Quantum Times (36 page)

     “Yes, General, I think that is exactly right,” said David.

     “Hank, how are we supposed to stop something like that?” the general asked his friend.

     Scarpetti’s eyes traveled all around the room searching for an answer and finding none. No one said anything. Greene unconsciously was staring up and to his right hoping for something to occur to him. David just stared at the two men. Finally Scarpetti said what all three were thinking, “If we do nothing and Plato is telling us the truth, then sometime soon someone is going to blow up The Capitol and probably kill half of our legislative branch or worse.” 

     General Greene found he could no longer sit still.  He rose out of his chair and walked around his desk to stand in front of Scarpetti. “Or we can choose to believe Plato and with whatever help he can give us, we fight and keep that disaster from happening – or at least we god damn well tried!”

     Scarpetti stood up too. “Then what?” he almost shouted. “Just because some alien – and I don’t care what his DNA says he is – he is an alien. Because he says we should attack another alien – we go and do it? Just because he says so? With no evidence at all!”

     Greene didn’t back up an inch. “We have evidence! We have Americans dying all over the planet. We have our embassy destroyed with hundreds of our best dead and more injured. We are bordering on chaos and our citizens all over the country are scared and looking to us for leadership – and we are doing nothing! Nothing!”

     Scarpetti’s face was red and his hands were balled into fists. “How do we know Plato isn’t behind all of that? He could be playing us! Don’t you see that? What do I tell the President? We should trust David here? What the hell does he know? He’s a damn writer – nobody elected him to anything. Maybe the President’s instincts on this are right! You ever think about that?”

      General Carl Greene then calmed himself down. Now was not the time to lose control. But now was not the time to back off and play politics either. He walked away from Scarpetti to reduce the physical aggression. Then he said, “Hank, the President is over his head here. He can’t wait for some kind of divine sign as to what to do. It is what battlefield generals have to learn: in the chaotic cloud of battle you have to use your best judgment and do what needs to be done. There is no certainty. But there is no doing nothing either!

     “He knows that if he goes along with believing in Plato, he has to take action – he has to initiate that action, not just wait for somebody to do something that is incontrovertible. And I think he is afraid to do the wrong thing. So it paralyzes him and he thinks he should just wait. He wants to wait and see. I wish we could, but we can’t. We don’t live in that world anymore. We have to hit first and hit hard or really bad things will happen.”

     Scarpetti too tried to calm down. He hadn’t lost his sense of control like that in years and years. Looking at his friend, he saw the combat general that Carl Greene once had been. He saw the general who had won a Silver Star for heroism. He saw a man ready and even eager to fight.

     “Carl, I’ll go to the President with all this,” Scarpetti said. “But frankly, I don’t think he’ll change his mind. Honestly, I’m not going to try to change his mind. I don’t agree that we have to act when we don’t even really know who the bad guy is. We just don’t know.”

     David had listened to it all. He desperately wanted the general to succeed in his argument with Scarpetti. But it was clear that he had lost. David felt like he had just been punched in the stomach by the Heavyweight Champion of the world.

Chapter Sixteen

“Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors

go to war first and then seek to win.”

--- Sun Tzu, The Art of War

     Captain Terumoto looked across the conference room table in The Lucky Dragon at the leader of Japan’s New Nationalist Party, Akira Watanabe. The two of them had been meeting for over two hours and so far the Captain approved of the man. He liked that he sat up straight at the table, not slouching over like a half-filled bag of rice. More importantly, Watanabe showed he had vigor and tenacity and perhaps even a true warrior’s spirit. The New Nationalist Party was not in the majority but under Watanabe’s leadership it had been growing and now represented a proud and vocal minority in Japan’s government.

     The New Nationalists made no apology for Japan’s World War II actions. They revered the soldiers and leaders of that war just as they did for those of any other war going back to the warring centuries when samurai fought samurai. Their mandate was to rebuild Japan to once again be an empire expanding nation – to once again be the dominant tiger of Asia. And Watanabe saw China as the greatest threat to that vision.

     Captain Terumoto took a sip from the Coke he had on a coaster by his note pad, a drink that he found was one of the best things about this particular Earth. He now rarely had tea in the afternoon. He noticed Watanabe’s eyes focusing on the Coke and he said, “One must always be open to blending the best of the new ways with the best of the old ways. Just because something was done by our ancestors does not mean it was necessary, just as all things new are not always cheap and superficial.”

     Watanabe agreed, “The sword loses to the gun, the gun loses to the bomb.”

     Terumoto held up his index finger to add to the point just made, “But the bomb has no discrimination and it tends to invite other bombs. In worlds where mutual annihilation is possible, the precision of a sword stroke may have advantages.”

     Watanabe nodded his head as if he understood, but Terumoto saw that he did not. “For example, though the strike against The Great Hall in Tiananmen Square recently took advantage of a bomb, it was actually a very precise sword stroke, a ninja-like attack, deadly and silent and anonymous.”

     This time when he nodded, Terumoto could see that Watanabe understood. Watanabe then said, “Thank you for the lesson. I will not forget it. Now is the time for quiet daring and strategic moves. Before a tsunami can roar across the land it must first build its strength by crossing a thousand miles of ocean.”

     Terumoto was pleased, “Perhaps that is a particularly apt metaphor. But keep in mind that China does not sit idly by. It is growing its military might year over year at more than ten percent. Sooner or later it will use that power. No man or country can have great power and for long resist the urge to use it. By then China will have convinced the Americans that Asia belongs to them. Make no mistake: the Americans will not fight China to protect Japan. That treaty is meaningless. Only Japan can protect Japan.”

     “Captain, I believe that too! My countrymen who long for peace do not understand there is no peace for the weak – only servitude. They ignore the lessons of history.”

     “Watanabe, my friend, I feel better knowing you know that. So I will share something with you: the history you refer to is true not just for this world but all the others too. All peoples are tribal at heart. Our tribe must grow strong to defend us against other tribes. Men always fight to gain domination over others. It is in our genes. Through our million years of Darwinian evolution, the warrior gene is continued. Were it not so, our species would have lost out to the saber-toothed tiger and the grizzly bear. Warfare is an evolutionary inevitability. And that is just the truth.”

     Terumoto paused if for no other reason than to enjoy the effect his words were having on Akira Watanabe. Clearly this young and ambitious man shared the same views. There was much they could do together!

     “One more thing is true,” the Captain added, “On all worlds Japan and China are historical adversaries. The countries of the West come and go, but ultimately they always go. Asia is not for them, we are trading partners, nothing more. That is always true.”

     Watanabe saw that now was the time to press forward on his agenda for meeting with the Captain of The Lucky Dragon. “I came today to meet with you to discuss how best to move forward. I was hoping you would help my Party to gain more prominence and to soon take on more responsibility for guiding Japan’s future. Your guidance and support is very necessary. Will you help me?”

     “Be aware my friend that what you ask for is no little thing. To go down the path you suggest will take you to places perhaps you will not want to go. It is not an easy or a safe path.”

     “The path does not scare me. I fear the greater danger is to not go down the path.”

     “Then take up your sword, Akira Watanabe. And I mean that quite literally. Those of Japan’s leaders who are afraid to pick up their swords must die by swords. And China must quickly learn that Japan is no paper tiger.”

To David’s surprise, General Greene accompanied him back to Pirate’s Cay. The general said that he had arranged to meet with Plato there. David was glad to hear it. Upon landing on the island, David went to find Gabriela who was then meeting with Professor Wheeling. Greene went immediately to find Plato.

     Greene found Plato in the room that Plato had turned into his office. Though it was an office that seemed to have no equipment or desk in it, it did have chairs and a table and walls that turned into screens whenever Plato wished it. Plato rose out of the chair and greeted the general with his clasped forearms greeting. As usually happened, Greene was struck by the sheer size and physical presence of Plato, standing just a few inches short of seven feet tall but with an Olympic swimmers hard trim body. Greene noticed his skin was now more tanned than when he had first appeared on the island.

     After the greeting, Greene wasted no time on conversational politeness, “David tells me he has already briefed you about our meeting with Hank Scarpetti. Since then, Hank did talk to the President and got the response he expected.”

     “I am saddened by that but not surprised.”

     “I want you to know that I do not agree with the President. If it was up to me, I’d be shooting everything we have at The Freya.”

     “That is what needs to be done,” Plato replied.

     General Greene held up his hands in resignation. “I really don’t blame the President. I’ve talked to my counterparts in London and Paris and Berlin and their leaders have all taken the same position. Everyone wants to wait and see. They are hesitant to take action. Only Israel is ready to fight, but they won’t go alone. They really can’t.”

     Plato nodded, “I know, I have spoken to all the world’s leaders. Not one of them seems able to change their world view. They judge the future in terms of their experience of the past. The future is now changing too fast for them. Part of what one must learn from the past is that with each new technological age, new dynamics come into play which require new paradigms and new strategies. And the time to adjust gets shorter and shorter.”

     “Plato, you probably don’t know this but the reason I was put in charge originally of the Armed Forces response to the arrival of your ship in our skies is because my responsibilities for the Army was to understand the effects and consequences of new technologies. What I found out over the last few years was that it was almost impossible for me and my team to keep up with the changes. New important technologies kept surfacing faster and faster. And I look into just a few years of the future and the pace of change keeps accelerating. Like I said, I don’t really blame our political leaders; new technologies are changing the world faster than they can keep up.”

     Plato rejected that, “Leadership is critical now. Your world depends on it. When Leaders make mistakes now, millions of lives can be lost. Your very world can be lost. That point must be pressed upon them!”

     Greene just shrugged his shoulders in defeat, “How can we do that? They don’t want to hear what you have to tell them. They want to believe that things will stay normal long enough for them to retire from the stage.”

     “General, there is one more thing I can do that I hope will convince them. I have had my team preparing it. It is the most brutal of lessons with far reaching consequences.”

     The general interrupted, “Is it dangerous? Are people going to be hurt? Killed?”

     “Not in the way you think. Think of it as a violent movie.” Then Plato smiled though his ancient eyes showed no real amusement, “Years ago on this Earth there was a movie called ‘Jaws’ about a Great White shark that attacked a seaside community. The movie was very popular and scary and I am told that for years afterward some people were afraid to swim out in the ocean. What I have in mind is like that.”

     Now it was the general’s turn to smile. “I saw that movie. I used to love swimming in the ocean and after I saw it I had to screw up all my courage just to take a three minute swim.”

     General Greene could not imagine one more disaster movie could make much of a difference. “So what am I going to do about the terrorist plot you mention to destroy The Capitol? I believe you, but I don’t know what I can do to stop it – and that would be a lesson I really want to spare my country.”

     Plato agreed, “The bombing of your Capitol would be highly destabilizing. You fought wars in Iraq and Afghanistan because of the destruction on 9/11 of the World Trade Center towers. So we must find a way to prevent that from happening. But you General Greene are going to have to take action. However, I have examined the command structure within which you operate and I believe that it will be within your power, if not your authority, to do what needs to be done. There is an expression here, ‘act first, and seek forgiveness later’.”

     General Greene didn’t hesitate, “I will take whatever action is necessary if there is any chance at all that I can save The Capitol from destruction.”

     “I thought that would be your response, General.” Plato then told the general what he would need to do and how Plato would help him.

     After the general had left, Plato asked David to come see him. A few minutes later David was sitting at the front of his desk. Over his many years, Plato had learned that one could never predict which individuals would rise to the challenges of their times. In part that was because history has a way of choosing its own heroes and villains but also there was the dormant force of character that only awoke for some individuals when confronted with extreme circumstances. Plato believed that David was one of those.

     “David, I think I have for you what will be the most important writing assignment of your life. What you write I will see is spread all across the internet. I know other commentators and pundits will use all media outlets to expound upon what I am about to do, but I want your communication to act as a foundational structure for all other commentary – and the world will read what you write.”

     David regarded Plato wide-eyed and doubtful; he couldn’t imagine what Plato wanted him to write. Also, he was very aware that though he now had a global following for his various forms of communication, that there could be no foundational writing for anything: there were simply too many points of view and too many wannabe pundits and experts – real or just in their own minds – and the world audience was not particularly attentive or discriminating.

     Plato laughed, “I see David you are doubtful. You think no one has the power I suggest that you will have. But I am going to give you a big advantage over everyone else: I am going to show you what I am going to do before anyone else sees it. You will have time to prepare your communication so that it can be submitted immediately – while everyone else is still reeling mentally. And I personally will help you in what you are to do. No one else will have that advantage either.

     At that moment, Gabriela, Planck, Ozawa and Dr. Wheeling arrived together. Plato smiled at them all. “Welcome, please take seats. You might want to face that wall there. I have something to show you all. I think you will find it very interesting – though I confess that you will find it enjoyable only if you like extreme horror movies.”

     They pulled seats up as they all looked at each other quizzically and quickly realized that each of them was equally unaware of what was to be seen. They made themselves comfortable and Dr. Wheeling, to everyone’s surprise, asked whether anyone had brought popcorn. A sense of humor was something no one expected from the professor. He was happy in his work on the island and it showed. Any thought of popcorn and an amusing movie experience left their minds almost immediately upon the beginning of Plato’s screening. What they watched over the next two hours left them in shock and in tears.

     Like before when he had shown a documentary relating to Earth #278 to his audience of world influencers, he showed them what was at its essence a silent documentary of an Earth destroying itself in a nuclear war. Yet this one was different; instead of showing an Earth that had an identifiably different cultural and historical timeline, this new Earth looked just like their Earth. When asked about that, Plato told them that the Earth they were watching was a new clone – the result of the violent clash of opinion world-wide in early 2003 over the United States decision to invade Iraq based on the claim that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction which he intended to use against Israel and the United States. On this Earth which Plato labeled #309, the United States threatened to invade and Hussein backed down and allowed investigators into his country who showed conclusively that he did not possess the WMD’s and war was averted.