A state of disobedience (23 page)

Colonel Farrell was of course duly court-martialed for violation of Article 88, UCMJ, "Contempt Towards Officials." This was one of two surprises. The first surprise was that he had not resigned from the Air Force to avoid that prosecution; this being the usual procedure. The second was that he was acquitted by a jury of his peers at that court-martial.

This acquittal did not save Colonel Farrell from a most unpleasant posting to Thule Air Force Base, Greenland, of course. . . .

Only once before had the American military, most especially its officer corps, been put to the test. And then, in 1861, fully a third had cast off their allegiance to the United States Constitution and joined their home states. These were joined, in some few cases, by officers of northern birth who were in political sympathy with the secessionists' aims.

That, however, was in a context of peculiar circumstances and widely differing interpretation of what was and was not constitutionally permissible and proper.

In the Rottemeyer presidency, on the other hand, there was little or no such difference of opinion among military officers. There was scarcely more among the rank and file . . . of any color, sex or religious persuasion. Almost openly spurned and despised by their commander in chief, the soldiers—officers and men, alike—heartily returned the feelings. Drawn themselves largely from the more rural—hence conservative—parts of the United States, they had little philosophical sympathy for her political and social goals, which were largely urban and liberal, shading over to Marxist. Their organizations twisted, warped and perverted by those goals, only long habits of obedience to civil authority, coupled with a lack of any clear alternatives, had kept these men and women to their duty.

And yet, what
was
that duty? These men and women had sworn an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. But a domestic force that flouted the first and second amendments, bought votes and influence through cash payments to the underclass, violated the doctrine of separation of powers, and persecuted their churches?

Increasingly, the habits of discipline, obedience, and subordination to civilian control found themselves warring with the deeper meaning of the military oath, "
all
enemies, foreign and
domestic
." Increasingly the military saw Rottemeyer and her movement as such. Increasingly, men and women in uniform resolved to—if not openly resist—at least damn by faint support whenever and wherever the opportunity might arise.

The first such instance during the crisis was, arguably, the departure of the heavy corps from Texas; leaving behind so much useful materiel. The second, almost open, rebellion came with the assault on the Western Currency Facility. The third, and sometimes this
was
open rebellion, was the refusal of the Air Force's pilots to participate.

Army and Marine companies and platoons could be led by their less politically astute or sensitive noncommissioned officers. Even ships could sail and maintain a blockade under their senior chiefs.

Planes do not fly without pilots, and to an extraordinary degree those men (and in a few cases, women) refused, openly or tacitly, to fly.

This was, of course, equally true of helicopters.

There were, of course, some pilots, experienced ones even, that could be bought. . . . 

DIRECT EXAMINATION, CONTINUED

BY MR. STENNINGS:
Q. What did you find in Baltimore, besides a job, Alvin?
A. Well, I noticed posters going up all over town, eventually. They were kind of crudely done, if you know what I mean. Well . . . maybe crude isn't quite the right word; the drawings were a good enough likeness, after all.
You know the ones I mean? They showed Governor Seguin from a front view and from the side, just like she was a criminal or something. For a while there they were everywhere: "Wanted: Dead or Alive."
Now, of course, nobody ever took any credit for them. They weren't official. They didn't offer any reward or anything like that.
 

But it started me to thinking, which never did come too easy to me. I mean, I'm not stupid. I never read books much, but I'm not stupid.
Anyway, if the White House could pay people to march in parades, and I was pretty sure that's where that money I was handed did come from, why couldn't they make up—have someone make up—some posters like that?
Take it all together: the parades, the news that all seemed to come from one side only, the posters. What did it add up to?
To me? Well, I added one and one and one and came up with the White House. But I figure to a lot of folks, it probably seemed like it added up to real—what do you call it?—a tidal wave? Yeah, a tidal wave of support for doing whatever it took to knock Texas into the dirt.

The faint nimbus of the rising sun was only just beginning to peek over the low Oklahoma hills to the east. A mild southern wind carried little dust on its breeze, and virtually none into the eyes of the Army teams overseeing the loading and departure of a battalion of PGSS "agents" towards Fort Worth.

The helicopters themselves, however, kicked up enough dust to be an annoyance. It was an annoyance to which the Army was long since used, however. The soldiers shrugged it off.

Not so the PGSS. Unused to helicopters at best—most of them, they snarled and choked as they neared the birds designated to take them by "chalk"—strange Army term meaning one load for one helicopter, so they had found out—to their landing zones.

The snarling was only about half due to the dust, however, or perhaps a bit less. Mostly they were frightened. They'd never been recruited, armed, organized or trained for this kind of mission. The last several weeks' intense training under qualified Army instructors had made good some of this lack—albeit not without some friction between the two. Still, the idea of close combat in buildings—the worst and deadliest kind of combat, so their instructors had told them—had not been high on their list of reasons for joining up.

With a circle of hands and a pointed finger the ground teams signaled their helicopters to take off into the wind.

Other battalions waited to load as soon as their transport returned.

Officers could not speak ill of the President of the United States. Noncoms and enlisted men could not insult officers but
could
say whatever they wanted about the President; no rule against it. At least there was no legal and official rule against it. The political officers—the troops had already taken to calling them "Zampolits"—might have different ideas.

Thus it was that, surrounded by officers and flight warrants of the battalion, one lone, slightly chubby first sergeant by the name of Henry looked around, saw no Zampolits, then stood upon a folding mess table and announced, "Be proud, gentlemen, be proud. That sound you hear over toward the PZ? Why that's our own brave boys carrying the 'elite of the nation'—
Rottenmuncher's Own
, the arrogant cocksuckers—into battle. What an awesome and welcome mission. What a garland for our proud unit's history. Can't you just imagine it, imagine how you're all going to feel when we get that campaign streamer that says 'Western Currency Facility' to put on our standard right next to Ia Drang and Al Nasriyeh?

"Oh, yes . . . something for each of us to tell our children and our grandchildren. 'Why yes, Johnny, I was there pulling pitch . . . or turning a wrench . . . or running tests of the electronics when the Rottenmuncher hammered the last shackle on the United States. Yep . . . that was me, your old grandpappy, helping make the world unsafe for democracy."

Most present in the tent laughed; First Sergeant Henry was one of those characters a lucky unit has; treasured because of—not in spite of—his humor and cynicism.

One warrant pilot did not laugh. Chewing and swallowing his bite of "undifferentiated meat with differentiated sauce" quickly, this warrant officer, CWO2 Harrington, asked, "And what the hell are we supposed to do, Top? We get our orders. We follow them."

Henry's lip curled in a sneer, not at the warrant so much as at the world. "Do, sir? Why I didn't say we should 'do' anything. Why that would be mutiny, sir, and I would, of course, never counsel mutiny. Why I would not even suggest to you gentlemen—oh, and ladies—that you remember your oaths to the country, because if I did then—who knows?—you might mutiny on your own.

"No sir, not me, never. No mutiny from this end.

"I might, though, ask the chaplain—oh, and you, too, sir," Henry indicated with a finger the battalion's JAG officer, "if it would be mutiny to ask God to help those men in the WCF that are going to be fighting there soon for
our
freedom."

Henry looked around for the unit chaplain. Finding him, and catching the chaplain's eye, the first sergeant shouted, "Hey 'Chap,' can we make this a
prayer
breakfast?"

Sawyers shouted into the ear of the newsman assigned to follow him and his command into the Western Currency Facility. "They haven't got a prayer, those dumb bastards on the receiving end."

"Why's that, Commander," asked the newsman.

"We're trained professionals, son. Those guys are just part-timers."

"You or your men ever clear a fortified building before?"

"A building's not fortified unless it's well defended," countered Sawyers. "And I don't see those amateurs putting up much of a defense. Hope they had a decent breakfast. It's likely to be their last one that isn't behind bars."

"What's for breakfast, cookie?" asked Fontaine.

The mess sergeant sneered, not at Fontaine but at a battery of flat silver containers. "Same as usual, bubba: undifferentiated meat with differentiated sauce; accompanied by only mildly radioactive, notionally wholesome, 'potatoes-all-rotten'; optional fake ham omelet; and some half decent coffee. We're running short on sugar for the coffee, though, so go easy."

Cookie never had cared for being rendered half obsolete by modern T-rations.

"Sounds, umm, great, cookie. Let me have—"

Pendergast's voice thundered, "Breakfast in the mess is cancelled. Get your asses to your battle positions. NOW, people! Move,
move
, MOVE!"

Fontaine quickly added two and two, coming up with the mathematically perfect answer of, "Hungry, and soon." With a mumbled, "Thanks, cookie," he reached directly into the trays of food, extracting several slices of meat and a scooped palm-full of omelet.

Ignoring the cook's outraged look even as he did his successful best to avoid the cook's flailing spatula, Fontaine's heart began to beat quickly as he joined the arm-flailing, grunting, wall-slapping herd of guardsmen racing from the mess to join their comrades at the walls.

Outside and above the WCF, the bulk of the pilots were mildly surprised that there was no groundfire. That they were also somewhat pleased by the lack went almost without saying. Quick glances at the facility's roof showed no possible landing place. They'd known this in advance and had not even planned such. Instead, the choppers brought the PGSS to soft and safe landings well away from the target building.

Commander Sawyers—he had managed to escape from arrest at the mission where the problem had begun—grunted with satisfaction at seeing the brisk, orderly, and frankly military way his men dispersed from their helicopters, took the prone, then raced for their initial objectives.

All those objectives were, of course, at or just past the outside limit of effective small arms fire from the WCF.

As the last of his men reached those objectives, and the last of the ferrying helicopters departed, Sawyers advanced with one other man and a loud speaker.

"Attention. Attention, all you people inside the currency facility. In the name of the President of the United States and the Secretary of the Treasury I call upon you to surrender, now, while there is still time. You will be tried—at a minimum—for criminal trespass on Federal property in accordance with the laws of the United States. . . ."

It was only with difficulty that Williams was able to keep the stress and fear out of his voice. He'd never been in real action before, not unless one considered representing a client before the Tax Court could be considered "action." Williams somehow didn't think it was quite the same.

Still, feeling stress and fear or not, Williams' words were clear when he asked, "How do you answer something like that, Top—err, Sergeant Major?"

Pendergast thought briefly, spit some tobacco juice, then answered, "I think I'd answer it with Royce."

"Royce?" asked the newly promoted Major Williams.

"Yessir. Best goddamned shot in the unit, bar none. Royce."

"Royce," Williams mused. "Royce? Sure, why the hell not? Might as well add to our charges. And it'll be harder for anybody to back out after the shooting starts. Royce. Fontaine, go get me Sergeant Royce, would you please?"

Baffled as it was by the building and the slit through which Royce fired, from his distance Sawyers never heard the actual discharge of the shot. One moment he was speaking into a microphone, holding the loudspeaker in his left hand. The next the speaker was torn away, hissing, sparking, sputtering and crackling as it died. Only then did he hear the crack of the bullet as it left its shock wave behind.

Tossing the ruined thing to the pavement furiously, Sawyers muttered, "So you motherfuckers want to play it that way, do you? Assholes!"