by James Rosone
Battlefield Russia
Book Five of the Red Storm Series
By
James Rosone & Miranda Watson
Copyright Information
©2018, James Rosone and Miranda Watson, in conjunction with Front Line Publishing, Inc. Except as provided by the Copyright Act, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Disclaimer
This is a fictional story. All characters in this book are imagined, and any opinions that they express are simply that, fictional thoughts of literary characters. Although policies mentioned in the book may be similar to reality, they are by no means a factual representation of the news. Please enjoy this work as it is, a story to escape the part of life that can sometimes weigh us down in mundaneness or busyness.
Table of Contents
State of Shock
Battle of Taiwan
Armored Fist
Russian Underground
British Awakening
From Georgia, With Love
The Big Switch
Counteroffensive
Operation Nordic Fury
Winter Warfare
Operational Security
World on Fire
Battle of Huatung Valley
Battle of Fei-ts Ui Reservoir
Battle of St. Petersburg
Winter Wonderland
Second Battle of Kursk
Humpty Dumpty
Victory over Russia
Liberated
Occupation Duty
Indian Squeeze
Cyber Saturday
Operation Fight Club
They Kept Coming
From the Authors
For the Veterans
Abbreviation Key
State of Shock
Washington, D.C.
White House
Vice President Walter “Wally” Foss was finishing up his daily five-mile run on the treadmill at his residence at the Naval Observatory when a member of his Secret Service detail walked up to him and signaled somewhat frantically that he needed to speak with him. Wally hit the stop button on the treadmill and pressed the pause button on his smartphone, stopping the playback of an audiobook about Teddy Roosevelt.
Taking his earbuds out, he asked, “What’s going on, Jim?”
Just then, three other agents walked into the room, spreading out to sweep the room for any potential threats. This unsettled Foss a bit—he had never seen a Secret Service agent anything other than calm, and one of them was visibly sweaty as he searched the room.
The first Secret Service agent explained, “Mr. Vice President, we need to move you to the White House Situation Room. The vehicles should be pulling up in a few minutes.” The agent handed him a towel to wipe the sweat from his face.
Foss sighed as he stepped off the treadmill. “That’s fine. Just give me a couple of minutes to get a quick shower and put some more appropriate clothes on.”
Mike Morrel, the head of his Secret Service detail, shook his head. “Sir, there isn’t time,” he asserted. “We have to get you to the White House immediately. We were just informed a couple of minutes ago that there was an attempt on the President’s life at the rally in Michigan. We don’t know if the President was hit, but we do know the Secretary of State was shot, and it has been reported that he was killed.” Agent Morrel guided the VP out of the fitness room and toward the stairs that would lead them to the main entrance of the building.
Within minutes, the procession of agents in black suits, black sunglasses, and clear earbuds had the VP out of the building and into the waiting motorcade. While the sirens wailed, VP Foss’s mind raced. “What the hell is going on? Did I really just hear what I think I did?” he thought in shock.
They raced down the road at top speed. The Vice President started thinking more about how many traffic laws they were violating than anything else. In what seemed like the blink of an eye, the sea of Secret Service agents was ushering him out of the vehicle and borderline shoving him down the hall. Before Foss knew it, he was down in the White House bunker.
“So, now what happens?” he asked.
Agent Morrel replied, “I just received word that the President was indeed hit, although we don’t know his status yet. The Chief Justice is traveling here now. Until we know more, the Twenty-Fifth Amendment is going to be invoked.”
The weight of what had just been said sat on the Vice President’s chest like an elephant. He had always known he was a heartbeat away from the presidency, but truthfully, he’d never wanted to ascend to that office in such a dramatic way. “Please let this be temporary…”
A few minutes went by with no new information. Foss started checking every possible source, turning the various televisions in the room to different news channels, hoping to find out something new.
His phone rang, startling him. He looked down and saw that the caller ID said Tom McMillan.
“How bad is the President, Tom?” Foss said, not waiting for the usual conversational cues.
“I don’t know yet,” said the National Security Advisor. “All I know is he was covered in blood and one of the doctors said they couldn’t feel a pulse, and then the elevator doors closed. I honestly don’t know, but I’m going to stay here until I do,” he replied.
The Vice President took a deep breath. “OK, keep me informed,” he said, trying to sound more positive about the situation than he felt. “The Secret Service has just taken me down to the bunker. The Chief Justice is also on his way. They are going to invoke the Twenty-Fifth Amendment for the time being until we know what the President’s status is.” Despite his best efforts, he recognized that his voice sounded a bit shaken as he spoke.
“You’ll do fine, Sir,” Tom McMillan said reassuringly. “We have a good team in place, and we’ll get through this. I’ll call you as soon as I know more.”
The phone clicked, and the call ended.
Almost twenty minutes went by. The Chief Justice still hadn’t arrived. Foss was getting really antsy. He started pacing the room.
Finally, he couldn’t take the anticipation any longer, and he got the attention of Agent Morrel. “Do we know how the President is doing yet?”
Lifting his cufflink to his mouth, Agent Morrel stated, “Hoosier wants a status update on POTUS.”
What seemed to Foss like an hour, but was really more like five seconds, dragged by. Suddenly, the Vice President noticed that the facial expressions and demeanor of Agent Morrel changed. He looked at the other agents—their faces were ashen. Morrel lowered his hand and then looked up at the VP with a look of sorrow in his eyes.
“We just got confirmation, Sir,” he finally said. “POTUS is dead. You are now the President.” He paused for a second, then added, “I’ve been instructed that we are to take you directly to the Oval Office. The Chief Justice just arrived at the White House to swear you in. The Secretary of Defense is also on his way here.”
The Vice President sat down in a chair for a moment, absorbing the information. He wasn’t sure what to say, or what to think for that matter. Forty minutes ago, he had been on his last leg of his five-mile run, just like any other day. The President was supposed to give a campaign endorsement in support of the GOP challenger in Michigan as they looked to flip that Senate seat. “How could he have been assassinated?” he wondered. It had been 55 years since a US president had been assassinated. It didn’t seem like this was really possible.
Given the situation, the agents did give him a moment. Then Agent Morrel put his hand on his shoulder. “Sir, we need to move,” he said gently.
Foss nodded and stood up.
Soon, they rode the elevator out of the bunker, and he was quickly led down a series of hallways until they entered the Oval Office. The moment he walked in the door, everyone stood out of respect. A few people were wiping away tears; others were obviously still in a state of shock themselves. Before he could say anything, his wife walked in with another agent and his two children.
She gave him a quick hug and whispered, “I’m so sorry, Wally. Hang in there. You can do this, and we’re here to help you. We have your back.” His two children wrapped their arms around the two of them and they shared a family hug.
Just then, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court finally arrived. He gave a moment for the family reunion, then he walked over with his hand extended. “You have my deepest sympathies, Mr. Vice President,” he said. “I still can’t believe that someone would assassinate our President like this, but please, we have to get you sworn in. Do you have a Bible you want to use? If not, I brought my own.”
Wally’s wife, Dana, produced the Foss family Bible. In minutes, Vice President Walter Foss was sworn in as the 46th President of the United States of America. A handful of pictures were taken of the event, and someone from the White House communications department video-recorded the swearing in. Soon these images would be posted to the official government websites and social media accounts. It was imperative that people know the government was still functioning despite this horrific event.
Once the ceremony was complete, the Director of the CIA and the Secretary of Defense urged him to join them and the rest of the national security staff in the briefing room. They had urgent matters to discuss and they needed his authorization. President Foss said a quick goodbye to his wife and two children and quickly followed the men to the Situation Room.
Upon entering the briefing room, the new President took his seat at the head of the table and motioned for everyone else to take their seats. Not looking at any one particular person, he immediately asked, “Could someone please give us an update on what happened in Michigan? Do we know who is responsible? Is the Eastern Alliance involved?”
Maria Nelson, the Director of the FBI, spoke up first. “Mr. President, the information we have presently is incomplete. We are still in the early stages of identifying who the shooter was, and if he was aligned with any of the Eastern Alliance powers or other political groups,” she replied.
Maria had just taken over as the new Director of the FBI three weeks ago. She was the first woman to hold the position at the agency. She had previously served as the head of the Science & Technology Directorate at the Department of Homeland Security before President Gates had appointed her to replace FBI Director Flagman, who opted to resign when it had become known that he was the subject of a Department of Justice investigation. When it had become public knowledge that he had tried to cover up the number of foreign agents that had been working within the government, the only way to recover was to step down. Besides, he had failed to investigate the plethora of elected officials who had obviously leaked sensitive and classified information to the press and to American adversaries. Flagman had become persona non grata in the public sphere.
When Gates had nominated someone new to head up the FBI, he had wanted someone who could bring a heavy technology background and fresh perspective. His goal had been to bring someone in who could bring the FBI’s way of solving crimes into the 21st century and restore public and political trust back to the agency. Not even a month on the job, and Director Nelson would now have to handle the death of a President and the continued threat of foreign intelligence and Special Forces actively carrying out attacks within the country.
While Foss felt for the situation that the new director found herself in, he wasn’t going to give her a lot of extra room. “I need more than that, Maria,” he told her bluntly. “What do you guys have so far?”
Director Nelson squirmed in her chair for a second. She looked around to the others in the room before she returned her gaze back to the President. “What we know right now is that the shooter fired multiple shots at President Gates. The first shot hit the President in his bulletproof vest, knocking him to the ground. The second shot hit the Secretary of State when the President’s security detailed jumped on top Gates to protect him. As the agents moved to secure the President in the Beast, the shooter fired a third shot. This one struck Gates’s bodyguard, went through the agent and hit the President, ultimately killing him.”
She sighed, realizing she would have to reveal her hand. “We believe we know who the shooter is, but we are waiting on a few more pieces of information to come in before we make it official. Preliminary reports indicate the shooter is named George Philips, an American citizen. So that means we are not dealing with a foreign national. Mr. Philips is currently in his final year as a PhD student at Brown University, where he was also the university president of the local antifascist or Antifa group. We have agents raiding his apartment in Providence, Rhode Island, right now.”
Several of the people near the President grumbled some obscenities. She overheard someone mutter somethings about Antifa having gone too far this time in their political disagreements with the government. President Foss silenced the comments with an icy stare.
“Do we have the shooter in custody yet?” asked Foss.
She shook her head. “No, Mr. President. Not yet. We set up a large cordon around the shooting, but we are not optimistic about capturing him inside of it. There was just too much chaos happening around the area when the shooting started. People started scattering and running every which way, making it incredibly hard to seal everyone inside our search perimeter. I am, however, confident that once we determine he is in fact the shooter, we will apprehend him within the next couple of days. Mr. Philips is not trained in how to evade capture, and he’s about to become the most wanted man in America,” she added.
Sitting back in his chair for a minute, Foss needed a few seconds to absorb the information. “What am I supposed to do next?” he thought.
“OK, here is what I want to happen,” the President said. “I want every trail, link, and associate of this Mr. Philips tracked down. We need to find out if he is a lone wolf assassin or if he had help.”
Foss then turned to his generals, adding, “I want everything that was going on with the war prior to this shooting to continue. We are not going to alter our plans unless something on the ground changes. In the meantime, I need some time to be brought up to speed on the status of the war, where we stand, and what our next steps are. I want to know everything the President had previously agreed to, what he had turned down, and any additional options that were to be brought up to him prior to the assassination. Let’s reconvene the war council in two days, once I’ve had some time to get caught up. Director Nelson, I want hourly updates from your office and Homeland on this manhunt.”
With his first orders as President issued, Foss got up and left the Situation Room to return to the Oval Office and try to figure out exactly what he was supposed to do next.
*******
Staten Island, New York
Arthur Kill Inlet, Kinder Morgan Terminal
Mikhail Fedorov ducked his head slightly and moved into the small cabin of the speedboat he and his colleagues would be using for this operation. It was still relatively dark, and the others wouldn’t arrive for at least another twenty minutes, but he wanted to make sure everything was ready. He reached down and grabbed several fishing poles and brought them out to the main deck. Once there, he assembled the poles before placing them in the six trolling pole holders, three on each side of the open-air cabin.
Running his hand across the side of the cabin wall, Mikhail had to admit, he really loved this boat. He had purchased the 42-foot Boston Whaler fishing boat two years ago and had really taken to the sport. He’d go out several times a week with friends he’d made through work and genuinely enjoyed his time out on the water. In many cases, he’d head down the Arthur Kill Inlet, which was part of the waterway that surrounded Statin Island and
was fed by the Hackensack, Passaic, and Rahway Rivers from New Jersey. It was more of an industrial channel than a commercial or recreational one, but he made sure to use it often, so his boat became a normal sight there.
Hearing some voices coming closer to him, Mikhail looked up. He smiled as he saw that his three compatriots had found the marina.
“Mikhail, you’re a lucky man to live here. This place is beautiful,” Artem Petrikov said. He tossed his duffel back to Mikhail, who caught it with both hands, grunting as the weight of the bag hit him. The other two Spetsnaz men near Artem climbed aboard the boat, handling their four-foot black hockey bags a lot more gingerly than Artem had.
Shaking his head, Mikhail asked, “What the heck is in here?”
Patting Mikhail on the shoulder, the ringleader Artem coyly answered, “The tools needed to complete this next mission.” Then his facial expressions became more serious. “Is Daria ready to meet us?” he asked. “It’s important that she be ready to pick everyone up and know how to get us to the safe house once this show starts.”
“Daria is ready. The van is fueled, and we’ve checked everything: headlights, taillights, and blinkers. There should be nothing that draws attention to the vehicle by law enforcement. She’ll get you to the safe house,” Mikhail replied, annoyed at being questioned for probably the fifth or sixth time in the last two days.
Artem nodded. “Mikhail, I only ask about these details because these are the issues that often lead to people being stopped. This is perhaps the most dangerous mission my team has embarked upon. We need to do our best to make sure we survive so we can carry out future attacks as directed. There are not many direct-action units left in America, so the ones that are still alive and operating need to make sure we do what we can to keep carrying out missions for the Motherland.”
Mikhail nodded, then changed the subject by pulling up the news report. The assassination of President Gates was all anyone had been talking about the past couple of days. Apparently, the shooter was still at large, despite the authorities having released his picture and name the same day the President had been shot. There was a massive manhunt underway across the country.
