War of Honor

by David Weber

  "I understand that," he said. "But the plan that gives us our best chance under Case Red calls for an all-out offensive, Eloise. All-out. We'd hit Trevor's Star with a sufficiently powerful force to take out Kuzak's entire fleet. That would account for at least half of their SD(P)s and over a third of their entire CLAC strength. Simultaneously, we'd hit every occupied system in succession with sufficient strength to overwhelm any of their local system pickets and roll them up. At the same time, we'd direct strikes at their more important perimeter bases. In particular, they've been very careless with their security arrangements for Grendelsbane. We could hurt them badly there with a much lighter attack force than I'd assumed before we began really studying Case Red. And we've been looking at the distinct possibility that we could surprise their Sidemore Station task force, as well. In effect, if our operations succeeded completely, the Manties would be reduced to only their Home Fleet, and they couldn't commit that to offensive operations without uncovering their home system. Which, in theory at least, would leave them with no option but to negotiate peace on our terms.

  "We have the ships and the weapons to do all of that . . . but our safety margin would be much narrower than anything I'd be comfortable with. And to make it all work, we'd have to hit them before they realized we were coming and redeployed."

  "Redeployed how?" she asked.

  "The most obvious thing for them to do would be to abandon the other occupied systems and concentrate on Trevor's Star. That's absolutely their most vital system, this side of the Manticore System itself. Next in priority would be Grayson. To be honest, the Grayson Navy scares me almost as much as the RMN, these days. All the intelligence indications are that High Ridge has managed to alienate Grayson pretty thoroughly, but I don't think it's bad enough that Grayson would refuse to come to Manticore's assistance. Some of my planners do think that, but they're wrong. Unfortunately, that's one more argument in favor of hitting the Manties hard, fast, and with as much surprise advantage as we can generate. Given the current tension between Grayson and the Star Kingdom, Mayhew would almost certainly have to stand fast, at least initially. Not only would he have his own system's security to worry about, but I doubt very much that Janacek and Chakrabarti have bothered with any of the preliminary planning that would be required to get the GSN effectively deployed quickly enough to hamper our operations. If those operations can be concluded on the timetable we're projecting."

  "Can they be?"

  "Obviously, I think it's possible or I wouldn't be pursuing the possibility. And I've tried to strike the best balance I can between allowing for the unavoidable friction that's going to slow us down and refusing to let concern over that paralyze the planning process.

  "But as I say, all of this is predicated on our getting in the first punch, and that's the part that worries me the most."

  Pritchart arched an eyebrow, inviting explanation, and he rubbed the scar on his cheek while he looked for exactly the right words.

  "We can virtually guarantee ourselves the advantage of surprise," he said finally. "All that would be required would be for us to attack the Manties while we're still negotiating with them. The only problem is that if we did that, we might very well win all of the battles and still lose the war because of the long-term diplomatic and military consequences. The instant we did something like that, the galaxy at large would conclude that we've decided to go back to the same policy of expansion as the old People's Republic. And not just as far as foreign nations would be concerned. The very people right here at home we've been trying to convince to believe in the restored Republic would come to exactly the same conclusion. That could be an awful high price to pay for defeating the Star Kingdom."

  "Yes, it could," she agreed quietly. She sat thinking for several seconds, her eyes distant, then refocused on him.

  "What exactly are you trying to tell me, Tom? I know you're not just rehashing all of this to hear yourself talk."

  "I guess what I'm saying is that, first, we need to do everything humanly possible to find a solution to our problems short of war. If it comes down to using force, though, our best chance is Case Red. But if we're going to execute Case Red, then we need to do it in a way that doesn't echo the old Duquesne Plan. Our diplomacy needs to make it clear that we've done more than merely go the extra kilometer trying to achieve a peaceful resolution. To make Case Red work, we're going to have to redeploy and preposition a lot of our fleet to execute an unexpected offensive . . . but we can't execute that offensive until the Star Kingdom fires the first shot or at least breaks off negotiations. We just can't do it, Eloise. I won't do it. Not after how much blood you and I have shed to prove we're not the People's Republic."

  "And when," she demanded angrily, "have I ever suggested to you that I would do that?"

  "I—" he began, then closed his mouth with a click. Then he drew a deep breath and shook his head.

  "I apologize," he said quietly. "I know you've never suggested anything of the sort. It's just . . ." He inhaled deeply again. "It's just that we've come so far, Eloise. We've accomplished so much. If we go back to war with the Star Kingdom, we could lose all of that even if we win. I guess it just . . . scares me. Not for myself, but for the Republic."

  "I understand," she said, equally quietly, and her eyes held his levelly. "But at the same time, Tom, I can't simply ignore all of the other responsibilities of my job because discharging them might get us back into a war. Especially not when the Manties won't let me end the war we've already got. So I have to know. If I make it clear to Descroix and High Ridge that we mean business, that I'm prepared to break off negotiations—which could be construed as renouncing the existing truce—will you and the Navy support me?"

  A moment of tension hovered between them as they faced one another, the man who'd made the restoration of the Republic possible, and the woman who'd overseen that restoration. And then Thomas Theisman nodded.

  "Of course we will, Madame President," he said, and if his voice was sad, it was also unflinching. "That's what a Constitution is for."

  Chapter Forty

  Shannon Foraker stood in Sovereign of Space's boat bay once more and watched Lester Tourville's cutter settle into the docking arms. This time, however, she wasn't waiting for Thomas Theisman or Javier Giscard, as well. Theisman was back in Nouveau Paris . . . and Giscard stood beside her, behind Captain Reumann and Commander Lampert. She glanced sideways at the man who had become the second ranking officer of the Republican Navy and felt an undeniable pang of sorrow as she realized she was already an outsider in this boat bay.

  The cutter finished docking, the pressure light blinked green, Tourville swung himself from the personnel tube into Sovereign of Space's internal gravity, and the side party snapped to attention. Bosun's pipes twittered, and the lieutenant at the side party's head returned Tourville's salute.

  "Permission to come aboard?" Tourville requested formally.

  "Permission granted, Sir," the lieutenant replied, and stepped aside as Reumann moved forward to offer Tourville the traditional captain's handshake of greeting. Giscard stepped forward with him; Foraker did not, because Reumann was no longer her flag captain.

  "Welcome aboard, Lester." Giscard greeted Tourville warmly, and the commander (designate) of Second Fleet smiled back at him.

  "Thanks, Javier." He shook Giscard's hand, then looked past the other admiral and smiled at Foraker. "Hello, Shannon."

  "Sir." She returned the greeting with an edge of formality which dismayed her when she recognized it. It wasn't his fault, or Giscard's. In fact, it wasn't anyone's fault. But as she looked at the two of them, she felt excluded, just as she'd felt when Theisman broke it to her that Sovereign of Space was about to become Giscard's flagship, instead of hers.

  Tourville's expression showed momentary surprise at the brevity of her response. But the surprise vanished as quickly as it had come, and she saw a flicker of sympathy in his eyes. Of course he'd understand, she thought. She'd spent too much time on his s
taff for him not to realize exactly how she must be feeling at this moment.

  She shook herself and gave herself a sharp mental scold for allowing her unhappiness to splash on to anyone else. Then she produced a smile for him. It might have been a tad lopsided, but it was also genuine, and she knew he recognized the unspoken apology for her terseness.

  "Well," Giscard said, in a voice which was just hearty enough to show he, too, had caught the undertones, "we've got a lot to talk about. So I suppose we'd better get started."

  He gestured at the waiting lift shaft, and his subordinates moved obediently towards it.

  * * *

  "So that's the bare bones of the current deployment plan," Captain Gozzi said, winding up the first stage of his briefing the better part of two and a half hours later. "With your permission, Admiral," he continued, turning to speak directly to Giscard, "I'd like to open the floor to general questions before we move on to the consideration of specific details."

  "Of course, Marius," Giscard told his chief of staff, and glanced at the other two flag officers present in Sovereign of Space's flag briefing room. "Lester? Shannon?"

  "From what I seem to be hearing here," Tourville observed, frowning from behind a cloud of fragrant cigar smoke at the floating holo map of the region around Trevor's Star, "this is no longer a hypothetical deployment."

  It wasn't precisely a question, but Gozzi nodded anyway.

  "That's correct, Sir. The Octagon sent us the preparatory movement orders this morning."

  "It sounds as if things are getting even dicier," Captain DeLaney said, her expression unhappy, and Tourville nodded in agreement with his own chief of staff.

  "That's exactly what I was thinking," he said, and frowned.

  "I know none of us are particularly happy about this situation," Giscard said with massive understatement, "but at least you're getting what you handle best, Lester—a detached, independent command."

  "'Detached!'" Tourville snorted. "That's certainly accurate enough. Just who had this brainstorm, anyway?"

  "That's not something I've been specifically told," Giscard replied with a wry smile. "Having said that, it has all the earmarks of something Linda Trenis would have come up with."

  "Figures. Linda always was too smart for her own good."

  "You don't think it will work?" Giscard asked, one eyebrow raised, and Tourville puffed on his cigar some more, then shrugged.

  "I think it should do what it's supposed to do," he acknowledged. "I guess what bothers me about it is that sending Second Fleet clear to Silesia seems to indicate that someone is beginning to think a lot more seriously in terms of reopening a can of worms I don't think any of us want reopened."

  "It sounds that way to me, too," Foraker put in. "That's one reason this whole deployment plan worries me."

  Even as she spoke, Foraker reflected upon how insanely dangerous it would have been for any flag officer to express reservations about her orders under the Committee of Public Safety. But she didn't serve the Committee; that was the entire point.

  "I don't think anyone in Nouveau Paris is taking the possibility of a resumption of hostilities lightly," Giscard said. "I know Secretary Theisman isn't, as I'm sure all of us are aware." He gazed at Tourville and Foraker until both of them nodded, then shrugged. "By the same token, it's his job—and ours—to be ready if worse comes to worst anyway. On that basis, do you have any reservations, Lester?"

  "Other than those I think any of us would feel about going up against someone as good as Harrington that far from any of our own support bases, no," Tourville conceded. "I like the fact that I don't do a thing without positive orders from home. At least we don't have to worry about my starting a war because no one got me the orders not to in time!"

  "Shannon?"

  "Actually," Foraker said unhappily, "I do have a few reservations."

  "Oh?" Giscard eyed her speculatively. "What sort of reservations?"

  "I can't escape the feeling that we're running the risk of strategic overreach," she replied. "In most ways, I have to agree that Case Red is . . . well, for want of a better word, elegant. It requires a degree of coordination I'm not entirely happy about, but it avoids the mistake the Legislaturalists made by starting with detached forces which were too far apart to stay in communication with one another. Except, of course, for Second Fleet."

  Giscard nodded. As soon as this conference ended, he and the newly designated First Fleet would depart the Haven System and head for his new station in the SXR-136-23 System. It had never received a name to replace its catalog designation because the thoroughly useless red giant had absolutely nothing, not even any planets, to attract anyone to it. It did, however, offer a handy anchor around which to park a fleet safely out of sight. And it just happened to be located less than forty light-years northwest of Trevor's Star.

  The logistics ships to support First Fleet were already in place, orbiting SXR-136's dim central fires with sufficient supplies and spares to sustain the entire fleet on station for up to six months. If it turned out to be necessary to leave First Fleet there for longer than that, the fleet train would detach ships in relays to bring back what was needed. And if the balloon went up, every single task group (except Second Fleet) set up by the carefully orchestrated war plan known as Case Red Alpha would depart from SXR-136. Its components would sail at staggered intervals which would place each of them at its objective at precisely the same time, but they would all depart from the same place, under the same orders, without risking the strategic miscue which had sent Admiral Yuri Rollins to the Hancock System early. Of course, it helped that, with the exception of Grendelsbane, all of those objectives lay within no more than a hundred and twenty light-years of Trevor's Star.

  "Unfortunately," Foraker continued, "the fact that this plan provides for better coordination doesn't change the fact that we're going to be attacking in a lot of places at once. Which means dispersing our forces to a much greater degree than I'd really prefer."

  "That's a valid concern," Giscard agreed. "I think, though, that it's an element of risk we're just going to have to accept. And if we're going to be dispersed, at least the Manties are spread even thinner."

  "There is that." It was Foraker's turn to nod.

  "And," Captain Gozzi pointed out respectfully, "the ops plan does provide for us to hit our objectives in sequenced attacks, Ma'am. We'll be concentrating superior forces for each attack, and starting with their nodal positions to take out their response forces first."

  "I know." Foraker frowned. "Given our resources and the mission objectives, this certainly looks like the most effective employment of our forces. I suppose when it comes right down to it, a lot of my concerns stem from the fact that I know how much of our planning is based on what we've been doing out at Bolthole."

  She grimaced and glanced at her own chief of staff.

  "Five and I—all our people—have tried to be as constructively critical of our own work as we could. But none of our conclusions have been tested in battle yet. Our simulations are solid . . . if the intelligence data on Manty hardware on which we based them is accurate. But we can't know for certain that it is. And even if the numbers are good, we're going to be committing an awful lot of ships, manned by people who're going to be going into battle using new hardware and new doctrine, both of which are completely untested where it really counts. I think we've all seen too much of Murphy not to realize how many things could go wrong, however well we've done our jobs at Bolthole. Under those circumstances, I'd really prefer a bigger numerical advantage at the critical points than it's going to be possible for us to achieve in light of how astrographically dispersed our ops area is."

  "I can appreciate your concerns," Giscard said after a moment. "At the same time, I suspect at least a part of them stem from your own conscientiousness. And I think you may be underestimating the quality of the work you and your people have done. Oh, I don't doubt for a minute that we're going to hit at least some holes in the doctrine, or
that we're going to find out some assumption about Manty capabilities wasn't sufficiently pessimistic. But Lester and I have gamed out a dozen battles in the simulators, using your new hardware and your new doctrine, and from what we've seen there, you've managed to increase our combat effectiveness by a factor of at least ten."

  He shook his head.

  "That's one hell of a lot better than we've ever had before going up against the Manties. If we manage to catch them still dispersed, then I think we're going to chew them up badly."

  "I hope you're right, Sir. But I still think we ought to be throwing an even heavier punch at Trevor's Star. That's their strongest point . . . and they've been kind enough to concentrate virtually all of their modern ships there, outside of the ones assigned to Home Fleet, anyway. If we destroy that force, then we can spread out from Trevor's Star and gather in all of the other objectives easily, because they won't have anything in the area that could possibly stop us."

  "But if we hit Trevor's Star concentrated," Tourville pointed out, "and they managed to get dispatch boats away—which they would do, Shannon, given the direct wormhole connection to Manticore—they might very well manage to redeploy their other covering forces before we could reach them with our own attacks. I don't see anything they could do that would actually stop us, but they could certainly concentrate sufficient forces on the more critical objectives to make it much more expensive for us to take them."