Prelude to World War III: The Rise of the Islamic Republic and the Rebirth of America

by James Rosone

  Jeff interjected, “Another point for consideration is that each country will need to establish a central entity (whether it’s a corporation or some other entity) that will coordinate the purchasing and sales of all national food products.”

  Katelyn nodded towards Jeff, then continued, “Another caveat we would need to place in this plan is that local farmers will need to have a choice in selling their products to local grocery stores and communities or to the government entity. We do not want this to appear like the government taking control of food production, because we are not. As long as we include this qualification, I believe this Consortium could work--it will take a lot of coordination and some patience, but I believe we can do it. If you would like, my staff can start to develop the outline for this Consortium and we can start the dialog with our potential partners.”

  “All right, then please have your staffs start work on this immediately and let’s see how fast we can get this moving,” the President said, satisfied that this idea had some merit and could potentially work.

  Looking at his watch, the President saw they were running behind schedule. “Let’s talk about the infrastructure projects, Jeff. Where do we stand with them?” Jeff tapped away on his tablet and the holographic map began to show new data and information represented on each state. He began to pull several states forward to discuss them in more detail. “As you can see, we have 497 bridge projects, 2,667 highway projects and 3,422 high speed rail projects underway. All of the agreed upon projects (including bridge, highway and high speed rail projects) in the 2037 Infrastructure Plan are on track.”

  Switching to a new image on the map, he continued, “The nation’s power grid upgrade and security improvement effort is moving forward. The Department of Energy is working with the various utility companies on hardening specific critical power nodes against EMP and cybersecurity threats. DHS and DOE are also stocking up on transformers and other critical components needed to repair and maintain the various critical nodes should something happen to the supply system,” Jeff said.

  “Good. This will fold in nicely with 2040 National Defense Authorization and Recovery Act. This country has been wholly unprepared to deal with any major catastrophes,” the President responded.

  “This has been a major focus of the National Recovery Working Group, Mr. President. We are scheduled to have a meeting with them next Thursday; I suggest we wait to discuss this further with them,” said Monty as he adjusted his reading glasses.

  “I agree, Monty. Thank you for keeping us on track. Before we move on—Jeff, I want to make sure that we are diversifying the equipment used in these upgrades. Pay particular concern to products that are built by Chinese firms or subsidiaries. I do not want our power grid exposed because we used the same product in every facet.”

  “I agree, Mr. President, and I will personally make sure that is being looked at,” said Jeff as he annotated a few items on the map.

  Running short on time, the President jumped to the next section of the brief. “How is our manufacturing renaissance going?”

  Jeff nodded towards his counterpart. “Katelyn can provide input into the trade aspect, but things are starting to improve a lot. The corporate tax and tariffs have helped with reshoring a lot of manufacturing; with the steady reduction in energy costs and a large supply of labor, it has made America a very attractive place to set up new manufacturing.”

  Katelyn broke in, “--We have also increased tariffs on competing manufactured products coming from abroad (with special interests towards products from China). We have spent the last two years reviewing the various trade policies and agreements currently in place. A lot of these deals were initially poorly negotiated, which led to our enormous trade deficit. We have since modified these agreements or terminated them. We have effectively evened the playing field for American manufacturers, which has encouraged a lot of them to re-shore a majority of their overseas plants,” Katelyn said as she used her tablet to display the latest trade levels on the holograph.

  “The Chinese, of course, are not happy about the tariffs, but the alternative is that they lose their ability to sell their goods to the American market.”

  The President smiled at this, “My entire life, the Chinese have taken advantage of my country. Now it’s time to take advantage of them,” he thought.

  “Good work Katelyn, I’m all for free trade, but it must be fair trade,” said the President. “Let’s continue to work on this Grain Consortium initiative and ensure our trade agreements are strictly fair trade going forward.”

  “China is in desperate need of both food and oil; the Grain Consortium would be the perfect tool to leverage those needs to our advantage. We can also add an additional charge to food and oil products being sold to China.”

  Jeff, sensing that the President wanted to “stick it” to the Chinese, asked, “Can you explain that a little better Mr. President? I’m having a hard time following.”

  “We sell the goods to China for the price we paid for through the Consortium, and we then add an extra 5% to it. Rather than taking it in the form of cash, we take it in the form of them forgiving that amount of our debt. So the Chinese would be able to secure a steady supply of food and oil from the US, while we get an even larger portion of our debt paid off. By doing this, the government wouldn’t be losing any money on the purchase of the food from our own markets and at the same time, we would reduce our debt by 5% with each sale made to the Chinese,” said the President, clearly excited at the possibility of reducing the debt even further while “getting even.”

  “I hadn’t thought about it like that Sir. I think it could work, but the Chinese aren’t going to like buying the food and fuel from us when they could just buy it directly from the market,” said Jeff.

  “Normally you’d be right. However, since the Global Depression hit, most of America’s food and fuel supply has been reserved for Americans only; very little has been authorized for overseas sales. We can tighten that restriction even further, forcing the Chinese to have to play by our rules.”

  “All right, Mr. President. I’ll start work with the Commerce Secretary and we’ll start putting this into action. I’m also going to meet with our various farmer groups; I want to see what we can do to help encourage our farmers to produce more products and increase the supply going forward. I think food could become the key to our economic success and recovery, at least in the short term, Mr. President,” Jeff said.

  “Ok, ladies and gentlemen, let’s get things moving and we’ll reconvene next week,” said President Stein.

  *******

  The Americans immediately began to implement the concept of the Grain Consortium (or “the GC” as it was quickly coined). Through a series of legislation and Executive Orders, AFC took the lead in purchasing commodities from American farmers willing to join in the GC. Canada quickly jumped on board, and so did a number of other countries. It would take the rest of the year to fully integrate all of the participating members into the GC, but the initial concept and American/Canadian partnership began to have an almost immediate impact. As the first planting season began, farmers in both countries reported a 120% increase in the number of acres planted for the first growing season.

  *******

  02 April 2039

  Paris, France

  Meeting between EU President, Canadian President, the Prime Minister of Great Britain, the NATO Secretary General and the President of the United States

  President Stein hated dealing with his European counterparts. Despite having lived and worked in Europe with NATO during the early part of his career, Henry still found that Europe was a continent so fragmented and diverse it was hard for anything of substance to get done. The US had spent so much blood and treasure on Europe during the 20th Century to ensure they remained a free people; most Americans did not believe Europe was worth spending any additional lives or resources on any longer.

  The Europeans had so fouled up the Syrian refugee crisis and the Ar
ab Spring in the early 2010s that millions of refugees had poured across their borders and never left. During the following 25 years, the demographics of Europe had changed as a result, and despite the central government’s having very little in common with (or love for) the Islamic Republic, a large percentage of their population did. There was a cultural undercurrent of support for the IR and a distrust of the central government by European Muslims.

  President Stein had landed in Paris, and as his motorcade made its way through the city to the location of the meeting, he could not help but notice how so much of the city had changed. There were a lot more minarets dotting the skyline and women wearing headscarves, despite the bans on them. The air hung with a certain darkness that was not there before; the atmosphere just seemed a bit bleaker, lacking the usual energy and hopefulness one would expect in Paris.

  The motorcade pulled up to the official entrance of the Elysee Palace, and as Henry stepped out he could not help but feel that he was entering a bubble that brought him back to another time and place in history. As he followed his security agents through the entrance, he was struck by the building’s grand décor and ceaseless beauty. Despite all of his travels, he was still amazed by his surroundings, like a child who has seen Disneyland for the first time. When he arrived in the Salon Doré, he was jolted back to reality a bit as he realized that he was the last one to arrive for the meeting. This meant that business would begin right away. He took a deep breath and refocused his mind on the task at hand.

  Without further hesitation, he extended his hand to greet the man closest to him in the room. “It’s good to see you again Chancellor Lowden. How have you been?”

  Chancellor Lowden took the President’s hand and gave him a firm handshake.

  “Things are going well. I hear America is experiencing an economic renaissance; you will have to share your secret with us.” A wry smile crossed his lips. President Stein tipped his head towards him in acknowledgement and smiled back.

  Turning to the next prominent leader in the room, President Stein continued the task of introductions. “Prime Minister Blair, how are things faring in Great Britain?”

  “We are doing great. Things are really starting to turn around. I do want to personally thank you for the generous food prices to England and the EU; this will make a big impact in our continued economic recovery,” replied PM Blair.

  In response, President Stein made some polite exchange with Blair that the rest of the room did not hear. The two men were not-so-secret fans of one another, and always enjoyed being face-to-face whenever possible. The benefits of teleconferences were a bit overrated in situations like these, especially with the potential security breaches from hackers.

  PM Stannis Blair was a strong leader, just as his cousin was, and worked hard to ensure Britain did not lose their British identity despite the recent massive influx of foreign immigrants. Unlike his EU counterparts, he wanted to model more of the British economy around what the Canadians and Americans were doing, especially with regards to their trade agreements with Asia.

  After shaking each leader’s hand, President Stein turned to the group and said, “Our goal in the US is to continue to strengthen our military and economic ties with England, the EU and our NATO partners. To that end, we cannot have our friends starving. The Grain Consortium can be used as both a relief program, and as a weapon if need be. The GC is only a month old, and as we get more organized, I can assure you greater quantities of commodities will be made available at reduced prices for those countries in our grand alliance,” Stein said with a warm and disarming smile.

  The leaders all nodded their approval; they were a very eager audience. President Stein spent some time going over the finer details of the Grain Consortium program; most of the leaders were taking notes and asking questions during the presentation. They were all very engaged.

  As President Stein finished speaking, the group stood for a brief restroom break. As some left the room and others mingled, Henry saw the Canadian PM, Troy Peck, approach him. “Mr. President, on a different topic, I wanted to thank you on behalf of Canada for the help America continues to provide in putting down the civil unrest in Toronto and Vancouver. These extremist Muslims have been causing all sorts of problems across Canada since the Grain Consortium stopped selling food products to the Islamic Republic.”

  One of the first initial acts of the GC was a decision to stop selling food products to the IR. It was a known problem that the IR continued to sponsor terrorist organizations globally and was persistently behind efforts to undermine Western governments. They were also continuing to try and expand their empire into Malaysia, the Philippines and Sub-Saharan and East Africa. To that end, the GC made it known that they would not sell food products to the IR until this behavior stopped.

  Canada had experienced a demographic change, just as Europe had. Decades of taking in asylum seekers and refugees had changed the religious and social dynamics of the country. The Islamic population made up close to 30% of the country. In several cities where the Islamic population was closer to 50%, there were movements to insist that these cities be governed by Sharia Law. There was also a growing crusade nationwide to move the country to Sharia Law and away from the control of the Canadian Constitution.

  The Government had, of course, balked at this and civil unrest began to take place all across the various Islamic communities in Canada. Tens of thousands of Canadian citizens had immigrated to the IR, and were likewise encouraging others to as well. Despite the migration of Muslims from Canada to the IR, the ones remaining were doing their best to turn Canada into an Islamic country.

  The Canadian administration was clearly overwhelmed by the violence, which had spread from Toronto to the rest of the country. Government workers and police officers were routinely being targeted and killed, and several buildings had been bombed. It was during the height of this violence that Troy Peck had called Henry Stein directly to ask if the US Government would be able to assist Canada in putting down this uprising by these extremist Muslim communities.

  At first, President Stein was reluctant to get involved; his main focus was on rebuilding America, and thus he wanted to avoid external conflicts. However, once the US Intelligence Community determined a lot of support for these uprisings was originating from Dearborn, MI, and the Detroit area, the President decided he needed to act in order to keep the same thing from happening within the US.

  The President, in agreement with the Canadian government, authorized the use of US Military Forces in Canada. This included the deployment of 5,600 Military Police, 120 Judge Advocate Generals (JAGs) and three Brigade Combat Teams (BCTs). There were also six Special Forces A-Teams assigned to support the BCTs. The results of the military engagement were almost immediately successful. Minor disturbances cropped up here and there, but the large-scale riots were gone and violence was on a definite decline.

  It was during this tense period that PM Beck and President Stein began to secretly explore the possibility of the US and Canada holding a national referendum to merge their two countries. It was too early to announce anything publicly yet, but there were a lot of back room conversations happening behind the scenes.

  “Troy, if Canada needs any additional help, please let me know. I’d be more than happy to deploy additional military police to Canada to help augment your government. We have been fortunate in that we have not experienced the same level of violence or uprising by our own Muslim communities. Of course, the problem really isn’t with Muslims directly, it has more to do with the 1% to 3% of radicals within these communities that stir up the problems. As we identify these individuals, we prosecute them under the law or move to deport them,” said Stein as he tried to reassure PM Peck that things would get better.

  The President was eager to get the next portion of the meeting started; his arrival had been delayed by nearly thirty minutes, so he felt behind schedule. The leaders filed back in and sat down, and Henry wasted no time. “Switching gears, I wanted
to speak with you all about the growing problem with Russia and with the Islamic Republic.” Stein linked his tablet to the holographic device on the table and brought up a floating global map. Next to the map, several intelligence reports, photos and analysis were available for the rest of the group to read through while he spoke. “I feel at this point; conflict is all but inevitable with the Islamic Republic. It is incumbent upon us to make preparations for this battle and ensure that we win.”

  As naïve as the leaders of the EU appeared, they also recognized that the massive change in demographics these last 25 years had caused some serious problems between their Muslim immigrants and their European counterparts. The provocative activities of the IR within Western countries and the rest of the world were pushing everyone towards a clash of civilizations.

  “Do you really feel that diplomacy will not work?” asked PM Blair, hoping that his own assessment was wrong.

  Stein responded, “At this point I do not; we’ve shared our intelligence with you in regards to the Russian build up and the massive troop movement and modernization of the Islamic Republic’s military. They are gearing up with assistance from China and Russia. The questions we have to ask are, ‘How much time do we have?’ and, ‘Who will attack who first?’”

  Chancellor Lowden cut in, “--Europe is still recovering from the Depression. We are only now able to adequately provide for our people; we cannot afford to spend additional resources on a military buildup.” He looked concerned while he was speaking, genuinely torn.

  “Chancellor Lowden, I understand your economic situation. The US has been in the same situation. You and I both know the EU cannot possibly hope to protect itself with a military force of 130,000 soldiers…. The US cannot protect Europe alone; we need Europe to do their part,” said Stein, nodding towards the photos and intelligence reports floating on the holographic screen.