“We are too scared of his arsenal,” Admiral Wilhelm Riess said, dryly.
“It will not be long before he gets the impression he can simply use those weapons to force us into submission,” Voss insisted. “We have to strike back, hard. Pick a target and annihilate it!”
“And what happens,” Krueger asked, “when he blasts another target in response? Do we blast a second target in Germany East?”
“If necessary,” Voss said. “He doesn’t have the power to devastate Germany Prime.”
“He does have the power to fire on America,” Volker said.
“If he’s managed to get the ballistic missiles unlocked,” Voss said.
“I think we’ve just seen proof that he has managed to unlock and detonate some of the tactical devices,” Riess said. “We cannot take the risk of assuming he can’t fire the ballistic missiles.”
“This is madness,” Krueger said. “If we strike a military target, we make matters harder for us; if we strike a civilian target, we butcher thousands of our own people.”
“And if we don’t,” Voss said, his voice rising sharply, “Holliston will butcher more of our people.”
“They are all our people,” Krueger said. “Field Marshal…”
“Enough,” Volker snapped. He slapped the table, loudly. “Is there any other way to deter Karl Holliston from unleashing more of his tactical nuclear weapons?”
“We could try to come to terms with him,” Riess suggested. “He can have Germany East, as long as the Easterners are prepared to put up with him…”
“And then we see him launching another invasion in the spring,” Voss said.
“I would be surprised if he could,” Krueger mused. “Replacing all of the lost or damaged pieces of war materiel will take years.”
“You don’t know that,” Voss said.
Volker held up a hand before the argument could get out of hand again. “Let me pose a question,” he said. “Can we resume the offensive before spring?”
“No, Herr Chancellor,” Voss said. “We lost too many men and machines in the blasts. I think the best we can hope for is some raiding of enemy lines — and now that winter is approaching rapidly, even that will have to be curtailed. The offensive will have to be delayed until spring.”
“And it may not be possible even then,” Krueger put in.
Volker barely heard him. He’d hoped for a quick victory, despite the certain knowledge that his government would pay a hellish price for it. But Holliston had trumped him, using nuclear weapons to ensure that the war couldn’t be won quickly — if at all. He was fairly sure that Holliston couldn’t devastate Germany Prime — most of the SS’s cruise missiles had been fired during the invasion of Germany Prime — but the price would still be horrendous. Could Germany East be invaded without so much death and devastation that the victory wouldn’t be worth the candle?
And if I irradiate a military target in my path, he thought, I’ll simply make life harder for my own men.
He didn’t like the idea of using atom bombs. Voss was right, Holliston had to be deterred; Krueger was right, Holliston might just launch a third nuclear device in response. And who knew what would happen then? The tit-for-tat missile exchanges predicted by the briefing notes depended on the commanders on both sides being fundamentally rational. What happened when one or both of the commanders was not rational?
And how many Germans am I prepared to kill, he asked himself, in what might be a vain attempt to deter a madman?
There was always the Germanica Option, he admitted silently. It wouldn’t be that hard to get a nuclear warhead to Germanica, to destroy the city. And it might destroy Holliston’s Government too.
And who knows, he mused, what will happen then?
He had no answer. Holliston wasn’t the type of person to appoint a successor, not when his successor might be ambitious enough to stick a knife in Holliston’s back. It was possible that Germany East would come apart, but also possible that someone more rational would take control… or that the remaining weapons would be launched in one final spasm of violence before the Reich disintegrated. There were too many variables for him to take the risk.
And there’s no guarantee of killing Holliston, he thought. The bastard might survive long enough to order a full-scale nuclear strike.
He cleared his throat. “Find a target — a military target — somewhere within Germany East,” he said, slowly. “Make sure it’s somewhere that won’t cause us problems, when — if — we resume the offensive. That target will be destroyed with one of our atomic bombs.”
“I must protest,” Krueger said, stiffly.
“I understand,” Volker said. “But we cannot allow Holliston to believe that we will just bend over for him.”
“There’s a large SS training centre,” Voss mused. “It might make an ideal target.”
“Or the docks near Valhalla,” Grossadmiral Cajus Bekker offered. “They’d be close enough to Germanica for the civilians to see the flash.”
Volker shook his head. He understood Bekker’s concerns — the SS controlled the docks near Valhalla, at the eastern edge of the Gulf of Finland, and it had captured a number of warships during the chaotic early days of the uprising — but the target was too close to Valhalla. The city would be devastated by the blast, even if it wasn’t targeted directly. No, better to target a training centre. If nothing else, it might show everyone else in Germany East just how far matters had gone downhill.
“The training centre will do,” he said, shaking his head slowly. A year ago, he had never even imagined that he would be making such decisions. And now, part of him had quietly accepted the deed and moved on. “Prepare the weapon and the delivery system.”
“Jawohl,” Voss said.
Volker looked from face to face. They all looked tired, tired and worn. He didn’t really blame them, either. They all bore some responsibility for the nuclear holocaust, even if it had been Karl Holliston who’d pushed the trigger. And they all knew that they were helpless to put an end to the war.
Horst is still on his way east, Volker thought. Maybe he can find allies in the east.
He pushed the thought aside and leaned forward. “We’ll continue to repair our defences, raid their positions and generally make their lives miserable,” he said. “And we will do our best to ensure that the wounded are well treated.”
“We can’t,” Krueger said, flatly. “Our health system was on the brink for years. It was breaking down even before this catastrophe.”
“We will try,” Volker said. He was not going to order the mass execution of countless soldiers, even if it would be a mercy kill. “We owe it to men who fought for us.”
Krueger met his eyes. “At what cost?”
“Whatever we have to pay,” Volker snarled. The surge of anger surprised him. If Konrad had lived, would his son now be dying of radiation poisoning? No, the uprising would never have taken place. But what would have happened instead? “We owe them.”