“Thank you. Now go to work and prepare for the coming battle. Make sure all your weapons are ready to use once you get into orbit. Dr. Burns is no match for you or your ship. No matter what happens, the Americans must not succeed. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir. I will prepare our launch and weapons immediately.”
Chapter 58 – Need to Know
President Stevens, The Imagine, Rocky Mountains, CO
Friday mid-afternoon with T-3 hours and counting, everyone was involved in the launch. They’d been running around the clock, performing their duties.
President Stevens watched as the crew checked for leaks and listened as they performed air-to-ground voice checks with launch control. He knew it had always been United States policy not to start a war. But at the same time that Ivanov was plotting to blow up the American spacecraft, President Stevens was preparing for an attack on the Russians if the European countries were attacked first. He had the Pentagon aim all of the remaining missiles at Russia and moved all the nuclear submarines within shooting distance of Russia. Several aircraft carriers were transferred from the Middle East to the Black Sea.
As he stood near Major Johns at mission control, he was informed that there was someone there to see him with urgent intelligence. He stepped away to take it. The CIA gave the president a classified report that proved the Russians planned to destroy the spacecraft flown by Dr. Burns.
When the president read the signals intelligence report, he was appalled. The Russians had not found the listening device that had been planted in the Kremlin. Ivanov was not planning to withdraw from his plans to conquer Europe and perhaps the world. Ivanov and Putin had always wanted to restore the Soviet Union. To Ivanov, these natural disasters meant an opportunity to inflict more danger on everyone until they surrendered to Russia. He probably felt the Americans were weak and could not defend the NATO allies. That was one thing. Attempting to destroy the American spaceship was another problem.
Why would Ivanov want to destroy everything that these space explorers had cooperated on for twenty years? There were a lot of benefits to having four spaceships search for a new world instead of only the Russian ship doing so.
After all, these four spaceships had worked together for almost twenty years in preparation of securing a new planet in the spirit of cooperation. President Stevens did not want an escalation of war with Russia, but at this point, it seemed inevitable. Plans needed to be set up and followed if the spaceship was to be saved.
The president knew Tom would be busy on the ship and was not going to let anyone board once a countdown began. If he could not get through to him, he would have to tell Major Johns to stop the launch again.
After fifteen minutes, he contacted Tom on his view screen.
“Mr. President, what is wrong? It must be very urgent.”
“Hi, Tom. You are correct. We intercepted communication from Mr. Ivanov, describing plans to blow up your spaceship after it reaches orbit. The Germans and Australians will be destroyed after you, in all probability. Evidently, Ivanov never wanted to cooperate to save humanity. He is still obsessed with power and wants the Russian ship with Yuri to be the only one that will settle on a new planet.”
“That is very disturbing. Is Yuri part of the plan? I have had some problems with him, but I very much doubt he planned to blow up my ship. Are you sure this is true?”
“I wish it were not true. The CIA caught Ivanov discussing the plot and all of his plans. As for Yuri, with his own life and career at risk, he is not going to disobey Mr. Ivanov or help you. We think he is a puppet for Mr. Ivanov. He is just obeying orders. Can you postpone the launch again for a short duration so we can meet with the officers on the Imagine and the people in the Pentagon? It is vital that we are all on the same page. We can make up a story for the reason to postpone again. We cannot let on we know about the Russian plan. If we do not meet, there is no guarantee that you will escape the attack by the Russians. There is no guarantee with our help, either. But you will have a much better chance to defend yourselves.”
“Okay. I will announce a six-hour delay due to the installing of a few magnets in the fueling process. We might as well let people know that the liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen propellants are almost finished being filled. We should be ready to meet you within one hour. I will let you on board again. Please come to the bridge.”
Chapter 59 – The Rising Tide
Tom Burns, The Imagine, Rocky Mountains, CO
Tom hung up with the president. Just when I think we might succeed and launch, someone else wants to interfere with our mission, he thought.
Minutes later, Tom made an announcement informing everyone that the launch had been postponed a third time due to a few maintenance issues. All personnel had to remain at their designated areas until otherwise notified. Meanwhile, the principal officers went to the bridge for a meeting with the president and Pentagon via the viewscreen.
After setting up communication between all the parties on a secure line, the president spoke first. He repeated the intercepted communication that was obtained by the CIA. It was clear the Russians were going to attack Europe to set up an attack on the Imagine. The one thing they had going for them was the element of surprise, since the Russians did not suspect America could do anything to prevent the attack from taking place.
The president was willing to attack Russia at multiple locations. Two main issues had to be discussed. First, should the spaceship even launch knowing that they could be struck by a nuclear missile designed to kill everyone and destroy the mission? Second, should the United States attack the Russians before the Russians attacked the United States?
The generals in the Pentagon wanted to deal with the second issue. About half of them felt a first-strike initiative was better than waiting for Russia to attack.
“If we destroy them first, they might not be able to retaliate or shoot down the spaceship. It would teach the Russians a lesson not to meddle in the affairs of the United States,” said one of the generals.
The other half of the generals preferred to see Russia attack first, since our missile defenses in Poland and on the submarines could effectively blow up the Russian missiles before they did damage. If we blew up a Russian nuclear missile while it was still over Russia, the radioactive fallout would kill millions of Russians.
After several generals weighed in on that issue, the president asked Tom and his officers what they wanted the United States Armed Forces to do, knowing hostile missiles would be shot at them. There was no guarantee the missile defense could block every Russian missile.
After a short discussion with his officers, Tom stood up.
“This is the biggest decision we have had to make as a team. I was not sure how we would get along with the Russians in space given some of the problems we have already had with them, but the idea we will be shot down and killed by Russian nuclear missiles is quite terrifying. My understanding of United States policy is we do not attack another country until they attack first. My feeling about attacking them first would depend on the number of missiles they plan to launch at us and our allies. If the number is large, we should hit them first. However, if we are talking about a few missiles, I say let them attack first, and we can destroy the missiles before they hit anything of consequence.”
Next, Bob Jackson stood up. “The officers of this ship will support whatever the president decides. However, it is our feeling that we cannot wait to launch forever. We cannot postpone our launch due to a Russian threat. The Russians will always have the capability of shooting at us. Whether they succeed in destroying us is another story. We have worked too hard and too long to back down to a threat like this. If the United States government is able to protect us until we are out of orbit, then we all agree we want to launch soon and take our chances.”