Without warning

Colonel Maccomb nodded and smiled thinly at Ritchie as he moved around the table. The two men had seen a lot more of each other than their families in the last month. Ritchie had come to trust the intelligence man’s judgement implicitly. He seemed able to read Jed Culver like an open book, for instance, and he’d warned of a possible Israeli strike days before it happened – which admittedly wasn’t all that impressive, because the same predictions had been made many times in the press. But Maccomb had worked up a scenario that predicted the attack almost exactly as it transpired. Unfortunately, the report had not made it to Ritchie’s desk before Asher Warat arrived in his office. The admiral made certain that the much-chastened commander of the 500th Military Intelligence Brigade understood he was never again to sit on any of Maccomb’s reports if the colonel thought they should go up the line.

‘Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,’ Maccomb began. ‘I have a number of points from each of the theatre commands to cover quickly before we discuss any particular issue in depth. Firstly, CENTCOM. Our latest best estimate puts half the population of the area dead, and it is likely that seventy-five per cent of the remainder are going to die within six months to a year.’

There was no evident reaction to the statement. Everyone had become inured to the horror story of the Middle East what felt like a long time ago.

‘Major combat operations have ceased entirely, both between our forces, which have now left the region, and our former combatants, and between Israel and her former combatants. Israel remains under martial law, but we expect the state of emergency to be lifted within the next forty-eight hours as decontamination procedures are progressed far enough to allow some of the population to return to work.’

Maccomb thumbed a control stick and powered up a large flat-panel display on the wall behind him. A very familiar map of the Middle East appeared, with each of the atomic strikes clearly marked. Shaded areas of fallout stretched around the sites.

‘A combined British, French, Russian and Chinese task force has arrived in Saudi Arabia to replace our own withdrawn forces,’ the intelligence man continued. ‘Smaller deployments have been made to various Gulf states to secure the surviving oil infrastructure. The Russian Federation’s missile forces targeting Israel remain on the highest state of alert. British and French submarines also remain on station in the eastern Mediterranean, as a continued deterrent against further strikes by Tel Aviv. The future status of the French nuclear submarine Le Triomphant remains uncertain, however, dependent of the outcome of the struggle within France.’

Ritchie had some trouble containing a snort of surprise at Colonel Maccomb’s talent for understatement. The ‘struggle’ he referred to had degenerated from incipient anarchy into civil war and from there into a confused and savage blood-swarm. Tracking the movements of the country’s nuclear submarines was consuming almost as much attention from the surviving great powers as speculating on the disposition of those assets should the French Government finally succumb to the intifada.

‘The situation within EUCOM is fluid,’ said Maccomb, continuing with his penchant for understatement. ‘The British Government is still enforcing its maritime exclusion zone and has secretly begun work to seal its end of the Channel Tunnel.’

That was a surprise to Ritchie. Since Franks had returned from Qatar and replaced him as Acting Chairman, he was no longer fully briefed on developments in Europe. Last he’d seen, Tony Blair was still denying that the Brits intended to do any such thing.

‘The state of emergency remains in place throughout Britain, but we are informed that it will be lifted in Northern Ireland as of 0600 hours tomorrow. Our best information to hand is that the Blair Government will ignore the ultimatum from the European Union to release all of the so-called emergency detainees and is in fact planning to deport significant numbers of them.’

A murmur rippled around the table at this last revelation from Maccomb.

‘With permission, General?’ Ritchie asked Franks.

The chairman nodded. ‘Make it quick, Jim.’

‘Do you have anything more precise than just “significant numbers”, Colonel?’ asked Ritchie. ‘Are they talking about flying out a couple of crazy mullahs or are we looking at mass deportations?’ The admiral’s daughter was in England, having escaped the Disappearance by a matter of hours. She was in no immediate danger, but the news coming out of the UK was growing darker every day.

‘My information is that the forced relocations will probably take place on a greater rather than lesser scale, Admiral,’ Maccomb replied. ‘Much greater. They will probably involve a significant drain on the security forces. It will be a controversial policy’