A House Divided

by Adam Yoshida

  "That," said the reporter, "from a very high-level source within the Western Army. That Army, now nearly 50,000 men in strength is, of course, encamped at Thunder Bay right now – roughly a two-day drive from Toronto. And, I have to say, after spending time with the soldiers and the leaders of this Army, I have little doubt that they mean what they say."

  At the WEF's headquarters, the reporter's final words were greeted with a whoop. General Jackson watched the smiling staff from behind a glass partition as he listened to voices yelling at him on the phone.

  "Now, gentlemen," Jackson said, "do any of you really question that a response to a proposed parlay is within my authority as the local military commander?"

  The silence hung on the line.

  "Ok then. Well then, that being conceded, I must say that I agree that whoever leaked it to the foreign reporter, and the general tenor of the quotes... Well, that's all very regrettable. That being said, what's done is done and what we have now is a very real opportunity that we may capitalize upon in the immediate future, especially given the panic that has already been created throughout the East."

  "General," Eagleton's voice came across the line, "I understand your point of view on this. However, policy-making must remain entirely within the political purview. When you surrendered your political office you agreed, implicitly, to step aside from political decision making."

  "Naturally... naturally," replied Jackson.

  "I will definitely seek to make a clarifying statement at the earliest opportunity."

  "All right. Do that," said Eagleton.

  "We'll get back in touch with our counterparts in the East and see where they're at. Have a good evening, General."

  The line clicked dead. Jackson turned to his Chief of Staff and smiled.

  "Tell those reporters outside that I'm going to have a press conference in fifteen minutes."

  "General," asked the reporter from the Toronto Star, "are you preparing to advance deeper into Ontario?"

  "I cannot and will not comment on future military operations," replied Jackson, "I will only say that we will take all necessary measures to assure the security of our forces."

  "Right. But are you planning to advance – for example, to make a lightning attack across Ontario designed to secure the city of Toronto?" pressed the reporter.

  "Asked and answered, Sam," replied Jackson.

  "Let me emphasize this point," said Jackson, pounding the lectern that had been hastily retrieved for him from a local high school, "the Western Army does not advertise its plans in advance. That would make no military sense. But let me assure the public, because I think that certain reporters have caused unnecessary public alarm, that the Western Army has always and will always conduct its operations with a view towards inflicting minimum collateral damage. For example, we would only resort – and this is a purely hypothetical example – to using heavy artillery in a built-up area, such as Toronto, if we were being resisted and forced to fight for the streets of the city block-by-block. We would not, of course, shrink from such a fight, but we would avoid it if at all possible."

  "General, if and I'll emphasize the hypothetical part of that question, if, your forces were to attack Toronto tomorrow afternoon, do you think that there would be fewer than 100,000 civilians killed during the fighting?" asked a reporter from the Vancouver Province , reading a question e-mailed directly to his phone from an anonymous number.

  "I don't want to get into hypothetical numbers, Jack, but I certainly would not make any promises."

  "But civilian areas would be avoided?" the reporter asked.

  "Well, if you're asking – again wholly hypothetically – whether we would deliberately fire upon civilian areas without a military objective then the answer, of course, is no. But, of course, an area ceases to be a civilian area when it is used for military purposes an, of course, in fighting in a built-up area it can be extremely challenging, even impossible in some cases, to avoid damage to civilian areas."

  "If you took Toronto, would you deliberately target civilian infrastructure, as was the case in Winnipeg?"

  "Look, I don't want to get into hypotheticals. It's possible that we'll be fighting in the streets of Toronto and that a few hundred thousands Torontonians will consequentially be dead by Thursday afternoon, sure. But that's not our desire or our publicly expressed intention," answered Jackson.

  The uproar was immediate and massive. Canadian and, indeed, world, television was filled with images of the Western Army's tanks driving and firing. The timeframe was so short and the panic so intense that no one really noticed that they were simply driving in circles. The story was so well-covered that it threatened to displace the Senate vote on the impeachment of President Warren as the leading story. Ontarians were driven to a frenzy of fear: wouldn't someone save them?

  The means had always been in place. That had never been in question. The willingness to act had always been the problem. The Premier of Ontario was a practical woman. Yes, technically speaking she was a Liberal and therefore shared a party with the Prime Minister. But, after Thunder Bay, it was clear enough to her that the Eastern Government would never subdue the West. Not without active military aid from the United States and possibly not even then, unless the Americans were willing to throw tens of thousands of their soldiers into combat in order to restore the rule of an Eastern government that wasn't particularly popular with the American people. Not unless they were willing to fight a Western government that was fairly popular with those same people. If the Congress would even vote money to a President who might be up for the fight. And, even then, it would mean battles fought across all of Ontario and, after the destruction of Winnipeg, who was to say what would be left of Ontario's industrial might when all of it was said and done. No, the Premier had told her Cabinet that afternoon, it was simply time.

  Her PowerPoint presentation had been prepared, under the conditions of the strictest secrecy, months before by a special unit working quietly in a basement at the University of Toronto. They had prepared other materials as well.

  "My fellow citizens of Ontario," she began a few seconds after the light on the camera began to glow red, "I come before you tonight to deliver as vital an address as a Premier has ever been asked to deliver. The challenges that I and the rest of your government have had to weigh have been the gravest ever to fall upon us at Queen's Park.

  "Together, we have accomplished some astonishing things. By itself, Ontario would be the nineteenth richest country in the world. Richer than Switzerland, Sweden, Saudi Arabia, and Iran among others. Our Province is an industrial powerhouse and countless economic advantages that are all its own. And today, all of this is threatened as never before.

  "An aggressive Western Army has crossed the borders of Ontario and engaged in open battle with forces of the Federal Government near the city of Thunder Bay. As you must already know, the results of that battle were a decisive victory by the Western forces. You have also heard the words of the Prime Minister, who has vowed to raise new armies and to fight new battles. And you have heard the words of the leaders of the Western Republic, who have accepted that challenge.

  "What would that mean for us? Battles would be fought across our countryside. Perhaps they would even spill into the streets of our cities. Maybe our cities would be destroyed for military and punitive reasons, as Winnipeg has been. What would it all be for?

  "I will be very plain with you: the Western provinces are determined to win their independence. It will take months of fighting, if the plans laid out by the Prime Minister go perfectly – and when has that happened? – and it will take much longer if they do not. War will devastate our cities and, even then, we have good reason to think that the West will secure its independence.

  "Where would that leave us? The grievances that drove the Western Provinces to take such action as they have are shared by many Ontarians: a hideously expensive Federal Government that takes more than it gives back. A Federal Government dominated by intere
sts over which the people of the Western Provinces – and Ontario as well – have shockingly little control.

  "It is with all of this in mind that I must announce to you that this evening the Cabinet voted unanimously to reach out directly to the government of the Western Republic in order to negotiate an end to the present conflict. Ontario had no part in choosing to begin this war, but it is now being fought on our soil and destroying our cities. We will have no part in that."

  From the encampment of the Western Army's I Corps outside of Thunder Bay, General Jackson stepped in front of the cameras once again, holding a piece of paper in his hands.

  "This evening," he began, "I have received an offer from General Pierce, commander of the Army of Northwestern Ontario, to unconditionally surrender and to place himself and his forces in the hands of the Army of the Western Republic. I am very happy to be able to report to you that, in accordance with the directives of my government, that I have accepted this surrender and offered full parole to all of the officers and men of the Federal Army over whom General Pierce holds command. They will be permitted to return to their homes in peace for the duration of this conflict, on the condition that they never again will take up arms against the Western Republic until they are honorably exchanged and released from their obligations.

  "As for myself, and for this army, I can only say this: we remain in readiness to continue the fight. This army could march tomorrow, if the need exists. We are sworn to uphold the independence of the West and we will do this. Of course, we remain servants of our political masters and the fundamental question of what comes next remains an essentially political matter. But, if the call is to march, we can and we will march."

  From his office in Vancouver, President Eagleton watched General Jackson's performance for the cameras.

  "Who will rid me of this turbulent priest?" he muttered aloud.

  In Washington, the CNN was jumping between events.

  "This has been a very busy news day, to say the least," the anchor vacuously announced over dual feeds running between Ottawa and Washington.

  "To say the least," the network's political analyst confirmed, "in and of itself, the seeming final birth of a new country in North America – coming after the greatest battle fought on North American soil in a hundred and fifty years – would be a news story. Perhaps two new countries, even, depending on how the final settlement shapes up. Story of the year, perhaps, story of the decade even. It's hard to get the image of artillery shells falling in a city that's just across the water from Wisconsin... It's hard to drive that from one's mind. And yet, here in Washington, we're impeaching a President."

  "A historic day, certainly," the anchor repeated.

  "I don't understand why they had to do that," said Sarah, shaking her head, as she watched MSNBC's cameras (Christopher had lost that particular argument for this day) pan over the war damage in Winnipeg, Thunder Bay, and their environs.

  "What do you mean?" asked Sorensen.

  "I mean that there's been so much death, violence and destruction throughout all of Canada. What did it all accomplish?"

  "I mean," replied Sorensen, "it looks like it made them free again. That's worth something. Yes, the war was terrible – it's hard to imagine cities that look so much like our own being destroyed by tanks, fighters, and artillery... But, at the same time, the choice that the West had was between fighting back or accepting that they'd be forever subordinated to the East."

  "It just seems terrible for so many people to die over what, in the end, amounted to money. They didn't want to pay and so they killed all of those people," she shook her head sadly.

  "Nothing in this world, Sarah, is about money alone. It's about what money represents. When the government has the right to come and take from you what it pleases – and to demand from you what it pleases – then we no longer have any rights as citizens. It really does – and I know that you hate this analogy – make us nothing more than slaves."

  "Bah," replied Sarah, "there's really no comparison there. Are you being made to work the fields and whipped day in and day out? Are you chained down? Are your children going to be sold away?"

  "No," said Sorensen firmly, "but that's not the only basis of comparison here. The question here is whether, when we accept that the state has the right to come in and decide to reallocate our property and our labor for the sake of 'the greater good' – without giving us any individual say in it, whether we are in any real sense of the word, free anymore."

  "But you did get to vote. And so did I. My guy won the last time and maybe your guy will win the next and we ought to respect that."

  "But that's not liberty, Sarah. That's just rule by one mob over the other. And, when that becomes the rule – like it did in Canada – then why ought anyone accept the arbitrary authority of one mob over the other? Because one of them happens to have a temporary fifty-percent-plus-one majority? That's a path to either totalitarianism or anarchy because it has no grounding in fundamental moral principles. 'Well, if everyone says so' isn't a moral creed."

  "Well," responded Sarah, "that's the way it works and I don't see it changing anytime soon."

  "I understand that Prime Minister," President Warren explained calmly, "and I certainly extend my deepest sympathies to both you and the Canadian people. Certainly, I condemn the extreme acts of violence and the terrible threats that the Western Republic has made against you. Yet, at the same time, I find it hard to see how we could possibly override the established facts on the ground."

  He listened as the new Canadian Prime Minister pleaded for aid to restore his authority in the wake of Ontario's move. As he listened, he waved his hand in the air, indicating that he was growing tired of listening to the Prime Minister natter on.

  "All I can say is how truly sorry I am that it has come to this. God go with you as well, Prime Minister," he added with evident insincerity as he hung up the phone and turned his head up to face his staff.

  "I hope that's never me," he said, before going on to ask: "what's the latest vote count?"

  "It looks very good, Mr. President," Alexis Jensen jumped in to explain, cutting off the Legislative Director.

  "We count fifty-seven votes for conviction and time is running out," the Legislative Director added by way of clarification. "I don't see your removal from office as a possibility at this point in time."

  "Well, that's good," replied the President, "but we still have a country to run. And, when this mess is over with, we'll have time and ground to make up. Are those executive orders ready?"

  "Yes, Mr. President," replied Jensen.

  Augustus King was weary, but he remained alert as he stepped into the room. Praetorian's Board of Directors and the rest of its private investors were, thanks to their heavy betting on the Western Republic's Victory Bonds and other associated investments, wealthier than ever before. Indeed, if the libertarian spirit of the Western Republic was to be preserved in subsequent years, they might make still billions and billions more thanks to the potential of an energy superpower with such superior geographic positioning.

  "I know that you'll point to the success that you've had in Canada – and I'll grant you that," the former Secretary of State began as soon as he had concluded his presentation, "but this is really just too damned much."

  "Just having this discussion could land all of us in a Federal prison," another interjected. But none of them left the room. King continued.

  "Gentlemen, I would remind you that in this, as in all other things, fortune favors the bold."

  "Nevertheless," said the former Secretary, "this is an incredibly dangerous game that you are now playing. It was dangerous before, but this is... Fuck."

  "I have made you tens of billions of dollars and, more than that, together we have let the world turn towards liberty. We cannot turn away now. I will not," said King.

  "It just doesn't add up," the Chief Counsel to the House Judiciary Committee, who had become the de facto legal advisor to the House impeachme
nt managers, explained. "There's no math that's going to result in a conviction so long as this remains, as the President has portrayed it, as primarily a partisan issue."

  "Thank you," Terrance Rickover said before asking, "can we have the room?"

  The Counsel nodded, buttoned his jacket, and exited the room along with most of the rest of the assembled aides.

  "Well," said Rickover, tapping his fingers on the desk, "I think that about says it all. Even with every card played, we're not going to make it, are we?"

  "We could consider going to Senator Jorgensen with some of the male escorts and drug stuff our oppo folks dug up and see if we can swing the vote," suggested his Deputy Chief of Staff.

  "No. Fuck that. That gets us to fifty-eight votes, maybe. And it gives him notice and might let him prepare a solid defense. The Governor of Minnesota is a Democrat anyway, and he's up next time around. We'll hold that for a week before the next election."

  That drew chuckles and smiles from around the table.

  Major Mark Varro kept hitting "refresh" on his browser, waiting for the latest news from the Capitol. He'd read every report on every site. He'd read every article that the Drudge Report linked. He simply refused to believe that, after everything – after every crime against the Constitution that the President was undoubtedly guilty of – that it could simply end here. Somewhere there had to be a miracle brewing. He had tried his best in order to turn the tide. Perhaps the Lord would deliver instead. Perhaps that had been his mistake, placing his trust in himself rather than in God.

  For hour after hour, the Major read not only every article, but dug through every comment thread. He was chasing rumors and desperate wisps of hope, but it was all that remained to him.

  Finally, he shut the laptop.

  "I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul," he repeated to himself, not knowing that he was quoting FDR's favorite poem. Steadying himself with these words, he turned away from the sleeping computer and resumed his very private science project in progress on his kitchen counter. After all, he realized, God helps those who help themselves.