Freedom's Sons

by H. A. Covington

  “That’s nice for the drunks and the stoners, but what about heavy industry?” asked Morehouse.

  “That’s the merely good news. We’re in better shape than we thought possible a few months ago,” Bresler told them. “There used to be a fair amount of industry in the Northwest before globalization set in, and America as a whole stopped manufacturing and shipped all the jobs out to China and Guatemala. In many cases, nobody wanted the factories to convert to yuppie condos or boutiques, and so the plants were just mothballed and forgotten about. My department has so far identified over a thousand manufacturing facilities which, in our opinion, could be re-commissioned and put back into production, either with their original products or else re-tooled for other stuff. Everything from shoes and electronic circuit boards to automotive engines and chemicals. These were mostly small plants, true, but then we’re not trying to break into world markets or supply the entire North American continent with widgets or whatever, just keep the Northwest Republic going in a completely self-contained economy.”

  “Do we have any steel production at all?” asked Morehouse.

  “Well, yeah, we’re producing our own steel now, just not exactly making it,” explained Bresler.

  “Say again?” asked Morgan.

  “Recycling. There are now smelting and re-fabrication mills going in Idaho Falls, Spokane, Bellingham, several in Seattle and Portland, and one in The Dalles. We have thousands of Labor Service people digging through old American landfills, junk yards, auto graveyards, so forth and so on and salvaging everything metal from tin and aluminum cans to junked Gremlins and Priuses. We’re shipping it to these plants I mentioned, where they are melting it all down and re-fabricating it into steel and iron pipe, steel and iron construction rebar, or making simple ingots of tin and aluminum and lengths of steel bar for whenever we can get a proper production system set up. More good news is that this source will last us for years. The number of old and new landfills in the Northwest and the riches that can be harvested from them seems to be damned near limitless. Until you look at what they throw away, you can’t begin to understand what a fantastically wasteful society the United States of America is. Was, I should say. I tell you that properly extracted and utilized, we have a supply of raw industrial metal in those dumps that will last us ten years. We’re also working on a plant in Puyallup to melt down and reprocess plastic, and once that gets up and running, our supply of raw material from the landfills will be virtually bottomless. We will be able to manufacture all our plastic needs, especially when we eliminate plastic beverage receptacles and go back to the old system of glass deposit bottles, for everything from ginger ale and beer to cooking oil and Worcestershire sauce.”

  “And now for the bad news you mentioned?” asked Barrow.

  “Paul’s department,” said Bresler. “Energy. The energy problem is crucial for industrial reconstruction as well as every damned thing else. Our coal-burning power stations are running way low, and we have lost all our nuclear capacity. That’s the one thing the Americans did efficiently after Longview. Apparently, they already had protocols in place for removing the fuel rods and scuttling the reactors on all our nuclear power plants, draining the heavy water and the cooling towers, so forth and so on. It makes you wonder how long they knew that Northwest independence was coming.”

  “Paul?” asked Morehouse.

  “He’s right,” spoke up Dr. Paul Hassling. “The fuel rods have been completely removed from Hanford and from the Columbia River reactors. Prescot in Oregon, the Idaho Falls light water reactor and the Idaho National Engineering Laboratory reactor, the Medford plant, all of them are now shut down. Those plants are useless until we can convert them to coal or methane, and that’s going to be a five-star bitch, technically and financially. I gave Ray here some estimates a while back, and I thought he was going to have a coronary.”

  “It can be done, Red,” Ridgeway told them glumly, “But it’s going to put a major hole in our inheritance that I really wish we could spend elsewhere, especially on military uses.”

  “What are we doing about it?” asked Morehouse.

  “Transferring as much of the grid as we can to coal and diesel generating stations, but we’re dangerously overloaded,” replied Hassling. “I’m busting our butts trying to up the capacity on water-power turbines along the Columbia, and we’re trying to get those silly windmill things down on the coast working again, but that’s not much good in the short term. Seattle and Portland and Spokane are still experiencing rolling brownouts. I have been assigned over twenty-thousand Labor Service personnel to obtain alternative fuel sources for electrical power generation, which is a fancy way of saying find anything that will burn instead of coal or diesel fuel, but it’s all makeshift. It’s crude and clumsy as hell, and we can’t keep it up for too long. We’re paying private lumber crews for wood, of course, but we’re also going through former ghetto and non-white housing areas in Portland and Seattle and other urban areas where the cockroaches used to nest. We’re tearing down any housing units that appear to have been rendered hopelessly beyond repair or renovation, which is most everything that niggers or beaners lived in, and we’re reducing all the wood to burnable chunks with trash compactors and chain saws. Then we ship it out by rail or truck to the power plants. Thankfully, most Northwest generating plants have rail connections we’ve been able to repair and refurbish, because they were built back in the days before Amurrica destroyed her railroads at the behest of the Mob-ruled Teamsters Union and the big oil companies. We can keep the coal-fired stations going for a while by burning nigger shacks, and also by burning hundreds of thousands of Jew and liberal books and magazines the Culture Ministry is cleaning out of the libraries and bookstores, plus the accumulated paper records and computer printouts of state and federal government for the past hundred years that we keep finding by the warehouse-full. But the diesel-powered stations are another matter. I have to tell you, gentlemen…”

  “And lady,” broke in Fiona Bonnar.

  “And lady,” Hassling went on with a bow, “I have to tell you that we now have only a week’s supply of diesel fuel left in the entire Republic, almost all of which has to go to the power stations. There are certain substitutes we can use, and I’ve already got some diesel stations running on everything from kerosene to cooking oil, but we still need the real stuff, a lot of it. The trucks that still transport almost all of our goods are falling idle. Gasoline is almost as badly in short supply. It’s true that diesel engines can run on other fuels, but even raiding all the Republic’s greasy spoons isn’t going to supply enough to replace the real McCoy.”

  “Alternative sources?” asked Morehouse. “I mean besides draining the cafeteria’s French fry cooker?”

  “Dr. Joseph Cord’s new Northwest Institute of Technology on the University of Washington campus is working full speed on developing a protocol for converting diesel generators to methane and alcohol, as well as various forms of substitute diesel fuel, anything that might work. Last week three small fuel alcohol plants went into production in Tacoma, McMinnville, and Spokane. The two on the coast are processing corn, and the one in Spokane uses potatoes. The same hog farms that Force 101 is using for refuse disposal are collecting the guano and beginning methane production in a small way, but none of these solutions are going to come on line within the next week. The energy problem has to be addressed now. Somehow we must get fuel imports from the United States and Canada resumed, or else in a month’s time we really will be driving horses and buggies and working by candlelight.”

  Morehouse looked at his watch, “That is the subject of our conference call, and it’s time,” he said. He leaned over to Barrow. “Frank, are Colonel Randall and his team in place?” he asked in a low voice.

  “That’s affirmative. I just got the text a few minutes ago,” said Barrow. “He has been briefed on the nature and purpose of his mission, but bear in mind he’s going to have to play it by ear as to deciding when and how to proceed.”
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  Morehouse touched a button under the table, and the curtains at one end of the room opened to reveal a huge plasma screen connected to a satellite uplink. A little light popped on in the upper right-hand corner, and digital lettering appeared on the screen. It read 60 seconds to conference. 59 seconds to conference, 58 seconds . . . . Morehouse chuckled. “I understand that the last time this system was used was when Chelsea Clinton informed the assembled state government of Washington that the United States of America now considered them to be expendable, and that Jerry Reb was coming for them.”

  “I woulda loved to’ve been a fly on the wall at that bit of must-see TV,” laughed John Corbett Morgan.

  “It got pretty hysterical,” said Morehouse reminiscently. “The speaker of the state Senate shot himself in the chair you’re sitting in, James. We found blood splatters and a bullet hole on the wall behind you.” The screen suddenly split into six squares, each one showing the face of a man in a business suit sitting behind a desk. The split screen was reproduced on two smaller monitors in the center of the ministerial conference table, and below each face was a name and title. The cabinet had been briefed in detail on each of these men and what his particular problem was with the Northwest Republic.

  Aaron Levy, CEO, Foodway Stores in Albany, New York, was a plump-faced Jew whose quivering jowls and bulging eyes indicated he was in a high state of agitation as he stared at the mortal enemies of his race.

  Sir Reginald Shaw, Chairman, Anglo-Standard Petroleum, appearing from London, was merely a toffee-nosed British git who found the whole racism thing uncouth—(“not the done thing, don’t y’know?”) and who considered the Northwesters to be bad hats and bad credit risks. (“Terrorists, rum lot of chaps, don’t y’know? Can’t do business with ’em, of course.”)

  Malcolm Dale Henderson, Chairman, United Parcel Express, headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana, was a blank-faced multi-millionaire about 60 years of age, who was married to a former Miss Mexico as his third trophy wife and whose white son by his first marriage had been a Marine Corps captain who was killed in the battle of Portland.

  William Robert “Billy Bob” Wiggins, Chairman, Associated American Petroleum Products, was a billionaire from Houston and a rabid Christian Zionist who sported a white ten-gallon hat even on video conference calls like this one. They could see the small stand on his desk bearing miniature flags of the U.S.A., the Lone Star state flag of Texas, and Israel.

  Michael Perlman, CEO, Continental Foods out of Los Angeles, was a small Jewish man with frizzy, black, almost negroid hair, liver lips and a nose that looked like a deformed mushroom. His eyes were literally rolling behind the thick lenses of his spectacles.

  Oliver Lodge, President of North American Consolidated Industries and also President of the American Business Association, was sitting in from Haverhill, Massachusetts. He was a quiet and expensively dressed man of about 50 who had been an American delegate to the Longview peace conference.

  “Good afternoon, gentlemen,” said Morehouse. “I am Henry Morehouse, Vice President of the Northwest American Republic and Speaker of the Northwest Constitutional Convention. These comrades assembled here with me are the Council of Ministers of the Northwest Republic, what most countries refer to as the cabinet. I won’t introduce them all individually, although you may know some of them from the news media. I know Mr. Lodge recognizes General Barrow and General Morgan from Longview.”

  “I do indeed remember General Barrow from many lengthy sessions,” said Lodge. “I also recognize my former colleague Mr. Stanhope, who regretfully turned out to be a traitor to his country.”

  “I found that I could no longer serve both my country and basic human decency, and I made my choice,” said Stanhope evenly. “I’m sorry if I have thereby forfeited your respect and your friendship, Oliver, but I knew the price of that choice beforehand.”

  “No buyer’s remorse, Walter?” queried Lodge archly.

  “None,” said Stanhope firmly.

  Lodge went on. “If memory serves, when last I saw General Morgan, he was jamming the barrel of a rather large revolver down Senator Howard Weintraub’s throat on the floor of the Longview conference room, while that remarkable young woman you call Nightshade was holding a switchblade to Jeanette Galinsky’s throat. A very proactive style of diplomacy, and fascinating to watch. [See A Mighty Fortress by the author.] I presume your cabinet are all of the same school of international relations?”

  “You would be correct in that assumption,” said Morehouse.

  “Then I suppose we’re fortunate not to be in the same room with you,” said Lodge. “I understand why these other five gentlemen are participating, since as I could have predicted at Longview, your new republic is experiencing difficulty with your food and energy imports. But why am I being honored with inclusion in this minor historical event?”

  “Your word carries weight in the business and economic world, Mr. Lodge, and you have personal experience with us,” said Barrow. “You can assure others as needed that we say what we mean, and we mean what we say. At present we have no need to deal with any of your concerns directly, but that may change, and you know almost all the people we will need to do business with.”

  “You’re not doing business with any of us, you goyische gonavim!” shouted Michael Perlman in fury.

  “Certainly not with any Jewish firm, and I don’t have to tell you, that’s a lot of companies!” snapped Aaron Levy. “What, are you meshugah? Any Jew do business with you Nazi murderers! You vant I should spit right on dis video lens? You vant?” Levy suited the action to the word.

  “You have laid violent hands on the Apple of God’s Eye,” rumbled the Texan Wiggins sternly.

  “Your people killed my son,” said Henderson.

  “And your people murdered my wife, but I’m sitting here talking to you, because it has to be done,” Morgan told him steadily.

  “There is also a legal problem, Mr. Vice President,” began Lodge.

  “Don’t call him that!” shouted Perlman from Los Angeles. “He is Vice President of nothing! Nothing!”

  “I don’t think wishful thinking is the way to go here, Mr. Perlman,” said Lodge. “We need to accept what is, and to my never-ending astonishment, it turns out that this is the way things are. As I was saying, Mr. Morehouse, there is a legal issue as well. The Department of Commerce has already prohibited any dealings with the territory now under your control, and as soon as we can figure out who will be President in a few months’ time and therefore who signs the laws, Congress will be imposing some of the most stringent economic sanctions in world history on the Northwest. You can’t ask us to disobey the law.”

  “Tyrants are always the law, Mr. Lodge,” spoke up Gary Bresler. “That is what makes them different from common or garden variety gangsters.”

  “Like you?” sneered Levy.

  “It is only because we chose to defy the oppressor’s law that we regained our freedom,” said Morehouse levelly. “Mr. Lodge, if you’re talking about ethics, pardon me if I’m not too impressed with multinational corporations’ history of strict legality and obedience to the laws of the countries wherein they operate. Let’s get down to brass tacks. We are moving full speed ahead in this new country of ours to create a completely self-contained economy wherein we grow or manufacture everything we need from automobiles to weapons, on through clothing, shoes, tools, and down to pancake mix, candy canes for Christmas, and some of the best beer you’ll ever drink, which actually we’ve already got. Eventually, your sanctions will be a dead letter, but that time is not now. Right now we need some things that we can only get from elsewhere, and until we can establish trading relationships with other countries throughout the world, that means doing business with American corporations.

  “Specifically we need three things. We need drugs and medical supplies, including parts for medical equipment in our hospitals. We need energy, especially gasoline and even more urgently, diesel fuel to run our electric power stations
. Finally we need food. Meat and agricultural produce we can supply on our own, from our own land. The Northwest is a breadbasket, but for the next few years until we get ourselves sorted out, we will need staples like rice, beans, canned goods, sugar, flour, coffee and tea, salt, that kind of thing. We need Sir Reginald and Mr. Wiggins and all the companies under their control to resume tanker and pipeline shipments of fuel to gas stations and other end users here. We need that right away, as in today. We need Mr. Levy and Mr. Perlman to resume shipment of certain basic food items, which we will list for you, to the various chain grocery stores and other existing outlets in the Northwest. We need Mr. Henderson to end his ban on UPE shipments to the Republic, so we can make our own arrangements for needed pharmaceuticals and medical supplies to be delivered on his vehicles, and also so that people living outside the Republic can help out their relatives in the Northwest individually, by sending them needed commodities. We understand that this will cause difficulties on your end, and you will of course be compensated for your goods and for your trouble. Compensated quite handsomely, in fact. Capitalism in the past has never been too worried about legalities when there are profits to be made. You traded under the table with old South Africa, and Iran, and Cuba, and North Korea willingly enough.”

  “Take your money and shove it up your goyische tuches!” shrieked Perlman, totally out of control. “You will get nothing, nothing from anyone in America or anyone else in de woild, if de Joosh pipple have anything to say about it, and we will, you schmucks! Oh yes, we will! I am sitting here by mein shvimming pool in Brentwood and I am watching TV and I am vatching you all starve and die, you and your shiksas and your little white brats, I am vatching you all die like dogs!”