious work
destroys morale," Kelly said. "Incentives have to be infused to
change the boat driver's mindset and all the rest of his community. The
incentive is to cleverly reduce the manning levels and enrich the work
experience."
"It's a war, Jerry. And I do what I'm
trained for. Just like you."
"I know. I can hear
our kids explaining what our jobs are to their classmates. 'Mommy shoots
planes down, and Daddy's work is secret. If he tells us, he'd have to kill
us."'
"Jerry, did you call to pick a
fight?"
"No. I called to ask you to marry
me."
* * *
"It's a mobile landing field with an
air force that has more warfighting capability than all but the top ten
countries in the world," Greg said. "You can take this platform
anywhere. You don't need to sit down with any banana republic and
negotiate where you take it. You don't have to quibble over docking
rights, berthing costs, or the right to land."
"China is a
huge disconnect," Greg said. "The reformers welcome us. The
hard-liners threaten us with nuclear destruction. Free-Traders have been
duped into complacency. There's plenty of cause for concern. China's the
last communist nuclear power and unpredictable."
"Didn't election scandals lead to further
revelations of Chinese influence peddling?" Pate asked. "An
elaborate network of Chinese island bases was discovered that directly
threatened the U.S. and was intended to cut off trade with Asia."
"With nuclear missiles in Cuba pointed at
the U.S., imagine the leverage China has to threaten the U.S. at the same
time they invade Taiwan."
* * *
Won wondered how the wise Sun Tzu would have
viewed China's current inbred hostility caused by a rigid strategic policy
and expansive world aspirations. "You Americans risk a Chinese
nuclear strike if you intervene in a conflict between China and Taiwan. Do
you value Taipei more than Los Angeles?" Wan had helped draft the
PLA's plan for the future. The strategic goal was to build a world-class
military force with modern strategic missiles and a navy capable of
projecting power far beyond China's shores. A tantalizing idea that
captured Wan's imagination was a plan for China to use the Panama Canal to
block access to commerce and naval ships at either end of the canal.
* * *
NORAD's early warning satellites, looking down on
the Chinese missile complexes, detected exhaust plumes from hundreds of
rockets. Long-range radars on the Aegis ships identified and locked on
Chinese boosters and designated them as targets for intercept. The missile
ship Iwo Jima launched 255 long-range interceptor missiles from its
missile tubes. The ship was capable of firing 2,400 rounds -- 1,200 each
of T1 and T2 interceptors. Flight times for the Chinese missiles varied
from eight to twenty minutes. The boost phase required five to seven
minutes before warheads and decoys could be deployed. This window was all
the time available for the interceptors to destroy the missiles in the
boost phase before the warhead was deployed.
"We're targeted," Pate said.
At that moment the
officer-of-the-deck ordered the ship into a tight turn.
The huge ship heaved as the four giant propellers
surged to full ahead and the helmsman spun the rudder to port. Everyone
grabbed for a handhold.
Greg's hands began to tremble. He set his
coffee mug down and his right eye started twitching uncontrollably. It was
a historic moment, but he felt no elation. He was numbed by what had just
happened… the only Battle Group equipped with a Sea Shield had
foreclosed the missile threat to the world.
"A Battle Group
with a Sea Shield is only twenty-four hours from any country," Pate
said. "Bullies will now know their missiles are useless. Cross a land
border to invade a neighbor and you attract a Battle Group with a Marine
Expeditionary Force." A Marine Expeditionary Force was the single
most powerful fighting force in the world. With 75 percent of the world's
population and infrastructure lying within three hundred miles of the
littoral-coastal populations meant the Marines were within three hours of
striking with their full war-fighting capability.
"What country is
equipped to go up against a force with a Sea Shield?" the admiral
wanted to know.
The door was still open for non-national
terrorists. Electronic and economic warfare and a Sea Shield didn't solve
the problem of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). But if you're a
terrorist, a Sea Shield puts a damper on trying to put WMD on missiles. A
big part of nuclear proliferation would go away if you couldn't put nukes
on missiles. Homeland defense against imported WMD becomes more
manageable.
***
In the back of Ready One, in the galley above the coffee pot, mugs hung on
the wall, one for each of the eighteen pilots, the maintenance officer,
and the gunnery officer. Greg filled his cup with coffee. His other choice
was "bug juice," a version of Kool-Aid.
Kelly took their trays and stacked them.
"See the news -- what a mess --the UN
plans to send thousands of new peacekeeping forces into Lebanon to stop
Islamic militants -- Jihad, Hezbollah, and Hamas -- from attacking Israeli
settlements across from Lebanon with rockets."
"The U.S. clashed
with the UN Security Council over the role of UN peacekeepers," Greg
explained. "The U.S. warned Syria and Iran again that their support
for terrorists disrupts the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. They
threatened to preemptively strike them with Marine Expeditionary Forces.
To change the regime in Palestine, we had to first change the regime in
Iraq. That attracted Saddam's loyalists and all the young al Qaeda Sunni
fanatics from outside Iraq. We were up to our eyeballs with crocodiles.
Israel was left alone facing the militants and Bush's Palestinian peace
initiative failed. Lebanon becomes a second front allowing us to kill two
birds with one stone. We stop the Islamic terrorists that hijacked the
Palestinians and at the same time seal off the porous borders with Syria
and Iran that supply fresh al Qaeda."
"We can't win a war against terrorism.
Terror is a tactic like air power." Greg groped for an analogy that
would make his argument clear. "We can't enlist coalition partners
with opaque abstractions. We have to convince them that Islamic radicals
have distorted the Islamic belief system by hijacking Islam and taking
their liberty and freedoms hostage."
"Papa, what makes you so optimistic to
believe Egyptians and other Arab societies won't embrace bin Ladenism or
some other Islamic theocracy like Iran's Shiites?"
"Bin Ladenism is a Sunni
doomsday cult," Greg replied. "Like all great religions or
belief systems, it's periodically hijacked by radicals like the Wahhabis."
"How did foreign policy change?"
"Policies adopted
for deterrence during the Cold War no longer apply. Before September 11,
policies were based on dealing with a rational enemy. There's nothing
rational about suicide bombers."
"You're too damned
optimistic."
"Nah. We have a model for regime
replacement and rebuilding. It's called Afghanistan. We also have another
model for a large Muslim population practicing their faith and striving
successfully in a secular, democratic state."
Kelly looked baffled.
"Where? Not Iraq!"
"In America! Even the
Saudis understand that. Just watch any airliner take off from Dhahran or
Jeddah headed for the U.S. Once the plane's off the ground, off come
women's abayas and men's thobes and guttras. Out of bathrooms come fashion
models in high heels and businessmen in thousand-dollar Brooks Brothers
suits, wearing Gucci shoes.
"The battle within Islam's belief
system, as with the other great religions, is who has the right to use his
or her interpretation of Islam to justify the right of certain people to
govern. The Shiite mullahs in Iran and the Sunni imams in Saudi Arabia
have hijacked Islam. The battle within the Muslim world is a battle for
hearts and minds. So we have two kinds of battles going on inside Islam;
one is an intellectual one for the hearts and minds of the Muslim world
and the other is a transnational war by terrorist ideologues against the
Western world. The strategic threat to America is bin Laden's
anti-American message and al Qaeda's unifying ideology."
Kelly clinched her fist and quietly pounded
the table. "Europeans bellyache about our unilateral action. They
want a coalition but they don't have anything to contribute. They shrink
from defense spending and, when push comes to shove, expect us to do the
heavy lifting. Then they demand the right to sit at the security table and
veto our policy actions."
Good. Kelly was
finally coming to grips with what she didn't like.
* * *
The general grimaced as he swallowed some of the
fiery alcohol from Shanxi and reflected on the consequences of what had
happened. Pretend to be a pig (play dumb) in order to eat the tiger. It
was Strategy Number Twenty-Seven of Sun Tzu's thirty-six strategies of
war. He closed his eyes in resignation. The strategy had not worked this
time. Indeed, there had been a serious miscalculation that had now caused
an undesirable consequence.
They had aroused the
tiger.
* * *
The screens were now blank. No more spots or
lines dancing across the grid like Pac-men, flashing and eliminating each
other. This wasn't a child's game. This was war in the twenty-first
century. When the spots disappeared, real people died.
When the planes were
safely recovered and ordnance stored at daylight, Captain Anderson would
declare a "steel beach" picnic and barbecue. They would cook
steak, chicken, hamburgers, and hotdogs on the flight deck. Golfers,
fishers, and bands would appear. The Air Department would lower one of the
aircraft elevators to the hangar deck, the ship would stop, and a swim
call would be issued. Crewmembers would get the opportunity to jump the
twenty-six feet from the elevator to the water. It wouldn't be unusual to
have 2,000 people literally jump ship.
Was the world a better place? Rogue
countries considering achieving political goals with the use of force
would study the outcome. They would conclude that the use of missiles was
no longer an option. Terrorists would still exist and be encouraged by
foolish nation-states. In the new world order the penalty bar had been
substantially raised.
Copyright S.
Owen Smith. All Rights Reserved.
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