The president reflected for a moment, then ordered, “Keep the Reagan and Truman strike groups a safe distance from the Russian fleet. Things haven’t blown up yet, and I don’t want incidental contact to spark a conflict. Regarding Ukraine, mobilize all Army, Marine Corps, and Air Force assets.”
“Yes, sir,” McVeigh replied.
“Hopefully, this is just a false alarm,” the president said. “Russia rattling its sword to obtain concessions from Ukraine.”
As the president examined the four individuals around the table again, he was met with uncertainty in their eyes.
34
MOSCOW
As the sun climbed into a cloudless sky, President Yuri Kalinin sat in the front row of a grandstand in Red Square, looking on in silence as troops in crisp formations, interspersed with Russia’s most advanced military hardware, passed by. Flanking Kalinin were the leaders of thirty countries, joining Russia’s celebration of the Soviet Union’s victory over Germany in World War II. Behind Kalinin and occupying a prominent place in the grandstand were the surviving Red Army officers who had defeated the Wehrmacht.
Seventy-five years ago, the Soviet Union had bled for the West, and it was Russia, and not the United States, that had defeated Germany. In June 1944, as the Allies invaded Normandy, the German Army defended its Western Front with sixty-six divisions. At the same time, Germany deployed 150 divisions along the Eastern Front, opposing the Red Army’s advance. Had Germany been able to transfer another 150 divisions to Normandy, or even a third of those, the Wehrmacht would have annihilated the Allied invaders.
Even with Germany opposing the Red Army with three-fourths of its military, it was the Soviet Union that pushed Germany back to its capital, taking Berlin and Hitler’s bunker, where the dictator committed suicide in the final hours of the conflict. The Soviet Union had bled for the West, its contribution to defeating Nazi Germany minimized by American historians.
The West’s memory, in addition to being inaccurate, was short; they no longer held commemorations of their role during World War II. In the West, World War II was a distant memory, the sacrifices of its people nothing more now than a footnote in history books. In contrast, Russia held annual Victory Day parades and remembrance marches, keeping the memory of its sacrifices alive.
Russia would not forget.
As the last light of day faded on the horizon, Yuri Kalinin stood on a third-floor balcony of the Kremlin Senate, his hands on the cold granite railing. As his eyes moved over the city, they came to rest on Red Square, where the crowds were dwindling after the day’s activities. It was there that he’d begun and ended the day’s celebrations, beginning with the Victory Day parade and ending with the March of the Immortal Regiment, where Kalinin led the annual citizens’ remembrance march through the city, leading a procession of over one million relatives and descendants of those who lost their lives in the Great Patriotic War.
The painful memories of the conflict weighed heavily on the Russian psyche, something the West seemed incapable of understanding. The United States, for example, extolled its Greatest Generation — those who fought in World War II — along with their enormous sacrifice: over four hundred thousand dead. A sacrifice that paled in comparison with the Soviet Union’s: seven million military personnel killed, along with twenty million civilians as the German Army exterminated ethnic groups during their occupation and razed entire cities to the ground as they retreated.
Twenty-seven million.
And these were the casualties from just the last invasion by a Western European power. First the Poles in the seventeenth century, followed by Napoleon’s army in the nineteenth century, with both armies sacking Moscow. The French Army had occupied the Kremlin Senate; Napoleon had stood on this very same balcony and watched Moscow burn.
Never again.
Russia would never again endure the genocide of its people or the destruction of its cities. Following World War II, the Soviet Union established a buffer zone of Eastern European governments friendly to the Soviet Union. The next time the West invaded Russia, there would be advance warning as troops moved through the Eastern European countries on Russia’s border, and next time, the war would be fought on another country’s soil. Unfortunately, the buffer zones to the west had eroded since the fall of the Soviet Union. The Baltic States had joined NATO, and now Ukraine, Russia’s longtime ally, was turning to the West. It was time Russia rectified the situation, re-forming a buffer zone of friendly provinces to the west, even if that meant employing its military.
Kalinin looked to the side as Boris Chernov joined him on the balcony. Chernov stood beside him in silence for a moment before speaking.
“All preparations are complete,” he said. “You must decide, Yuri.”
Kalinin’s eyes swept across Russia’s capital again before coming to rest on Red Square, where the March of the Immortal Regiment ended.
Twenty-seven million dead.
Never again.
Kalinin turned to Chernov. “You may proceed.”
35
WASHINGTON, D.C.
It was almost 10 p.m. when the president called it a day and ascended to the second floor of the White House, entering the presidential bedroom suite. The first lady was already in bed, with a book in her hands and her back propped up with three pillows. As she looked up to greet her husband, the phone on the nightstand rang, accompanied by the vibration of the cell phone in the president’s suit jacket. Pulling the phone from its pocket, he examined the caller: SecDef McVeigh.
“Yes, Bob. What is it?”
“Russia has invaded Ukraine and Lithuania. Troops started pouring across the borders a few minutes ago.”
The president absorbed the information and its implications, then replied, “Meet me in the Situation Room with the Joint Chiefs as soon as possible.”
“How about midnight?” McVeigh asked.
“See you then.”
As the president slid his cell phone back into his suit jacket, he met the concerned eyes of the first lady, who had placed her book on her lap. “What is it?” she asked.
As the clock struck midnight, the president entered the Situation Room in the basement of the West Wing, taking his seat at the head of the rectangular table. Members of his staff and cabinet were seated to his right and the Joint Chiefs to his left, with the Situation Room walls lined with additional military and civilian personnel. SecDef McVeigh, seated on the president’s right, began the brief.
“We’re still analyzing the data, Mr. President, bringing more satellites into play and querying local sources on the ground, but here’s what we know. At four thirty a.m. local time, a Russian mechanized infantry division invaded Lithuania, and six mechanized infantry brigades invaded Ukraine. Another twenty-four brigades from Russia’s Western, Southern, and Central Military Districts are racing toward Lithuania and Ukraine — six toward Lithuania and eighteen toward Ukraine.
“I’ll discuss Lithuania first, because Russia’s objective seems clearer. Satellite recon shows the Second Guards Motor Rifle Division taking defensive positions on the Polish border and along a parallel line fifty miles to the north.”
“They’re establishing a corridor into Kaliningrad Oblast?” the president asked. “What for?”
“Our best guess is that the Russians plan to permanently annex this region of Lithuania, removing the thorn in their side — having to request permission from a NATO country anytime they want to move military personnel or equipment between Kaliningrad Oblast and the rest of Russia. They’ll still have to go through Belarus, but Belarus is a staunch Russian ally.