Tombstone looked at the man and grinned. It was Decatur’s captain, Commander Richard Hough.
“They’ll probably rename it the Sammie Reed, Dick,” another man said.
There were groans from some of the officers, and a few scattered laughs.
Tombstone looked away. The banter had an air of gallows humor to it. These were men who already felt all but abandoned by their country, whose government cared more about budget cuts and social experiments in political correctness than in their welfare.
Tombstone shook his head. This wasn’t the Navy he’d joined more years ago than he cared to remember just now. That had been a close-knit fraternity of men and women who’d dedicated their lives to the Service and to the nation. There’d been some lingering inequities, yes, but for the most part it had been an institution where hard work and devotion to duty were the paths to success. Hell, it had been a Service where millions of minority men and women had gone to get a better shake than they would be able to on the outside. He wondered sometimes how an American military more worried about minority quotas and sensitivity to the feelings of others than about solid career experience would handle the next crisis that came down the road.
“Attention on deck!”
They all surged to their feet as Rear Admiral Douglas E. Tarrant entered the room, followed closely by Captain Brandt. Their appearances contrasted sharply ― Tarrant was tall, silver-haired, aristocratic, while Brandt was shorter, with close-cropped hair and a bulldog-ugly face ― but the two men had proven to be a superb team in Norway and the Kola Peninsula. A knot of staff officers followed them, finding seats near the front of the room.
“As you were,” Tarrant said quietly as he reached the podium. Chairs scraped against the deck as the assembled officers of the battle group sat down again. The air was tense with anticipation.
“Good morning,” Tarrant said. “There have been some developments that impact on our operations. We have new orders from Washington and will be redeploying the battle group to extend our operational area north and west. Commander Sykes will cover the details of the situation. Commander?”
He nodded toward Commander Daniel Sykes, the Flag Intelligence Officer, who walked up to take Tarrant’s place at the podium. He laid a thick file folder in front of him and produced a telescoping pointer from his pocket. A petty officer set up an easel beside him and put up a chart of the Black Sea.
“Gentlemen,” Sykes began. “Our original purpose for this deployment was to oversee the no-fly zone over Georgia. This was necessary because of Turkey’s decision to deny both basing privileges and permission for overflights of their territory in protest over the UN’s policy of encouraging ethnic minority separatist movements. The MEU operating with the Guadalcanal group was to be the initial ground component for the humanitarian effort in Georgia, with a British peacekeeping unit taking over in about two weeks.” The intelligence officer paused. “As of this morning, however, all operations in Georgia assume a lower priority. They are not suspended, but our new operational orders have precedence.”
Magruder heard coughs, groans, and restless movement around him. It wasn’t uncommon to have the White House change a mission profile in midstream; indeed, that sort of thing was all too common. But evidently they were being asked to take on additional duties, stretch their resources thinner to try and keep doing their original job while taking on a whole new task as well.
Sykes waited for quiet before going on. “You all know the chaotic situation in the former Soviet Union. The Reds and the Blues are still fighting in Russia proper, while the other republics are for the most part declaring independence and throwing out whichever faction has troops on their soil. In many cases those troops are simply going home, or defecting en masse if they contain local contingents.” The pointer indicated the territory of the Ukraine, colored gray on the map. “By far the best organized of the breakaway republics at present is Ukraine. They have the largest army and a lot of first-line equipment inherited from the Reds, and their government seems to have the only clear-cut agenda of any of the contenders. Unfortunately, that agenda is one Washington regards as dangerous.”
Tombstone found himself nodding. The latest group to seize power in Kiev had been led by right-wing extremists who preached the twin sermons of security and nationalism with an all-too-familiar and chilling fervor. They had already been accused of attempting a program of ethnic cleansing inside their borders, and they made little effort to hide their intentions of expanding Ukrainian territory at the expense of their war-torn neighbors.
“High on the list of Ukrainian priorities is the conquest of the Crimean Peninsula,” Sykes went on. His pointer tapped the map to indicate the rough diamond shape dangling from the underbelly of Eurasia. “Traditionally, the Crimea has been part of Ukraine from the time modern Russia first began to take shape, at least for geographic and administrative purposes. But the ethnic composition of the Crimean population contains a higher proportion of Russians, and after Gorbachev dissolved the Union there was considerable friction between Russia and Ukraine over the fate of the peninsula. To make matters worse, the Crimea contains some of the most important military bases in the Black Sea region, as well as one of its finest ports, at Sevastopol.”
Sykes paused to allow the enlisted man to put up a new map, this one a more detailed view of Crimea proper.
“The, ah, political future of the Crimea has continued to remain in doubt. Most of the peninsula’s population actually favor Russian control. However, the Red faction, which maintains control of the peninsula, is too weak and too occupied with the Blues elsewhere to adequately defend the place. The man in charge is General Sergei Andreevich Boychenko. Intelligence tells us he was something of a compromise for the post, a man trusted by both the fleet and Red Army elements in the area.
“In fact, Boychenko has been rather cool toward the Red cause. He sided with the Reds initially, but he suffered a lot of defections and at least one fair-sized mutiny within the fleet, and he’s voiced opposition to the Krasilnikov regime more than once.”
Sykes paused as if for dramatic effect. “Last weekend, while negotiating for the return of the Russian nationals from that Victor III we sank, he put out feelers to both the United Nations and to Washington, offering to surrender the Crimean Military District to international control. His stated reason is a desire to avoid an expansion of the civil war, but we believe his real fear is that the Ukrainians might be about to assert their claim to the peninsula. Intelligence sources, including satellite surveillance, suggest that the Ukrainians may be about to move, probably through an amphibious landing on the Crimea’s west coast. Boychenko’s forces would be completely inadequate to stop a determined attack.
“Washington and the UN have decided to honor General Boychenko’s request.”
The briefing room dissolved in a chaotic babble of many noises. “Christ, CAG!” Owens said. “They’re getting us involved in the Russians’ war again!”
Admiral Tarrant stepped up to the podium once more, waiting patiently until the noise died down. “There’s no doubt,” he began, then stopped, waiting until absolute silence descended on the room before continuing. “There is no doubt at all,” he continued, “that if the Ukrainians take over the Crimea, they will bring their ethnic cleansing operation right along with them. In that sense, at least, this will be a humanitarian effort. The United Nations sees Boychenko’s offer as an opportunity for the cause of international peacekeeping. But it is also a huge responsibility. Basically, if the UN takes Boychenko’s surrender, they’re guaranteeing the Crimea against outside attack, and that’s a far cry from sending in humanitarian aid to some third-world nation still locked up in tribal warfare. The Secretary General won’t accept that responsibility without a firm commitment of American support. That’s where we come in.”