by Ira Tabankin
“Sir, the power in all of Washington DC is out, it was intentionally cut we have to assume this is the start of an assault. We have to get you to safety.”
“How is the elevator going to work without power?”
“The emergency generators are cutting in; we’re having some problems with two of them, seems there’s water in their fuel tanks. We’ll worry about how the water got into the tanks later; our first task is your protection.”
“I didn’t get to complete my speech; the people will worry something horrible has happened to me, I need to assure the people I’m all right. If they think the racists have harmed me, there’s going to be bloodshed. I’m the people’s elected leader to bring America into the future. I must complete my address before it’s too late.”
“Mr. President, once you’re safe in the bunker we’ll see about getting you back on the air…”
Before the lead, Secret Service agent can complete his sentence new alarms sound. One of the agents listens to his ear bud, saying, “incoming planes. Stingers have been deployed to the roof; two Patriot air defense missile batteries are online, they're operating on their backup generators. Looks like a flight of C130s, thinking either gunships or we’re about to have a bunch or visitors drop in on us.”
The senior agent yells, “Bring those planes down before they get close enough to either attack us or drop paratroops. Tell the patriots they are free to fire.”
President Obsma is trying to break free of the agents; he yells, “What’s happening? I’m the President; someone tells me what’s happening!”
While still half dragging and half carrying the President, the lead Secret Service agent responds “Mr. President there are incoming airplanes, these could be gunships that can tear the White House apart or drop paratroops on us.”
“Why would anyone do either?”
“Sir, I’m assuming not everyone agrees with your hope and change.”
Five miles away the Army Patriot Air defense missile has the incoming planes on radar when their radar image flares into thousands of new images.
The senior Secret Service agent hears the alert tone in his ear, his presses the ear bud, “What’s the situation?”
“Sir, we’re being jammed, the Patriot batteries report their radar is filled with thousands of returns.”
One of the agent's replies, “Damn it, the only thing that has enough power to jam a Patriot battery is either an EA 6B or F/A 18G, either way, it means the Navy just declared war against America. Tell the Patriot batteries to focus their radar into narrow beams and scan to the east.”
A minute later, “Sir, the batteries report they can’t hold a lock.”
“Tell them to fire anyway, fire towards the last held position of the C130s, the missiles might persuade the planes to turn around, or we may get lucky and nail a couple.”
The Secret Service agents on the White House roof have started firing Stinger man-portable air defense missiles. These small missiles are not radar guided; they target the hot surfaces of the incoming planes. As soon as the incoming planes see the smoke trail of the Stingers, they drop flares to draw the incoming missiles away from the airplanes.
The senior Secret Service agent hears nothing but static from his ear bud,”Damn it they’ve jammed our signals. Let’s get the President into the bunker ASAP. My gut says we’re going to be hosting a number of visitors.
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“General, the power went off in DC on schedule, we caught the President in mid-word.”
“How far away are the planes?”
“Sir, they are only a couple of minutes away from the White House, there are five C130s and two F/A 18Gs providing jamming.”
“Shutdown the entire city, jam all of their radios and communications systems, I don’t want the Secret Service to be able to call for help.”
Chapter 15
Every communication network, every broadcast channel, every cell phone is jammed and unusable. Static is the only sound heard from any device. Telephones don’t have dial tones; computers can’t locate available networks; no one can log onto the internet or their internal networks. Every phone number dialed including 911, returns a fast-busy tone. Every television station is off the air.
Commander Randolph flying one of the F/A 18G electronic warfare fighters asks his electronic warfare officer sitting behind him, “Mongoose, how goes the battle?”
“Red nose, just great, they must be going crazy in DC; nothing is working, between us and flight two, we’ve got the entire metro area shutdown. Because radios are out, the metro buses have stopped running, the trains have stopped in place, hell we’ve even turned all of the traffic lights red. No one is going anywhere, and no one is talking to anyone else. Except for course for us. We’ve left our channel open.”
“Goose what if the Secret Service locates our channel?”
“No joy there red nose, we’ve got the auto sequence engaged, we’re jumping channels every couple of nanoseconds, even if they were able to lock on, before they could blink we’ll be on another frequency.”
“I assume you’ve locked out the Patriot battery’s radar?”
“Goose, the first thing we locked down, we don’t need any rude surprises.”
“Anything we can do about their Stingers?”
“The C 130s have flares; they may or may not work; the new Stingers are very good knowing the difference between a flare and a real airplane.”
“Let’s pray the Secret Service has the old seekers, I don’t want to lose our boys because our own missiles are too good.”
“Roger sir, we can drop some flares, we also have the experimental decoy we can deploy. The decoy flies behind us emitting the same IR as a fighter. The problem is the C130s don’t have the decoys.”
“Good, deploy it, let’s hope the decoys suck up any Stingers.”
On board the C 130s, “Captain March, this is the pilot, we’re one minute out, the Hornets have the RF spectrum covered and shutdown, our only fear is the Stingers the Secret Service has. I’m dropping flares now, tell your people to watch out for them.”
“Roger.”
“Everyone, up, attach, check the person in front of you, get ready, stand in the doorway, I’m going to be the first one out, follow me in one second interval.”
Captain March stands in the open doorway; he turns to the jump master, salutes, and steps off into the darkness over Washington DC, eight others join the Captain before two Stingers strike the C 130 destroying it in mid-air with 40 troops still on board.
Three of the C 130s can drop their troops, one is hit before anyone can jump, the plane turns back with minor damage, and the other plane is destroyed before a single person can jump.
The Secret Service sees the parachutes floating down; they start firing machine guns at the chutes. 25% of the Marines are killed in the process of landing. The Secret Service agents race three blocks from the White House to capture the paratroopers before they can get organized when the agents turn a corner they run into sixteen militia members who open fire on them.
Six agents are standing in the rose garden firing Stingers into the air at the Hornets. The decoys behind the Hornets work as advertised, the Stingers track and try to attack the decoys. “Mongoose, we just lost our decoy. Damn Stinger got it.”
“Better the decoy than us.”
“I’m going to fly higher taking us out of the Stingers range.”
“Roger, I got everything shut down.”
The agents get an unwelcome surprise when two Marine Cobra attack helicopters arrive firing 30mm cannons at the agents. None of the agents survives the attack. Captain March looks up smiling; he turns to his gunny sergeant saying, “Nothing like good old firepower, I’m happy we have our own air arm, so we don’t have to call for help.”
“Yes sir, I’d hate to be a Secret Service agent tonight.”
“I never did like their black suits, reminds me too much of the “Men in Black movies.”
“Sir, we’re all
that made it, we have 48 people and two wounded; one caught around in his arm coming down and one broke his ankle when he landed in a tree limb which broke dumping him hard on the ground.”
“Didn’t anyone teach him how to land? Never mind, let’s get to the tunnels. How many of the SEALs made it?”
“Sir, Twelve. We lost the plane with two teams on it.”
“Damn it, do we know where they were?”
“Sir, the last we saw of them is when they landed, they took off, we haven’t seen them again.”
“They know their job, we have ours, how far from the tunnel entrance are we?”
“Sir, two blocks to the southeast.”
“Let’s go.”
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The senior Secret Service agent tells President Obsma, “Sir, we’re under attack, we’ve brought down a couple of their planes; however, they have one or more jamming planes over DC; we can’t communicate with anyone. We’re going to leave the White House; you’re most likely their target. We have to get you out of here before the paratroopers get here.”
“Where are we going?”
“We’re going to take you through the tunnels, then out of DC; we have a helicopter waiting in Arlington to take you to Mount Weather. You should be safe there.”
“What about my family?”
“They’ll be safe, whoever is attacking us is after you, not them.”
The Secret Service manages to sneak President Obsma into the tunnels under Washington DC; the Marines enter the tunnel complex three blocks from the President’s location. The seals arrive at the White House three minutes after the President left. The SEALs and Secret Service come face to face. The Secret Service agents drop their weapons and raise their hands, “We surrender.”
“Agent, where is he?”
“He’s not here which is why we surrendered.”
“I don’t suppose you’ll tell us where you took him will you?”
“We both have our orders; we don’t want to fight you. You don’t want to fight us, in normal times we’re both on the same side. Today all we can say is he’s not here. We don’t have specific knowledge where he was taken.”
“Why should we believe you don’t know where he was taken?”
“Because of your jamming we lost communications, the senior agent in charge arranged to move the President, we couldn’t hear a word he said.”
“I’ll buy that if you answer the following question, theoretically speaking if there was ever an attack on the White House and you had time to remove the President where would he be taken? All theoretically speaking.”
“Well, if we’re speaking theoretically, then I’d say he would be transported to Mount Weather.”
“Oh, that’s going to be a good one. That’s where Congress is hiding.” Both sides break out laughing. The Secret Service agent asks the SEAL commander, “While you’re here, would you like a tour so you can be sure he’s not here?”
“Thank you that would be very nice.”
“You two men stay here, four come with me. We’re going to take a tour of the White House with this agent. We’ll make sure he’s not hiding in plain sight.”
“Sir, orders if we find him?”
“Bag and tag him.”
“Sit what about his family?”
“Don’t harm them. Our mission is to retrieve the President, not his family. Don’t touch them, be respectful.”
The men move off into the White House, whose staff looks surprised to see twelve heavily armed seals searching the White House.
President Obsma and his security detail miss running into the Marines under the city by only feet. The President exits across from the Pentagon where he’s driven in an unmarked white delivery van to a waiting black hawk helicopter that takes him to Mount Weather. Arriving at the bunker, the President is surprised to find Congress already embedded in the facility. The Speaker of the House welcomes the President, “Hello Mr. President, welcome to Mount Weather. It’s nice of you to drop in and pay us a visit. Since disbanding Congress, we’ve missed you. You’re right on time to sit in on your impeachment trial.”
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The people in Maryland and Virginia have no idea what’s going on. One minute they're watching television or surfing the web and the next all communications are cut. 30 minutes after the networks go off the air, televisions and the internet return, however, they all show the same program. “Looney Tunes” is being broadcast on every channel, across every website. The faces of the main characters have been replaced with those of the administration. This continues for two hours when everything returns to normal.
Chapter 16
President Obsma turns to his Secret Service detail, “Arrest the Speaker; he’s clearly threatening me.”
“Sir, we’re sorry; however, the Speaker has not threatened you with any bodily harm; he merely welcomed you to Mount Weather and informed you the Congress will be bringing to the floor a vote on articles of impeachment. Sir that is totally within the Speakers right to do. I haven’t seen any physical threats against you.”
“Agent Rogers I sent Congress home, as such they shouldn’t even be meeting. When I sent them home, they entered into a state of recess, while, in the recess, they can’t meet or hold any discussions. In such a state, they can’t bring any votes to the floor since they’re not legally in session. The Speaker’s proposed vote will not only harm me; it will do irreparable harm to the country, as such I’m ordering you to arrest the Speaker.”
“Mr. President, I can’t speak to the matter of law. However, the Speaker hasn’t done or said anything to threaten your health or well-being as defined by the scope of our policy.”
“You idiot, if Congress impeaches me, it will have a very large impact on my well-being and health. If the House impeaches me, it will damage the entire country. As such, you are bound to protect me. Protect me from these fools who mean to do me harm.”
“Mr. President, we can’t protect you from an impeachment vote. The Constitution covers such a vote.”
Yelling, President Obsma screams, “How many times do I have to say it? I do not care about the constitution! I’m the only person who can lead the country through the many problems the racists have dragged us into. I’m the one the people of the country trust to bring America into the light. Now stop these fools from putting me, ME on trial. You are bound by your oath to protect me, even if it means giving up your lives that is as it should be. I am your leader; you should swear an oath to me personally.”
The Speaker of the House calls out, “Sergeant of Arms, please escort the President to the main conference room, he will be able to defend his actions personally.”
“Mr. Speaker, I’m not having anything to do with your illegal vote. In fact, I’m going to sign an executive order to put the constitution on hold for the duration of the current national emergency.”
The Speaker looks sadly at President Obsma, “Mr. President, not even you can get away with that one. The constitution is the foundation of America. The people will never sit still for that.”
“Mr. Speaker, you’d be surprised what the people will accept. They elected me twice; they know I have their best interests at heart. I am the voice of the people; I am the heartbeat of the people; you and Congress are held slightly above yesterday’s leftovers. The American people don’t trust or respect Congress. They will follow me, just watch and learn.”
“Mr. President, whether you stay or leave we’re going to bring to the floor for a vote articles of impeachment against you, the Vice President, and your entire cabinet.”
“I refuse to stay here and listen to your banter. You have no authority to impeach me; I’m going to sign an executive order to disband Congress. I’ll have you kicked out of this facility. I am the President; my word is law. My will, will be done.”
“Mr. President, you are the Chief Executive of the country, you are supposed to uphold the laws passed by Congress which are signed into law by the sitting President. Sir, you’re t
he one who has acted above the law, the law of the land is not going to be ignored any longer.”
“Do whatever you want, I’m going to have the DHS arrest all of you for treason. The DHS will kick all of you out of this and every other federally owned property. The President turns to leave the facility telling his personal security detail, “Take me someplace secure, get the Secretary of DHS to meet me wherever you’re going to take me.”
“Mr. President, there is the bunker under the Greenbrier Hotel, it was closed a few years ago, I think there is still a couple of FEMA staff keeping an eye on the facility, we can have you there within three hours.”
