Balance of Power

by James W. Huston

  Gray stood up quickly. “May I respond?” he demanded of the judges.

  The presiding judge nodded. “Quickly,” he said.

  “Your Honor, Mr. Pendleton has set up a classic red herring, a head fake to throw Your Honors off the real issue in this case. The jurisdiction over the Navy is a false issue. We are not asking you to enjoin the Navy, Your Honor. We are asking this court to enjoin Congress. You do not need the Navy here to do that. If this court declares the Letter of Reprisal unconstitutional, at least through a temporary order pending further briefing, then the Navy would follow any such Letter at its own peril. The issues are whether we have a likelihood of prevailing and whether there will be permanent irreparable injury, in the absence of the court’s actions. There will certainly be permanent injury if the Navy follows the Letter and people are killed as a result.”

  Gray paused and breathed deeply. “The issue here is whether Congress can decide what the words of the Constitution mean. Whether Congress can decide, for example, that a Letter of Reprisal would allow it to issue an order to the National Guard of California to take over the state house and overthrow the governor of California. Obviously it cannot. Can Congress say the Letter of Reprisal means…anything? Do they have the sole power to define its content? That cannot be. It is up to the court to set the limits on the language of the Constitution.

  “So, can it be this court’s position, as Mr. Pendleton apparently requests”—he glanced at Pendleton—“that Congress can make it mean whatever they want, and can do whatever they want, and the court is powerless to stop them until briefed? Until months pass? Until Mr. Pendleton and his firm have stalled long enough for the damage to be done?

  “There is no authority in history for issuance of a Letter like this to a U.S. Navy warship. It has never been done before—”

  The judge interrupted Gray. “Sir, but there is no authority saying that it cannot be done either, is there?”

  “No, sir, but the historical context in which it has been issued before—”

  “Don’t you have to show a likelihood of prevailing at trial before the trial court can even consider issuing a restraining order?”

  “We believe it is clear that we will prevail, as we showed in our papers. Moreover, the risk of injury is so great—”

  “Thank you, Counsel. That will be all,” the judge said, cutting him off. The judge shuffled papers momentarily, then looked at Gray. “I take it that you want our decision immediately. Am I right?”

  “Yes, Your Honor, as soon as possible. It is already four o’clock on Friday afternoon, and if the court could get the decision out before the end of the day it would be much appreciated. We need this action stopped right now. Waiting until tomorrow or, even worse, until Monday would be disastrous.”

  “Very well. We will give you our decision within the hour.”

  “Thank you very much.”

  Pendleton stood up. “Thank you.”

  “All rise,” said the clerk as the judges stood and the three of them filed out through the door at the front of the courtroom.

  Gray walked over to Pendleton as Pendleton picked up his briefcase and began to leave. “I think I’ve got you this time, Mr. Pendleton.”

  Pendleton looked him straight in the eye. They were of equal height. “Then why are you sweating?” he asked, his gaze steady.

  “You know what really gripes me about all of this?” Gray moved closer so that his voice could not be heard by the gallery. “This whole thing started because the Speaker of the House is simply trying to protect his own turf. The Pacific Flyer was built in his home state and Stanbridge has a lot of friends in the shipping industry. One of his cronies owns the Stewart Shipping Line. Before he was Speaker, Stanbridge supported the President’s proposal that would mandate that fifty percent of all goods shipped into and out of the United States be shipped on U.S.-flagged vessels.”

  “Do you have a point?” asked Pendleton stonily.

  “So, he gets this bill passed, fifty percent of all shipping has to go through American-built and -flagged ships, NASSCO goes nuts because they now have more shipbuilding contracts than they can shake a stick at, and suddenly one of Stanbridge’s primary campaign contributors, Mr. Jack Stewart, has a shipping line with his name on it that is going to take advantage of this new legal requirement. Sure enough, he comes up with a new ship design built by NASSCO in San Diego, starts a new automobile-shipping facility in San Diego—which the Port Authority loves of course—and the Stewart Shipping Line convinces Ford to ship through them to Indonesia with their brand-new cars on his brand-new ship, and these guys go and blow the whole thing to bits. They humiliated your guy. That’s why we’re here,” Gray said with a patronizing tone at the end of his sentence.

  Pendleton stared at him. “Where did you go to college?” he asked him.

  “What difference does that make?” Gray responded hostily.

  “Did you ever take basic logic?”

  “No, why?”

  “Have you ever heard of the logical fallacy of post hoc, ergo propter hoc?”

  “Of course. Because B followed A, it was caused by A,” Gray said proudly.

  “Exactly. Now, if you will excuse me, I have other things to do.”

  Gray frowned, confused. “And do you know who the two largest contributors were to John Stanbridge’s last congressional campaign?”

  “No, but I have a feeling you’re going to tell me.”

  “That’s right. Jack Stewart and Bryce Dabny. Do you know who Bryce Dabny is? President of NASSCO. Isn’t that a surprise?” Pendleton began to turn. “And you know who else is on his list of big contributors?” Pendleton kept walking. “Your law firm.” Pendleton excused himself and made his way through the mob of reporters in the back of the room and down the hallway.

  Gray came out into the hallway. “I think I’ll talk to some of these reporters around here,” Gray said loudly. “I’ll bet they’re more interested….”

  24

  THE COMMUNICATIONS OFFICER RAPPED SMARTLY ON the door to Admiral Billings’s at-sea cabin. “Come in,” Billings called loudly.

  The officer stepped into the cabin empty-handed. “Well?” Billings looked at him with questions in his eyes as he buttoned his khaki shirt with the two stars on each collar.

  “No messages, Admiral,” he said, chagrined but not embarrassed. “Not a one. I thought maybe one of our systems was down or maybe one of the comlinks in the satellite had failed. But the satellites are working fine. Their locator signals are intact. We can hear the signals coming down. We’ve definitely been cut off, Admiral. I think they have sent out a modification of the encryption schedule so that we’re off it and everybody else is on it. They sent the message to everybody but us. There are signals flying all over the place; it’s just that nobody is talking to us and nobody is acknowledging our signals. Even the HF radio signals. We can hear people talk in a clear voice, but they won’t acknowledge us. You want my opinion?”

  Billings just looked at him as he tucked his shirt into his pants.

  “I think the word went out, Admiral, that we’re a pariah. Nobody is to communicate with us in any way whatsoever. Even if they receive our messages, they’re not to acknowledge or respond to them.”

  Billings head jerked up suddenly. “What about the other ships in our battle group? Are they responding?”

  “Yes, sir. We have normal comm with them, but they’re in the same fix we’re in. They’re not getting anything from the outside either.”

  Billings looked at his brass wall clock and saw that it was 0400. “This is going to be an interesting day.”

  The communications officer smiled weakly. “Yes, sir. I have a feeling you’re right.”

  “Thank you for your efforts. I’d like to keep our communications lines open. I want to continue sending situation reports, and all other messages that we would normally send, as if nothing had happened. If they don’t want to acknowledge us and pretend we’re not here, that’s the
ir business. We’ll continue to do what we have always done. They can at least know what we’re doing, even if we don’t know what they’re doing.”

  “Roger that, Admiral.”

  “That’ll be all.”

  “Yes, sir.” The communications officer spun around and left the stateroom, closing the door behind him. Billings finished dressing and walked to SUPPLOT. Beth Louwsma was staring at a chart.

  “Well, Beth, looks like you’re out of a job.”

  “I will never surrender, Admiral.” She grinned in response.

  “Get any intel on those South African SAMs before they shut us off?”

  “No, sir, we’re going with what we’ve got and that’s it.”

  “Where is that Dillon fellow? I wanted to pick his brain about a couple of things.”

  “I expect he’s still racked out—he traveled a long way yesterday.”

  “I guess he did.”

  “It’s only 0400,” she added.

  Captain Black walked in. “Morning, Admiral. Beth.”

  “Good morning,” they chorused. The admiral drew coffee from the urn bolted to the countertop.

  “You over your tantrum from last night yet, Chief of Staff?”

  “I’m sorry, Admiral. I thought we were supposed to speak freely. I hope I wasn’t out of line.”

  “No, you were just saying what you thought, which is your job.” His eyes narrowed slightly. “But I have to know if you’re onboard. Are you going to be against me now, or are you with me?”

  “I think you made the wrong decision, Admiral, but it’s your decision to make. I’m with you.”

  Billings blinked and went on. “What do we need to do between now and tomorrow morning?”

  “Well, Admiral, I was checking the ship’s track just now,” Captain Black began, clearly preferring the new topic. “It’s my understanding from the planning we did last night and from talking to Colonel Tucker that they want L hour and H hour to be 0540 tomorrow—fifteen minutes before sunrise,” he said, referring to the time the landingcraft and helicopters touched the island. “They think the only way to achieve any type of surprise is to hit the beach before the bad guys wake up.”

  “I agree. What’s our current position?”

  “Currently one hundred twenty miles east/southeast of Bunaya. We’re scheduled for a light flight schedule, about seventy-five percent of the usual cyclic ops. The Amphibs are ready to go. The Marines say they could go today if they had to, and will be more than ready by dawn.”

  “Okay. Ops O up yet?”

  “Yes, sir, he is. I saw him at the wardroom.”

  “Get him down here. I want to go over a couple of quick things.”

  “Yes, sir,” the chief of staff said, going to the phone located on the admiral’s desk.

  “So, Beth, what do you think? We going to get any additional intel?”

  “No, sir.” She shook her head. “That’s why it’s critical we get the SEALs ashore tonight. Our last planned TARPS run was shot down—we haven’t even had any imagery since yesterday afternoon.”

  “So, for all we know, they could be reinforcing the island with hundreds of troops teeming over the sides of mother ships from all over Southeast Asia?”

  “That about sums it up, Admiral. I seriously doubt that’s happening though—I don’t think anybody has that kind of force outside of Vietnam, and I don’t think these guys are working for any country—wait a second,” she said, brightening. “We may have an option after all. Admiral, remember our special guests for the Cobra Gold exercise?”

  “The Army contingent?”

  “Yes. Remember what they had with them?”

  Billings looked puzzled.

  “The Predator, sir.”

  “I’m not following you,” Billings said.

  “Admiral,” Beth said, moving closer to him, “it’s the newest remotely piloted vehicle in the inventory. It’s pretty small—they’ll never see it or hear it on the island. Remember those tests they did, where it flew at fifteen thousand feet and sent live video to the Lincoln? It works!” She tried to control her excitement. “It can be our eyes. It’s the answer to our lack of satellite coverage, or any other intel. The Predator can do it all for us.”

  He looked at her, curious.

  “It was set up to be launched from the shore, but I’ll bet the catapult guys can rig it for a launch from the cat as a dummy load.”

  “What else can it do?”

  “IR, radar, and live video link. And it can be up for hours.”

  “You think you can make it work?”

  “I’m sure we can.”

  “Make it happen,” the admiral said enthusiastically. “But wait—if we use it tonight, can we use it tomorrow morning during the strike too?”

  “I wouldn’t count on it. We should probably use it for only one launch.”

  Billings sat back and considered his options. “Send the SEALs in tonight, and launch the Predator before the attack in the morning.”

  “Roger that, sir,” Beth said.

  “The close air support…” The door opened while he was speaking and the admiral’s operations officer rushed in.

  “Good morning, Admiral,” he said, out of breath.

  “Morning, Ops. How are you doing?”

  “Frankly, Admiral, I’m getting a little uptight. The idea of being cut off from the entire United States and Washington is a bit spooky. You couldn’t drive a pin up my butt with a ballpeen hammer.”

  The admiral smiled slightly and sat down. He turned away from his screens to look at the other three officers. The two sailors in the background, who were accustomed to moving plastic ships around on the board, were sitting idly. With no additional intelligence on updated positions for the ships, they stayed where they had been twelve hours before. “Let me ask you guys something. What do you think the President is up to? What do you think his plan is?”

  No one answered.

  “No opinions?”

  No one dared speak. They didn’t want to be wrong. The admiral looked at the chief of staff. “Call Drano. Tell him to wake up Dillon and get him up here. He’s the most political guy we’ve got. I’ll ask him.”

  Dillon sat up and hit his head on the bunk directly above his. Someone was banging on his door. His mind raced to gather data, to tell him where he was and what he was doing there. He looked at his luminous wristwatch: 4:15 A.M.Bam, bam, bam. What in the world? He put his feet over the side of the bed and stood up. The tile was cold under his feet. What happened to my carpet? He located the source of the knock and walked toward it. He felt movement. Ship. I am on a ship. He shook his head to clear it and reached for the door handle. Bright light from the passageway streamed in.

  “Good morning, Mr. Dillon,” said Lieutenant Reynolds.

  “Good morning. What’s up?” Dillon asked, less confused.

  “The admiral would like to see you right away, sir.”

  “What?” Dillon asked. “Oh. Right. Um, let me…let me get dressed. Do you want to come in?”

  “No. I’ll wait out here, sir. I’ll just escort you there when you are ready.”

  “Okay. Give me five minutes.”

  Dillon reached for the switch and turned on the overhead lights. He had never been this tired in his life. He felt as if he had lost 30 percent of the knowledge he’d had two days ago. He walked to the steel-doored closet and opened it. What do you wear on a ship? He had brought his boat shoes, thinking that they would work just fine since he would be on a boat. He had never realized that an aircraft carrier is related to a cruise ship only in that they both float. It was a very serious place with some very serious corners and sharp things that would break your feet if you weren’t careful. Your feet might even break if you were careful. Most of the officers and sailors wore black hard-soled shoes or boots, most with steel toes.

  He pulled out a white shirt that had gotten wrinkled in the around-the-world flight, and put it on with his gray suit pants. He tied a red and blue str
iped tie and combed water through his hair. He ran the toothbrush quickly over his teeth and went out the door. “Okay, let’s go,” he said to the lieutenant.

  The lieutenant nodded and led him down the passageway. Moments later they entered SUPPLOT and Dillon tried to remember whether he had been in this particular space before. He recognized the large color screens and the admiral.

  “Well, good morning, Mr. Dillon.”

  “Good morning, Admiral. How are you today?”

  “Fine, thank you.”

  Dillon stood in front of the admiral and his staff, not knowing what to say. He had been summoned, but had no idea why. “Is there coffee anywhere?” Dillon asked hesitatingly.

  “Absolutely. Fowler!” the admiral yelled across to a sailor. “Get Mr. Dillon here a cup of coffee.”

  “Yes, sir.” Fowler grabbed a porcelain cup off a rack next to the pot. He filled it and gave it to Dillon, who sipped it gratefully.

  “Mr. Dillon, sit down here,” the admiral said, pointing to a chair near his. “Just talking here with my staff…we wanted to discuss the political implications of…what’s going on. We thought that you might be better placed than anybody else to deal with that question.”

  “I’ll try, sir,” Dillon said, listening to the hum of the air-conditioning and the equipment. It was cold in SUPPLOT and Dillon felt a chill.

  “You ever been to Israel?”

  Dillon looked at him puzzled. “No, sir. Never.”

  “Speak any Hebrew?”

  “No.”

  “When I was commanding officer of VF-84, the Jolly Rogers—you may have seen them, skull and crossbones, black tails…” Dillon shook his head. “Well, anyway, when I was the CO of that squadron on the Nimitz, we pulled into Israel once. Haifa. Great city. On a hill, pretty. Anyway, they have a saying over there that I love. I’ve used it ever since. If something is really screwed up, a fiasco, they say it is a balagan. If it’s really screwed up, it’s an eza balagan. A real fiasco. Good word, huh?” he asked.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, Mr. Dillon, what your boss has given us, this Letter, has put us in a position that could really turn out to be a balagan. My job is to make sure it doesn’t. You understand?”