Sudden Threat

by A. J Tata

  In reality, Stone had received a phone call from a female police officer saying she wanted to ask him some questions. He nervously inquired, “About what?” only for her to tell him, “We will discuss that later.” They made an appointment for the following afternoon.

  “Looks like the rain’ll stop soon,” Lantini said, trying to change the subject.

  How’s that for some intelligence insight, Stone mused.

  “Is that good or bad?” the president asked.

  “Both, depending on how you look at it,” Lantini said.

  That’s nailing it down, Frankie old boy, Stone said to himself.

  Fleagles and the NSA walked in and sat down.

  “Chairman,” the president said.

  “We were just discussing this rain that’s slowed the action some. Looks like it’ll lift soon,” Sewell said.

  “That’s good, right?” Fleagles asked in a naive sort of way.

  Sewell smirked. “Could be. But Jennings has put the rest of the light division on a ship and is taking them around the other side of Luzon,” he said, standing and pointing at a map. “He’s got almost two brigades ready to assault from hovercraft, walk the short distance over this ridge, and come in on the enemy’s flank. He reasons, and I agree, that if we can take away this guy,” he said, thumping a red square symbol with two Xs at the top, then we win today. If not, then the fight goes on. And, if we don’t win in the next two days, I’m afraid the international scene could get out of control. It’ll be another week before we can get enough tanks over there to make a difference.”

  “Thanks, Chairman. Impacts on Iraq?” Davis asked.

  “Significant, but we think we can be on schedule for next winter or spring,” Stone said.

  “If that’s the math, then okay. But we’ve got to watch the terrorist flow into Iraq. If they’ve got weapons of mass destruction, then we need to accelerate.”

  “This Pacific Rim thing has soaked up time and talent, sir. Only way to put it,” Sewell said, rein-forcing Stone’s position.

  The president had begun to speak when a young Army captain, Stockton Ackers, stuck his head inside the room from the operations office and said, “Sir, we need you in here.”

  “Can it wait?” Davis asked.

  “No, sir,” Ackers responded, his serious eyes locked firmly with the president’s.

  The entourage entered the small operations cell, where computers thrummed with messages, phones constantly rang, maps hung on the wall crazily, and young military officers dressed in civilian clothes performed yeoman’s work, often clocking in eighteen- to twenty-hour days.

  “Sir, we’ve got reports of Chinese nuclear weapons moving from the western border with Russia,” Ackers said, pointing at a large map about where the Great Wall would be, “to the eastern area near Shanghai. They’ve never moved those missiles before. We think it’s a response to the Philippine crisis.”

  “Is there any way we can track those things,” the president asked.

  “Sure, sir, but if they launch, they launch. Nothing we can do about it,” Ackers responded to the simple question.

  “Okay. I’ll talk to President Jiang today. Anything else?”

  “Yes, sir. About an hour ago a Korean destroyer sank a Japanese Kuang Hua VI attack boat. They were both in international waters, but the attack boat looked like it was trying to get inside Korean waters. We think it was the newest Japanese ship—”

  “I guess I’ll talk to President Park after Jiang,” the president said, shaking his head, wondering what could happen next.

  “Sir,” Ackers said, hesitating. “Taiwan’s pushed its navy out from Taipei and is poised just southwest of Okinawa, and we’ve still got the Chinese navy building forces in the East China Sea. This thing could blow any minute.”

  “Spare me the editorial, Captain,” Davis snapped, causing Ackers to clench his jaw. He had been in the operations center for twenty straight hours. He had worked through the first night of Operation Enduring Freedom-Philippines and was operating on a meager four hours of sleep in the last seventy-two. He probably knew better than any of the politicians exactly what was happening.

  The president thought about the implications of Ackers’s information. How should he respond to China, Korea, Russia, and Taiwan? Each felt threatened, he was sure. The era of the Japanese warlord had left an indelible imprint on the minds of many of the leaders of that region, like Hitler in Germany and Napoleon in France.

  But they saw Japanese culture and society as more capable of producing the racist, demagogic warrior of the past. Perhaps Germany was beyond Hitler, and France, Napoleon, but its Asian counterparts might interpret Japan to be reemerging as a nationalistic threat off the east coast of the Asian continent, driven by warlords indistinguishable from the executive auto manufacturers.

  Their economic expansion during the past sixty years was the twentieth century’s Trojan horse. The Japanese had funneled their historical penchant for war and aggression into highly productive endeavors such as industry, manufacturing, and other high-technology development, but sooner or later, they had reached a point of diminishing returns. Like the once-successful merchant who fell on hard times, they could either fight back or file for bankruptcy. Japan wasn’t about to go for Chapter Eleven.

  The men retired to the situation office conference room again burdened with the new information.

  “We have to finish this thing in the next twenty-four hours,” the president said, hanging up the phone. He had called the Chinese prime minister, who was his usual intransigent self.

  “If Japan is not defeated by midnight tomorrow,” the Chinese leader had said, “we will take matters into our own hands.”

  The men stared at each other, realizing how right Meredith had been. She had picked up the horseshoe and tossed a perfect ringer, the metal clanking loud through each man’s ears today.

  Their collective mind, though, was frozen by the news. At the strategic level, if they could not keep China and others out of the war, the United States would lose everything. The most dynamic free-market economy in Asia would wither, taking with it a large portion of the European and American markets, potentially launching the world into another depress-sion.

  China had the ability to annihilate Japan with nuclear weapons. The ultimate irony would be China’s introduction into the war, and the United States siding with Japan to stop an even-more-dangerous aggressor. Even worse would be the Chinese destruc-tion of Japan, only to witness massive American involvement to rebuild the vital trading partner.

  The international community’s economic inter-dependence made the world economy a house of cards. To pull one away might very well bring the entire house down. Worse, at the foundation were the United States, Japan, and Europe, all mingled together like a tri-colored fabric.

  The men stared at each other, none knowing what to say.

  Then Sewell winked at Stone, his civilian equiv-alent, and decided to break the ice.

  “Let’s just see how this thing pans out.”

  CHAPTER 95

  Pentagon, Washington, DC

  “The move with Takishi was risky,” Fox said to Diamond.

  “Risky indeed,” Diamond agreed.

  The two men were sitting in Fox’s office again; Fox in his throne and Diamond in the facing chair. Fox put his hand on the desk next to Diamond, his fingers spread casually toward his partner. Rezia’s aria, “Ocean! thou mighty monster,” from Carl Maria von Weber’s Oberon, played quietly in the background.

  Diamond reached out and took Fox’s hand, lightly stroking the well-manicured fingers, caressing the palm as he might a wounded dove.

  “But it was necessary to get China sufficiently concerned to put forth their ultimatum,” Diamond said. He lifted Fox’s hand and kissed it.

  Fox ran a finger around Diamond’s lips, smiling.

  “Yes, that was a brilliant move. Now the twenty-four-hour ultimatum is in effect. We will have to complete the destruction of the Japanese
, or else China and North Korea will ‘take matters into their own hands.’” He pulled his hand away from Diamond, who was in the process of kissing each individual finger, in order to make quotation marks around his sentence.

  Fox leaned forward and ran his delicate hand through Diamond’s sparse hair.

  “So we started out with Nine-eleven in order to open the door for action in Iraq,” Diamond said, nuzzling his head into Fox’s hand. “Then we retaliate against Al Qaeda and the Taliban sufficiently to get them out of Afghanistan, but not sufficiently to destroy them. Brilliant suggestion by the way, Saul. The lingering threat will open so many oppor-tunities—the possibilities are limitless.”

  “It was a good idea,” Fox purred. “We haven’t put more than a brigade in Afghanistan. And when that Matt Garrett crossed over and was about to get you-know-who, well, your quick action to blackmail Stone was genius. Using Stone’s personal infor-mation to create an E*Trade account so that ‘he’ could short AIG and United Airlines was pure brilliance.”

  “Thank you.” Diamond sighed. “It certainly got Stone to move Garrett far off the Al Qaeda trail quickly.” The two men were becoming aroused, stimulated by their manipulations and grand strategy. “Matt Garrett’s dead now anyway. That’s what I hear.”

  “Good. Good. That was a loose end we didn’t need,” Fox said. “Not that he knew anything. But he was too aggressive, too good.”

  “That’s right. Then, as we gathered the momen-tum on Iraq, we have to hand it to Stone, who worked faster than we thought he could, to get the Philippine situation to a sufficient level actually to be a diversion,” Diamond said.

  “But they had been working on that for two years.” Fox chuckled. “The Japanese used him and outsmarted him.”

  “Well, we’ve been working on our project longer than that,” Diamond moaned. He was in full arousal. The two were holding hands with both hands, fingers interlaced, appearing to be locked in some tantric yoga pose.

  “Yes, we have,” Fox said. “Which is why we had to intervene with Takishi to get him to ratchet up the force levels so that there was a credible threat to the region.”

  “So that China and North Korea would issue an ultimatum,” Diamond whispered, blowing into Fox’s ear.

  “Which brings us full circle.” Fox sighed. “We will wrap this up soon and begin large-scale deployments to Kuwait. I’ve already signed the deployment orders.”

  “I’m just thankful that you broke the Rolling Stones’ code,” Diamond said, running his cheek against Fox’s.

  “Rather easy, Dick. We will ruin Mick Jagger, Charlie Watts will be dead soon, and Keith Richards is already dead. That only leaves the question about what we do with Ronnie Wood,” Fox said.

  “Problematic,” Diamond agreed, kissing Fox’s neck.

  “We have to make sure that the Philippine action is done quickly and leave Wood intact. He may not be much, but he’s what we got,” Fox said.

  “He’s our man,” Diamond agreed.

  CHAPTER 96

  Island of Luzon, Philippines

  Zachary watched the convoy move out and called Kooseman, the acting battalion commander.

  “I’ve got about 120 tanks, plus a shitload of infantry fighting vehicles moving north toward Bongabon,” Zachary said, peering above a rotted log. He lay in the prone position, holding a set of binoculars to his face, counting. He had slipped a knee pad over his swelling elbow so that he could hold the binos steady.

  The Ranger medic had done all he could for SSG Quinones, the morphine shot being the most helpful. With the rain, a medevac was impossible.

  “What I’d give for a few A-10s and some F-16s,” Zachary said.

  “Like you always say, sir, this is infantry weather. Them zoomies can’t handle this shit,” Slick said, smiling, feeling safe watching the procession move away from them to the northwest. It was a comforting feeling, as if he might never see them again.

  “Yeah, but they’d make short work of this. I don’t see a single air-defense weapon,” Zachary said.

  He was right. In Zach’s assessment the Japanese had gone into the conflict severely unprepared, despite their strategic and tactical surprise. They had some stinger gunners riding in the tanks and infantry fighting vehicles, but all they could do was react. There was no integrated system set up for early warning such as the Americans used.

  Zachary and Slick lay against a rotted log, soft from the rain, waiting for the word from Kooseman. Zachary had played cowboy enough for one war and was growing apprehensive over his isolation from the rest of the unit. Once again, he was all alone, save for the Rangers to his left flank. It was, however, his fault. He had moved the company on his own initiative.

  Something instinctual had governed him, almost forcing him to the new position, as if he was supposed to be there.

  They heard wet, muffled sounds of artillery rounds leaving their tubes and cutting a path through the driving rain and high clouds. The rounds popped in the distance. Through his binos Zachary saw timber crash and mud splash on the wooded knoll they had earlier defended. The Japanese self-propelled artillery pumped round after round into the infamous knoll, then shifted its fire onto the town of Cabanatuan, indiscriminately spraying the area.

  Zach could see thatch huts, the ones that had withstood the onslaught of the rain, disintegrate under the now-incessant bombardment. They had learned one lesson, Zachary figured, and that was to go nowhere without artillery support.

  “Bravo six, this is Knight five, over,” came Kooseman’s voice over Slick’s radio handset.

  “This is Bravo six, over,” Zachary said.

  “Can you do anything about that artillery; it’s getting pretty bad over here?” Kooseman asked, anger in his voice.

  Zachary’s mind raged white-hot He’s got a lot of balls. Kooseman had chastised him for moving so far away but had the nerve to ask Zachary to attack the enemy formation and compromise his new position. Yesterday, he would have done it without fail, but today, he had gained a better perspective. Some of the edge had dulled from his hate, the driving force to kill every Japanese soldier. He recognized that he had a larger responsibility to protect his company and complete the mission.

  “What do you want me to do? I’ve got about fifteen missiles,” Zachary said, hoping that would discourage Kooseman.

  The artillery volleys increased, and for the first time Zachary heard the impotent battalion 105mm rounds impacting near the Japanese 155mm self-propelled guns. They landed harmlessly around the armored hulks of the Japanese guns.

  “Can you see their arty? How many guns do they have?”

  Zachary didn’t like the way the conversation was going; but then he thought of guys like McAllister and Glenn Bush, who were probably over there getting shelled.

  “Roger. I count sixteen guns. Looks like two batteries. All are firing,” Zachary said, knowing imme-diately what his new mission was going to be.

  “You’ve got enough to take them out,” Kooseman said, trying to make it sound like an order.

  Water dripped steadily off the black handset that Zachary held to his ear and mouth. His elbow had busted a hole in the log, and he saw some maggots crawling on his sleeve. As he brushed his elbow against the soggy wood, he wondered about Kooseman’s mathematical capabilities. Sure, he could get most of the artillery, but then would have to bear the brunt of nearly two hundred armored vehicles turned against him.

  It was suicide.

  “I’m not so sure it’s a smart move,” Zachary said into the handset, realizing he was being insub-ordinate.

  “I’m not asking your opinion, Garrett. Shoot the artillery. Do it now,” Kooseman retorted. He heard loud explosions amplified by the transmission. Looking through his binoculars as the gray shade of morning lightened ever so slightly, he watched as a shell tore a huge hole in the prison roof.

  “What happens when these two brigades turn on my ass?” Zachary asked.

  “We’ve got you covered. Have you shot the arti
llery, yet?”

  “Roger. Happening now,” Zachary said, tossing the handset to Slick. Zachary ordered his platoon leaders to his position, and they rapidly arrived, Kurtz limping with a large bandage around his lower leg.

  “We’ve got orders to destroy that artillery,” he said, pointing at the dark figures jumping backward each time they fired. They were nearly five hundred meters away, perfect distance for the missile gunners. Zachary hated to use the passive voice regarding an order. Normally he took responsibility for every-thing, but he had a hard time justifying to his men that their company was supposed to attack a two-hundred-strong armored vehicle convoy.

  “Then what?” Taylor asked.

  “Then we fight like good soldiers, Andy. We do our best. We’ve been given a mission, and we’re gonna do it.”

  Kurtz and Barker were silent as Zachary sketched out a new plan. It was simple: Assign each gunner an artillery piece, everyone would fire simultaneously, then the company would move a kilometer to the rear, into the jungle.

  He watched as his platoon leaders trod back to their platoons, and could not help wondering about that night attack they had botched in training over two weeks ago.

  Just don’t screw the pooch here.

  “Packers,” he said into the radio after receiving word from the three platoon leaders that they were ready.

  He looked over his shoulder and thought he saw something, something blue, but then watched as his antitank gunners once again scored strikes on the enemy armor.

  Despite the pelting rain, thirteen of the sixteen artillery pieces were burning a bright orange hue, the color of a sun.

  The sun, yes. Blue skies mean the sun will come out.

  Zachary looked back over his shoulder and saw a blue patch of sky moving slowly above a mountain peak, like an old man on a Sunday drive.

  Hurry up!

  “Knight this is Bravo. Destroyed thirteen of sixteen. Out of missiles,” Zachary reported to Kooseman, ready to pack his bags and move into the jungle.