Liberty's Last Stand (32 page)

Sarah saw me looking, twisted her right side mirror, and took a squint.

“Tommy, what if some civilian was killed in that explosion?”

“We all have to die sometime. I'll pray for 'em.” I wouldn't, though, if I heard they were Soetoro voters.

It took a little under half a minute for the sound of the blast to reach us. The concussion probably broke windows in Leesburg.

SEVENTEEN

T
he mushroom cloud was still hanging over Leesburg when General Martin L. Wynette and two staff officers, both generals, arrived at the Executive Office Building across from the White House. President Soetoro and thirty or so of his staff were waiting in a large conference room. The emergency generators were apparently running sweetly: the building was well lit and the air conditioners were pumping cool air.

“So what is your plan to crush Texas?” the president asked the chairman of the JCS.

“The briefer has some maps. He'll run through it and we'll answer questions.”

The briefer, Major General Strong, stood in front of a huge computer screen, upon which a PowerPoint presentation was projected. “Our first problem is manpower. Given desertions, we're estimating our combat effectives are fifty percent of what they should be.”

The president's chief of staff, Al Grantham, blew up. By reputation, he was one of the most aggressive leftists on the president's staff, and, although he was white, was of the opinion that white America would have to be conquered. He thought most whites were racists and Nazis. “You mean to tell me that in the armed forces only the people who want to fight have to fight?”

Wynette said flatly, “We have a volunteer army. It's hard to make someone fight if they refuse to do so.”

Grantham glared. “What the hell have we been paying them for?”

“We have been paying them to defend the United States. Not to put too fine a point on it, a lot of our personnel don't think shooting their fellow Americans meets those criteria.”

“Court-martial the bastards.”

“Oh, we can do that, if the president orders us to do so. We can convict them of cowardice, give them bad discharges, maybe some jail time, but that still doesn't put people in ranks willing to fight.”

The president gestured at the briefer to continue.

The major general nodded and said, “We will take two divisions, one armored, one infantry, from Georgia and Alabama; put them on trains, trucks, and air force transports; and assemble at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. From there we will proceed to Austin and take it, engaging any Texas military units or guerilla bands we encounter along the way. Meanwhile we will have the Fourth Infantry division at Fort Carson in Colorado proceed by road to Amarillo, and from there to Austin. So we will have three divisions in a two-pronged assault. Operating on two fronts—”

“How will they get across the rivers and all that?” Grantham interrupted, glowering.

“I was about to cover that, sir,” the briefer said patiently. “We will drop paratroops to seize the key bridges and hold until relieved. Then—”

“So how are you going to get there? Across cow pastures and rice paddies?”

“We will use the interstates and other roads where possible. A division cannot move on only one road. It must move on a wide front, yet not so wide that one brigade cannot reinforce the other. Where we must cross rivers without a bridge available, we will use pontoons. We will have close air support from attack helicopters and air force fighters every foot of the way. We'll use satellite reconnaissance, aerial reconnaissance, and drones to keep us apprised of the enemy's movements.”

“Those crackers are going to shoot at you,” Al Grantham said. “Probably a lot. Every one of those racists has a gun, or two or three or four.”

“No doubt,” Martin Wynette replied. “We'll take casualties, yet we'll annihilate all opposition and proceed forward as fast as possible to our objective.”

The president smiled at that comment. He apparently liked to think of his opposition being annihilated. Then the smile faded. “When?” he asked.

“It will take at least two days to get people sorted out and transferred to fill up our three assault divisions. Another four days to get our people and equipment to Barksdale, and another two days to get them under way. The Fort Carson division commander says he can get his division under way in two days, after he gets his personnel sorted out and is reinforced by willing fighters. That shuffling will take at least two days, maybe three. Then it will take another three days to get them to the Texas line. Seven days total. If anything slips, eight or nine.”

“What will the rebels be doing while we are getting our show ready to go on the road?”

“Making a nuisance of themselves and getting ready to block our moves.”

“How will they know what we intend?”

“Texas' commander is JR Hays, Jack Hays' cousin, and he was a career army officer, although retired now. He could probably write our op order. If he hadn't burned out in the Middle East and retired, he would have become a general. I've seen his service record. JR Hays is a soldier from head to toe, and he doesn't shrink from combat. He's seen more than his share and knows precisely how to fight. And how to win. The Taliban had a price on his head: ten thousand American dollars. No one in the Middle East was able to earn it.”

“Can you whip him?”

“The United States Army can.”

“Eight days to get combat troops into Texas,” Al Grantham stated. “Or nine. Or ten. Or eleven. That's too long. Can't we use fewer troops and go sooner?”

“Even if we cut our invasion force to only one division, we will only save one day,” Wynette said flatly. “So the tradeoff is one division that can possibly be surrounded and cut off, or a two-pronged assault that will force the Texans to divide their forces to fight them both. In my military judgment, and the judgment of the Joint Chiefs, if we are going to hit Texas with a hammer, it should be a really big hammer, as big as we can put together in a reasonable amount of time. Given a month, we could hit them with every American soldier willing to fight.”

The president nodded his agreement.

Grantham asked, “And how many is that?”

“I don't know yet,” Wynette said. He continued, “There are around twelve thousand fighting soldiers in a division. We'd like the divisions at full strength, if possible. In addition to their weapons, artillery, air support, food, and ammo, we must also move all the support equipment and manpower required to keep the warriors eating, sleeping, and fighting, the planes and choppers flying, the artillery supplied with ammo, and enough extra stuff to provide humanitarian relief. We are doing all we can to get this organized and moving, which is everything humanly possible.”

“So we sit on our asses for eight days and wait,” Al Grantham summed up.

Wynette gestured to the briefer, who went on with his presentation. JCS envisioned beginning air operations against Texas tomorrow. The targets would be all the surrendered military equipment at the military bases. Missions would be flown by B-52s escorted by F-16s during the day and B-1s at night targeting Fort Bliss, the Texas Guard armories, and other military targets. The navy can bring an aircraft carrier around Florida and begin air operations in two days against the military bases around San Antonio and Killeen. “Our goal,” the briefer summed up, “is to attrite their armor and air assets by seventy-five percent by D-Day, which is the day we plan to cross the Texas border.”

“Why not hammer their industry, their refineries, and factories and power plants?”

“Those are legitimate strategic military targets,” Major General Strong said, “but the primary goal of the air campaign must be the destruction of the enemy's combat power—the opposition we'll face when we put boots on the ground. After we knock out their combat power and render it impotent, then we can bomb strategic targets.”

“But before we do that,” interjected Wynette, “you must decide how much of an economy you want standing after we take over. If everyone is destitute and starving, the assets to feed them and rebuild Texas must come from the rest of the United States.”

“Just the military targets,” the president said. Then he added, “Unless this invasion gets bogged down. If push comes to shove, we are going to win if we have to flatten every building and kill every cow in Texas.”

“Yes, sir,” General Wynette said.

Barry Soetoro leaned forward in his chair and looked straight into Wynette's eyes. “I expect you to crush the rebels, General. If you don't, don't come back alive.”

It was the second time that the president had told him that, and though Wynette had kissed ass for a lot of years, he was fed up with Barry Soetoro. “Mr. President, if you don't think I can win, fire me and get a general you think can. The army has plenty of experienced combat leaders for you to pick from.”

“You're the man I want,” Soetoro shot back. “I
know
you'll obey orders.”

“And you think these others might not? What kind of orders wouldn't they obey?”

Soetoro's eyes were locked on Martin Wynette. “We'll cross that bridge when we get to it,” he said.

Wynette was the first to look away.

Back in the air-conditioned Pentagon, Wynette had another bad moment. The staff had framed the loyalty question to the troops as “Are you willing to fight for the United States of America to stamp out a rebellion?”
Yes
or
No
.

Last night on television he saw commentators talking about “Barry Soetoro's army” versus Texas. Wynette thought—and he knew many of his troops thought—there was a huge difference between “Barry Soetoro's army” and “the United States Army,” and the more commentators talked like that, the more desertions he would have.

The Joint Chiefs assembled in his office. They wanted to know their role in putting down the riots that were raging in the big cities.

“Forget about that for now. That doesn't seem to be the president's priority,” Wynette replied. “He seems to think that if he squashes Texas, all his other problems will go away. However, in fifteen minutes Grantham may call and want us to invade Detroit.”

What he didn't say, although he thought it, was that the president and his staff were fixated on the wrong problem. In his years of service he had served on joint staffs on numerous occasions and knew it was the job of a commander to define the priorities and keep his staff focused on them. Wynette thought Barry Soetoro didn't understand what his problems were or couldn't prioritize; if either was the case, he was incompetent. As the general saw it, the primary problem in America just now was that civil authority in much of the nation was about to collapse. It wasn't just Texas that the president might lose, it was America.

When JR Hays arrived in Austin that afternoon, he headed straight for the capitol and was ushered into the governor's (now the president's) office. He waited in a corner while some politicians briefed Jack.

Several thousand people a day were pouring into Texas from other states. Many of these people said their extended families, neighbors, and coworkers were only a day or two behind them. More people were coming, a lot more, and they would need housing and jobs. After the politicians had spent ten minutes discussing how the flood of refugees might be accommodated temporarily, Hays shooed them out and locked the door. He and JR sat in chairs facing each other.

“We've had some good luck,” JR said, “because a lot of the people in the army and air force refused to fight for Barry Soetoro. Any commander in that position would have had to surrender. Still, those services are going to find people who
will
fight for Soetoro, and then the shooting will begin in earnest.”

“So what's your plan?”

“We can't sit here waiting for Soetoro to hammer us. I would bet my soul they are plotting to do that right now in Washington. If Soetoro lets us get away with leaving the Union and setting up as an independent nation, other states will do it too, one by one, and eventually he won't own anything but the federal district in Washington. He can't let that happen. He has to whip us, and he has to do it as soon as he can assemble the forces to do it with. Every day he doesn't win is a victory for us. If we can pile up enough little victories, we can win the war.”