“It was Daddy’s idea to complicate the code. Six spaces to be filled by one of nine numbers or twenty-six letters. What’s the possible number of combinations?”
“About 1.8 billion,” James says.
A “3” joins the pulsing numbers on the monitor
“Won’t be long now.”
“How?” Susan Burns asks, shaking her head. “How did you get the enable code?”
David gives her a small smile. “Between Billy’s inside information, James’ computer genius, and my familiarity with every missile from the Atlas to the Peacekeeper, how could we not?”
“Among,” James says.
“What?”
“You gave three indicia. The word is ‘among,’ not ‘between.’”
An “A” pops up on the screen.
“Among other things,” David says, “we’re just a lot smarter than the folks in Omaha, Cheyenne Mountain, and Washington.”
As David gloats, James unfolds a laptop computer and inserts a cable coming out of its port into a plug on the deputy’s console. James turns on the computer and begins entering a series of letters and numbers. “Time to fool the missile,” he says.
General Hugh Corrigan sits at a desk wondering why he turned down a chance to be commandant at the Air Force Academy. A graduate of the Academy, fighter pilot in Vietnam and later commander of the 21st Tactical Fighter Training Squadron, he was assigned to Air Force Space Command as a colonel when it was created in 1982. In typical military fashion, he paid his dues with a variety of other assignments, including a stint at the Pentagon, another at NORAD, and finally commanding the 379th Bomb Wing during the Persian Gulf War. From a Saudi Arabian airfield dubbed “Club Jed” by the Americans, Corrigan directed massive strikes by B-52 Stratofortresses against Iraq’s Republican Guard in northwestern Kuwait. There were 523,000 American military personnel in the Persian Gulf, but none were more important than Corrigan’s B-52 crews.
After the war, Corrigan had his choice, commandant of the Academy or commander of STRATCOM. Either way, he’d be flying a desk, so he chose the job that put him in charge of all ICBM operations. At this precise moment, he knows, there is an ICBM missile operation that is operating quite nicely, thank you, without any input from him whatsoever.
A flashing red light casts an eerie glow over the STRATCOM War Room. At a heartbeat pace, the light illuminates a sign on the back wall, “Peace is our Profession.” The old slogan of the Strategic Air Command. There is no more SAC. With reorganization came U.S. Strategic Command and Air Force Space Command. Still, General Corrigan considers himself a SAC warrior.
“The intrusion is a nuisance,” Colonel Farris says, “but that’s all. It takes a second capsule to confirm the launch command, and without—”
“General, sir!” It’s Technical Sergeant Ryder, angrily banging keys on his computer. “They’re looping the enable code through a second computer and sending dual messages to the missile. The MGCS thinks the enable code’s being confirmed by another capsule.”
On the front screen, the code “6-8-B-A-3” pulses. The number “7” is added, and the code stops pulsing.
Beneath the six digits, a message flashes, “Enable Code Entered.”
A buzzer sounds.
A second message, “Enable Code Confirmed.”
Pandemonium.
The technicians bang away at their keyboards.
Air Force officers babble away on satellite hookups to Washington.
Digital launch information flashes by on the screen, the numbers streaking too fast to comprehend. From somewhere in the equipment comes the soothing female voice of the computer: “Launch order confirmed. Confidence is high.”
General Corrigan doesn’t flinch. He figured it was coming. Turning to Sergeant Ryder, he says, “Activate command launch inhibitor.”
“Yes, sir.”
The sergeant frantically pounds his keyboard, grimaces when nothing happens, then tries it again. The wall screen flashes the message: “Launch inhibitor access denied.”
“I can’t get in,” the sergeant says, his voice breaking. “The bastard’s just stolen our missile.”
General Corrigan is ashen, but his voice is steady. Turning to Colonel Farris, he says, “Get me the President.”
-28-
Double Fail-Safe
Jack Jericho slogs through the shallow water of the sump, pauses and listens. No sounds other than the thumpa-thumpa of the pumps. He had taken a fork in the channel and lost them. Now confused and afraid, he thinks about these warriors of God. At first, he tells himself, it could just be a protest against nuclear weapons. Take a missile hostage, get some TV coverage, call it a day. Like the environmental groups that chain themselves to trees to stop the loggers. But these guys tried to kill him, and that’s a step or two beyond paying your dues to Greenpeace.
He thinks about Jim Jones and David Koresh and that loon in Switzerland, what was his name? The guy with the Order of the Solar Temple, which sounded like a “Star Trek” episode. He knows that if armed men are in the silo, Security Command has been overrun, and he wonders if all the bases of the 318th are under attack. Wonders, too, if the invaders have laid siege to the launch control capsule.
He starts moving again, stopping only when he gets to a red box labeled, “Emergency Phone.” He opens the box and grabs the phone. It rings immediately, an open line to the launch control capsule.
David and James sit in the flight chairs at the console. Rachel leans over David, a hand on each shoulder.
“Time to sound the trumpets,” David says.
“For His glory,” Rachel says.
“Show time, baby!” James cries out.
A red telephone on the console rings.
“That’s an internal line, isn’t it?” David asks, turning toward Owens, who sits, handcuffed by the rear wall.
The phone rings again.
“Isn’t it!” he demands.
“Yeah.”
David gestures toward Gabriel who lifts Owens to his feet and drags him to the console. “Find out who he is and where he is,” David says. “Be a good soldier, and you’ll get an airmanship medal.”
David hits a button, putting the phone on a speaker, and Owens answers. “Launch control, Lieutenant Owens.”
“Lieutenant, thank God it’s you.”
“Identify yourself.”
“It’s Jericho. We’re under attack! Get Air Cav in here, get Special Forces!”
Owens shoots a look toward Gabriel who pokes the barrel of his rifle at him.
“Five by five, Jericho. State your location.”
“Lieutenant, are you listening? We’re under attack. Keep the blast door sealed. Call in the fucking cavalry!”
“Affirmative. State your location, Sir.”
In the sump, Jericho pulls the phone away from his ear, stares at it, then slams it down.
In the capsule, David furiously back-hands Owens across the face. “Sir! Sir?” He hits him again, and blood seeps from Owens’ lip. “When did the Sergeant get a promotion?”
If ignorance is bliss, Captain Pete Pukowlski is the happiest man in the United States Air Force. Seated in the galley, just off the tunnel from the launch control capsule to the silo, he is drinking a beer and entertaining the U.N. Nuclear Non-Proliferation Commission. “I would have brought in some wine for you fellows if I thought of it,” he says, nodding toward the French ambassador. “Not that I care for it myself. That red stuff gives me a headache and makes my piss smell like crankcase oil.”
The French ambassador winces and sips at his beer. Pukowlski has set out a plate of pretzels and some onion dip in a metal container he picked up at a gas station/convenience store outside of town. None of the ambassadors seems anxious to try the dip, though the Englishman picks up the container to read the ingredients, most of which sound like experiments in a high-school chemistry class.