Vortex

  “Look, Lieutenant, we’re both busy men. After all, this is wartime. We have to expect these small irregularities to crop up occasionally. Just let me pass, and I’ll make sure your paperwork’s brought up-to-date as soon as I can. Right?”

  The younger man’s face darkened in anger, and Metje winced inwardly, aware that he’d blundered badly. He’d meant to use his most cordial senior-officer-to-junior-officer tone. Instead, he’d sounded more like a smarmy, whining panhandler.

  “And once again, Kommandant, I have my own orders. I cannot allow you to proceed without verifying your identity. “

  The lieutenant’s eyes narrowed and he stepped back a pace from the car door.

  “Give me your ID card, sir… please.”

  Metje saw the man’s hand drifting toward his holstered pistol. His heart fluttered once, then twice, and the sweat running down his back felt ice-cold. A loud clicking noise told him that one of the other soldiers at the barricade had just taken the safety off his assault rifle.

  He folded. With his hand shaking uncontrollably, Metje passed the card through the Astra’s open window.

  “Thank you, Kommandant.” The lieutenant slid the ID card into his shirt pocket.

  “Park over there, off the road, while I call this in. Sir.”

  Thoroughly cowed, Metje obeyed. He reversed the Astra and pulled off onto the highway’s gravel shoulder-stopping just ahead of the mammoth Hippo. His heart sank as he watched the officer walk over to his radio-equipped jeep and pick up a microphone, standing with his back to Metje.

  His mind raced through the options left open to him, raising and discarding them in almost the same instant. Doing nothing was not an option.

  “The

  Defense Ministry was sure to have an alert out with his name on it by now.

  Resisting arrest seemed even more absurd-pitting his poor pistol marksmanship against a squad of rifle-armed soldiers would be simple suicide.

  And escape…

  MetJe thought about that. The Astra was a fast car. If he could swerve around the single Army truck parked ahead, he might gain a large enough lead to evade any pursuit. It seemed worth trying. He reached for the ignition key with trembling fingers.

  He glanced at his rearview miff or The young lieutenant had just spun round, his face a mask of anger. Oh, God. He knew.

  Metje gunned the engine and felt his tires spin wildly in the loose gravel.

  Come on! The Astra shot forward in a cloud of dust and thrown gravel, accelerating rapidly. For a millisecond, he felt a wild surge of exhilaration. He’d done it….

  Flames stabbed out of the darkness-muzzle flashes from rifles firing at point-blank range. The Astra’s front windshield

  starred and then shattered, shot out by the same bursts that shredded its front and rear tires.

  Metje felt himself thrown forward against the steering column as his car skidded to a stop in a cloud of dust, torn rubber, and exhaust.

  He was still recovering from the abortive ride when the car door slammed open. Rough hands yanked him out of his seat and out onto the road. Two grim-faced soldiers grabbed his arms, while a third quickly pulled his pistol from its holster.

  As his hands were cuffed behind him, the lieutenant strode up, finally stopping with his face only centimeters away from Metje’s. The normal deference shown by a junior officer toward his superiors had vanished entirely.

  “I checked with my headquarters, Kommandant Metje. They informed me that you are charged with dereliction of duty and desertion!

  Those charges have been confirmed by General de Wet himself!”

  Metje tried to protest, but the younger officer’s outraged voice rode roughshod over his words.

  “Save your lies, man! It’s too late.”

  The lieutenant jerked a thumb toward the darkness.

  “Take him away.”

  With a burly soldier pulling on each arm and his hands secured behind him, Metje was led, stumbling, toward the Hippo. As he walked, he tried vainly to put his shattered mind back in some kind of order. He’d have to get his story straight for the court-martial.

  But the two soldiers led him straight past the personnel carrier and out to a small tree twenty meters away. Metje looked around, suddenly unsure of what was happening. The lieutenant and another two men were following along right behind him.

  They dragged Metje over to the tree and roughly turned him around to face the parked APC. They took the handcuffs off just long enough to pull his hands around its slender trunk, then snapped them shut again. Oh, my God .

  The lieutenant waved his men back and walked over to where Metje writhed, straining futilely against his bonds.

  “We don’t have time for the pointless formality of a court martial. In any event, I’ve received direct orders as to the disposition of your case. Sentence will be carried out immediately. “

  He turned to leave, stopped, and whirled back to face the shaking, white-faced officer. Wordlessly, he reached out and ripped the AWB pin from

  Metje’s uniform. Then he strode over to where the four soldiers stood in a group.

  Without even bothering to form them in a straight rank, the lieutenant barked, “Ready!”

  Four assault rifles snapped up, aimed directly at Metje.

  Metje looked at the leveled barrels in horror. His knees buckled and he sagged forward against the handcuffs holding him to the tree. He started sobbing.

  “Nooooo! You can’t! I am an Afrikan-” Fire! “

  Four bullets slammed into Metje’s head, chest, and abdomen. He died instantly. His nation’s death wouldn’t come so easily.

  CHAPTER

  Commitment

  NOVEMBER 14-THE WHITE HOUSE, WASHINGTON, D.C.

  The once steaming-hot cup of coffee sitting on the President’s desk had long since grown stone cold. Now it sat off to one side, pushed aside and abandoned after a particularly abrupt hand gesture threatened to spill its contents across an important stack of telexes, reports, and maps.

  “Indeed, Prime Minister, you’re absolutely right. The situation is quite intolerable.”

  Vice President James Forrester slid his own empty cup onto the low side table by his chair and leaned forward. The President’s sudden formality was a sign that the hour-long, early-mo ming conversation with Britain’s prime minister was drawing to a close. Until now, everything had been on a strictly first-name basis.

  “Exactly. My people will be meeting within the hour,” The President arched an eyebrow at Forrester, looking for confirmation.

  He nodded back. Most of the NSC’s key players had al506

  ready been at their posts for more than twenty-four hour sever since the first unsettling reports of the new Cuban offensive started pouring into official Washington. And a Marine Corps helicopter was already parked out on the White House lawn, on standby to fly him across the Potomac to the

  Pentagon.

  “Yes, Prime Minister, I’ll call you the moment I have more detailed information from this end. Yes. And thank you, too. ” The President put the phone down, his expression grim.

  Forrester couldn’t control his curiosity.

  “Well?”

  The President looked up.

  “It’s a go, Jimmy. The British are in.” He seemed older somehow.

  “I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all. But I just don’t see that we have any other real choice. “

  Forrester felt his pulse accelerating. He rose from his chair.

  “In that case, Mr. President, I’ll be on my way. Hurley has his group waiting for me.”

  He glanced behind him as he left the Oval Office. The President sat still behind his desk-staring sadly at nothing in particular. Not for the first time, Forrester realized that it was a hell of a lot easier to follow orders than it was to give them.

  EMERGENCY CONFERENCE ROOM, THE PENTAGON

  At the President’s direction, the NSC’s Southern Africa Crisis Group had shifted its day-to-day operations over
to the Pentagon. The basement

  Emergency Conference Room there was larger, had better communications facilities, and allowed faster access to the latest intelligence data from the region.

  Almost as important, the Pentagon had more parking and entrances and exits than the White House. And that, in turn, made it easier to hold a serious meeting without creating a three-ring media circus. The print and

  TV reporters who prowled through the White House looking for fast-breaking news had limousine-counting down to a science.

  Besides, the Conference Room looked a lot more like a

  hightech command center than did the rather dingy White House Situation

  Room. A bank of six-foot-high computer display screens, most of them blank at the moment, lined one whole wall, three across and two rows high. The length of a T-shaped table accommodated Crisis Group staffers and aides, while members of the Crisis Group sat across one end. A microphone stood in front of every seat at the table. Podiums, with as much audiovisual equipment as a small high school, allowed the entire group to be briefed on developments.

  Doors led to the basement hallway outside, an adjacent communications center, a pair of small apartments with beds and washrooms, and a carefully guarded cubicle crowded with terminals linked directly to the mainframe computers at every major U.S. intelligence agency.

  The Conference Room was supposed to be filled with organized chaos.

  Instead, it was just chaos. Cuba’s attack into South Africa had caught the

  Crisis Group in mid move turning what was supposed to be a smooth transition into a frantic scramble.

  Officers and enlisted personnel from all four military services came and went in a steady stream, mixing with little knots of harried-looking civilian aides. Technicians clustered on one side of the room, trying to get the right images displayed on the room’s wall-mounted computer screens.

  Maps for southern Africa were on file, but they hadn’t yet been converted to the Pentagon’s new computer format.

  More enlisted men staggered in, carrying scaled boxes of highly sensitive intelligence reports. An extremely tense Air Force captain stood in the doorway to the tiny intel cubicle, checking off each report’s title and serial number. Under normal circumstances, he would have counted every page of every report to make sure that none were missing-but circumstances were clearly not normal.

  A low whistle broke across all the activity. The assorted technicians, officers, and enlisted men scattered through the chamber turned to see a short, bowlegged Army sergeant major waving them out.

  “Meeting’s on, gents.

  Secure the room.

  In the sudden exodus, pen flashlights, tech manuals, tools, and reams of paper were all left lying in place. They’d be needed again once the politicos and higher brass were done jawing at each other.

  Flanked by his military aide and civilian chief of staff, Forrester entered at a fast walk-his hair still windblown after a wild, rain-drenched helicopter landing outside the Pentagon. Shrugging off his wet overcoat, he moved to the spot marked for him at the conference table. He nodded once to red-eyed Edward Hurley, plainly weary after a long, sleepless night spent monitoring developments, and took his seat.

  All conversation around the T-shaped table died away.

  Forrester glanced to either side, unsurprised to see that the Crisis

  Group’s membership had expanded overnight to include the Joint Chiefs, the CIA director, the secretaries of defense, treasury, and commerce, and a small army of high ranking assistants. So much for the original idea of a small, manageable group. Washington’s political and military leaders were drawn to international crises like moths to a flame.

  He rapped once on the table.

  “I’ll make this short and sweet. I met with the President this morning.”

  Everyone at the table opened notebooks and grabbed pens. Guidance from the Man would make their task a lot clearer. Not easier-jUSt. clearer.

  Forrester paused briefly before plowing straight ahead.

  “The President has decided to authorize direct American intervention in southern Africa.

  Direct military intervention. “

  He raised his voice, overriding the surprised murmuring coming from around the table.

  “We have three objectives: One, bouncing Vorster and his goons out of power. Two, preventing Cuba from gaining control over

  South Africa’s strategic minerals. Third, and most important, securing world access to those resources by restoring some kind of civil order over there.” He glanced at the wall clock showing local time It was already ten forty-five A.M.

  “The President’s scheduled a full cabinet meeting for seven o’clock tonight. He wants our recommendations and preliminary plans by then.”

  :,

  “Good God. Christopher Nicholson broke the stunned

  silence. The CIA director had been fiddling uneasily with the cap of one of his pens, pulling it off and pushing it back on.

  “Mr. Vice President, we are still gathering information on the invasion, on Cuban intentions and capabilities. We don’t know how many troops are involved, we don’t know where they are located. We can’t possibly act without a better idea-“

  “I’m sorry, Chris, but we can’t wait for you to produce some glossy intelligence product.” Forrester’s tone combined urgency and impatience.

  “We just don’t have time to dot every i and cross every t. Hell, you’ve all seen the financial news this morning.”

  Most of the men and women around the table nodded grimly. The world financial markets were in an uproar. Prices for South African-produced minerals were skyrocketing. Gold alone was trading at more than a thousand dollars an ounce. The New York, Tokyo, London, and other stock markets were all in sustained free-fall. Several governments had shut down their exchanges in a frantic effort to slow the collapse.

  Commentators and self-proclaimed economic experts were openly predicting a new world recession. Others were using the word depression.

  Forrester looked down the row of stunned faces.

  “We simply don’t have any choice, folks. The President wants a solid plan he can present to the nation by this time tomorrow morning. Not a ‘spin’ and not a ‘slant.”

  “

  He nodded toward the one lit display screen-a map showing the known war zones in Namibia and South Africa.

  “The world’s too small a place for this kind of crap.”

  More nods. This wasn’t America’s first reminder that the nominal end of the Cold War hadn’t automatically ushered in a millennial age of peace and prosperity.

  Forrester turned toward the Air Force general sitting to his left.

  “Walt, the President has one key question he needs answered right away. Can the

  Cubans win if we don’t intervene?”

  The chairman of the Joint Chiefs didn’t hesitate.

  “Yes.”

  The civilians around the table were openly surprised by Hickman’s blunt answer. Senior military officials, like their civilian counterparts, tended to be more comfortable with carefully hedged assessments.

  Nicholson spoke up first.

  “How can you be so sure, General? My analysts estimate that the total Cuban attack force is still smaller than the whole South African army. They’re outnumbered by at least two to one. How can Castro hope to beat those kind of odds?”

  Hickman shook his head impatiently.

  “The overall numbers don’t matter worth a damn, Director. What counts is combat power on the front line.

  And right now the front lines are in South Africa itself-not Namibia.

  Cuba’s probably got a ten-to-one force ratio there.”

  He left the conference table and moved to the display screen.

  “Look here.

  Half of Vorster’s reliable troops are dangling out here in Namibia-more than a thousand miles away from the real action. Most of the rest are scattered around in penny packets, chasing down
black guerrillas and rebel commandos.” He faced Forrester directly.

  “So the question is, can

  Pretoria shift its heavy armor and infantry units out of Namibia fast enough?”

  Hickman shook his head again, answering his own question.

  “I doubt it.”

  He traced a sparse network of red and black lines shown on the flickering display map.

  “South Africa’s road and rail net is just too limited. Plus,

  Cuban MiGs have achieved almost total air superiority. They can pound the hell out of troop trains or truck convoys moving by day.”

  1, SoT I

  “So South Africa’s troops are going to arrive piecemeal -if at all.

  They’ll slow the Cubans down some, maybe even a lot, but they’re not going to stop them. Not short of Pretoria anyway. And they’ll be cut to pieces in the process.”

  Hickman stalked back to his seat in the silence that followed.

  Nicholson cleared his throat.

  “I still believe we should offer the

  President some alternative to an ill-conceived and unilateral commitment of U.S. forces.”

  Forrester stopped him there.

  “Hold on, Chris. The British have agreed to send troops as well.”

  “Are their troops going to stop every bullet the South Africans or Cubans fire, Mr. Vice President?” Nicholson shot back.

  “We’re talking about going to war against a country that has more than a hundred thousand men under arms -a country that’s already at war with Cuba and itself. This isn’t going to be a walk in the park. We’re talking about a casualty list that could run into the thousands.”

  Forrester’s eyes narrowed at the unsubtle dig, but he kept his temper under control. Beneath all his bluster, the CIA chief spoke for a sizable fraction of the cabinet, the Congress, and the American people. Nobody wanted to rush into another bloody, unwinnable quagmire like Vietnam.

  “The alternative to military action is another Great Depression-tens of millions of people out of work, hunger, riots.

  “Neither the President nor I claim to be infallible, Director. Do you see an option we’ve overlooked?”