"Mr. President," the chairman of the Joint Chiefs said, leaning confidentially toward him, as though Taylor's face had already appeared on the monitors, as though the distant man were already listening in, "I don't think we should mention this Scrambler business to Colonel Taylor. Until we have a little more information. He's got enough on his mind."
President Waters spent the moment in which he should have been thinking in a state of blankness. Then he nodded his assent. Surely, the generals of the world knew what was best for the colonels of the world.
"All right," he said. "Put Colonel Taylor through."
Taylor did not want to talk to the President. Nor did he want to speak to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as much as he liked the old man. He did not want any communications now with anyone who might interfere with the operations plan that was rapidly being developed into an operations order for the commitment of his regiment. Besides, he was very tired. He had not yet taken his "wide-awakes," the pills that would keep a man alert and capable of fighting without sleep for up to five days without permanently damaging his health. He had hoped to steal a few hours of sleep before popping his pills, so that he would be in the best possible condition and have the longest possible stretch of combat capability in front of him. Now he sat wearily in the communications bubble in the bowels of an old Soviet warehouse, waiting.
Just let me fight, damnit, Taylor thought. There's nothing more to be done.
Sleep was out of the question now. By the time this nonsense was finished, it would be time to start the final command and staff meeting with the officers and key NCOs of the regiment. Then there would be countless last-minute things to do before the first M-100 lifted off.
"Colonel Taylor," he heard the voice in his earpiece. "I'm about to put you through to the President."
The central monitor in the communications panel fuzzed, then a superbly clear picture filled the screen. The President of the United States, looking slightly disheveled, elbows on a massive table.
The poor bastard looks tired, Taylor thought. Then he tried to perk himself up. His past exchanges with the President had taught him to be prepared for the most unexpected questions, and it was difficult not to be impatient with the President's naiveté. For Christ's sake, Taylor told himself, the man's the President of the United States. Don't forget it.
"Good morning, Mr. President."
For a moment, the President looked confused. Then he brightened and said, "Good evening, Colonel Taylor. I almost forgot our time difference. How is everything?"
"Fine, Mr. President."
"Everything's all right with the Soviets?"
"As good as we have any right to expect, sir."
"And your planning session? That went well, I take it?"
"Just fine, Mr. President."
"And you've got a good plan, then?"
Here it comes, Taylor thought.
"Yes, sir. I believe we have the best possible plan under the circumstances."
The President paused, considering.
"You're going to attack the enemy?"
"Yes, Mr. President."
"And you're happy with the plan?"
Something in the man's tone of voice, or in his weariness of manner, suddenly painted the situation for Taylor. The President of the United States was not trying to interfere. He was simply asking for reassurance. The obviousness of it, as well as the unexpected quality, startled Taylor.
"Mr. President, no plan is ever perfect. And every plan begins to change the moment men start to implement it. But I harbor no doubts — none — about the plan we've just hammered out with the Soviets. As the combat commander on the ground, I would not want to change one single detail."
Taylor heard a laugh from the other end, but the sound was disembodied. The President's face remained earnest, worn beyond laughter. Then Taylor heard the unmistakable voice of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the background.
"Mr. President, Colonel Taylor's telling you not to fiddle around with his plan. We'll give him a lesson in manners once we get him back in-country, but for now I think we better do what he says." The chairman laughed again, almost a snort. "I know Colonel Taylor, and he's apt to just ignore us, anyway. Isn't that right, George?"
Thank you, Taylor thought, fully aware of the risk the chairman had just taken on his behalf, and of the cover he had provided. I owe you one.
"Well, I'm not certain I like the thought of being ignored," the President said seriously, but without malice. "However, I have no intention of interfering with the colonel's plan. I think I know my limitations."
If I live, Taylor thought, until election day, I just might vote for the poor bastard, after all.
"Colonel Taylor," the President said, "I'm just trying to understand what's going on. I'm not a soldier, and I seem to spend a great deal of time being confused by all this. For instance, these wonder machines of yours, these miracle weapons. No one has ever managed to explain to me in plain English just exactly what they're all about, how they work. Could you take the time to do that?" How, Taylor wondered, could you tell your president that you did not have time, that you had everything but time?
"You mean the M-l00s, Mr. President?"
"Yes, all that gadgetry the taxpayers bought you. What's it going to do for them?"
Taylor took a deep breath, searching for a starting point. "Mr. President, the first thing you notice about the M-100 is that it's probably the ugliest weapons system ever built." Taylor heard a background voice ordering that an illustration of the M-100 be called up. "The troops call it the flying frog. But, when you fly it, when you learn to fight out of it, it becomes very beautiful. It's squat, with a big belly to hold all the equipment and the fire team of dragoons — mounted infantrymen — in the back. It has tilt rotors mounted on stubby wings. It doesn't look like it could possibly get off the ground. But it does fly, Mr. President, and it flies very fast for a ship of its kind — or slow, when you want it to. Its electronics make it almost invisible to the enemy. He might see it with the naked eye, but our countermeasures suite — the electronics that attack his electronics and confuse him — is so versatile, so fast, and works on so many levels, that one of his systems might see nothing but empty sky, while another sees thousands of images His guided munitions will see dummy aircraft projected around the real one. But our target acquisition system— the gear we use to find him—has 'work-through technology Unless the Japanese have come up with a surprise, we should be able to look right through their electronic defenses.
"You see," Taylor continued, choosing his words from the professional history of a military generation, "we rarely fight with our own eyes anymore. It's a competition of electronics, attempting to delude each other on multiple levels, thousands of times in a single second. The Japanese taught us a lot, the hard way. But we think we've got them this time. Anyway, the revolution in the miniaturization of power components gives us a range of up to fourteen hundred nautical miles, one way, depending on our combat load. That's good for a bulky system that's really still more of a helicopter than anything else. But the best part of all is the primary weapons system itself. The Japanese surprised us with laser weaponry back in Africa. And they're still using it. But on-board lasers have more problems than were apparent back in Zaire. We didn't realize how dependent the Japanese were on recharging their systems, for instance. They were closely tethered to their support system and they could only fight short, sharp engagements. We took a different technological tack.