Garrett chuckled. "Not yet, Keith. Suffice to say that the Sirocco incident has a lot of people in Washington very unhappy right now. And nervous. There is a… perception that we may be coming down to a final showdown with Tehran."
"Meaning?"
There was a long hesitation. "Spear-to-spear."
"My God."
"There is that possibility," Garrett told him. "Just listen to what General Vintner has to say. He'll bring you up to speed."
"Yes, sir."
"Again… sorry to call you so late. I hope you hadn't already turned in."
"No, sir. Not a problem."
"Good. I'll talk to you later today. I just wanted to give you a heads-up on General Vintner's visit. Good night, Keith."
"Good night, sir."
He stared at the telephone in his hand for a long moment before quietly hanging it up. Spear-to-spear. The phrase, he knew, had been floating around the Pentagon and in various Navy headquarters for some time now as a deliberately misleading and unexciting euphemism. "Broken spear" had long been the code phrase for an incident involving a nuclear weapon or warhead that could lead to a nuclear accident. That phrase had led to the use of the more colorful "spear-to-spear" as a term for a nuclear showdown, a confrontation between two nuke-armed adversaries, each expecting the other to blink.
Nuclear confrontation. Washington's number one nightmare scenario.
He lifted his legs and rolled back into bed, trying to gently reestablish the warm spoon-embrace from which he'd been awakened. Kathy — somehow she'd slept through the phone's ring — stirred and mumbled something, but didn't wake up all the way.
Iran had nuclear warheads. There was little enough doubt about that. Tehran hadn't publicly announced the fact, or conducted a test, but they'd been spreading the word across the Middle East on an unofficial basis for at least the past two years, and getting a fair amount of political leverage for their effort throughout the region. North Korea had been selling them the equipment, the raw materials, and the know-how for ten years at least. Possibly they'd finally sold them a bomb as well… or possibly their own home-grown nuclear research had finally paid off.
Either way, Tehran had a long history of working closely with Islamic terrorists, as well as an even longer history of seeking military, political, and religious dominance throughout the Gulf. They might easily decide that nuclear confrontation with America would make them the heroes of the Muslim world.
And North Korea had also been giving them a lot of help with their ballistic missile program lately. There were intelligence estimates floating around inside the Washington Beltway now to the effect that Iran might be capable of hitting the continental U.S. with a nuclear ICBM within another five to seven years. Scary, scary stuff.
And there wasn't a lot that could be done about it, either. Ever since the invasion of Iraq had failed to turn up the WMDs that were the purported excuse for the invasion, the news media, Hollywood, and the more liberal segments of the U.S. population had been particularly outspoken in their stand against what they called American militarism. In his opinion, if those jokers could be believed, Iran had a perfect right to develop its own nuke weaponry.
Stewart wondered sometimes if the United States was going to have to lose a city or two before she woke up to the realities of a very dangerous modern world. He'd thought the loss of a couple of Manhattan skyscrapers had awakened the nation seven years ago. Evidently, it was going to take something more.
New York City, perhaps? Or Washington, D.C.?
As a U.S. naval officer and as the CO of a Navy warship, Stewart was oath-bound to stand between America and any enemy who sought to inflict that kind of harm on her. Unfortunately, there was only so much he could do, only so much any man could do.
But, by God, if there was a way the refurbished Ohio could make a difference out there in the narrow shallows of the Straits of Hormuz, then he would see to it that she made that difference.
Perhaps an hour later he knew he was not going to get back to sleep. Carefully easing his way out of the bed, he got up, dressed, wrote a note for Kathy on the computer for her to find when she got up, and left the house.
There was a hell of a lot of work to be done if the Ohio was to be ready for departure by Saturday.
5
A knock sounded on the door. Stewart looked up from the maintenance log he was reviewing. "Come."
The door swung open and the Marine sentry leaned inside. "Sir. General Vintner to see you, sir."
"Send him in!"
A submarine, even a vessel as relatively spacious as the Ohio, was a bit cramped for formalities, and even the captain's office — a small compartment adjoining his stateroom, which, with desk, chairs, and other essentials, was almost claustrophobic — was little more than a glorified walk-in closet.
Still, Stewart stood as the general entered. Vintner wore a civilian jacket and tie. He was gray-haired, in his late fifties or early sixties, Stewart guessed, but steel-hard in both his bearing and the expression in his eye. "Captain Stewart?" he said, extending a hand. "Thank you for seeing me."
"Captain Garrett strongly suggested that I see you, sir. But it is a pleasure, believe me." He gestured to the only chair other than his own in the room.
Vintner chuckled as he took a seat. "Captain Garrett can have strong opinions. He's a real hard-charger. As well as a good friend."
Stewart sat down again behind the desk. "Yes, sir.
Uh… coffee?"
"Thank you, no. I don't want to take up too much of your time, Captain. I understand you're making ready for sea."
"That's what they tell me. I… gather you have something to talk to me about that may have a bearing on this deployment?"
"Possibly," Vintner said. His jaw hardened. "Possibly. If you will indulge me, I'd like to tell you a little story."
"Of course."
"Operation Millennium Challenge. Have you read anything about it? Summer of '02."
Stewart searched his memory. "Um… something in Naval Proceedings? The war games in the Gulf just before we invaded Iraq?"
"That's the one. What do you know about it?"
Stewart shrugged. "It was a large-scale exercise. We needed to know we could deploy our fleet elements efficiently. A preparatory exercise for the real thing."
"Exactly." Vintner leaned back in his chair. "As it happens, I was part of the OPFOR staff."
OPFOR. Opposing Force. In military war games, OPFOR was the U.S. force serving as the enemy against which U.S. units could be deployed, trained, and tested.
"Millennium Challenge," Vintner went on, "was the most elaborate and expensive war game we've ever put together — two years in the planning, and costing something like $250 million. Altogether, it involved all of the service branches, with almost fourteen thousand U.S. troops at seventeen locations and nine life-force training sites, and using a small army of computers to run the simulations. It wasn't aimed at Iraq, exactly, but it was set in the Arabian Gulf, and it simulated a conflict with a hypothetical rogue nation. The good guys were 'Force Blue,' of course. The bad guys, OPFOR, were 'Force Red.' The war was set to last for three weeks, and to end with the overthrow of Force Red's tyrannical dictator on August fifteenth."