Liberty's Hammer

by Reed Hill

  *****

  Biggs Airfield at Fort Bliss - El Paso Intelligence Center

  El Paso, Texas - July 5th, 2017 - 5:36 am

  Daníel Sifuentes looked at the ninety people bound and gagged as they sat cross-legged on the cold linoleum of the huge boiler room in basement of EPIC headquarters. The skeleton crew of the Intelligence Center was roughly evenly split between civilians and military from various branches of the armed services. The creak of the pipes and knocking of the boilers' inner workings echoed in the cavernous space, as Sifuentes paced before the hostages. "Everyone pay attention to me completely, now," Sifuentes' dry growl was very good English, with heavy South American lilt to it. "If you cooperate, you will survive this and see your families once more."

  Sifuentes suppressed a grin. It was almost comical how pitifully simple it had been to take the praised war prize that the facility represented. He had lost five or six men, mostly the common criminals and local recruits who were assisting his Red Vipers, but the firefight lasted only a few minutes. Once past the entrance, the only real weaponry they had faced, they needed merely to clear the six floors of cubicles and offices of the handful of stray heroes who came at them with pistols. Dios mio! How ridiculously under-armed these soldiers were beyond the entry points and first floor guard stations and their pathetic arms lockers. And there were so few actual riflemen as well – so many of these senoritas running around, along with men who looked like airline stewards.

  Sifuentes paused and stooped to look a female Air Force officer in the face and gripped her chin with his fingerless-gloved hand, "You do want to see your family again, do you not?" Tears streamed down the cheeks of the pretty, young officer, and she nodded briskly, closing her eyes as Sifuentes leaned closer. This one reminded him of his beautiful Helena back in Chihuahua, with the somber green-flecked brown eyes flecks and high cheek bones. "That's what I wanted to hear," Sifuentes tried to wipe away a tear and stroked her short brown hair. "That's best for all of us." With closed eyes, he drank in her floral perfume, and rose to his feet, pawing at his thick mustache, pondering.

  It was a shame Sifuentes had needed to make a sacrifice in order to gain cooperation, but this was one of the unfortunate realities of war. Not an hour before, in the main monitoring center, their leader, a short Marine Colonel, had stuck out his clean-shaven jaw and stoically intoned, "We won't negotiate with you. You can do what you will, but we will not be assisting you or discussing anything about this facility with you." Sifuentes had asked God to forgive him when he signaled to Jose to put a bullet between the man's eyes. The marine seemed an honorable soldier, committed to serving his country, but Sifuentes wasn't there to negotiate. Sifuentes was equally committed and he had a cause that desperately needed him to succeed.

  He was honored that the Dons had asked him to lead the Red Vipers to the belly of the bestia del norte, the northern beast, for a strike at its soft, exposed underside. For many years, generations of his ancestors had been crying out to him from the ground, for Sifuentes to propel the movement forward. He could feel it in his bones – the cause was just and he was going to avenge them.

  A knock on the gray, steel door halted Sifuentes admiration of the young officer, and he rose and nodded to one of the dozen soldiers with the maroon and black striped fatigues behind. Another of his Red Viper Guard appeared in the doorway and signaled to Sifuentes to come over. "Jefe, we got word from the artillery battery. They have one of the big ones up and running now," the young commando whispered. "The ones that shoot down the airplanes and helicopters."

  "Excellent," Sifuentes replied in a low tone, "have the engineer come see me here personally as soon as possible."

  He dismissed the Red Viper trooper and stepped forward, closing the door behind him, "Now, ladies and gentlemen. I want you to know it is not necessary for there to be any further unpleasantness."

  There were a number of retorts and curses stifled by ducked-tape gags, but Sifuentes continued with a casually raised hand, "I know you may find this hard to believe, but I may find it in my heart to release you." He stopped and looked into the faces of several of the men and women, lingering awkwardly long. "I'd like nothing more than to make this possible, but it depends entirely on your total cooperation."

  Sifuentes glanced back at the pretty young officer. She was still crying. The young airman in the pressed light blue shirt next to her tried to keep a brave face, but was having trouble. That's the problem with the United States. The men had grown soft and acted like women, and the women had traded their femininity for the rewards of the man's world. Look at the result. It was evil. It was not the white hot evil of the crazed Aryans of Europe in the 1930s to be sure, but it was evil nonetheless. It was the banal evil of a culture rotting from beneath, a society with no root. America had become a craven, thoughtless cesspool of arrogance and myopia. It wasn't a demonic or monstrous regime that had been put upon them by dictators; rather, it was the cruel treachery of fabricated prosperity and false hope marketed to them as consumers. They enjoyed the tasty delights of moral confusion and cultural insanity that now choked their obese gullets. They had reaped the whirlwind, and most seemed to not notice.

  Sifuentes stopped and bent down to caress the dark hair of the female officer once more. He dark eyes were full of fear and what looked like a plea for mercy. "Do not worry, my dear," his voice was sweet like a lover. "Cooperate and no harm with come to you. You believe that do you not?"

  After a small pause, the young woman nodded her head profusely as she sobbed beneath her gag.

  "Good," Sifuentes stroked her hair and rose again to his feet. "Very good."

  *****

  Governor's Residence

  Austin, Texas - July 5th, 2017 - 5:42 a.m.

  The desk phone in the War Room buzzed, bringing in General Dinger and General Stein for another conference call.

  "We have just gotten our hands on new reports coming out of Fort Bliss, sir," General Stein said. "It's not all bad news, Governor."

  "Go ahead," Chase said dryly.

  "One of the fueling stations at Biggs Airfield exploded – cause unknown," said General Dinger. "And we have discovered that EPIC, the El Paso Intelligence Center at Airfield HQ was taken by the attackers after a short fire fight. EPIC is FORSCOM's eyes and ears for the whole southwest," said Dinger.

  The El Paso Intelligence Center had been created in the 1970s in response to the conclusion that better intelligence was needed for a secure border. The key recommendation of a two-year study suggested the establishment of a southwest border intelligence center to be led by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and staffed by representatives of that agency, as well as the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The focus of the Center was to assist in the identification of drug traffickers and alien traffickers along the U.S.-Mexico border. "EPIC is staffed with over 200 personnel and liaison officers from 15 agencies, including Texas Border guard."

  "Our Ranger Command station for Company E is run out of there," Ted White said. "I imagine once they got inside the buildings, it wasn't much of a fight."

  "Why?" said Lopez.

  "All of the main bases and facilities have been gun-free zones since 2008," Dinger said.

  "Jesus Christ, you're kidding me?" said. Lopez

  "And with EPIC out, JTF North is down," said General Stein. "That's the Joint Task Force for North America – the multi-service operation by the U.S. Department of Defense for anti-drug and counter-terrorism operations."

  "Well, the good news on the Fort Bliss situation is that most of the anti-missile defense systems and accompanying units were transferred to Fort Sill last year," General Stein said. "The USAADCEN, the Air Defense Artillery Center, which trained U.S. and NATO troops for seventy years, had been moved to Fort Sill in Oklahoma during the latest round of base closures. There had been over a hundred batteries of missile systems active there a few years ago, but most are now up at Sill." No one wanted to acknowledge the gravity of the missile defense
systems being captured.

  "What do you mean most?" Doyle asked.

  "About twenty percent of the inventory remained behind, for training purposes," General Stein said. "The unit is responsible for the MIM-104s, sir."

  "Well, what are those?" Chase said.

  "Patriot Missiles, sir – it's our top of the line mobile surface-to-air system. Twenty-four of them, with at least eight being the Foxtrot model which has anti-ballistic missile capability."

  "Bad guys then swept through the base proper killing and rounding up personnel as they went. Fire fights ensued, but the majority of the reservist soldiers who were there were in their racks or off-duty with their families. There are twelve hundred families on post, sir. The post commander, his wife and kids are still missing as is the Director of EPIC. He's a retired four-star General, Jim McMullen. We have to assume that they hold the Patriot missile facilities as well as EPIC HQ."

  "Jesus God in heaven…" Chase mumbled as he placed his hand over his mouth.

  "A small remnant of survivors from the MP Regiment and pieces and parts of 2nd Brigade was able to regroup and evade to the north at the artillery range HQ, but the insurgents captured or control probably close to a hundred Humvees and supply trucks. They disabled over half of the artillery and tank battalion assets – we're not exactly sure how at this point – and they control the remainder. We think seven or eight AH-64 Apache combat helicopters at Biggs Field were destroyed or disabled, leaving as many as a dozen in their control." Gen. Dinger said. "We have the main artillery battery at the ADA – Air Defense Artillery school – which is at the Bliss range."

  General Stein continued, "I've placed a call to the Air Forces Northern National Security Emergency Preparedness Directorate at the Air Force North, Tyndall Air Force Base and spoke to the duty officer there. N-S-E-P coordinates and partners with DEA, DHS and FBI to conduct Homeland Defense and Civil Support operations. They are Florida's equivalent facility and task force."

  "Somebody cut to chase for me. Just what is actually getting done here?" the Governor said sternly.

  "Honestly sir, the U.S. military does unbelievably well when it…has…the time to prepare and plan properly. Think of it as a very big ship sir. It turns very slowly," Stein said. "The information I've gathered based on 911 calls, Border Security hotlines and police reports indicate hundreds of armed thugs, Mexicans and Chicanos primarily. There was a serious firefight at McAllen police HQ, but we lost it at 0355 hours. It went up in flames when it was attacked by an APC with a fortified gunner, supported by several fire-teams."

  "Honestly, sir the best images we have were captured by a News helicopter about an hour ago," General Dinger interjected. "Our drone images indicate they engaged HQ with, most likely Russian or German medium class armed troop transport, like what was used up at Ft. Bliss, and they had U.S. markings. We're trying to get better information on that sir, but–"

  Chase cut him off, "The make and models don't concern me right now. I want to know who controls what and what have we got to defend these cities."

  "General Dinger and I have been coordinating with the U.S. Army, but they have been…well… less than cooperative to this point," Stein said. "Not entirely sure but they may be trying to get a handle on things themselves."

  "That's insane. What the hell does that mean?" Chase furrowed his brow, looking directly at Ted White. It was very rare to see Chase lose his composure, but the stress was mounting and it was leaking out of his normally stern demeanor.

  "I asked for some air support from the duty officer up at Ft. Hood and they are running the request up the chain. They have Apache helos, and of course the whole 1st Cavalry Division, 3rd Corps is there." General Stein intoned coolly. "They are deployed in Iraq presently, but they maintain one Brigade command stateside at all times, and have a minimum of four Apaches, four Kiowas and six Blackhawks in 4th Battalion."

  "What's the problem? Why aren't they responding?" Lopez asked.

  "There are at least two primary issues, sir and probably a third," General Stein said. "First, there is the matter of Command Authority. Ft. Hood reports into 5th Army and USNORTHCOM. Tasking for the Army is run out of Ft. Bliss, and Ft. Bliss is…as you know…um…out of commission. I don't think that NORTHCOM has its act together right now. It's the 'big ship' problem, in essence."

  "The second issue is getting the federal agencies with command authority, response capabilities and the ones that actually know about what's happening on the same page. The eyes and ears need to talk to the hands and feet to get something done, and as you can guess the hands and feet don't move until the eyes and ears tell them what to do."

  "And then there's the third problem, that I hope would be just my paranoia and not an actual issue," General Stein said.

  "Politics…" said Chase.

  "Indeed, sir." General Stein said. "One contact wondered aloud to me, if I should even be talking to you, Governor."

  "I wouldn't say we're exactly high on the list of this federal government's closest friends," Lopez said. The truth of that hung in the air and the room was largely silent as Chase paced for a moment.

  "And sir, that's not all," Ted White broke the quiet.

  "What else?" asked Doyle.

  "I have unverified reports from the past half hour from troopers in Laredo and Del Rio that Border guards on routine patrols encountered heavy resistance and had to retreat." White said.

  Chase just stood there, staring contemplation across the room apparently studying a large painting of a lion attacking a horse while he thought. It was a reproduction – a good one at that – of a famous painting, but Doyle couldn't recall the artist. Strange that Doyle had never noticed that painting until just that moment, and he had been in the residence a dozen times in the past year, and practically for 36 hours straight.

  "One thing I know about predators and their prey…" Chase said as he turned his back on the table.

  "It's better to be the predator…" Doyle mused somberly. Lopez glowered at him and a wave a heat passed up to Doyle's collar. He sometimes drew the ire of his boss, but he liked to just tell things the way he saw them. Lopez had chided him that he needed to manage that more closely, if he wanted to make it in politics.

  "That's correct, Mr. Doyle," the Governor said turning to face Doyle. "A man once said: 'On whom does the cheetah prey? The old, the sick, the wounded, the weak, the very young, but never the strong.'" The Governor looked at Doyle, "The Lesson: If you would not be prey, you had better be strong."

  "That's wisdom," Doyle said. "Who said it?"

  "Confucius?" Lopez guessed.

  Chase shook his head, "G. Gordon Liddy. And this is most certainly a time for strength gentleman," Chase said.

  *****

  Fox Run Rod and Gun Club

  Outside of Hunt, Texas - July 5th, 2017 - 5:50 a.m.

  "We're not getting anywhere now," Brodie said. "We're just saying the same things over and over, so I'm going to suggest that we adjourn for the night."

  "Or the morning…" Mark Simmons said through a yawn.

  "Yeah, I know I'm pretty beat," Kirk Thompson sighed. "Some of these bobcats and mountain lions on the walls are starting to scare me."

  They had been confined in the Chapel for the past hour, trying to hash out a plan on what to do about all the turmoil. The formal meeting room of the club, the Chapel was a large oak-paneled room off the back of the main clubhouse and was part library for all things outdoors and part exhibition hall. The walls were lined with framed maps, newspaper pages and displayed enough taxidermy of West Texas game to fool most kids into thinking it was a small petting zoo. They were only missing a handful of the club's regulars, and this meeting represented the most members the Chapel had entertained in probably five years. Most of the club avoided club business and just preferred to shoot, drink and hang out.

  They had sat around the huge, oak conference table and were on a merry-go-round over even how to define the riots. One side – including Kirk Thompson, Ma
rk Simmons, Charlie Duggan and Dennis Evans – thought this might be associated with a larger strain of the system, and could be the first in a series of dominoes leading to some kind of "doomsday" scenario where everyone needs to head for the hills. The other side, those with more military background – including John Finnegan, his buddy Frank Martin, Mac Harris, Glen Tucker and Joe Calderon, joined oddly by Ben Murkowsi – generally thought that this wasn't as grave a situation as those guys said and the military would be able to control it, probably within 48 hours or so. No real need to panic. Just lock the doors, keep an eye on the TV for news, and let this all blow over.

  Although he generally didn't feel like he knew enough yet to take a strong position, Brodie's gut told him that the military could handle this. Mac Harris voiced this sentiment as he summarized his thoughts, "I don't know guys. Don't you think the Army has the capability to deal with something local like this?" Harris was a rather small black man in his mid-fifties, about a head shorter than Finnegan, with rocks for biceps and calves. Originally from Houston, Harris still ran thirty miles a week despite his age. He had been a member of the club since Brodie was a kid, and Brodie recalled that Harris was a Blackhawk helo pilot back in the 80s and 90s. While he didn't know Mac well, he knew that he had a great reputation and was a good friend of Dennis Evans.

  "Come on Mac, this has all the earmarks of a Cartel move on Mexico del Norte, probably an Op being run by the CIA," Charlie Duggan threw his hands in the air and scratched his thick brown beard. Average height and close to fifty pounds overweight, Charlie probably could have stood to sacrifice a little Internet time in favor of some exercise. "I saw on the TV before I came over, that El Paso has been hit too. This crap has been brewing for a decade and a half, and now, it's game on." Duggan was the club's conspiracy theorist and was always talking about the black helicopters, RFID chips, GMO foods, the 'New World Order' and the police state that the U.S. was becoming.