Alternate Wars
Page 29
“Then maybe this is where men who want to prevent further slaughter belong,” said Roosevelt. He looked up at the sky. “They’ll be mobilizing in another half hour, Frank.”
“I know, Mr. President.”
“If we leave now, if we don’t try to take that hill, then Wilson and Pershing were right and I was wrong. The time for heroes is past, and I am an anachronism who should be sitting at home in a rocking chair, writing memoirs and exhorting younger men to go to war.” He paused, staring at the hill once more. “If we don’t do what’s required of us this day, we are agreeing with them that we don’t matter, that men of courage and ideals can’t make a difference. If that’s true, there’s no sense waiting for a more equitable battle, Frank—we might as well ride south and catch the first boat home.”
“That’s your decision, Mr. President?” asked McCoy.
“Was there really ever any other option?” replied Roosevelt wryly.
“No, sir,” said McCoy. “Not for men like us.”
“Thank you for your support, Frank,” said Roosevelt, reaching out and laying a heavy hand on McCoy’s shoulder. “Prepare the men.”
“Yes, sir,” said McCoy, saluting and riding back to the main body of the Rough Riders.
“Madness!” muttered Roosevelt, looking out at the bloated corpses. “Utter madness!”
McCoy returned a moment later.
“The men are awaiting your signal, sir,” he said.
“Tell them to follow me,” said Roosevelt.
“Sir…” said McCoy.
“Yes?”
“We would prefer you not lead the charge. The first ranks will face the heaviest bombardment, not only from the hill but also from the cannons behind the bunkers.”
“I can’t ask my men to do what I myself won’t do,” said Roosevelt.
“You are too valuable to lose, sir. We plan to attack in three waves. You belong at the back of the third wave, Mr. President.”
Roosevelt shook his head. “There’s nothing up ahead except bullets, Hank, and I’ve faced bullets before—in the Dakota Bad Lands, in Cuba, in Milwaukee. But if I hang back, if I send my men to do a job I was afraid to do, then I’ve have to face myself—and as any Democrat will tell you, I’m a lot tougher than any bullet ever made.”
“You won’t reconsider?” asked McCoy.
“Would you have left your unit and joined the Rough Riders if you thought I might?” asked Roosevelt with a smile.
“No, sir,” admitted McCoy. “No, sir, I probably wouldn’t have.” Roosevelt shook his hand. “You’re a good man, Frank.”
“Thank you, Mr. President.”
“Are the men ready?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then,” said Roosevelt, turning his horse toward the small rise, “let’s do what must be done.”
He pulled his rifle out, unlatched the safety catch, and dug his heels into his horse’s sides.
Suddenly he was surrounded by the first wave of his own men, all screaming their various war cries in the face of the enemy.
For just a moment there was no response. Then the machine guns began their sweeping fire across the muddy plain. Buck O’Neill was the first to fall, his body riddled with bullets. An instant later Runs With Deer screamed in agony as his arm was blown away. Horses had their legs shot from under them, men were blown out of their saddles, limbs flew crazily through the wet morning air, and still the charge continued.
Roosevelt had crossed half the distance when Matupu fell directly in front of him, his head smashed to a pulp. He heard McCoy groan as half a dozen bullets thudded home in his chest, but looked neither right nor left as his horse leaped over the fallen Maasai’s bloody body.
Bullets and cannonballs flew to the right and left of him, in front and behind, and yet miraculously he was unscathed as he reached the final hundred yards. He dared a quick glance around and saw that he was the sole survivor from the first wave, then heard the screams of the second wave as the machine guns turned on them.
Now he was seventy yards away, now fifty. He yelled a challenge to the Germans, and as he looked into the blinking eye of a machine gun, for one brief, final, glorious instant it was San Juan Hill all over again.
18 September 1917
Dispatch from General John J. Pershing to Commander-in-Chief, President Woodrow Wilson
Sir:
I regret to inform you that Theodore Roosevelt died last Tuesday of wounds received in battle. He had disobeyed his orders, and led his men in a futile charge against an entrenched German position. His entire regiment, the so-called Rough Riders, was lost. His death was almost certainly instantaneous, although it was two days before his body could be retrieved from the battlefield.
I shall keep the news of Mr. Roosevelt’s death from the press until receiving instructions from you. It is true that he was an anachronism, that he belonged more to the nineteenth century than the twentieth, and yet it is entirely possible that he was the last authentic hero our country shall ever produce. The charge he led was ill-conceived and foolhardy in the extreme, nor did it diminish the length of the conflict by a single day, yet I cannot help but believe that if I had fifty thousand men with his courage and spirit, I could bring this war to a swift and satisfactory conclusion by the end of the year.
That Theodore Roosevelt died the death of a fool is beyond question, but I am certain in my heart that with his dying breath he felt he was dying the death of a hero. I await your instructions, and will release whatever version of his death you choose upon hearing from you
—General John J. Pershing
22 September 1917
Dispatch from President Woodrow Wilson to General John J. Pershing, Commander of American Forces in Europe.
John:
That man continues to harass me from the grave.
Still, we have had more than enough fools in our history. Therefore, he died a hero.
Just between you and me, the time for heroes is past. I hope with all my heart that he was our last.
—Woodrow Wilson
And he was.
ABOUT THE EDITORS
GREGORY BENFORD is the author of several acclaimed novels, including Tides of Light, Great Sky River, Heart of the Comet (with David Brin), In the Ocean of Night, Across the Sea of Suns, and Timescape, which won the Nebula Award, the British Science Fiction Award, the John W. Campbell Memorial Award, and the Australian Ditmar Award. Dr. Benford, a Woodrow Wilson Fellow, is a professor of physics at the University of California, Irvine. He and his wife live in Laguna Beach.
MARTIN H. GREENBERG is the editor or author of over 300 books, the majority of them anthologies in the science fiction, fantasy, horror, mystery, and western fields. He has collaborated editorially with such authors as Isaac Asimov, Robert Silverberg, Gregory Benford, and Frederik Pohl. A professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin, he lives with his wife and baby daughter in Green Bay.
“If Lee Had Not Won the Battle of Gettysburg” reprinted from IF IT HAD HAPPENED OTHERWISE, ed. by J. C. Squire, © 1931 by Longman’s Green, London, and reprinted with permission from the Longman Group, Ltd., London, England. All Rights Reserved.
“And Wild for to Hold” copyright 1991 by Nancy Kress.
“Tundra Moss” copyright © 1991 by F M. Busby.
“When Free Men Shall Stand” copyright © 1991 by Poul Anderson.
“Arms and the Woman” copyright © 1991 by James Morrow.
“Ready for the Fatherland” copyright © 1991 by Harry Turtledove.
“The Tomb” copyright © 1991 by Jack McDevitt.
“Turpentine” copyright © 1991 by Barry N. Malzberg.
“Goddard’s People” copyright © 1991 by Allen Steele.
“Manassas, Again” copyright © 1991 by Abbenford Associates.
“The Number of the Sand” copyright © 1991 by George Zebrowski.
“Over There” copyright © 1991 by Mike Resnick.
/> Gregory Benford, Alternate Wars