“Sir,” interrupted Hewlett, “during a recent Naval War College war game, an OPFOR counterforce strike was initiated with an assassination attempt on the President and select members of the NCA. The theory was that by killing the brain or paralyzing the nervous system, the arms couldn’t be properly utilized. The attempt caught our forces by complete surprise. And that’s why I think it’s only prudent that we change our defense condition to DEFCON Four.”
“But we still don’t know for certain who was responsible,” Pritchard countered.
“If we go and threaten the Russians, and find out later it was a Ukrainian operation, we could be losing an important ally in the region.”
“I’m not asking to start the countdowns,” returned the Marine.
“All I’m suggesting is to stir the beast from the annual summer holiday doldrums. And as for possibly insulting an ally, Colonel, our Commanderin-Chief has just been shot down, along with God only knows how many other brave Americans.
And when the American people finally learn about it, it’s gonna take every bit of restraint we can muster to keep them from demanding a declaration of war!”
The Chairman nodded thoughtfully.
“I like the idea of taking us down a notch to DEFCON Four. Colonel Pritchard, inform the NMCC of this change, and get the word out to each of the strategic commands. What’s the status of TACAMO?”
Pritchard was already busy relaying this order to his staff, and his aide alertly replied, “Iron Man One is the current alert bird, Admiral. It deployed out of NAS Patuxent five minutes after receiving our initial Code One, with General Lowell Spencer as the senior Emergency Action Officer.”
“It’s imperative that we keep in close contact with General Spencer, Lieutenant,” said Warner to the aide.
“If anything should happen to us, we’ll be handing off the football to Iron Man One. And speaking of footballs,” he added while looking at Brittany, “Commander, are you going to be all right? I know you were close to both the President, his Secret Service detail, and, of course. Major Ryan.”
Afraid that her voice might betray her true feelings, Brittany summoned her bravest smile and nodded that she’d be fine. She dared to trade the briefest eye contact with the Chairman. And instead of his usual scrutinizing stare, there was something in Warner’s eyes that appeared to be looking within, perhaps to the immense responsibility he had suddenly shouldered.
“Well, gents, it’s true, all right,” said Jake Lasky as he settled in behind the flight engineer station and buckled his harness.
“And not only does it look like the President’s been killed, but the football’s been compromised as well. Wait till you hear the real-time tape that Red just played for me. It includes the gunshots that took out the President, and ends with his MIL AIDE howling away like someone was cutting off his arm.”
“Maybe that’s how they got the satchel off his wrist,” mused Lucky from his copilot position on the right side of the cockpit.
“I sure hope the Chairman is putting together one jim-dandy of a retaliatory strike.”
“The Admiral and his emergency action team were still meeting in the conference room. But I heard from Red that they were already going down to DEFCON Four,” Jake revealed.
“DEFCON Four?” Lucky repeated.
“That’s all a President, his staff, a National Security Advisor, and an entire Secret Service protection detail are worth nowadays? Hell, if that’s not reason to order Cocked Pistol, what is?”
Coach put down the aeronautical chart he had gotten from the navigator and eagerly joined the fray from the pilot’s seat.
“Did Red say anything about them determining the ones responsible for the slaughter?”
“Come to think of it, she didn’t say,” answered Jake.
“Then they obviously don’t know who it was,” Coach inferred.
“Which means we can’t go launching a full-scale nuclear war without first knowing who the hell did it.”
Lucky couldn’t believe what he was hearing, and he pushed back his headphones to speak his mind.
“Am I missing something?
The President flew all the way out here to the Crimea, at the invitation of the Presidents of Russia and Ukraine. Wasn’t this to be a secret summit of peace? Obviously not, and there’s only two countries to blame. I say hit the both of them, with enough plutonium to put them back into the Stone Age.”
“Did you ever stop to think that a third party could be the culprit?” offered Coach.
“Maybe it was a bunch of Arab extremists, or a group of international terrorists, who are responsible.”
“Coach,” interrupted the navigator while pointing to the radar screen, “I believe we’ve got some company out there.”
All eyes went to the rectangular, flashing-green console mounted in the center of the main instrument panel. The digital radar screen displayed the northeastern corner of the Black Sea, with Nightwatch 676 represented by the blinking black star halfway between the Crimean Peninsula and the coast of Romania.
Due east of this position, currently passing south of Yalta, was a tight, triangular-shaped formation of three flashing red stars, and it was Coach who made the first attempt at identifying them.
“If I’m not mistaken, they’re long-range interceptors, most likely MiG-25 Foxbats. And, Lucky, right now you get my vote for DEFCON One.
“Cause they appear to be headed straight toward us, and if they’re carrying air-to-air missiles, we’re gonna be in one hell of a fix.”
Chapter 12
“Base, this is Eberly. Over. Winona Base, this is Ben Eberly. Do you copy?”
Vince could tell from the district ranger’s strained tone that he was getting frustrated. For a good five minutes now, Eberly had been trying to reach the Winona Forest Service office on his two-way, with only static for his efforts.
“I don’t understand it,” said the ranger, his tanned forehead dripping with sweat.
“Those new repeater towers usually give us excellent reception.”
Vince glanced over to the far side of the sandbar on which they were standing, and saw that the group of agents responsible for deploying the portable COMSAT telephone appeared to be similarly frustrated. Instead of talking on the handset, they focused their efforts on the miniature satellite dish. For as long as Eberly had been trying his two-way, his men had been busy sweeping the skies with the dish, in a vain effort to make contact with the proper satellite.
“It looks like my people aren’t having any luck either,” Vince noted while raising his hand to his brow to shield his eyes from the blazing noon sun, and sweeping his glance to the east. A nine-hundred-foot-tall bluff of solid limestone met his gaze, and Vince didn’t have to see any more to know why the efforts of his communications team had been unsuccessful.
“Where exactly did you say we’d find a notch in that bluff?”
Vince asked.
“It’s immediately downstream from the shoals,” replied Eberly.
“And you can access it from that sandbar your security team was off to visit in the john boat
“Then let’s do it, my friend,” said Vince.
“It’s not every day that we receive a partial emergency action alert like that, and it’s imperative that we establish a secure SATCOM link with all due haste.”
“For expediency’s sake, why not load up your SATCOM into one of the john boats and we’ll run your team down to the access site,” Eberly offered.
“That way they can set up while we follow in the canoes. It’s a ten-minute float through Mary Deckard at best, and that sandbar will be the perfect place to have lunch.”