A few laughs, snickers and whoops could be heard, mostly from the NCO’s.
This was a tactic used by General “Black Jack” Pershing in the Philippines prior to World War One. The US had taken possession of the Philippines during the Spanish American War of 1898. In 1911, a Muslim uprising took place in Mindanao, and General Pershing had the insurgents shot with bullets dipped in pig’s blood and then their bodies were buried with the guts of the pig. This discouraged future Muslim attacks by future Jihadis because they believed they would be prevented from entering Paradise if they were buried with the blood from a pig and its guts. General Gardner’s staff wanted to take a page from history and see if it would make a difference in this war — any small advantage that could be gained was something worth pursuing, no matter how strange or unconventional it may be.
“If anyone has further questions, please stay behind and ask them to Brigadier General Williams. I want everyone ready to move within the next twelve hours.”
“Eric, are the other HIVE locations operational yet?” asked Monty.
“All thirty sites are operational; we’ve located and moved every member of Congress and senior government official along with their families to the secured locations. There should be no more high level assassinations,” said Eric Jordan in a serious tone.
“I still cannot believe the Chinese would openly assassinate our elected officials,” said Jorge Perez in disbelief.
“The world powers seem to be trying pretty hard to put us down for the count,” said Monty angrily.
“Is the President going to sign the Executive Orders for the Trinity Project today?” asked Director Perez.
“We are still going forward with the program? I thought we had agreed to table that,” said Jane Smart, the Director of the FBI.
“We had tabled it, until the Chinese killed all but three of the Supreme Court Judges and Senator Landrew. Between the Muslim extremists in our country and Chinese sleeper agents, the President made the decision to move forward with it last night,” explained Monty.
“I understand your concern with it Jane; if it does not work, then we will shut it down,’ said Director Perez.
“Call me old fashioned, but once this program goes live I highly doubt it will ever be turned off. It’ll become too powerful a tool to simply cancel it.”
“Right now, we need to stop these terrorist attacks and bring some sense of security to the American people. The war in Israel is finally starting to turn in our favor, but the Chinese have really hit us hard,” explained Monty with a bit of concern in his voice.
The Trinity Program was the culmination of decades of identity intelligence collection, social media monitoring, big data and predictive behavioral analysis into one program. Essentially, the program would scan people’s social media pages, blogs, and other easily obtainable information and analyze the behavioral characteristics of every single person in the US and the rest of the globe to provide a predictive analysis as to whether or not that individual posed a security threat. Because of the use of biometrically enabled national identity cards, the purchases people were making could also be included in the profiles being generated.
Once the parameters for the search were entered into the program, the system could immediately go to work providing real-time data of threats, including: their locations, who they were connected to, and a detailed dossier of the individual’s activity that met the program’s requirements, justifying them as a valid threat. Once a link to a known threatening individual had been made, a warrant for further investigation would be acquired from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. Then the program would begin to go through the individual’s emails, phone calls, text messages, banking records, etcetera, until it had built a complete dossier of the individual for analysts and senior leadership to determine their next steps. Once activated, the Trinity Program would become the most complex and detailed profiling and surveillance program in the world.
By 2039, biometrics had become a major part of the American economy and was a major component in reducing crime throughout the country. Through federal grants, The Department of Homeland Security had assisted cities and communities throughout the country in installing traffic and surveillance cameras in public places and buildings, similar to what London and other British cities had done. The network of cameras covered the vast majority of public spaces, making it easier to track the movement of suspicious individuals.
Of course, the Trinity Program was highly classified, with less than 20 total people in the government knowing about its existence, including the two programmers who built it. There were also several checks and balances built into the program to ensure it would not be used for a political or discriminatory role outside of its stated mission to protect the Homeland. All four agency directors, in addition to the President, Speaker of the House and Senate Majority Leader, had to agree on the search parameters and any modifications before it could be used or changed.
As Jane and Monty were engaged in their intense discussion about the Trinity Program, the President walked into the War Room. He could tell by the awkward silence that followed his entrance to the room that he was interrupting something. “Sorry for the intrusion. I know I’m a few minutes late, but let’s go ahead and get this meeting started.”
“Mr. President, we have broken the briefing down by theaters of operation as requested. The first theater we are going to discuss is Asia,” said Colonel James. Colonel Alisa James was a sharp Air Force officer who had been the Defense Attaché to China just four months prior. Her unique knowledge of Chinese military capabilities attracted the President’s attention during a briefing at the start of the war with the IR, and she had been his preferred briefer ever since.
“In Taiwan, the PLA has landed nearly 215,000 troops and effectively split the country in half. The Taiwanese Defense Forces, or TDF, believe they should be able to hold their current positions for at least another month, and will continue to do so for as long as they can. The TDF destroyed nearly 20 % of the invasion force’s ships and shot down over 1,300 Chinese fighter drones. Ultimately, the TDF will have to surrender if they are not reinforced, but at present, they are tying the PLA down and costing them thousands of casualties a day.”
“We have three attack submarines in the area who have been hitting the Chinese surface fleet on and off for the last three days with some success. They were able to destroy a PLAN heavy missile cruiser along with two roll-on, roll-off heavy transport ships, which will probably hurt the PLA/PLAN logistically more than any of the other ships sunk thus far.”
“In Okinawa, the PLAN and PLAAF have destroyed our Naval, Marine and Air Force bases on the Island. Most of our aircraft that had not deployed prior to the surprise attack by the Chinese were destroyed on the ground. The 12,200 Marines, Sailors and Airmen are working with 15,000 Japanese Defense Forces (or JDF) to prepare the island for a potential invasion. Unfortunately, we do not have any capabilities within the region to evacuate our military members from the island. Should the Chinese land ground forces on the island, our forces are on their own.”
“The North Koreans and Chinese have not made a move towards South Korea yet. We are not sure how long this will last. Admiral Libby, the PACOM CG has ordered all American forces in Korea to withdraw to Japan. The South Koreans have activated their entire reserve forces and are moving to fill in our positions as we withdraw.”