A Desert Called Peace

by Tom Kratman

  "Then, too, Parilla's an old soldier, but he doesn't know much of anything about war, less still about modern war. He understands discipline, leadership and politics. I need him for that. But I'm quite sure he'd let me do what I want to train and lead the force, even if I weren't paying for it."

  Parilla, escorted by Kennison, Morse, and Bowman, pulled up to the entrance of Casa Linda in Carrera's Phaeton. Once, when he had been the effective ruler of the country, Parilla would have been driven in his own. Since then he had fallen on somewhat harder times, although he was hardly living in poverty. Carrera would have been more than prepared to give Parilla the Phaeton, or to buy him one of his own, to get his cooperation. He knew that wouldn't be necessary.

  When the vehicle stopped, Morse got out to open the door. Carrera and Kuralski came to attention and saluted although no one was in uniform. After Parilla returned the salute, Carrera walked down the steps to greet him.

  "General Parilla, it is good to see you again." The two smiled conspiratorially.

  After shaking hands, Carrera escorted the party down to the briefing room. The rest of his staff was already there. Lourdes served drinks while Carrera introduced Parilla to the staff. Then Carrera began the briefing.

  "General Parilla, I have asked you here today to get your approval for a plan for raising, equipping and training an expeditionary force, roughly brigade sized, to participate in the war against the terrorists. I thank you personally for coming out of your way to meet with me here at my home. The Estado Mayor would once have been a more appropriate spot for this but, since this house is air conditioned and the Estado Mayor has been demolished, I thought you might prefer to be brought up to date here."

  "And besides that," Parilla added, "this place is secure. There probably isn't another quite so safe in the country."

  "This first item of business is the shape of the organization we have planned." Carrera gestured for a slide to be shown on the screen in the front of the briefing room.

  "As you can see, General, we've named it a legion. It should be obvious enough why."

  Parilla looked confused but let it go. "I confess I don't know, but do you think, do your people think, that this is a good design, Patricio? It seems odd to me."

  Carrera frowned, not at Parilla but at circumstance and fate. He shrugged. "Honestly, in some ways it's a crappy design. But it has some serious good points. It actually is not designed for use so much as for expansion. In the expanded form, with every cohort grown to the size of a small regiment of about one thousand to fourteen hundred men, and the legion grown to the size of a division, it would be fairly optimal for the kind of war we expect to fight. As is, it is as much as we can afford, as much as we have the personnel to lead, and as much as we have time to train those leaders for. Matthias, explain to the general, would you?"

  Esterhazy nodded and went over the finances. He didn't need to remind Parilla who was paying for everything.

  Carrera interjected, "Basically, Raul, the hit my family's fortunes took in the TNTO attack has not been made good. The value of our assets is down to about forty-seven percent of what it had been."

  "Ja," Esterhazy agreed. "If he vere to cash out assets now ze loss vould be enormous. His family vould object and he might lose control in a shareholders' fight. As is, if Patrick can vait, zere is no reason for ze assets not to return to zere prior value . . . in a couple of years."

  "Matt's used his contacts to arrange loans secured by my holdings, Raul," Carrera added. "We have a line of credit for seven hundred and fifty million FSD, a personal loan, really, secured by me, er, rather secured by what will be my personal share once the estate is finally probated. That's all we have to count on."

  Carrera sighed, a bit wistfully. "I'd have gone for a full division, anyway, and just used shit for equipment until we could afford better but the personnel and training issues make that more than a little problematic. As is, not only are we going out smaller than I'd like, and not organized the way I'd like; we're not going to be able to afford the best equipment either.

  "There is no telling exactly how the war will roll out. It could be that Sumer folds immediately and we go right into a counterinsurgency war."

  Seeing Parilla's somewhat quizzical look, Carrera stated, "Oh, yes; no matter what, there will be an insurgency, though I have reason to suspect the FSC is not even considering the possibility.

  "It could be that there will be a major conventional fight, something like the last Petro War, though on a lesser scale, because Sumer has not managed to make good its losses. What we really expect though, is a campaign—more or less conventional—of about three to seven weeks' duration, followed by an insurgency."

  Triste, sitting in the left rear corner, added, "You got that right. Those idiots in the War Department, to say nothing of that king of idiots, Ron Campos—that's the FSC's secretary of war, General—are really being obtuse about this. I don't think I've ever even heard of anyone engaging in such wishful thinking since the FSC got itself into that dumb-assed war in Cochin, forty years back."

  Carrera scowled a bit. This was Campos' second stint as SecWar. Carrera had not thought the first sufficiently impressive to justify a second.

  He continued. "Anyway, the legion is based in large part around the needs of counterinsurgency. Thus there are four infantry cohorts, each with four infantry centuries, plus combat support and headquarters and support, because a square organization is more suitable for controlling an area and the people on it than a triangular one is. Note though, that triangular is clearly better for maneuver warfare. There are Cazador and mechanized cohorts because the one is critical, and the other useful, for counterinsurgency. The rest is fairly self explanatory except for the size and shape of the aviation ala."

  "Ala?" Parilla asked.

  "Latin for 'wing,' as in 'cavalry wing.' But all the real cavalry is in the air now, so . . ."

  "Bring up the aviation slide, would you, Mitch?" Carrera asked.

  When the slide was shown, Carrera frowned. "General, this one makes only limited sense except in terms of its being a training vehicle for a cadre for a much larger air organization. It's the largest group after the service support cohort. It has fifty aircraft including remotely piloted vehicles. That doesn't include medical evacuation aircraft. Of those fifty, it has sixteen helicopters, twelve medium and four heavy. We don't know yet which medium and heavy lift helicopter we will choose or what we can afford. I am inclined towards Volgan and there are a sufficient number for sale, usually used and rebuilt, at an acceptable price. We are probably going to use modified crop-dusters built in the FSC for the close air support role." Carrera saw Parilla's smile and hastily added, "No, sir, don't laugh. They have impressive capabilities—over two tons of ordnance, thirteen hardpoints and can turn on a dime—and have already been combat tested in the close support role in Santander."

  "In any case, in designing the air ala, our twin goals were: every asset that would be in divisional level air support wing must be there, and it must be able to lift the combat elements of one infantry cohort plus the Cazador cohort in not more than two lifts with eighty-five percent of the helicopters operationally ready. This does that but the personnel inefficiency when dealing with numbers of aircraft this low is just appalling.

  "Naval slide, Mitch."

  Parilla looked that over and saw a few light warships plus a number of merchant ships. He shrugged. Soldiers were soldiers and didn't care about ships. One thing did catch his eye, though.

  "What's this intelligence collection ship?"

  Omar Fernandez, sitting next to Triste in the left rear of the room piped in, "That one's for me, General."

  "We need to have a long talk about that, Fernandez," Carrera said, his eyes narrowing to slits. "And soon. Like, say, after this meeting is over."

  "Anyway, General, that's it. You have detailed diagrams of the tables of organization in your packet. Pending your questions . . ."

  Carrera stopped to sip at a cup
of coffee. Parilla sat digesting the rest of the chart of the Headquarters. Parilla asked about the unusual staff set up.

  "A good question, General. There are basically four staff arrangements in use in the civilized world. The FSC's system of four equal sections, which is what you are used to, and which they inherited from the Gauls in the Great Global War, is designed to be something of a committee. I believe it has a number of defects, chief among them being that these staffs inject an equality into the planning and conduct of military operations that has no place in battle. The Anglian system is needlessly complex and badly over officered; we don't have enough trained officers to hope to emulate it anyway. The Volgans could be said not to really have much of a staff structure below division level.

  "Instead, the model we have chosen is the same staff form that the Sachsen used with great success in the Great Global War and before. Historical experience says that this is much the best form for a highly mobile force. To some extent I expect this to make up, partially, for the fact that our organization is not really geared to highly mobile warfare. This staff form also does not suffer the defect of permitting the rear echelon to act as a dead weight upon the fighting line. Instead, everything goes to support the front. Lastly, this form for the staff does not permit the personnel managers to have much of a say in operations. It locates the clerks so that they cannot harass the line with constant demands for timely information that no personnel management system can do anything useful with in a timely manner."

  Parilla chewed his lower lip for a few moments before saying, "I don't think I like that, Patricio. Armies are composed of people; hence personnel management is a critical component of the force. It's as important as, maybe more important than, logistics."

  Carrera jerked his chin slightly sideways, then chewed his own lip for a bit. "I am put in mind of a story I read once," he said, "a true story, about a day in August, 1944, Old Earth Year, when the American Army in France had a total infantry replacement pool of one rifleman for perhaps twenty or so divisions. Imagine, if you will, General, a situation where thousands of personnel managers are in a position to manage one poor rifleman. How privileged that man must have felt! I have always thought that if those personnel managers had been mostly infantry themselves they wouldn't have been managed quite so thoroughly, but there would have been more than one man to replace the hundreds killed and wounded that August day. Computers, by the way, do not seem to help this problem much once the shooting starts."

  Parilla thought about that for a minute and decided Carrera was probably right. His face said as much. He thumbed through his hand- out packet and said, "I note you have General Abogado in charge of our foreign trainers. How is old Ken doing?" He remembered Abogado rather fondly from his days as commander of FS Army troops in Balboa.

  Carrera smiled. "He's fine and raring to go last I saw him, Raul, which was here, two days ago. He asked about you. In any case, he says he'll be ready within six weeks to begin the first course he is going to be running for our senior officers, a sort of truncated CGSC, a command and general staff course. He'll also be running a number of other courses to train and select lower leaders and technicians."

  "Good, good," said Parilla. "I remember—with envy, too, I admit—the way he used to train the FSC troops here. A fine old soldier."

  "He was that," Carrera agreed. Pity about having feet of clay. Still, Abogado is superb at what he does provided you keep him away from women.

  "Where are we going to train the troops, by the way, Patricio? Most of the old FS facilities have been sold off. The Civil Force lacks facilities, generally."

  "Mitch, bring up the Fort Cameron slide, please."

  The previous slide disappeared to be replaced by a map of a small area well known to Parilla from his days as commander of the Guardia Nacional.

  "Sometime, someday when we can afford it, Raul, I hope to buy the Isla Real outright and turn it into a base for us," Carrera explained. The Isla Real, or Royal Island, was about eighty kilometers north of Ciudad Balboa and was about two hundred and seventy square kilometers in area. "But that alone will cost twice our total budget now to buy and build up. It will have to wait. In the interim . . ."

  He pointed at the slide. "This is a map of the old Centro de Instruccion Militar at Fuerte Cameron. As you can see, it is sufficient to our current purposes, with enough range space and well-drained, open, flat areas for tentage. Most of the buildings will go for housing cadre, offices, and school rooms."

  Again, Parilla accepted that. He asked, "What about rank structure? I see lots of old Roman military titles, few modern. Is there a reason?"

  Carrera nodded. "We'll be working mostly with the Army of the Federated States and the Anglians. They are extremely rank conscious. I simply do not want them, initially, to have the slightest clue as to the ranks of our people they are dealing with. Thus, signifers are roughly second lieutenants, but could be considered first lieutenants or captains. Tribunes I through III are, for our purposes, 1st lieutenants through majors, but could be considered majors through colonels. Legates 3rd through 1st are lieutenants colonel through brigadiers. On the other hand, in Latin 'legate' means lieutenant general, three stars, or ambassador, which is a four star equivalent. The sole dux, or duce, is yourself. The centurionate runs from optio, basically a platoon sergeant, through 1st centurion, the senior noncom of a cohort, and on to sergeant major, of which this expeditionary force needs only one at this time, Sergeant Major McNamara."

  "Seems silly to me, Patricio."

  "Give it time, Raul. Are you ready for dinner?"

  Adjourning to the mess, Parilla asked about a set of thirteen carved and silvered or gilded eagles perched atop poles.

  Carrera gestured toward the table and chairs, mahogany and intricately hand carved. "There is a furniture factory in Valle de las Lunas, Fabrica Hertzog, that does fine wood carving and makes some really superb furniture. They made this table, the chairs, the sideboard and the china cabinet. Good work, very good. When you gave me this mission, I gave some thought to what the units' symbols should be. I had Fabrica Hertzog make these up.

  "We'll present them to the legion, cohorts, ala and classis at a solemn, probably half-religious, ceremony sometime in the future."

  Carrera moved to take one of the eagles from its rack against the wall. He presented it to Parilla. "As you can see, sir, the eagles themselves are of gilded or silvered wood. The plaques we just had made up. They give the name and number of the unit that will carry it. This one, for example, is for the 8th Artillery Cohort, Terremoto." Earthquake. He put down the Eighth's eagle and picked up another. Pointing to its plaque he read off, "Eleventh Air Ala . . . Jan Sobieski, who beat the Turk at Vienna with his winged hussars." Carrera went down the list, pointing to each in turn. "Legion: Ruy Diaz de Bivar, Legio del Cid for short . . . First Cohort: Principe Eugenio, Prinz Eugen who led the Austrians against the Turks . . . Second Cohort: Roberto Guiscard, the Crusader . . . Third Cohort: Ricardo, Corazon de Leon, the Crusader . . . Fourth Cohort: Barbarossa, Crusader . . . Fifth: Carlos Martillo who stopped the Moslem advance at Tours in old France . . . Sixth: Vlad Tepes who fought the Turk for Transylvania . . . Seventh Combat Support: the sword of El Cid, Tizona . . . Ninth Service Support: his horse, Babieca . . . Tenth: the Headquarters, Santiago Matamoros, Saint James the Moor killer . . . Twelfth Classis: Don John who crushed the Turk at Lepanto."

  "You see where I'm going with this, right?"

  Parilla laughed, "Oh, yes, I see, my friend."

  Dinner commenced and carried on more or less silently. Parilla was on information overload and the staff knew better than to talk plainly. After all, they worked for Carrera, not Parilla. When it was done, and the maids were clearing the table, Carrera asked the general—no, el Duce—yet again, if he had any further questions.

  "No, none. You have done a fine job . . . by the way, what is your rank in all this?"

  "We have to talk about that, privately. At this moment I probably have
no official legal rank beyond a mandate from the Legislative Council to be your deputy and to help prepare the Legion. Shall we repair to the living room for a nightcap to discuss just that? We also need to talk about your own rank." Carrera nodded to Kuralski to keep the rest of the staff away while he and Parilla chatted.

  "The day after tomorrow I am flying to Hamilton, FD to speak with, umm, my family senator. She owes my family a great deal. She also needs our support for future campaigns. Frankly, I despise the bitch on principle but she ought be a useful conduit to greater FSC support."

  An hour and a half later, while Bowman and Morse drove the general home, Kuralski, Sergeant Major McNamara, Fernandez and Carrera relaxed on the back porch of Casa Linda, overlooking the sea. The salty smell of ocean, overlaid with the smell of decayed organic matter from the coast, wafted up.

  McNamara chided his boss. "Now, sir, if you had been t'at good at dog and pony shows back in the FS Army you would have gone far. Why I can just picture you as some four star's aide de camp."

  Carrera made a gagging sound and then leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands behind his head, satisfied at a job well done. "They tried to grab me to be someone's aide de camp three times, Top. The idea made me ill; I despise general officers, for the most part. And, besides, don't confuse inability with unwillingness. I could always dog and pony with the best of them. I just wouldn't do it without a really good reason. Tonight I had a good reason.

  "And, Mac, tell the boys to put on the uniforms starting tomorrow. With the ranks I gave them when they first got here, with the proviso that Kuralski and Kennison are Legates I and the ex-captains are Tribunes III. And they can skip the promotion party for my having made Legate III. It's just another tool. Besides, we are going to be much too busy for that nonsense over the next several months."