Strike Force

“An official ruling is fine, but I can tell you what the Outer Space Treaty says: no one can regulate space travel or access to Earth orbit,” National Security Adviser General Jonas Sparks said. “That’s been the case ever since Sputnik. Besides, we have dozens of Russian spy satellites overflying us every damned day.”

“True,” Secretary of State Mary Carson said. She turned to President Martindale and continued, “But sir, that only applies to spacecraft in Earth orbit. If General McLanahan’s men flew the spaceplane through the atmosphere over Russia, that’s a violation.”

“Hell, Doc, we flew spy planes across each other’s borders for decades,” Sparks said. “It was so commonplace, it became a game.”

“And we’re on the path to returning to the Cold War mentality that existed back then,” Carson retorted. “Sir, if we continue to allow General McLanahan and his spaceplanes to just flit across the planet like that without advising anyone, sooner or later someone’s going to mistake it for an intercontinental ballistic missile and fire a real missile. Overflying Russia with a satellite in a mostly fixed and predictable orbit is one thing — having an armed spaceplane suddenly appear on a Russian radar screen out of nowhere could trigger a hostile response. A simple courtesy message on the ‘hotline’ to Moscow or even to the Russian embassy in Washington would be sufficient.”

“Frankly, Mary, I don’t feel very courteous when it comes to the Russians,” the President said.

“I mean, sir, that a simple advisory might prevent an international diplomatic row, a retaliatory overflight, or at worse someone getting nervous and pushing the button to start another attack.”

“Okay, Mary, I get the message,” the President said. He turned to the Secretary of Defense: “Joe, get together with Mary and draft up a directive for General McLanahan and anyone else using the spaceplanes to notify the State Department to issue an advisory to the Russian foreign ministry in a timely manner. That should be sufficiently ambiguous to allow us some leeway in when to report.”

“Yes, Mr. President.” Gardner glanced at Carson’s exasperated expression but did not comment.

He could always count on Mary Carson to bring up all the negatives about each and every situation crossing his desk, Martindale thought — her comments always served to head off possible difficulties, even though he generally thought she pressed the panic button too often and too soon to suit him. “It’s not the Russians I’m concerned about right now, folks — it’s the Iranians,” the President said. “Gerald, what do you have?”

“Not much yet, sir,” Director of Central Intelligence Gerald Vista responded. “No one has heard from any of the clerics or most of the executive branch of the Iranian government for days.”

“My office has been trying repeatedly to get a statement from the Iranian U.N. ambassador, but he’s nowhere to be found,” Secretary of State Carson added, “and some of the NATO foreign ministries who still have diplomatic ties with Iran tell us the Iranian ambassadors and consuls have dropped out of sight.”

“Sounds like they’re lying low,” the President observed. “But is Buzhazi the reason, and if he’s powerful enough to scare government officials as far way as New York City, does he have a chance of succeeding in engineering a military coup?” He turned to Joint Chiefs chairman Glenbrook. “What about the Iranian army, General?”

“The latest we have is the regular armed forces are still in their garrisons, sir,” Glenbrook said. “We don’t know if they’re just staying in defensive positions, awaiting orders, or defying orders and not going out to hunt down Buzhazi and his insurgents. A few specialized units have mobilized — we think those units will try an assault on the Khomeini Library in Qom within forty-eight hours.”

“This has been a Pasdaran fight so far,” Vista said. “We haven’t seen any regular army involved. Maybe the Pasdaran has been weakened to the point where they can’t do the job.”

“Is it possible that we haven’t heard from the clerics or the president of Iran that were apparently in Qom…because they’re dead?” Vice President Maureen Hershel asked. She turned to a video teleconference unit on the credenza beside her. “General McLanahan?”