W E B Griffin - Corp 09 - Under Fire

by Under Fire(Lit)

  "How are you, Ralph?" Ridgway said.

  "You don't know Pickering, do you?" Howe said.

  "No, I don't," Ridgway said, offering Pickering his hand. "How do you do, General?"

  "How do you do, sir?" Pickering said, and then turned to `Harriman: "Are you hungry, Averell? Did they feed you on the plane? A drink, perhaps?"

  "I could use a little taste," Harriman said.

  "General?" Pickering asked Ridgway.

  "Please," Ridgway said. "I don't know what time it is according to my body clock, but it's obviously 1700 some-where."

  "Charley," Howe ordered. "Fix drinks, please."

  "George, call downstairs and have them send up a large order of hors d'oeuvres," Pickering ordered. "We'll decide about dinner later." He turned to Huff. "Come on in, Sid," he said.

  "Excuse me, gentlemen," Ridgway said. "This is Colonel James, my aide."

  "We're trying to come up with a term to describe Charley and George," Howe said. "Charley was my first sergeant when I was commanding a company, and George-who is a captain of homicide when he's not a Marine-was with Flem all through the second war. He was with Flem on the first plane to land in Japan after the Emperor decided to sur-render."

  "With your permission, sir, I will leave now, and report to the Supreme Commander that you have been safely de-livered here."

  Ridgway made a gesture with his hand signifying he could leave.

  "You have my number, Colonel, in case you need any-thing at all. And the car will be here from 0800," Huff added, to Ridgway's aide.

  "Yes, sir. Thank you," Colonel James said.

  Huff left.

  "Sid's been Douglas's chief dog-robber forever," Picker-ing said. "No offense, Colonel."

  "None taken, sir," James said, smiling. "I'm familiar with the term."

  "Gentlemen..." Charley Rogers said, and they looked at him. He was at a sideboard loaded with whiskey bottles.

  "Scotch for me, please," Harriman said.

  "I'm a bourbon drinker," Ridgway said.

  "Colonel?" Rogers asked James, who looked at Ridg-way for guidance.

  "Jack usually drinks scotch," Ridgway said.

  "Scotch it is," Rogers said.

  "You were on the first plane, were you, Captain?" Ridg-way asked Hart.

  "Yes, sir."

  "That must have been interesting," Ridgway said.

  "The streets from the airport were lined with Japanese- soldiers, sailors, and civilians standing side by side. They bowed as the car drove us here," Hart said. "Very interest-ing."

  "I presume both you and Master Sergeant Rogers have all the security clearances required?" Ridgway asked.

  'Top Secret/White House," Howe answered for him. "And we have our own communications with the White House."

  "You understand, I had to ask," Ridgway said. "Well, that means we can get right down to business, doesn't it?"

  "Give me a moment alone with General Pickering first, please," Harriman said.

  "Certainly," Ridgway said.

  "We can use my bedroom," Pickering said, and pointed to that door.

  Harriman opened the door and went through it, and Pickering followed him.

  "I saw Patricia in the Foster Lafayette literally on my way to the airport," Harriman said. "She asked me to give you her love-and this."

  He handed a small jewelry box to Pickering, who opened it.

  The box had been designed for a ring. In it, stuck into the small slot designed to hold a ring, was a small silver object on a thin silver chain. There was also a sheet of jew-eler's tissue.

  "My God, I thought this thing was long lost," Pickering said, taking the object in his hands. "It's an Episcopal ser-viceman's cross. Patricia gave it to me when I went off to World War Two."

  "There's two more in the tissue," Harriman said. "I am under orders to tell you they are to be delivered to your son and a Captain McCoy."

  "That may prove a little difficult," Pickering said.

  "Excuse me?"

  "Captain McCoy is now somewhere behind enemy lines," McCoy said. "And my son-our son-was shot down just after noon August second."

  "Good God! My dear fellow, I didn't know!"

  "There is some hope, some faint hope, that he is still alive. He went down behind the enemy's lines near Taegu. Another Marine flew over the site shortly afterward, and reported the cockpit was empty."

  "You think he may have been captured?"

  Pickering shrugged.

  "Capture is better than the alternative," Pickering said. "The enemy has shot a lot of American prisoners-at least a thousand, almost certainly more-out of hand."

  "If he is a prisoner... will that compromise you, Pick-ering?"

  Pickering didn't reply.

  "Forgive me, I should not have asked that."

  "No, Averell, you shouldn't have asked that," Pickering said. "Thank you for bringing this to me."

  He held up the serviceman's cross, then draped it around his neck. He closed the jewelry box and slipped it into his pocket, and then he walked back into the sitting room.

  Harriman followed him a moment later.

  "It has always been my experience when faced with a difficult situation to deal with it as quickly as possible," Harriman said.

  Everyone looked at him curiously.

  "General Ridgway," Harriman said. "General Pickering has just told me his son is missing in action."

  "Oh, God!" Ridgway said. "General, I'm so sorry."

  "Thank you," Pickering said.

  "The President, in my judgment, under the circum-stances, will have to be informed," Harriman said.

  "The President knows," Howe said.

  "Indeed?" Harriman asked. "You're sure of that?"

  "I called him myself and told him," Howe said.

  "And his reaction?"

  "He asked me how General Pickering was taking it, and I told him, and he said to use my judgment whether or not to express his deep personal regret. I decided that General Pickering didn't need any more expressions of sympathy."

  "That's all?" Harriman asked.

  "What Harry said to me, Mr. Ambassador," Howe said, coldly, "was `use your judgment, Ralph. If telling him I'm really goddamn sorry will help, tell him. If not, don't.' That's practically verbatim. And that's all he had to say. Is that clear enough?"

  "Yes, of course," Harriman said. "I meant no offense."

  There was a moment's awkward silence, and then Gen-eral Ridgway said, "The ambassador and I will be meeting with General MacArthur in the morning. There are some things that I think you should know, and may not, and there are some things I know you know that we don't know, and should, before that meeting. May I suggest we get on with this?"

  There was a knock at the door. Hart opened it, and a waiter rolled in a cart on which an enormous display of hors d'oeuvres was arranged.

  "Is this place secure?" Ridgway asked.

  "Charley found some microphones," Howe said. "They may have been Japanese leftovers, or not. Anyway, both Charley and Sergeant Keller, our cryptographer, have gone over it-and keep going over it, and Charley's and my suite-and as far as we know, it's secure."

  " `Or not'?" Ridgway quoted.

  "I don't think the KGB has bugged this place, General," Howe said. "And I also don't think the KGB would be the only people interested in what might be said in this room."

  "You don't have a safe house, Fleming?" Harriman asked.

  "There doesn't seem to be any way to say this deli-cately," Pickering said. "So: The station chief here thinks of himself as a member of MacArthur's staff. I think any-thing said in the CIA safe house would be in the Dai Ichi Building within an hour."

  "And there's no other place?"

  "Ernie McCoy-Ernie Sage McCoy-has a place here," Pickering said. "Ralph and I have been using that."

  "That's Ernest's daughter, right? She's married to a Ma-rine?"

  Pickering nodded.

  "And she's cleared for Top Secret/White House," Howe said. "I cleare
d her."

  "And we could go there?" Harriman asked.

  "George, call Ernie and tell her to expect guests," Pick-ering ordered. "And tell her not to worry about hors d'oeu-vres. We'll be bringing our own."

  "They'll know we went there, Flem," Howe said.

  "Perhaps the ambassador can casually mention he went to see the daughter of an old friend when he's with MacArthur," Pickering said.

  [FOUR]

  NO. 7 SAKU-TUN DENENCHOFU,

  TOKYO, JAPAN

  1905 6 AUGUST 1950

  "I thought it might be you, Mr. Ambassador," Ernie Sage McCoy said when they walked up to her door. "It's nice to see you again, sir."

  "Forgive the intrusion, Ernestine," Harriman said. "But we needed someplace to talk, and General Pickering sug-gested your home."

  "There's coffee in the dining room, and I understand you've brought hors d'oeuvres?"

  "George is getting them out of the trunk," Pickering said.

  "... and I sent the help out. And now I'll get out of your way."

  "You're very gracious, Ernestine," Harriman said.

  "My name is Ridgway, Mrs. McCoy," Ridgway said. "Thank you for letting us intrude."

  "No intrusion at all," she said. "My husband is-what should I say, `Out of town on business'?-and it's good to have something to do."

  She led them into the dining room, then left them alone. Hart and Rogers carried in the hors d'oeuvres, and looked at Pickering and Howe for directions.

  "Go keep Ernie company, George," Pickering ordered.

  `Take some of the hors d'oeuvres with you, Charley," Howe ordered.

  When they had left, Harriman picked up a shrimp, took a bite, and then said: "That's what the President was wor-ried about-that you two would get along too well, and that therefore it might be best to talk to you separately. He said you were two of a kind."

  "We haven't had anything to disagree about," Howe said. "We see the same things-from our different perspec-tives-the same way. But we can make ourselves available to be interrogated separately, can't we, Flem?"

  "Interrogation is not the word, General," Harriman said.

  "That's what it sounded like you had in mind on the tele-phone," Howe said, bluntly.

  "From my perspective," Ridgway said, quickly, as if to keep the exchange from getting more unpleasant, "given that both General Howe and General Pickering enjoy the confidence of the President, we could save a lot of time by just sitting down at the table and talking this out together."

  "That's fine with me," Harriman said, sat down, and reached across the table for another shrimp.

  The others sat down.

  `This place is secure?" Ridgway asked.

  "More so than the Imperial," Howe said.

  "I defer to you, Mr. Ambassador," Ridgway said.

  Harriman nodded, and touched his lips with a napkin.

  "Marvelous shrimp," he said, and then went on, seri-ously: "The President is concerned-as something of an understatement-about several recent actions of General MacArthur. Let's deal with his trip to Formosa first. Two questions in that regard. One, does General MacArthur un-derstand that the President does not wish to have the Na-tionalist Chinese involved in Korea? Two, what was he doing in Formosa? General Howe?"

  "I'll defer to General Pickering," Howe said. "MacArthur has not discussed that with me."

  "And he has with you, Fleming?"

  "I was at the Residence," Pickering replied. "General and Mrs. MacArthur had heard about my son, and wished to express their concern. The subject came up. He under-stands how the President feels about using Nationalist troops, and didn't want them in the first place because they would have to be trained and equipped. He went to Taipei, he told me, as a symbol that the United States would not

  stand idly by if the Communists used the mess in Korea as an invitation to invade the island."

  "And you believe him?"

  "Yes, I do," Pickering said.

  "And you think, when I broach the subject to him, that's what he will say?"

  "I'm sure he will."

  "When the President heard that General MacArthur had gone to see Chiang Kai-shek," Harriman said, "he was fu-rious. Several members of his cabinet, and others, made it clear that, in their opinions, it was sufficient justification to relieve General MacArthur."

  Neither Pickering nor Howe responded.

  "The question of relieving General MacArthur came up again with regard to his message to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the VFW," Harriman said. "You're familiar with that?"

  Pickering shook his head, no, and looked at Howe, who shrugged his shoulders, indicating he had no idea what Harriman was talking about.

  "Neither of you is familiar with the message?" Harri-man asked.

  "No," Pickering said. "What was in the message?"

  "A disinterested observer would think that General MacArthur was not in agreement with the foreign policy of the United States," Harriman said, sarcastically. "A cynic might interpret it to be the first plank in the platform of presidential candidate Douglas MacArthur."

  "There was nothing about a VFW message in the Stars & Stripes," Howe said.

  "The message was `withdrawn' at the President's order,"

  Harriman said.

  "Then what's the reason for the pressure on the Presi-dent to relieve him?" Howe asked.

  "There are those, I surmise," Harriman said, "who do not share General MacArthur's opinion of himself."

  "You know what Frank Lloyd Wright said, Averell," Pickering said. "Something about it being rather difficult to be humble if you're a genius."

  "But Wright is a genius," Harriman said.

  "So is MacArthur," Pickering said. "He's flawed, cer-tainly. We all are. But he's a military genius, and that should not be forgotten."

  "There are those who blame him for this mess we find ourselves in, in Korea," Harriman said.

  "How about Acheson's speech?" Pickering said. "I took the trouble to read it. He made it pretty clear-maybe by accident-that Korea was not in our zone of interest. It was almost an invitation for North Korea to move south."

  "MacArthur has been in command of any army here that is-as has been demonstrated-incapable of fighting a war," Harriman argued.

  "I've talked to a lot of officers here since I got here," Pickering said. "They place the blame on Louis Johnson. Johnson's `defensive economies' went far beyond elimi-nating fat-they cut to the bone and scraped it. The First Marine Division was at half-half, Averell, half-wartime strength. And there's been almost no money for the Army. When there's no money, there's no training, and without training, armies cannot prepare to fight."

  "By inference-Louis Johnson serves as Secretary of Defense at the President's pleasure-you're saying the of-ficers you spoke with, and perhaps you yourself, place the blame for this mess on the President."

  "The last time I was in the Oval Office," Howe said, "there was a sign on Harry's desk that read `The Buck Stops Here.'"

  " `Harry's desk', General?" Harriman asked. "General, you're referring to the President of the United States."

  Howe looked uncomfortable.

  Pickering laughed. Everybody looked at him in surprise.

  "I just figured out what you're doing, Harriman," he said. "I'm an amateur playing your game. It took me a lit-tle while."

  "I have no idea what you're talking about, General," Harriman said smoothly.

  "You're collecting damaging quotes from me-and from Ralph-that you can use as aces in the hole with Harry Truman if we don't go along with what you have al-ready decided he should hear." "Now see here, Pickering..."

  "Let me save some time for you," Pickering said. "I think Douglas MacArthur is a military genius; I've seen him at work. He's a soldier who fully understands how to obey an order, especially one that comes from the Commander-in-Chief. He thinks an invasion at Inchon is the best-and probably the only-way to avoid a very bloody and lengthy battle back up the Korean peninsula. I agree with him. If there are those who d
on't agree with him, in my opinion, they're wrong.

  "What the President is going to have to do is decide who is best qualified to run this war: MacArthur, or someone half a world away in the Pentagon. That's obviously his right. But until he decides the brass in the Pentagon is right and MacArthur is wrong, what he should do is get out of the way-and keep his people out of the way-of MacArthur, and let him fight this war. Relieving him, or sending Pentagon brass here to look over his shoulder, nit-picking his plans, would be almost criminally stupid." Harriman's face tightened.