“Sir, this is repaying evil for evil. It’s becoming the very essence of what we hope to defeat.”
“No, no, no—it’s not. It’s not. It’s stopping evil once and for all.”
“How? By using the instruments of evil, the instruments of war?”
“The instruments of war are not evil, Mr. Secretary. Not in and of themselves. Not unless they are in the hands of those who use them for evil. Preventing the slaughter of innocent Americans is not evil. It is profoundly moral and inherently just.”
“Mr. President? Do you hear yourself? Do you? Let’s say we invade Iraq. Maybe—maybe—we’ll lose fifty thousand Americans. Maybe. But maybe not. It’s a worst-case scenario. But you’re talking about murdering fifty times that number, guaranteed, and civilians at that.”
“Whose side are you on here, Tucker?”
Paine looked stunned.
“I resent that, sir.”
“So do I,” the president continued. “My oath was to uphold the U.S. Constitution and protect and defend the American people from all threats, foreign and domestic—not to protect and defend every man, woman, and child on the face of the earth. I am not God. I am not responsible for everyone. I am responsible to make sure our innocents—American innocents—are not slaughtered. Not by Saddam Hussein. Not by Mohammed Jibril. Not by the next Osama bin Laden. Nobody. Ever. Period. End of story. I didn’t bring us to the point of nuclear war, Mr. Secretary. Saddam did. But I am not sending ten thousand or twenty thousand or fifty thousand or even five hundred Americans to their certain deaths in a protracted ground war in Iraq—not when I know that Saddam has nuclear weapons and anthrax and Sarin gas and VX…not when I know Saddam is dying, desperate, hates us, and might think he has nothing to lose…not when I know that our people could be slaughtered by the Butcher of Baghdad. That, Mr. Secretary, would be evil. And I won’t be part of it, and you shouldn’t be either.”
For the first time, Bennett was glad these two men were not in the same room. It might have come to blows, no matter how badly injured the president was. Nevertheless, as much as he loved the president and thought he made sense, Bennett found himself internally siding with Paine.
He didn’t know what the president should do beyond launching air strikes. But he knew that under no circumstances should he resort to nuclear weapons. And in the end, Bennett was convinced that no matter how powerful and passionate an argument MacPherson was making now, in a few hours he would cool down and change course. Of this he had no doubt.
“It is this that I won’t be part of,” the secretary responded, just as passionately. “You are talking about pushing the button and then drilling for oil and making everyone in Israel and Palestine fat and happy. You’re talking about your little pipe dream, Medexco. And I agree, it is compelling. It is attractive. And under other circumstances it might be perfect. But right here, right now, it does not wash. You cannot kill millions of innocent Iraqis with a nuclear weapon and then hold an IPO. It is wrong, Mr. President. Profoundly wrong. And it is conduct unbecoming of you and the American people.”
“You are out of line, Mr. Secretary,” said the president. “Let me be perfectly clear. If the United States decides to use nuclear weapons against murderous enemies, it will not be in order to bring peace and prosperity to Israel and the Palestinians. No. It will be to protect the lives and vital national interests of our people and our allies—and to rid civilization of a mortal threat to its very survival. Period. What I was asked, Mr. Secretary, is what might come next. What I was asked was where we might go next after making such a dreadful and horrible decision. And what I’m saying is that this is one answer. Not the only answer. It’s not a panacea. But it is one answer among many. Yes, the world will still have problems. Yes, we’ll still have to deal with North Korea and China and the Sudan and AIDS and cancer and poverty and racism and all the other sins and ills and plagues that existed last week and last month. But I’m saying this could be one of many silver linings to a very dark cloud. This could be the dream of a sunny day after a terrible gathering storm. That’s what I’m talking about, Mr. Secretary. And I deeply resent your implications to the contrary.”
Bennett’s back and necked ached terribly.
He found himself hunched over, clenched up, deeply anxious about where this was leading.
“Mr. President, we only have eighteen minutes.”
It was Mitchell. Time was running out.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” said the president, “we need to begin to set things in motion. There will be time to make a final decision. But there are some things we need to do immediately.”
Bennett instinctively reached for McCoy’s hand under the table and squeezed gently. She glanced over at him, and squeezed back.
“Secretary Trainor.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I hereby direct you to commence Operation Imminent Cyclone immediately. Begin massive bombing runs against Baghdad, Tikrit, and all Iraqi air bases. Use conventional munitions only. Flush the bombers—the B-52s, F-18s, F-111s, the whole team. Use conventional cruise missiles and Tomahawks off the carriers to begin with—and make it hurt.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. President.”
“Get the 82nd and Delta Force on the ground immediately, hunting down those Scuds. How far away are they right now?”
“Almost there, sir. They’ve been flying from the U.S. all night.”
“Good. Get SEAL Team Six and the guys from the Nuclear Emergency Search Team on a chopper headed towards Baghdad. I want them in the theater as fast as possible. The minute we get any whiff of another possible nuclear launch, we’ll send them in like the Israelis’ GhostCom force to disable the missile and recover the warhead. But look—we don’t have much time and we’ve got to keep the Israelis and the Saudis out of this war. You got that?”
“Yes, sir.”
“OK. Then launch B-2s out of Whiteman and get them to Incirlik, Turkey, as fast as you can. Have them each locked and loaded with those tactical nuclear missiles. And get their targeting packages ready for Baghdad and Tikrit, just in case. This goes without saying, but I want it said to those pilots anyway, by you personally, Mr. Secretary: those pilots may not release those nuclear missiles except on my direct command and with the appropriate nuclear launch authorization codes. I have not made my final decision. But I want them to be in place if necessary. Let’s just pray to God it doesn’t come to that.”
“Yes, sir.”
The Defense Secretary picked up a secure line back to the Joint Chiefs at the Pentagon and set things in motion.
“Sanchez?”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
“Get Football in here and at my side ASAP—and have him call back to the National Military Command Center at the Pentagon and get briefed.”
“I’ll do it right now, sir.”
“Good. Bill, get on the horn with all the Congressional leadership. I know they’re scattered all over the country but I need them on a conference call as fast as you possibly can get it arranged.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Bob, get me Prime Minister Doron on the phone immediately. Then get me Chairman Arafat on a separate line. And go get Chuck Murray. Have him line up the networks for tonight and begin to coordinate some leaks. Make them work, Bill. We can’t afford to screw up now.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then, call Shakespeare back at the White House. Get him working on a draft speech for tonight. And check with Public Liaison. I want the details of the memorial service and make sure the First Lady has them, too. I’d like to see if Franklin Graham could come and speak. Call him yourself, Bob. Let him know I’ll call him the moment I can.”
“You got it, sir.”
Corsetti moved to the other end of the conference room, grabbed a secure phone and got a White House operator on the line to begin making things happen.
“Marsha, get all the allies on the phone. Start with London. Then President Vadim in Moscow.”
“Mr. Pr
esident?”
It was Secretary Paine. He was clearly being left out of the loop, but he no longer seemed enraged. Nevertheless, the President continued to be very formal with him.
“Yes, Mr. Secretary?”
“One question.”
“What?”
“Mr. President, you are unleashing the power of the gods, and with it the law of unintended consequences. Who’s to say what will happen next? What if Moscow decides it needs to use nuclear weapons someday? Or Beijing or Pyongyang or India or Pakistan? My God, Mr. President, what if Tehran ever decides to go nuclear against Israel? What then? What would we do? What could we possibly say when they look us in the eye and say, ‘Hey, you did it first?’”
The silence was almost eerie.
“Mr. Secretary, I’ve got less than fifteen minutes. We don’t live in a perfect world, and I guess I’ll just have to cross those bridges when I come to them. For now, I’ve got a job to do. And I’m going to do it.”
The president nodded to Corsetti and the transmission was cut. The videoconference call was over. The debate was finished. Now it was time for the hard part—shutting down Saddam before Iraq could actually launch a nuclear missile. And time was running out.
David Doron stared at his colleagues, took a deep breath, and picked up the call.
“Mr. President, I trust you have an answer.”
“Mr. Prime Minister, I am calling to inform you that the United States has just launched full-scale war on the Republic of Iraq.”
The exhausted Israeli Prime Minister exhaled with relief.
“Our cruise missiles are in the air,” MacPherson continued. “Our bombers are taking off as we speak. We’re deploying ground forces as quickly as we can. You have my word: We are going to take down Saddam Hussein and neutralize his military machine no matter what it takes.”
“That is welcome news, my friend.”
“At nine P.M. Eastern I will make a televised address from the Oval Office, explaining the events that led up to this moment. I will explain why our national security, our vital interests, and our friends and allies are in grave danger. And I will describe our course of action. But David, as a friend, I need to know one thing.”
“Yes, Mr. President?”
“If I find it necessary to order the use of a weapon of mass destruction against Iraq, finding no other course of action effective in neutralizing Saddam’s forces quickly enough, would your government back us publicly and at the U.N.?”
“We would,” Doron replied instantly. “How else can we help?”
“You can stand down your nuclear forces, David,” MacPherson said softly but firmly.
There was a long pause.
“Please don’t ask that of me,” Doron replied.
“I must. It will be bad enough for the U.S. to use such weapons. But make no mistake—there will be terrible international repercussions if your country were to use them. That I can assure you.”
“Mr. President, I am well aware of the risks we face in terms of international opinion. Even international trade. But we are on the brink, sir. We are talking about the very survival of the Jewish race as we know it. My government wishes you well in this military campaign. But let me be clear—if we see the slightest indication that Iraq is again prepared to use such catastrophic force, we will act. We will act decisively. We will act with cataclysmic force. And we will act without warning.”
“I urge you to reconsider,” MacPherson responded, his mind scrambling to find a coherent argument—any argument—to dissuade the Israeli leader.
“That I cannot do.”
“Then I guess my country better get the job done, so you won’t have to take matters into your own hands.”
TWELVE
It was a killer storm—in the wrong place at the wrong time.
It was daytime in the Middle East. But it looked and felt like the dead of night. The winds were gusting over the Mediterranean—as well as over Lebanon, northern Syria, and northern Iraq—at upwards of forty to fifty knots.
Massive sheets of rain were moving horizontally. Bolts of lightning lit up the dark and ominous sky, allowing anyone brave enough or stupid enough to be on the pitching, heaving decks of the two American nuclear-powered aircraft carriers to see monstrous waves cresting at thirty to forty feet.
It was no time to go to war. But then soldiers, sailors, and airmen never get to choose when they go into battle.
The flash traffic email arrived from CENTCOM, and it was red hot. The message was quickly decoded, printed, shoved in a black folder marked “TOP SECRET” and rushed to the captains of each ship. Minutes later—despite the raging storm—dozens of fighter jets began catapulting off the decks of the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt and the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan, the newest 97,000-ton state-of-the-art Nimitz-class American aircraft carrier patrolling the Med.
The Commander-in-Chief had spoken. America was going to war—now. And the man in the gun sights was Saddam Hussein.
“Downey, don’t mess with me.”
Sam Maxwell—the counterterrorism watch commander sitting behind a bank of sixteen computers and five giant TV screens in the FBI’s fifth-floor OPS2 center—couldn’t believe what he was hearing over the phone. “I’m in no mood for a joke.”
“No joke, sir. I’m telling you, I just got it. I triple-checked it. It’s real.”
“You’re telling me Treasury Secretary Iverson just got an email from Yuri Gogolov?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And he opened it?”
“Yes. It was forwarded from his personal AOL account to his BlackBerry—and he opened it right on Air Force One. Then deleted it. And it’s a weird note, too. I don’t get it. And I don’t know what to do. I thought you and the director should see it right away.”
“Got that right, Downey. OK. Sit tight. Don’t tell anyone. I’m coming to you.”
The president finished his call with Doron and turned back to Bennett.
“Jon, the minute we get to Andrews, I want you and Erin and Deek to get on a plane and head back to Israel immediately. I’ll brief you guys in the air. But when you land, you’ll need to huddle with Galishnikov and Sa’id and let them know what I want to do with this peace plan. Then you all need to meet personally—but separately—with Doron and Arafat. Walk them through this peace plan scenario. Step by step. Piece by piece. Doron is trigger-happy right now. I don’t blame him. But we need to get him and his team thinking about life after we take out Saddam—about the endgame. Arafat is another story. He may only be an honorary figurehead leader now, not the actual duly elected leader of the Palestinian Authority anymore, but don’t kid yourself. He and his loyalists still effectively run the place. He’s the man you need to persuade. And the key with Arafat, Jon, is to make one thing crystal clear. He either signs on to this deal—a deal that will make him and the Palestinian people richer than they’ve ever hoped for, dreamed of, or imagined—or he and his cronies are finished.”
The ominous words just hung in the air. Ultimatums weren’t MacPherson’s style, thought Bennett. But then again, neither was nuclear war.
“I will cut off all U.S. aid to him,” the president continued. “I will send in the Rangers and Delta Force to hunt down his terrorists. And then we’ll go after him. Personally, I’ve had it with Arafat and his whole corrupt bunch. It’s time for them to lead, follow, or get the hell out of the way. If I have to wipe out Iraq, then believe me, we’re going to knock heads together and get peace throughout the region or there are going to be serious consequences for the Palestinian leadership. Got it?”
Bennett just stared at his friend the president in disbelief.
“You got a problem with that, Jon?”
“No, Mr. President, I just…”
“You just what?”
“I’m sorry, I mean—an hour ago I worked on Wall Street. Now you want me to go to Israel to negotiate a peace plan with Yasser Arafat while Saddam Hussein rains nuclear missiles down on our heads?”
“First of all, Iraq isn’t going to get a second chance to fire any missiles, nuclear or otherwise. Second of all, who am I going to send, Tucker Paine? You know the situation. You know this oil deal. And you know me. You’re it, Jon. You do your part and I guarantee you I’ll do mine. I’m not going to let Iraq nuke Israel. Period.”
The president’s case wasn’t all that convincing, much less comforting, thought Bennett. The prospect of dying in a nuclear holocaust in a country he knew so little about—and cared about even less—nearly paralyzed the normally unflappable Bennett. But what choice did he have? Those were the cards he’d been dealt. And one thing was for sure: He couldn’t afford to lose.
Daylight is no time to fly into the heart of darkness.
But they had no choice.
In Saudi Arabia, the issue at the moment wasn’t a raging electrical storm. It was a blinding sandstorm that dangerously reduced visibility. But America was at DefCon One, sandstorm or no sandstorm.
So, without warning, twenty-two F-15E Strike Eagles—part of the 48th Fighter Wing (dubbed the “Liberty Wing” during the Eisenhower Administration)—roared out of Prince Sultan Air Base near Al Kharj, Saudi Arabia, about an hour southeast of Riyadh, and shot hard, fast, and low over the desert, heading north into Iraq.
Their orders were straight from CENTCOM in Tampa: Take out Iraq’s air defense installations, establish one hundred percent American air superiority and then hunt down and destroy Iraq’s mobile missile launchers.
Scud hunting was like a finding a needle in a haystack at five thousand feet going Mach two. But first they needed to dominate the skies. That’s what each pilot and his weapon systems officer were trained to do. But it took time. And time was one thing of which they had very little.