“Show me our course.”
“Zu befehl.” As you command. A dotted red line appeared from Salem’s current position to the end of her firing run.
“Mark optimum firing positions for each target.”
“Zu befehl.”
“Lay guns automatically to engage each target from optimum firing position. Three-round burst per gun.”
“Target nummer vier in… fünf… vier… drei… zwei…”
“Fire!”
Salem shuddered as each of her three main turrets spat out nine eight-inch shells in six seconds. The AID tracked the path of each shell and automatically adjusted the lay of each gun within each turret.
“Engagement suboptimal, Herr Kapitän. Recommend repeat.”
“Repeat.”
Again the ship shuddered.
The avatar spoke, “Target assessed destroyed. Target nummer zwei in… fünf… vier… drei…”
“Captain,” Daisy Mae announced, “I hate to cut this short but we are due to commence our firing run in four minutes. Shall I meet you on the bridge?”
McNair nodded and stood to go.
“We’ll continue this conversation later,” he promised as Daisy disappeared.
From a position under a shed erected at the base of Cerro Paraiso, Paradise Hill, two senior Panamanian officers, one of them a major general, the other a colonel, watched a platoon of Chinese-built light tanks, accompanied by a platoon of mechanized infantry in American-built M-113s armored personnel carriers, moving by bounds down the range and toward a razor-backed ridge to the west of, and paralleling the Canal.
There should have been fuel and ammunition to run this exercise several times, Boyd knew.
But there wasn’t.
However hard he tried, Boyd seemed completely unable to stop supplies from disappearing. Sometimes it was vehicles that disappeared into the ether. At other times, it was weapons, ammunition, food or fuel. Building material was so fast to go that he expected to see new highrises popping up all over Panama City.
It was costing, too, and in more than monetary terms. Roads were not being completed, roads that not only would be required to support the defense but were required to move and supply men and materials to build the defense. Bunkers were half-started and left unfinished. Obstacles, from barbed wire to landmines were left undone. Fields of fire remained uncut. Only those fortifications the gringos built directly for themselves were improving to schedule.
The fortifications that were not being completed didn’t matter, per se, to the lean, ferocious looking colonel standing next to Boyd. Suarez commanded one of the six mechanized regiments in the armed forces. To him roads mattered a lot, bunkers not a bit.
“But they’re stealing my fucking fuel,” Suarez fumed. “How the fuck am I supposed to train a mechanized force without any goddamned fuel? How the fuck am I supposed to train my gunners without any fucking ammunition?”
“For the life of me, Colonel, I know it is going, but I have no clue where it is going to, or how it is getting there,” Boyd answered.
Suarez thought deeply for a moment. How far do I trust this one? He is one of the families; can he be trusted at all? But then, he is here, now, trying to help, trying to put a stop to this vampiric siphoning of the lifeblood of our defense… and his reputation is good.
What decided Suarez was the Combat Infantryman’s Badge on Boyd’s chest. Panama had adopted it, just recently, and Suarez himself had been given the award, albeit rather tardily, for actions in defense of the Comandancia in 1989. It meant something to those few entitled to wear it.
Suarez answered, “I don’t know where or how either, General, but I sure as hell know who. And so do you.”
Boyd scowled. “Mercedes? That one is certain. His whole family down to illegitimate fourth cousins, too.”
“And both vice presidents. And every second legislator,” Suarez added. “And all four corps commanders and all but maybe two of the division commanders. Every goddamned one of the bastards looking out for number one.”
“Cortez, too, do you think?” Boyd asked.
Suarez spit. “He’s got a lot more opportunity than most to steal fuel, no?”
“So much for ‘Duty, Honor, Country,’ ” Boyd mused.
Cortez was a 1980 graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point. Boyd had learned a certain distaste for “ring knockers” as a young private. That distaste had never quite left, and Cortez’s depredations had only served to bring it back to full strength.
“From the division commanders all the way up to the president, himself.” Boyd shook his head with regret and disgust. “God pity poor Panama.”
“God won’t save us, sir,” Suarez corrected. “If anyone saves us it will have to be ourselves.”
Boyd bit his lower lip nervously. I think I know what he means: a coup. Yet another in the endless series of coups d’etat that are the bane of Latin political life. But I can’t participate in a coup. I just can’t.
Previously Mercedes had worked through intermediaries. Today was special. A Darhel, titled the Rinn Fain, accompanied by the United States Undersecretary of State for Extraterrestrial Affairs, had deigned to come to see to the defense of Panama personally.
The Darhel entered the president’s office with grace and a seemingly confident strength. The president had been briefed that the Darhel never shook hands. Instead, Mercedes greeted the alien with a suitably subservient deep bow which the Darhel returned less than a tenth of. The president then showed the Darhel around the office, pointing out some of the tacky and vulgar artwork on the walls. The alien commented favorably on a few of the works.
A measure of just how bad this shit is, thought the undersecretary, that the Darhel can find merit in it.
Soon enough, the president, the undersecretary and the Darhel found each other facing across the small conference table tucked into one corner of the office. The undersecretary was the first to speak.
“Mr. President, the Rinn Fain is, as you know, the Galactic emissary to the United Nations for International and Intergalactic law, treaties, and the law of armed conflict. He is here to speak to you about certain questionable things Panama is engaged in, in the preparation of its defense, things which violate some prohibitions contained in human, and galactic, law.”
Again, Mercedes made the Darhel as slimy a bow as the height of the table would permit.
The Rinn Fain went silent, face smoothing into an almost complete mask of indifference, upon being seated. Only the alien’s lips moved, repetitively, like an Asian priest reciting a mantra. While the Darhel recited, he removed from the folds of his clothing a small black box, an AID.
“The Rinn Fain’s AID will speak for him,” the undersecretary said. “I understand it is programmed to deal with the law.” In fact, the nearest English translation of the AID’s basic central program was “shyster.”
“The law,” said the Darhel’s AID in an artificial voice, “stands above sentient creatures, above their political and commercial systems, above the perceived needs of the present crisis or of any crisis. Before there were men, there was law.”
Mercedes nodded his most profound agreement. Without the law, I could never take as much as I do.
“It has come to our attention that the Republic of Panama, at the instigation of the United States, has decided to adopt certain defensive measures prohibited by your own laws of war. I refer specifically to the planned use of antipersonnel landmines.”
Mercedes’ brow furrowed in puzzlement. He recalled being briefed on some such but the details…? Well, military details hardly interested him absent the opportunity for graft.
“I am somewhat surprised, I confess,” Mercedes said, “that Galactic law even addresses landmines.”
“It does not, not specifically,” the alien shyster-AID answered. “What it does do is require that member states and planets of the confederation follow their own laws in such matters. Panama is a signatory to what the people of your world sometimes call the ‘Ottawa Anti-Personnel Landmine Ban Treaty.’ As such, Panama is expected to abide by the terms of that treaty, to refrain from the manufacture, stockpiling, or use of antipersonnel mines.”
A detail, previously forgotten, suddenly popped into Mercedes head. “But we are manufacturing, stockpiling, or emplacing no mines. They all come from the gringos.”
The undersecretary sighed wistfully at the wickedness of a depraved mankind. “Despite the earnest recommendations of the United States Department of State, the United States has never ratified the Ottawa Accord.”
“As such,” the shyster-AID continued, “the United States is free to use them at will. This is not the case for Panama, however, which has a duty — so we of the legal bureau believe — to prevent them from being manufactured, used or stored not only by its forces but on its soil.”
“The gringos are not going to go along with this,” Mercedes observed.
Again the undersecretary spoke, “It is true, Mr. President, that those Neanderthals at the Department of Defense will take a dim view of any attempt to prevent them from using these barbaric devices.”
Calculating that the time had come to present the threat, the Rinn Fain’s AID added, “However, failure to abide by and enforce its own laws will put the Republic of Panama, and its citizens, under Galactic commercial interdiction.”
“No trade?” asked Mercedes.
“No trade,” answered the undersecretary.
“And no travel via any Galactic means,” finished the Darhel’s shyster-AID.
At that Mercedes eyes bugged out. No travel! That means I am stuck here and so is my family. Oh, no. Oh, nonononono. This will never do.
“Could we not withdraw from the treaty?” Mercedes asked. “I seem to recall that most treaties permit withdrawal.”
“In this case, no,” said the undersecretary. “You might have withdrawn before the current war began. However, pursuant to Article Twenty, no state engaged in war may withdraw from the treaty during the period of that war, even if landmines are used against it.”
“I see. Well, in that case, Mr. Undersecretary, Lord Rinn Fain, you have my personal word that the Republic of Panama will do everything in its power to abide by its obligations under the law.”