“I think you’ve proven you can handle them, ma’am,” Freeman said. “I’m not sure if you’ve ever taken on a Turkish mullah before.”
“No, and the President of the United States, or his men and women in uniform serving overseas protecting American allies, shouldn’t have to either,” she said with a sudden edge. “I wanted to know what steps you will be taking to assure that our combat troops deploying overseas will be properly taken care of and given the support and respect they deserve.”
“We’ve had a military presence in Turkey for over forty years, and women have been sent to Turkey for the past twenty-five years,” General Freeman said uneasily. “Relations between the U.S. and the Turks have always been good. The key to that success has been the discipline of our troops and the proper respect paid to the Turkish nation by the American government. As long as we treat the Turks like valued allies and not like Islamic-fundamentalist mountain heathens, we won’t have any problems.”
“Are we treating the Turks as anything more or less than valued allies, General?” she probed, staring at him dead-on.
Freeman knew that anything he said would go directly to the President’s ear, and quite possibly to the press and to Congress as well, so he hesitated before answering, but he finally replied, “I detect an attitude in some circles that might suggest we’re doing Turkey a favor by providing them military assistance.”
“We do tend to jump when they call, General,” she said tightly. “And it does seem as if we give more than they offer in return.”
“All we want is a stable, strong ally in the Middle East,” Freeman said. “We don’t have any allies these days who unconditionally agree to everything we say or want. I think it’s in our country’s best interests to extend to Turkey every possible benefit.”
“An alliance, especially one such as NATO, is a give-and-take affair,” she informed him. “But reasonable people can differ about all that, General. My concern remains the same: can we expect to see any problems crop up with having American women soldiers in Turkey during Operation Peaceful Hands, and if so, what are you going to do about it?”
“The answer to your first question is yes, I do expect some cultural, societal backlash,” Freeman replied. “Asking a Turk to accept a foreign woman to defend his homeland will definitely cause problems — to what extent, I don’t know. The answer to the second question is, we will do our assigned mission until ordered by the President to withdraw. Any soldier, man or woman, who can’t follow orders or who has a problem with any aspect of the indigenous situation will be relieved, removed, and replaced.”
“That doesn’t sound very fair to me, General,” the First Lady said coldly. “A Turkish man whose mind is trapped in the eighteenth century doesn’t like the idea of a well-trained, highly intelligent woman defending him against danger, and the woman has to suffer for it? Don’t our women soldiers have enough to worry about?”
“All our soldiers had better worry about one thing: the threat — and the threat is not from Turkey, but from Russia,” Freeman said, putting on his service cap to signify that he was ready to leave. “They should worry about their level of proficiency; their knowledge about potential adversaries, proper procedures, and their own weapon systems; and about maintaining a winning attitude. Everything else is wrong thinking, inappropriate thinking, and it will only hurt the mission and hurt the force.”
“What if the threat our women soldiers face is an ally, or even one of their own?” she asked. “How are they supposed to deal with that?”
“They don’t deal with that—I deal with that, ma’am,” Freeman said. “And when it becomes a problem, I will deal with it.”
“I know you will, General,” she purred, patting his arm as if to reassure him. “And I consider it my job to deal with such problems as well. I believe in our women soldiers, General. I know they face many more difficulties, real deeply seated societal difficulties, and they need special help to overcome those problems just so they can be given the right opportunity to do their job. I consider it my duty to make sure they are given the proper atmosphere to succeed.” She visually sized up the tall general with a glance, as if to say, your kind doesn’t scare me, then she smiled. “Thank you for listening to me, General — good day.”
When General Philip Freeman stepped into his staff car to return to the Pentagon, he found his jaw muscles tightly clenched, and he had to consciously work to relax them. Christ, why couldn’t that bitch stick to ribbon-cuttings? He was getting it from all sides of this Administration — including one side he never expected. He knew he served at the pleasure of the President, but sometimes he wanted to know exactly what that meant — was it the man himself, or was it everyone around the man, and did that mean everyone?
In certain jobs, certain fields, the women chosen to serve in those positions did outstanding work. Whether or not the environment was influenced or guarded by the First Lady, most of the women serving in the U.S. military were first-rate, and this was recognized by most of their male counterparts. Then why the low-key dressing-down by the Steel Magnolia? Why the veiled threats? Was it just the unknown mystery of Turkey or was something going on he didn’t understand?
That question was going to have to be back-burnered for the time being — deploying an air battle wing, an Army battalion, and three combat vessels and their support units halfway around the world in the shortest time possible would require all his attention, not to mention dealing with the Congressional leadership and the press once the operation was made public knowledge. Philip Freeman reached for the secure telephone in the back of the staff car and got to work.
TWENTY-SEVEN
After being released from the hospital and spending nearly an entire day answering questions for the accident investigation board, Rebecca looked forward to her one-day pass. It would be a good opportunity to check in at Liberty Air, have a quiet dinner someplace, sleep in her own bed, and perhaps see Ed. Her shoulders and legs still hurt a bit from the crash landing, but she wanted nothing more than to get that episode out of her life and get back to normal — if generating her flight to fight a possible nuclear war could be considered normal.
But just getting off-base that day proved to be nearly impossible. As she drove off-base and headed toward home, it felt to Rebecca as if she was abandoning the Air Force in the midst of a crisis, abandoning her unit, even her country. A series of signs along the exit road read, HAVE YOU SIGNED OUT WITH YOUR CQ? BASEWIDE ALERT STILL IN EFFECT — CONTACT YOUR UNIT, and ALERT IN EFFECT — UNAUTHORIZED DEPARTURE PROHIBITED. The line of cars waiting to get into the base was long because the guards were stopping and searching every car, and there was someone at the guards’ gate taking down license numbers of those leaving the base. Rebecca had her twenty-four-hour pass from the flight surgeon taped to the inside of her windshield for the guard to check. The expressions she saw from the guard and from those in the line of cars waiting to enter the base were strange and eerie. She imagined them thinking: Why on earth is she leaving now, with a Defcon Three status?