“Amen to that. In the military we call it seizing the initiative, forcing your enemy to react to your moves rather than you reacting to his.”
“It’s the same way in politics.”
Nadine looked at her watch and said she had to leave for the university. Her breakfast was only half-eaten. She rose, got a kiss on the cheek from both men, grabbed her purse, and hurried for the garage.
Jack Hays leaned back in his chair. The maid came in with the coffee pot and poured.
When she had left again, Jack Hays asked JR, “If you were running the military show, how would you go about it?”
“That’s a big if.”
“A hypothetical.”
“The commander must figure out what he has to fight with. That’s Job One. What we have in the way of people, weapons, ammo, and transport defines our options. Our hypothetical commander must start there.”
Jack Hays nodded, sipped his coffee, and nodded again. “If I offered to make you a general,” he said, “and put you in charge of the Texas Armed Forces, which is the National Guard, Air National Guard, and every military unit within Texas, all you can grab, you’d be in charge of defending Texas. Would you take the job?”
JR grinned. “I came here this morning,” he said, “to ask for a job in the Texas Army. Any job. Soldiering is all I know. I suspect that you are going to need an army very badly, very soon.”
“General Twilley has wanted to retire for the last year, and I have been asking him to put it off and hang in there. I want you to take his place. The air guard guy is Major General Elvin Gentry. He’ll answer to you.”
“Okay,” JR said.
“Before you go, I have to add the Texas Navy to your list of responsibilities. We got a nuke attack sub yesterday morning. USS Texas. She’s sitting at a pier in Galveston, and we’ve got to do something with her quick before the U.S. Navy sinks her or steals her back.”
“Is she undamaged?”
“The sheriff down there thinks she is, but his nautical experience is limited to bass boats.”
“I’ve got an old army friend who got fed up with grunts and transferred to the navy,” JR said slowly. “He’s retired now. As I recall, he was in attack subs. Smart as a tack. Went to nuke power school and did well. He’s a law student now at UT. I can send him down to evaluate the boat. If we can’t move and hide her, Jack, we probably ought to scuttle her right where she is so the SEALs can’t steal her out from under our noses.”
“They could do that?”
“You can bet they’re noodling on how to do it right now.”
Jack Hays scooted his chair back and rose. “Sounds like you need to get busy.”
“Yes, sir,” JR Hays said. “I’ll do my best.”
“I’d like to introduce you to the press and the Guard brass hats this morning, but I’ve got to go to Houston again. We’ll do the paperwork when I get back. I’ll scribble a note to General Twilley. You run out to Camp Mabry, give it to him, and take command — and have him muster you up a major general’s uniform.”
“Where is Camp Mabry?”
His cousin stared at him a moment before he answered, “West Thirty-Fifth Street, west of Highway One.” Then he grinned. If you don’t know, ask. JR would do nicely.
The governor wrote the note in longhand, they shook hands, and JR headed for the front door and his pickup.
JR drove to the University of Texas Law School and went in. He found his friend, a muscular black man named Loren Snyder, standing in a hallway outside a classroom talking to two fellow students.
“Lorrie.” JR smacked him on the shoulder.
“JR Hays, folks. Long time no see, JR. What are you doing here?”
“Thinking of getting a law degree and wanted to talk to you about that.”
“Well,” Loren glanced at his watch. “I have ten minutes.”
“Terrific.”
JR led Loren away from the other students to a quiet corner. “Weren’t you in attack submarines?”
“Yep. Sixteen years of it after the army, which my wife said was plenty long enough. Now I’m going for the gold. Going to be a personal injury lawyer and screw those insurance companies down hard.”
“Before you get to that, I need some help. I’m now a major general commanding all the military forces of the new Republic of Texas.”
“You’re what?”
“You heard me. We acquired a nuke attack sub yesterday morning down at Galveston, and I need a quick evaluation of the boat by someone who knows what they are talking about.”
“I saw in the paper Texas was making a port visit there.”
“Will you go to Galveston right now and evaluate the condition of the boat? Then answer some questions for me. Specifically, can we get enough ex-sailors to move her, can we hide her, or should we just sink her at the pier so the SEALs can’t snatch her back?”
“You haven’t even asked me if I’m a loyal Texan.”
“Are you?”
“Well, I don’t know. Haven’t thought much about it.”
“You do this, I’ll give you a medal to frame and hang in your law office, when you get that office.”
“You want me to go now, miss today’s classes?”
“An hour ago would have been better.”
“How do I get hold of you?”
“Any National Guard armory. They can radio me a message.”
Loren gave him a sheet of paper from a notebook and JR wrote upon it, “Please allow Loren Snyder to inspect USS Texas,” and signed it JR Hays, Major General, Commanding, dated it, and gave it to Loren.
“Well, that looks official,” said Loren.
“I gotta run,” JR said. “And you do too. Saddle up.”
Brigadier General Lou l’Angistino was fifty years old, from Nebraska, an ROTC graduate who had worked his way up the ladder, flying and performing staff jobs. He flew F-4 Phantoms and F-16s, and considered it ironic that he now commanded a bomber wing. The Global Strike Command dudes must have been very unhappy when they heard. Of course, he had served a tour on the GSC commander’s staff, and maybe that was why he was selected.
L’Angistino habitually went to bed at nine o’clock in the evening unless he had an official function to attend, and rose between four thirty and five o’clock a.m. He usually put a leash on his black Lab and then ran five miles, rain or shine.
The events of the previous week troubled him deeply. He knew all about Jade Helm, the plan of the Federal Emergency Management Agency to put Americans in concentration camps, and he also knew that liberals, minorities, and Democrats weren’t the intended detainees. He had been appalled when Soetoro announced martial law and invoked Jade Helm.
The National Guard’s blockade of the runway yesterday was only the first shot in the war, he told himself. Texas has a lot more bullets. Last night his staff thought that the crash crews would have the runway cleared by late this morning. Then he would fly the planes out, if he could find enough flight crews. He suspected that might be a problem. But he would worry about all that when he got to the office.
Normally the general ran on base, but this morning he put the lab in the car and headed for the main gate. He drove past the thirty aircraft that lined the boulevard to the highway, aircraft dating from World War II right up through the present day. One was a retired B-1 and another a retired C-130.
He drove the seven miles into town, marveled at the display of Texas flags, and, as the sun rose, was jogging in a park with his dog.
Two miles along he saw a man in a baseball cap sitting on a bench with a rifle across his knees. He had a golden retriever on a leash. As l’Angistino got closer, he saw the man was probably Latino and well past retirement age. He was also wearing a gun belt with a pistol in a holster.