by Dale Brown
had come in since the President's address to the nation; he
placed one on the desk in front of the President. "A thank-
you note from President Lee of Taiwan," he said. "He heard
about the death of a c ' rew member and wants your permission
to thank the EB-52 bomber crews personally."
"How in hell did the ROC find out about the Megafor-
tresses?" the President asked incredulously. "That chance en-
counter outside the Oval Office? Had to be more than that."
"We'll find out, sir," Freeman said. "It was obviously more
than a leak-it was a direct exchange of classified information,
a serious breach."
"Just find out who did it and throw his ass in jail," the
President snapped. "Next, I want to know-"
"You better take a look at this, Mr. President," Ricardo
interrupted, pointing to one-of the televisions. "It looks like
Finegold's giving a press conference inside the Capitol."
The group listened with shocked expressions as Senator
Majority Leader Barbara Finegold announced that the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee and Senate Armed Services
Committee would be holding joint hearings on the report that
FATAL TE R RA I N 197
the President had sent long-range bombers to attack Chinese
warships, and whether or not these attacks prompted the Chi-
nese to launch and detonate nuclear weapons-or if the Amer-
ican bombers had been the ones that dropped the' nuclear
weapons. She quoted the official Chinese government news
agency, Xinhua, as saying that B-52 Stratofortress bombers
had been spotted in the area launching nuclear-tipped missiles
just before the nuclear explosions occurred, and that they had
gun camera video to support the claim. Sprinkled throughout
the statements and Q&A afterward were words like "indepen-
dent prosecutor," "violation of the War Powers Act,"
"breach of trust," and "terrorist."
"This is unbelievable! Who in hell does she think she isT
the President shouted. "How in hell did she find out?"
"It's a guess, Mr. President, nothing more," Ricardo said.
"The Chinese news agency is putting their own spin on the
skirmish, and Finegold is latching on to it. She's been on the
stealth bomber warpath ever since the Iran conflict. She's
slinging shit, looking to see what sticks, that's all."
"Terrorist," Hale muttered bitterly, when he heard the word
a third time. He had moved over beside the President so only
he could hear his comment. "Sounds like Admiral Balboa put
a bug in her ear. I'll bet he's talked to Finegold.-
"Don't even think about shit like that unless you've got
evidence, and I mean concrete evidence, that he's done some-
thing wrong," the President said. "Not one word, not even an
angry glance in his direction."
"Kevin, when are you going to stop coddling Balboa?"
Hale asked the President in a low voice. Hale was.probably
the only man in America who could call the President by his
first name, and even he rarely used the privilege-he was cer-
tainly mad enough to do so now. "He's a self-serving snake.
Force the bastard to retire, or fire his ass. He talked to Fine-
gold, I know it."
"Jerrod, you and your father taught me all I know about
leadership," the President said. "You taught me how to come
from nowhere, come from defeat and divorce and obscurity,
how to pull together a disorganized party and almost take back
the White House and Congress all at btice. We didn't do it by
eliminating anyone who ever disagreed with me."
"What about loyalty, Kevin?" Hale asked. "You always
demand absolute loyalty from your people."
198 DALE BROWN
Balboa is not just an appointee, Jerrod-he's a soldier,"
Martindale replied. "I'm the commander in chief He either
follows my orders, or he destroys his own reputation and
honor."
" What if he doesn't give a shit about his reputation and
honor, as long as he gets whatever the hell he wants?" Hale
asked acidly. "Maybe Finegold promised him a job some-
where. What if he just decides, since he's on his way out soon
anyway, to destroy your reputation along with his own?"
"If his false accusations stick, then maybe I don't deserve
to be in the White House," the President said.
Hale clenched his jaw in response. "That's nonsense, and
you know it, Kevin," Hale said. "The people can be manip-
ulated into thinking anything. There's nothing noble in losing
the White House because Balboa decided to betray your trust,
or because the press latched on to a juicy story and let it blow
all out of proportion."
"Hey, Jer, let me remind you, in case you forgot-I did
send a B-52 bomber over the Formosa Strait, and it probably
did precipitate the Chinese attack on Quemoy," the President
said. "Balboa and Finegold aren't lying-they're just talking
out of school."
"But Balboa works for you, sir," Hale said. "He knows
better than to blab to anyone, especially the leadership of the
opposition party. Balboa's got to be stopped."
"We can handle him, Jerrod, but not by cracking his skull
open with a baseball bat," the President said. "Keep your eyes
and ears open, but take no direct action. Got it?" Hale nodded,
but he was seething nonetheless. "Get Chastain and Balboa
on the videophone." The President turned to Philip Freeman.
"What have you got for me, Philip?"
"Preliminary report from CINCPAC, Admiral Allen, says
that either a Taiwanese SAM fired from one of their frigates,
or an air-to-air missile fired by the EB-52 Megafortress sta-
tioned over the Formosa Strait, shot down a nuclear-tipped
C . hinese rocket or cruise missile, resulting in a partial nuclear
yield," Freeman said. "Had it not been for the EB-52, Que-
moy would've been toast-or glass, depending on how pow-
erful a _full yield would've been. The Taiwanese frigate,
identified by the EB-52 crew as the Kin Men, was destroyed
by a nuclear-tipped cruise missile."
IL
FATAL TERRAI N 199
"Looks like putting that EB-52 thing out there was a good
idea after all," the President said.
"Maybe not, sir," Freeman said. "Good possibility that
Taiwan could have fired first, followed closely by the Mega-
fortress. Our side could've started the whole thing."
"Shit," the President muttered, shaking his head. "Who
was flying the . . . ah, damn, never mind, don't tell me, I know.
Brad Elliott was flying the Megafortress, right?" Freeman
nodded. "They all right? Elliott, McLanahan-he always flies
with Elliott-and the rest of the Megafortress crew? They
must've been close when the nukes went off."
"Substantial damage, one casualty on Elliott's EB-52,"
Freeman said. "The electronic warfare officer, a young lieu-
tenant. Elliott was slightly injured. The plane's on its way
back, escorted by -another Megafortress."
The President felt sorry for the dead crewman, but only
because he had the bad luck of flying with Brad Elliott. "It
was probably Elliott who spilled the beans to the ROC." No
one in the room offered to refute that theory. "Any chance
whatsoever that the nukes came from one of the Me afor-
tresses)" 9
Freeman paused-and that pause, the realization that he
didn't know, made little hairs on the back of the President's
neck stand up. "I'll order the Defense Intelligence Agency to
do a complete security audit and inspection of the Megafor-
tress project office at Edwards, Sky Masters, Inc., and their
facilities on Saipan and on Guam," Freeman said grimly. "I
would love to say that Brad Elliott wo6ld never do such a
thing as launch a nuclear weapon without permission-and it
hurts me to even think this-but I can't. In fact, I would as-
sume he could get his hands on whatever weapon, nuclear or
otherwise, he desired, in fairly short order."
"I'll lock his cell at Leavenworth permanently myself if
he's to blame for a this," the President said angrily. "How
about any of our ships? Could they have launched a nuclear
weapon?"
"None of our surface forces in the Pacific theater have nu-
clear weapons deployed on them, sir," Freeman said. "We
have three Ohio-class ballistic missile boats on patrol in the
Pacific-Indian Ocean fleet; only one, the, West Virginia, was
in range at the time of the explosion. We're trying to get in
contact with him."
200 D A L E B R 0 W N
"How often do they check in?"
"Varies, but it's much more often than during the Cold
War," Freeman said. Nuclear-powered ballistic missile subs
on patrol, even now years after the end of the Cold War, did
everything they could to remain undetected for long periods
of time, sometimes spending as long as a month sitting on the
ocean bottom. These days, they spent less time in total seclu-
sion, but it was still important for them to remain undetected
and autonomous, so contacting one was never an easy job.
"All of the Los Angeles- and Sturgeon-class attack subs had
their nuclear weapons removed five years ago."
"Double- and triple-check everything, including all vessels
that could have had nukes on board-I don't care how long
it's been," the President ordered. "If there's even the wildest
possibility that a ship could have loaded and fired a nuclear
missile, I want it checked out. What about Taiwan? Do their
ships carry nukes?"
"The Hsiung Feng anti-ship missile, which is a license-built
version of the Israeli Gabriel, is reported to be able to carry a
nuclear warhead, although the Israelis never deployed the mis-
sile with them," Freeman replied. "We believe one of the
frigates involved in the skirmish carried these missiles. The
larger frigate carried American-made Harpoons and Standard
missiles and ASROC rocket-powered torpedoes, which all
were at one point or another capable of being fitted with nu-
clear warheads. Although we never sold any nuclear-capable
weapons to Taiwan, if it once had nuclear warheads, there's
every possibility that Taiwan could have readapted their weap-
ons with small nuclear warheads. But chances are very low
the explosions were from Taiwanese weapons."
"Doesn't exactly fill me with confidence," the President
said grimly. "I want to talk with President Lee of Taiwan as
soon as possible, and I hope the hell he comes clean with me."
He paused, deep in thought; then: "Let's talk about China
going to nuclear war with Taiwan-or us," he said grimly.
"Any thoughts?"
"Becoming more and more of a reality, sir, considering
what's happened," Freeman replied. "Last year, despite their
threats, I would've said it was virtually impossible. Last week,
I'd have thought it was improbable. Now I think it's possible
that we could see more low-yield attacks against Taiwan - - ."
He paused, then added, and possibly Okinawa, Guam,
FATAL T ER RAI N 201
South Korea, even Japan. Like you said, sir, the genie's out
of the bottle."
The President slumped in his chair and put a weary hand
on his forehead, shielding his eyes as if fighting off a massive
headache. "Damn," he muttered. "Was it a mistake to send
those bombers over the Strait? Would any of this be happen-
ing?"
"I think it would be ten times worse, Mr. President," Jerrod
Hale said.
"I agree," Freeman added. "Quemoy might be a smoking
hole in the ocean, and Formosa might be under attack as well.
Those bomb
ers-in fact, that one bomber-deterred the PLAN
from continuing their attack."
"But we weren't talking about China destroying Okinawa,
Guam, or Japan before," the President said. "Shit, maybe it
would've been better if they succeeded in their invasion."
"Then we'd still be here, talking about our options-except
China would have attacked and perhaps destroyed an indepen-
dent, capitalist, pro-America democracy in Asia," Freeman
said. "Sir, this isn't your fault-the People's Republic of
China is driving events here, not you. The best we can do is
anticipate, react, and hope we don't escalate the conflict any
faster than it's already moving."
The President stopped and considered that point of view,
then nodded his agreement. "Sometimes I don't know if it's
my guilty conscience, or the press, that makes me think I'm
responsible for every disaster in the world these days," the
President said. "But I'm not going to sit on my ass and watch
China or anyone else start World War Three."
He paused again, shaking his head as if scarcely believing
the words that were forming in his head. Finally, he said,
Philip, contact Arthur and George Balboa-I want the com-
manders in place to prepare to put our nuclear forces back on
alert." The President's study seemed to get very quiet, as if
all of the air had suddenly been sucked out of the room; even
the unflappable Jerrod Hale had a shocked expression on his
face. "I want it done as quietly as possible. Just the com-
manders for now-no aircraft, no subs, no missiles. I want
' them formed up and ready to start accepting their weapons,
but they don't get any weapons until I give the word." Hale
looked at the President, silently asking, "What about Bal-
boa?"-he knew that there was no way this could be kept
202 D A L E B R 0 W N
quiet -with Balboa chairing the Joint Chiefs of Staff. But the
President remained resolute.
Freeman nodded. "I'll draft up an executive order for your
review and signature," he said. "The order will stand up the
Combined Task Forces inside U. Strategic Command. The
CTFs will meet in Omaha and organize their staffs, but nothing
else until you give the word." The President nodded ab-
sently-he could afford to forget that aspect of this growing
threat for now. But Freeman pressed another problem into the
foreground: "What abo
ut McLanahan and the Megafortresses?
Keep them on patrol for now?"
The President recognized that Freeman had phrased the
question carefully, intedecting his own opinion into the ques-
tion-he wanted the EB-52s, with their powerful offensive and
defensive weapons, to stay. The President nodded. "As long
as they pass a security review, they stay on patrol."
"Balboa probably won't like that," Hale offered.
"Probably not," the President responded. "But the reason
we sent those things out there-because we needed something
out there right away, something that could keep an eye on the
Chinese and respond in case the shooting started-has come
to pass. We need them now more than ever."
"Admiral Balboa will call for sending in the carriers," Free-
man said.
"No way I'm going to send them in now-they'd be sitting
ducks for another nuclear attack," the President said imme-
diately. "I'm not going to send any carriers into the region.
We got one carrier in Japan and the other near Pearl Harbor?"
Freeman nodded. "Both are ready to get under way as soon
as ordered. The Independence can be in the area in less than
two days. Washington in about four days."
"Good," the President said. 11 If we need them, I'll send
them in-until then, we put diplomatic pressure on China to
back off, and we keep the Megafortresses on station. Now let's
finish up what in hell we're going to tell the media, before
someone else fires another shot at my backside."
FATAL TERRAIN 203
U. PACIFIC COMMAND COMMAND CENTER
PEARL HARBOR, HAWAII
TUESDAY, 3 JUNE 1997, 2031 HOURS LOCAL
(4 JUNE, 0131 HOURS ET)
NOW ENTERING THE VIDEOCONFERENCE the computer-
synthesized voice announced, LIEUTENANT GENERAL BRADLEY
ELLIOTT, RETIRED; COLONEL PATRICK MCLANAHAN, RETIRED;
MAJOR NANCY CHESHIRE, USAF, ANDERSEN AIR FORCE BASE,
GUAM. CLASSIFICATI , TOP ECRET. VOI AND DA E V-
ICES TERMINATED; PLEASE CHECK OPERATIONAL SECURITY
AND RE-ENTER SECUR.ITY ACCESS CODES. A moment later:
THANK YOU. FULL VIDEOCONFERENCE SERVICES ACTIVATED.
When the large LCD flat-plate monitor came to life, what
