Kennedy squirmed and not from his back. "The fact that the Cubans have at least one nuke will come out in a couple of days. Pierre Salinger was approached by a gentleman from the New York Times who said he had proof that we know the Cubans have a nuke. He even named the item as a Frog 3 missile."
Shoup was outraged. "There's a god damn leak somewhere."
"Obviously," Kennedy retorted. "And the FBI is searching for it. However, the fact remains that the secret is out. Almost. The reporter agreed to sit on it for one week when we appealed to his sense of national security."
“Nuclear casualties remain a price that might just have to be paid," Taylor said.
"And I'm sure you're all aware of the pressure I'm under to settle this peacefully. Last night I received another letter from Pope John XXIII who urges us to pray for peace." He chuckled. "Although I had the distinct impression that His Holiness wouldn't be too upset if we kicked the crap out of the godless communists and returned Cuba to the bosom of Catholicism and Holy Mother Church."
"The pope's a good man," Shoup said solemnly.
"And this morning I got a request from the Organization of American States. Adlai Stevenson reports that the UN is about to pass another general assembly resolution calling for us to leave Cuba to the Cubans. It won't pass, but the vote is getting closer."
Lyndon Johnson glared at Kennedy. "Have all of these worthy assholes forgotten that Cuba started this mess, that Cuba has killed or wounded hundreds of our military and civilians, and that Cuba has attacked and damaged or sunk two of our warships on the high seas? It looks like the OAS and the UN are suffering from politically selective memory."
"Lyndon, I absolutely agree and so does former president Harry Truman. He called this morning and told me to get off the pot and hit the Cubans hard and where it hurts. But that is the world we live in. And what about civilian casualties? They could run into the hundreds, if not thousands."
General Maxwell Taylor looked at him coldly. He had fought his way through Europe in World War II, including dropping behind enemy lines on D-Day as commander of the 101st Airborne Division. He had been called out of retirement just a few months earlier to take over as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.
"I once said I thought that nuclear warfare was unlikely and I still feel it will not happen between Russia and the United States. However, if a rogue like Castro has a nuke, then all bets are off. He must be stopped and that nuke must be taken away from him, regardless of the cost. If we show weakness now, regarding either Guantanamo or that missile, our enemies will nibble us to pieces because they will know we will not respond with all the weapons in our arsenal, and that means we will not use nuclear weapons, although we will allow others to use them. We will have no allies and no credibility.
"And regarding civilian casualties,” Taylor continued, “they are an unfortunate necessity, a fact of life in modern war. And you're right; the numbers are likely to run into the thousands, sir, not the hundreds. Please recall, that in the weeks running up to D-Day, we bombed the daylights out of France's transportation network and did so with DeGaulle's full knowledge and reluctant cooperation. Perhaps as many as twenty thousand French civilians were killed."
LBJ glared at Kennedy. "There's an old saying, Mr. President, you can't make an omelet without breaking the eggs. The general's right. There will be casualties and we can't back away from doing the right thing because we're afraid of them."
At this moment of decision, Kennedy was torn. He wanted Guantanamo back. He hated Castro and wanted him out of Cuba. He wanted success but he wanted it to come at a cheap price. He couldn't abide the thought of American boys being killed by an atomic bomb, however small the damn thing might be. Nor could he abide the thought of thousands of innocent Cuban women and children being blown to pieces by conventional American bombs and artillery.
Before entering, Director McCone had handed JFK a note saying that his agent, Elena Sandano, had an important piece of information for him. She was waiting a few rooms away. He needed a break.
Kennedy stood. "I agree we must have a decision. I will get back to you in one hour."
"Lieutenant Ross, I have good news and I have interesting news that maybe isn't quite so good."
Gunnery sergeant Cullen had been poring over a coded message and had obviously completed the translation.
"Let me have the good news," Ross said.
"You've been promoted to first lieutenant. Congratulations and it's long overdue. I guess that asshole you insulted couldn't hold you back forever, could he?"
Andrew flushed as Cathy laughed. Did everybody know about his situation? "I think you should buy us all a drink," Cathy suggested.
"Will a sip of brackish and warm water from a canteen suffice or will you take a rain check?"
"Rain check," they chorused.
Cullen signaled that he wanted to talk to Andrew alone. Nobody questioned it. They'd done it before. The two men walked a few dozen yards away from the others and stopped.
"Like I said, lieutenant, the second part is interesting. We're instructed to be on the lookout for a tracked vehicle, a cut-down tank chassis, carrying a missile launcher."
"What kind of missile are we talking about?"
"They called it a Luna or a Frog 3, and, sorry, but those are names I'm not really familiar with, so I don't know what the hell makes them so important. I just felt just the two of us should talk about it first."
Andrew searched his memory for the answer. There had been multiple briefings on Soviet weapons systems and special emphasis had been given to those that the Cubans might possess, or that the Soviets might bring in. The only tracked vehicle that wasn't a tank or armored personnel carrier were anti-aircraft systems and they either fired regular shells or surface to air missiles. The Cubans had SAM2 surface to air missiles mounted either on tracked vehicles or Soviet Zil trucks. These were the same missiles that had shot down the U-2 spy plane piloted by Gary Frances Powers and the American jet that Cullen had seen destroyed.
So what the hell was a Frog 3? He wished he'd paid closer attention, but, hell, he was an accountant and a short-timer. It had to be important or his handlers wouldn't have bothered with the information, so why?
Oh yeah, he thought as he began to remember. It was a short range tactical ballistic missile that had a range of about fifteen miles and was nothing more than a glorified very heavy artillery shell. One of them just wasn't all that important.
Unless it had a nuclear warhead. He paled. Oh shit.
"Lieutenant, what is it?"
"Gunny, we got problems."
Elena Sandano thought the president looked like death warmed over when she entered the Oval Office with Director McCone. Only Bobby Kennedy was there. Lyndon Johnson was conspicuous by his absence. Tough. She didn't like him.
She'd gone to the trouble of wearing a skirt and jacket that were far more modest then the outfit she'd worn for the first meeting and now knew she'd wasted her time. The skirt was pleated and hung well below her knees, almost to her ankles, and the blouse was high-necked and full. This time, JFK was far too tired to stare at her legs or breasts. His eyes looked vacant for a moment, like he wished he was elsewhere. He shook off his lack of alertness and managed a politician's warm smile on her behalf.
"Good to see you again, Dr. Sandano. I trust you once again have some blunt advice for me."
"If you'd like some, sir, but I've actually come with some information."
"Really?"
"Yes sir. We have just received confirmation that Castro is going to hold a land lottery in the next week to start giving parcels of land in and around Guantanamo Bay to so-called deserving peasants and other workers. That means that, in a very short time, more than a hundred thousand civilian men, women, and children will be setting up housekeeping in and around what had been our naval base."