by Jack Strain
“Appreciate the head’s up, John, anything else you got for me?”
“Like I said, Dutch, tomorrow’s going to be rough. If you don’t play ball, I won’t be able to protect you. Talk some sense into him for the good of the country and yourself. People are going to jail, Dutch, this is no shit - the God’s honest truth. Too many people have died, and this president and his nutjob troll mobs are out of control. Help yourself.”
After the call ended Schultz just sat back in his chair with his mind racing trying to figure out what to do. His stomach was churning up a painful burning sensation from his chest to his throat. Fighting back the acidic bile, got up from his chair and headed to his office to start reviewing material for his appearance and thought.
Maybe Mitchum’s right, perhaps it’s time Douglas and I had a chat after all.
Chapter Forty Six
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
The eighty-one-year-old King Salman bin Abdulaziz rarely raised his voice to his favorite son and future heir, but now his once powerful voice resounded as he castigated his son for his impetuousness and failure to properly consult his father and king. His aging, spotted hand trembled as he pointed angrily at his son and repeated for the third time, “How could you be so stupid and short-sighted? We need the Americans. I should arrest you this very instant and send you into exile without your yachts and riches and see if you remember who rules the House of Saud.”
Wisely, he remained silent while his father shouted his displeasures after the disclosure in the New York Times of his attempts to kick the Americans out from their Gulf bases. His overtures to several of the Gulf States had been fruitful, but the Kuwaiti Emir looked unkindly at the prospect of losing his American patrons and contacted the Saudi king immediately. His father’s reaction was worse than he feared and he could sense that perhaps he had gone too far this time.
Slowly coming to his feet, Prince Mohammad bib Salman stood to his full height and with his hands held out in a sign of contrition respectfully interrupted, “Father, please hear me out…please, I beg of you. I never intended to disrespect you. Yes, I undertook discussions about the Americans, but I never did so in your name. It was always understood that it was to be a serious discussion and only undertaken with your blessing.”
MBS paused and then added, “Father, everything is different now. I don’t think that we can ever go back.”
The King suffered from a mild case of dementia rumored to have started after a minor stroke in 2011, but the Crown Prince knew his father still possessed his faculties and an iron will. Perhaps that is what bothered the old king that his son did not confide in him. Even now he could not hold back his love for his son and his eyes began to soften, and his voice lost some of its rancor. “Son, I know that what has been done, cannot be undone, but what you propose is far too risky…dangerous.”
The Crown Prince’s eyes lit up a bit as he noticed his father’s anger start to subside. In a soothing and respectful voice, he said, “Father, I know on the surface what I propose seems to be fraught with great peril. However, I believe that to continue our special relationship with the Americans would be even more perilous. It pains me to say it, but these are not the same people they once were. Look what they have done to our greatest enemy.
“Yes, they ended a deadly threat to the Kingdom, but they didn’t just inflict a military defeat. They burned cities to the ground, killing tens of thousands as if in some unholy bloodlust. How can the House of Saud, Custodians of the Two Holy Mosques, and leader of the Sunni Muslim faith ally itself with infidels dripping in the blood of Muslim men, women, and children? Our people won’t have it. It will only push them towards the jihadists.”
Nodding his assent, he knew his son spoke the truth. Reports from the Saudi Embassy in Washington were disturbing, to say the least. More than a thousand Saudi nationals at last count had already been swept up in the American anti-terror sweeps.
“You may be right about the people above all else. So, what do you propose to do after the Americans leave and remember there is no guarantee that they would simply pack everything up and depart. Who shall the Kingdom ally itself within the years ahead. The Persians won’t stay weak forever.”
Smiling deeply inside, but out of respect maintaining an outward appearance of humility, the Crown Prince did not hesitate to answer, “Father, perhaps the answer lies in our own history with the Americans and the West. Why did they ally with the House of Saud, to begin with seven decades ago? Because they needed our oil. We craved secure markets, and their support benefited the House of Saud. But with this relationship also came many headaches. How often have the Americans and their true ally in the Middle East, the Jews, caused us grief?”
Nodding in agreement, the king mumbled, “More times than you know my son, far more than anything written in the history books you used to read.”
“That’s it exactly Father, the Americans drill their own oil and gas now and don’t really need our resources any longer, at least not the way they did at one time. Who needs us more than any other country in the world? The Chinese. They are infidels, yes, but they are infidels who can be counted upon to allow us to live our lives without interference. They want a secure supply of energy supplies, period. We can create a true partnership based on mutual interest and strength.
“Let us look to them for security, but more importantly, Father, the House of Saud should be reaching out to the entire Muslim world, even the Shia heathens, and no longer rely on the West for anything. We will still sell them oil but no longer allow them to dictate anything ever again. They have shown themselves who they truly are, and we now know that they are not friends of the Muslim world. Lead us, Father. and watch the people shower you with love and respect.”
King Salman’s eyes began to moisten as he heard the Crown Prince’s moving words, but he knew deep in his heart that it would fall to his son to make it so. Coming to his feet, the King embraced his son and kissed his cheeks and said, “Make it so, my son, make it so.”
Chapter Forty Seven
The White House
Even though the hour was late, nearly midnight, a restless President Wolfe sat alone in his personal residence in the East Wing and continued obsessively watching the latest cable news updates. He looked more like a teenager sitting on a couch, eyes glazed over, and clicking from one channel after the other in a random fashion, rarely staying on the same channel for more than five minutes.
“…the governors of Maryland and Virginia along with the Mayor Melinda Boozier held a joint news conference condemning President Wolfe’s decision to federalize their respective National Guard units and order their deployment to Washington to maintain order.” CLICK.
“…more than two hundred and seventy-five senators and representatives have signed a document demanding the president appear before the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War.” CLICK.
“…the General Assembly of the United Nations has voted near unanimously condemning recent U.S. actions both at home and across the globe. The Iranian ambassador made a powerful appeal to this international body to convene a War Crimes Commission and to charge the American President with crimes against humanity.” CLICK.
“…what you are seeing now on the screen are massive flames coming from Italy’s biggest refugee camp in Mineo, Sicily. Flames broke out two hours ago and this former U.S. Army base in the center of Sicily, home to nearly five thousand refugees from forty nations, has turned into a raging inferno. Hundreds are feared dead…” CLICK.
Wolfe was about to top off his glass with more fifty-year-old Macallan Scotch whiskey when his iPhone vibrated loudly on the coffee table. Grunting as he reached for it, he rolled his eyes when he saw that it was Dutch calling for the fifth time today.
Jesus Christ, Dutch, take a fucking hint. You bailed on me buddy, remember?
He was about to unmute the TV when Baxter Davis knocked and poked his head in the door and said, “Mr. President, sorry to disturb you, but can I have a wor
d?”
He was really not in the mood, but Wolfe knew that he had been hiding out for days now, and Davis had been pretty much covering his ass, so he had little choice. “Sure thing, Baxter. Grab a drink why you’re at it.”
Davis replied in a fatigued voice, “Thank you, Mr. President.”
“For Christ sake Baxter, no one’s around. It’s Douglas, not this Mr. President shit.”
Shielding his reaction but taken aback nonetheless, Davis knew Wolfe preferred formality especially from people who weren’t from the old Manhattan gang like the dearly departed Schultz. He quickly answered back, “Douglas it is. Can I top you off?” He poured three fingers worth of the smooth scotch for himself and two fingers worth for Wolfe.
“So how are you feeling, Douglas?”
“Top of the fucking world, Baxter. I’m only the most hated man of this century. Fucking protesters are so goddamned loud that they keep me up half the night. Hell, just knowing they are out there keeps me up at night. And oh yeah, tomorrow my best friend will be appearing in front of the Joint fucking Committee on the Conduct of the War and those fuckers want to bury me. I’m doing great.”
After a deep tug at his glass, Baxter offered up a sympathetic look and spoke in a soothing tone. “I can’t imagine what you must be going through right now, I really can’t. All I know is that history will remember what you did these past weeks for a hundred years and those weak assed pussies outside will be nothing but a footnote.”
With a hint of regret in his voice, Wolfe spoke in a low tone, “Baxter you may be right that those protesters may only rate a footnote, but there’s going to be whole chapters in the history book on the first president ever actually impeached.”
Baxter was about to say something when Wolfe suddenly got up and moved in an agitated manner towards the sealed windows and spoke harshly. “You know what, Baxter? Fuck history and fuck them. I’ve lost everything. My daughter’s gone, my name is shit, fucking UN wants to arrest me for war crimes, the billion-dollar business that I built from nothing is going into the shitter now that no one wants a big “W” on their buildings, and worse - I have to stay in this fucking job for another two and half years putting up with this shit.”
Without warning, Wolfe’s hand tightened around the crystal Tiffany tumbler, and in one violent fluid motion, Wolfe threw the glass against the far side wall shattering it and sending its contents careening around the room. A shocked Davis barely had time to put up his arm to cover his eyes as several shards flew towards him. Six seconds later two Secret Service agents dramatically burst into the room with their guns out quickly scanning for threats. Agent Maria Sanchez was the first in the room, and her eyes were drawn to the president who was standing red-faced and breathing heavy and looking as if he was about to break something else.
Sanchez had never seen the president - or any president for that matter - so outwardly angry, even dangerous. The only other person in the room was a clearly shaken Baxter Davis who had his hands up but remained seated and kept saying, “It’s okay…it’s okay…everything’s fine.” But the high-pitched tone and shaken eyes clearly indicated that everything was not fine.
Training immediately kicking in, Sanchez put away her Sig Sauer P229 and slowly approached the president, and said in a very soothing, yet commanding manner, “Mr. President, it’s me, Maria. Let’s take a walk and calm down. Everything is going to be fine.”
At the word “fine,” the president’s eyes lit up again, and he directed his frustration at her as he said, “I am so sick of hearing from everyone that everything’s fine when everyone goddamn well knows that things are pretty far from fine. In fact, things are completely fucked, and all of you know it.”
Maria’s expression never changed, and her voice didn’t lose its purposeful soothing manner -like a cop trying to talk someone down off the ledge of a building. She simply said, “I hear you, Mr. President, really I do. Things can’t be undone, but we are all worried about you, sir, and want you to try to relax. Let me walk you back to your bedroom and Henry will take Mr. Davis back to his office. Maybe we can get the first lady on the phone to talk, sir, maybe that would help?”
Letting out a short HUMPH under his breath, the president strode over to the coffee table, grabbed the bottle of scotch by the neck, and before Agent Sanchez could react headed out the door. With a voice full of derision, he added, “Leave the first lady out of this. I sent her away from this fucking prison for a reason. Now I’m headed to bed and don’t expect to be bothered until the morning…late morning!”
The two agents on the president’s detail and Baxter Davis were left standing in the room with a huge stain of 50-year-old scotch etched against a cream-colored wall and shards of glass littering the carpet. But even worse, a deep feeling of dread welled up in their stomachs. The President of the United States was not well. Who knows what would happen next?
Chapter Forty Eight
November 2nd
Buckley Air Force Base, Aurora, CO
Senior Airman Davey Lopes had a reputation for being a hardass, and that was fine by him. The twenty-six-year-old former gang member from El Paso knew he was lucky to have escaped that world and build a new life in the Air Force. The Air Force gave him everything - discipline, an education, a career - and as a result, he never cut himself or anyone serving under him any slack. He was deadly serious, and the only things in this world he truly cared about were his loving wife and two beautiful girls and making sure his country was safe from attack.
Lopes served in the 2nd Space Warning Squadron and was responsible for operating the constellation of U.S. early warning satellites which include the older DSP satellites and the next generation dual sensor SBIRS or Space Based Infrared Systems. Each high-level SBIRS satellite flew a geosynchronous orbit at about 22,236 miles above sea-level and was outfitted with a highly advanced infrared sensor suite that looked for signs of global launches while a different sensor could focus on a fixed region or even an individual launch. Each of these $1.1 billion satellites was critical to the defense of the U.S. and its global interests.
Over the past three weeks, Senior Airman Lopes along with the entire squadron had been pulling extended shifts to cover the ballistic missile threat from the Iranians and other nations threatening American military forces and its allies. Unlike many other branches of the armed forces which were able to stand down now that the crisis seemed to have passed, the members of the 2nd Space Warning Squadron remained on wartime alert conditions.
Lopez was in the middle of running a system check on SPIRS-GEO 1 when an alert rang out and announced that a missile plume had been detected and tracking began instantly. Two seconds later, the system confirmed a launch site with specific GPS coordinates indicating a launch point from Pukchang Air Field, North Korea. The experienced Senior Airman logged the event and announced, “Alert One…Alert One. GEO1 has positively identified a ballistic missile launch originating from North Korea and has begun tracking NK missile, designated Bravo Mike One, waiting for confirmation of telemetry data and possible touchdown points.”
The watch commander’s voice rang out, “Lopes, what are we looking at?”
“Sir, too soon to identify…need another sixty seconds to get a better idea. Recommend retasking DSP 145 to reorient orbit to back up GEO 1.”
“Permission granted. Okay people let’s track this sucker. I want likely target confirmation in two minutes.”
“Missile tracking over northern Hokkaido, Japan, still climbing Sir.”
The highly advanced automated systems in place sent Flash Traffic messages directly to the 460th Space Wing and NORAD, North American Air Defense Command at Peterson Air Base in Colorado Springs who sent Flash Traffic messages to all commands including National Command Authority in Washington D.C. The North Korean missile threat was taken very seriously, and minutes later AEGIS equipped air defense ships went to general quarters and began preparations to get underway from ports in Japan and South Korea. Airborne assets from
surveillance birds to fighter-bombers began shifting patrol zones, and a massive array of spaceborne and ground-based early warning radar stations began tracking the lone NK launch.
Lopes was concentrating on his multiple screens tracking the missile and about to confirm that Bravo Mike One looked like a Hwasong 12 intermediate ballistic missile when his system flashed another alarm and this time two more launches were detected.
Lopes whispered to himself, holy shit, but maintained control of his emotions and calmly announced, “We have two more birds in the air. Repeat: two more missile plumes positively identified, lifting off from Sunan Airfield, North Korea, designate targets as Bravo Mike Two and Bravo Mike Three. Systems tracking.”
Watch Commander Major Eric DeFazio felt the tension grip his body.
What the hell is that nutcase doing? Hasn’t he been following current events? Because we’ve been blowin’ fuckers away across the globe and this guy starts launching missiles again.
DeFazio was about to place a call to NORAD Headquarters when a familiar alert signal announced another missile launch. Lopes said, “Alert One, Alert One, systems detect another heat plume indicating another ballistic missile launch this time from Pyongyang Airfield North Korea, designate target as Bravo Mike Four. Systems have a positive track on all four Bravo Mikes, headings as follows. Bravo Mike One following similar track as previous launches over Hokkaido, tracking indicates an expected touchdown roughly two hundred miles off the tip of the Kamchatka peninsula, Russia.”
“What about Bravo Mikes Two and Three?”
“Systems tracking both birds. Looking like Hwasong 14s passing over Korean peninsula, expected to track over southern tip of Kyushu, Japan and continue on a southeast trajectory towards….” Lopes eyes went wide when the touchdown point indicated possible impact point near the American territory of Guam and stammered for the first time as he said, “Sir, heading towards Guam. Repeat: heading towards Guam. Missiles still climbing. Cannot confirm final impact point at this time.”