“That brings up another problem: brass. I’ve got brass pickers combing everywhere looking for spent shell casings. We’re okay on the four-inch guns, and the shells for those are big enough to turn more on a lathe, but we’ll have to extrude small-arms brass and… I really just don’t know how. We can reload what we’ve got; make it work pretty well, in fact. Before we lost power, we made molds and swages for thirty-, forty-five-, and fifty-cal with grease grooves. We can make bullets out of solid copper, tin, or lead with a gas check of some kind, so they’ll work with the fast-twist rifling. Lubed copper bullets work fine in the Springfields and Krags with a slow rate of fire. You can use ’em in the Thompsons and the 1911s too, but they get really filthy. And like I said, when the brass is gone, it’s gone-unless we can figure out how to make more.”
“I knew about all that stuff,” Matt said, “and we’ll see what we can do about power. Mr. Riggs, I’ll get to you directly. But what about other stuff, Bernie? The ‘new’ weapons you mentioned?”
“Yes, sir. Personally, I’d love to have torpedoes, but that’s going to take a while longer. We’ve still got the propulsion body of the condemned torp with the crumpled warhead and we’re reverse-engineering that, but the precision required…” He sighed. “We’re just not there yet.”
“What can you give me?”
“Exploding four-inch shells and bombs, sir. Lots and lots of bombs. Pretty powerful ones too, eventually-if the guncotton works like I expect.” He glanced at Mallory. “I know the bigger ones might not do us a lot of good until we have something to drop them from, but when we do-”
“Don’t build them before I find out how much weight the planes’ll carry!” interrupted Ben.
“Don’t worry.” Bernie grinned. “We’re working on little ones first, like mortar bombs. In fact, that’s what they are.” He nodded at Alden. “Pete-the General-and Campeti came up with the idea. Real mortars-the ‘drop and pop’ kind. Way safer, lighter, deadlier, and with a lot longer range than the ones we’ve been using. No reason you couldn’t drop ’em from an airplane, though.”
“Very good,” Matt complimented him, “but that still leaves us, in the short term, with a dwindling number of small arms when what I want is more.”
“Yes, sir. I’m afraid our best short-term option is still a musket of some kind, like you said. That’s one of the things Silva’s been fiddling with, although his idea of a musket-”
Matt interrupted. “But I’ve also said I’m not sure muskets really give us much advantage.”
Pete Alden spoke up. “Skipper, I think they will. You’re worried about arrows reloading faster and being about as accurate. Normally, that would be true. You’re also thinking they’re not much advantage over what we’ve got, but what about the enemy? They don’t use longbows. I don’t think they can. They’re just not built for them, so they’re stuck with crossbows, which take about as long to load as a musket and they’re not as deadly. Besides, they’ll be an improvement in another respect: right now, all our spearmen have to carry a longbow as well. Once they have muskets, with socket bayonets, they can shoot and stick with the same weapon. There might also be a psychological effect on the enemy. Maybe they’ll flip and go into one of Bradford’s ‘Grik rout’ fits after a single volley. I’m not counting on it, but they will be better than what we’ve got. As to the accuracy issue, as lame as our industry is right now, that’s going to improve. We can already make the barrels much better than they did in the seventeen hundreds, and eventually, smoothbores can be rifled…”
Matt was nodding. “I see what you mean, Mr. Alden. Very well. You’re the infantryman and I’ll defer to your judgment. I guess we have to be prepared to backtrack a bit before we can leap ahead. At least see what you can do about preparing for simple breechloaders, if you can.” He took a breath and looked at Bernie, decision made. “For now, if muskets are what we can do, that’s what we’ll do.” He paused for a moment and glanced uncomfortably around the chamber. “What about
… that other thing we talked about?”
Sandra gave him a stormy look, but remained silent. She’d clearly already stated her opinion.
Bernie’s eyebrows knitted. “You mean… the gas?” Matt nodded and Sandison frowned, glancing at Tamatsu Shinya. He sighed. “Making the stuff isn’t that big a deal. Mustard or chlorine is dangerous, but not hard. The problem is dispersal-and dispersing it far enough away from us, but close enough to the enemy. Wind would always be a factor.” He hesitated. “Some may not be all that concerned about ethical issues, as far as the Grik-”
“ I am concerned about the ethics of such weapons,” Shinya interrupted sharply.
Matt looked at him and shook his head. When he spoke, his voice was quiet. “Believe it or not, Colonel Shinya, so am I. So is everyone here. Maybe not for the sake of the Grik, really; I wish God would stomp them all like bugs, but gas is just wrong. Using the stuff would take us and our friends to a level almost as bad as the Grik-a level I don’t want to be on and I don’t want our Lemurian allies to ever see.” He took a breath before continuing, now directing his words primarily at Adar, who’d shown an interest in the “wonder weapon.” “Gas kills everything. Indiscriminately… horribly. It’ll kill animals, Grik, ’Cat prisoners-and any of Shinya’s people who might be working for the Grik under duress. I will not gas ’Cats or men-even Japs who aren’t working for the enemy against their will.”
Matt rubbed his eyebrows. “I know it may be hard for you to understand, Mr. Chairman, but I grew up around guys who somehow survived gas attacks in the Great War and… well, ‘survived’ isn’t the best way to put it; ‘lingered in misery’ is probably better, and they only got a little of the stuff. Honest to God, much as I hate them, it would turn my stomach to gas even the Grik. I’d rather burn them alive. We’re going to have to think about this a lot more.”
The chamber grew quiet for a moment and Adar was genuinely taken aback by the intensity of Matt’s evident revulsion toward what seemed, by description, such an effective and efficient weapon.
“Moral issues aside,” Matt continued soberly, “even if we made gas and solved all the problems with delivering it, how do we protect our troops? Unfortunately, we do have to think about it and we do have to solve that problem, at least. Does anyone honestly think this Kurokawa wouldn’t give gas to the Grik if he thought it would benefit him? He’s helped them in every other way. Like Ben said, we don’t have any rubber, and even if we did, how do you make a gas mask for a Lemurian?” Matt shook his head. “There’s no Geneva Convention on this world, governing this war, but we have to decide right now that if we ever make gas, it won’t be used willy-nilly. Won’t be used at all unless we’re in a jam so tight we don’t have any choice.” He shrugged and Sandra grasped his hand. He looked at Adar. “That’s how I feel, and that’s the deal.”
Adar said nothing. He had no choice but to agree, but he was perplexed. Clearly, Captain Reddy was extremely sensitive about the subject; all the humans seemed to be. Gas must be a terrible weapon indeed if one was willing to sacrifice the lives of one’s own troops to avoid using it.