“I understand, General.”
Others in the Oval Office were listening in on the conversation, and by their body language they clearly did not understand why the armies of Europe were suddenly standing to along the No Man’s Land between the West and East.
“I’ll take that under advisement, General. Politically, we’ll probably raise the matter directly in Sweden in the first instance. I’ll think on it some more, take some input from trusted sources, but I think your suggestion has merit.”
Stimson’s reaction was plain, but as to whether it was fuelled by exasperation at the Soviet’s probable duplicity, or at Eisenhower’s suggested responses was unclear.
“General, let me interrupt you there. I will not make a decision in haste. I understand why you have increased your readiness levels and taken the other precautions, That’s laudable and, I repeat, I’ve no problem with it whatsoever. But let me be abundantly clear here. I will not, repeat not, undertake or sanction any act that could place us in the role of aggressor, and I will not act precipitously.”
Truman nodded at Eisenhower’s response.
“Good. I’m glad you can understand that. Now, General, your job is to make sure we are ready for another shooting war at the same time as you do everything you can to make sure we don’t get into one. My job here is exactly the same. How best to do that, I’ll decide directly and keep you informed, but I do suspect that political pressure may reap benefits, combined with your suggestions.”
Truman wound up the conversation.
“Yes, thank you, General.”
The other members of the ‘audience’ relaxed their postures and gently placed their listening pieces on the desk.
“Indeed, General. Let us pray that is the case, for now and for generations to come. Good day to you.”
Replacing the receiver, Truman knotted his fingers together and flexed his hands.
“Well, to be blunt, I can see that we’re not all carried by the strength of General Eisenhower’s words.”
Stimson looked up from the sofa.
“Again? We’re going to go through it all again?”
“I do hope not, Henry. By God, I do hope not, and that’s why we mus… excuse me, gentlemen”
The telephone rang, causing the President to stop.
“Hello… yes, well, put him through.”
He placed a hand over the mouthpiece and successfully mimed the word ‘Winston’, causing a renewed rush for the listening pieces.
“Good afternoon to you, Prime Minister. What can I do for…”
Truman grimaced as he was cut short by his friend’s interruption.
“Yes… yes… I’ve just finished speaking with him just now, I expect he’ll be calling you directly, Winsto…”
Stimson arrived in time to hear the piece of information that had not been available at the time of the early morning NATO briefing.
“Say that again please, Winston.”
Collectively, the US Administration’s highest officials drew breath in a gasp.
“On February 26th you say. How did you come by this information, Winston?”
Churchill explained in the briefest way, knowing that the full information was already being disseminated to Allied intelligence agencies across the globe, albeit in a controlled and very top-secret way.
HMS Vivid, a British ‘V’ class submarine on silent patrol within the Black Sea, had trailed a number of large enemy submarines over a period of two days.
‘A large enemy submarine was known to have surfaced in the Black Sea, and erected and fired a missile of a type similar to the German V-2 weapon. Periscope camera shots had been failures due to some water-seal malfunction, but the experienced submarine captain had not recognised the type of submarine involved, and had discontinued his periscope monitoring due to the numerous enemy aircraft that were overflying the area.’
Because of the extremely dangerous and secret nature of its mission, the vessel had not been able to report what they had heard and observed until back at their base station in Greece.
That report had been communicated to Churchill at the same time as Eisenhower was rousing his officers at Frankfurt.
Forrestal mouthed two words as Churchill was winding up his summary.
‘Delivery system?’
Truman paled at the whispered question.
“Thank you for letting me know, Winston. You’ll know what Eisenhower has done. He has some other proposals which we need to discuss, but I think I need to expand on this new information before that.”
He nodded vigorously at the man in an office thousands of miles away.
“Yes… that would be fine. Should give us both enough time to understand more about this new development.”
The same two words that Forrestal had introduced floated across from England and into the Oval Office.
“That is a possibility, Winston. Let us pray we are wrong. I’ll call you this evening. Yes… yes… and please pass on my best regards to the King. Thank you. Goodbye.”
This time Truman placed the telephone back in the receiver with all the gentleness of a chimpanzee with a new hammering set.
Without humour, he addressed Stimson directly.
“So, what do you think of Eisenhower’s other ideas now, Henry?”
Stimson snorted.
“I still don’t like them Mister President, but the need for them has become clearer than it was. In time, we’ll praise General Eisenhower for his foresight. For now, perhaps we should simply pray that the world has not become what we now think it has, and work as hard as we can to prevent any renewed hostilities.”
“Amen to that, Hen…”
“Not that it’ll do any good, Mister President.”
“What?
“It seems inevitable that war will return, clad in all its old horrors and resplendently garbed in the new weapons of death and destruction.”
They all remained silent to allow Stimson to continue.
“We know… we’ve used atomic weapons, so we understand that they will destroy all of us if we come to further use, for there will be no control, no limit on their use once both sides throw that at each other. That German fellow, Brecht… he wrote something that aptly describes the situation we find ourselves in, and no matter what we do will we avoid what is to come.”
Stimson flopped into a chair like a man exhausted by life.
“I saw a Brecht play whilst I was visiting Chicago last fall… Louis Schaffer ran a small production to test its stage viability. The Resistible Rise of Arturo U it is called. It’s an allegorical work, set in Chicago itself and substituting a Capone character for Hitler. I remember one line from it… it struck me clear as a bell, Mister President.”
He wet his lips as he summoned the quote from the recesses of his memory and burned the words on their minds with his gentle but powerful delivery.
“Do not rejoice in his defeat, you men, for though the world stood up and stopped the bastard, the bitch that bore him is on heat again.”
Truman smiled at his weary warhorse.
“Let us pray that you’re mistaken, Henry, and plan for you being right. So, Gentlemen… what responses do we make?”
1353 hrs, Monday, 17th February 1947, Friedrich-Ebert-Strasse, temporary government building #1, Magdeburg, Germany.
Speer nodded, barely able to contain his excitement and pleasure.
“We must, of course, cooperate fully with any requests from NATO command. Our forces will respond immediately, Feldmarschal.”
Speer stood and walked quickly around the desk, quickly pouring and handling two coffees, one for himself, and one for his military supremo.