On the heels of the President’s announcement, the Department of Transportation announced that as of Monday morning, October 5, all ports and airports on the East Coast would be closed to incoming ships and aircraft — except for those aircraft specifically designated for evacuation purposes.
The London tabloids, five hours ahead of Washington, set the tone for the media bonanza, ruthlessly joining together the two American news stories, and the papers appeared on the streets by two o’clock, East Coast Time, on Wednesday morning, September 30.
MAC CRACKS UNDER TERRORIST THREAT, shouted the London Daily Mail’s headline, in end-of-the-world type, above a subhead that read:
U.S. PRESIDENT MCBRIDE QUITS
WHITE HOUSE TYRANT MORGAN RECALLED
One single large photograph of the new President was captioned: PAUL BEDFORD TAKES THE OATH WITH ADMIRAL ARNOLD MORGAN AT HIS SIDE.
It was in fact a dazzling front page, and all the twenty-four-hour American television news channels were showing it before 3 A.M. The Mail devoted six pages to the story, the lead being written by its star political feature writer Tony Pina.
On a bright October afternoon of pure political theater, Charles McBride resigned yesterday as the 44th President of the United States. He left secretly by Navy helicopter from the lawn outside the Oval Office.
Minutes later, Vice President Paul Bedford was sworn into office before a select group of military chiefs, which included the former National Security Adviser Admiral Arnold Morgan, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Tim Scannell, and the heads of the United States Navy and Marine Corps.
Senator Edward Kennedy was also in attendance for the ceremony, which was conducted by Judge David Moore, who had been specially appointed by the Supreme Court.
Fifteen minutes into his Presidency, Paul Bedford summoned the White House Press Corps to the Briefing Room, where he explained that his predecessor had suffered a nervous breakdown and was under medical supervision at Camp David.
He then revealed that the United States has been under a monumental threat from a Middle Eastern terrorist group that has already blown up Mount St. Helens, the giant volcano in Washington State, and then exploded the simmering Caribbean volcano on the island of Montserrat on Monday night.
The threat to the U.S.A. was to erupt the Cumbre Vieja on the Canary Island of La Palma, thus setting off a mega-tsunami across the Atlantic that would wipe out the American East Coast and greatly harm the shores of Western Europe and North Africa — unless the American President agrees to move its entire military force out of the Persian Gulf area, and strong-arm Israel into conceding an Independent State of Palestine, vacating the left bank territories.
So far as we know, the United States has made no effort to comply with these demands, and is believed to be conducting a massive search in the Atlantic to find a nuclear submarine apparently containing the terrorists and submerge-launch cruise missiles with nuclear warheads.
The terrorists’ threat, that horrendous prospect of a mega-tsunami, is believed to have proved too much for President McBride, who was reported to have collapsed on hearing the news that the terrorists had hit Montserrat on Monday, carrying out a previous threat, almost to the minute.
President Bedford has vowed to catch the submarine and destroy it, and has announced plans to evacuate the cities of Boston, New York, and Philadelphia.
Scientists say that from the moment of impact in the seas off La Palma, there would be only nine hours before New York City went under more than 100 feet of water.
On the opposite page was an large picture of Admiral Morgan in Naval uniform, beneath the headline — THE RETURN OF THE IRON MAN. The accompanying story began:
Admiral Arnold Morgan, the former nuclear submarine commander who held the last Republican Administration together, was called yesterday out of retirement and summoned to the White House by the new Democratic President.
The White House confirmed that the Admiral has been appointed Supreme Commander of Operation High Tide, the code name for the massive submarine hunt currently under way in the Atlantic to locate and take out the terrorist warship…
Since the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs had been reluctant to admit there was any connection between the McBride resignation and the threat from Hamas, the U.S. television networks had been reluctant to join the two stories. The devil-may-care treatment of the situation by the London papers, however, gave them all the Dutch courage they needed, and by breakfast time, there was no doubt in the minds of Americans: Charles McBride had cracked, and wimped his way out of the Oval Office, afraid to face the personal torment of ordering his fleet into action to destroy an aggressor. Worse yet, he may not have had the courage to order an evacuation of the big cities and coastline communities. And there were several newspaper and television features on Arnold Morgan, “The Man the U.S. Government apparently cannot do without.”
There were various headlines on the same drift:
ADMIRAL MORGAN — THE LION OF THE WEST WING
THE DAY ADMIRAL MORGAN FACED DOWN CHINA
ARNOLD MORGAN — AMAN FOR TROUBLED TIMES
ADMIRAL MORGAN — PATRIOT OR A GLOBAL GAMBLER?
MORGAN — THE MAN WHO FLEXES AMERICA’S MUSCLE
What no one wrote, anywhere in the world, was that President McBride had been frog-marched out of the Oval Office by a Detail from the United States Marine Corps, while the Service Chiefs looked on.
It had been a military coup of the kind that usually happens in those restless countries around the world in which economic crises, drug wars, and power-hungry dictators had taken their toll. But with the difference that this was America, Land of the Free, where the coup, if the term even applied, had lasted only ten minutes, after which order was restored and the flag never lowered.
Wednesday morning, September 30, saw a drastic change of pace in Washington. The entire city was dominated by the Military, the National Guard, and the police. All unnecessary business was halted, criminal and civil cases were suspended, arrangements were made to evacuate court officials. In two instances, it was necessary to isolate the juries — certainly for nine days, possibly longer.
Colleges and schools were preparing to close down at the end of the day. Hospitals were canceling planned operations, discharging as many patients as possible, and preparing for the evacuation of the seriously ill.
The Army were already in hospital corridors assisting with the removal of high-value medical equipment. At some of the bigger establishments, there were as many as six 18-wheelers parked outside emergency room entrances, while the troops loaded up and recorded space-age hospital diagnostic machinery in readiness for journeys to U.S. Air Force bases on higher ground.
Hotels and motels all along the East Coast were refusing all new reservations, and guests already in residence were asked to leave as soon as possible. The Hamas threat was not, after all, from a group of reasonable, educated people. It was from a bunch of Middle Eastern brigands who would stop at nothing, and who might even panic and blow the Cumbre Vieja four or five days early, since it was now obvious the U.S.A. could not, or would not, comply with their demands.
If the tsunamis of Krakatoa were anything to go by, any heavy, loose objects, like automobiles, railroad cars, pleasure boats, even light aircraft, would be swept up and hurled around like toys. This applied also to more permanent structures like telegraph poles, statues, billboards, electric pylons, and trees.