“It would be cheaper than digging them out,” Hanover said, scowling. He’d hoped to keep the news secret, but Germany had made that impossible. Simply by broadcasting the entire message, the BBC had picked up on it even as they were studying the message from Stewart.
“True, I suppose,” Truman said. “Ambassador King is very against making peace with Germany, and of course peace with Russia is politically impossible.”
Hanover nodded, forgetting that Truman couldn’t see him. “It’s a trick,” he said. “The governments of the countries he named are all very pro-German anyway, even the French. Did you notice the attachments he sent back with Stewart’s message? If we agree, we will not be allowed to land any troops to guarantee their independence, such as it is.”
“And not a word about Russia,” Truman said. “Tell me; how much danger is there of them managing to lift an atomic weapon on one of those rockets?”
“None,” Hanover said confidently. “Even if they succeeded in making one, it would be a while before they managed to make one small enough to put in a rocket.”
“They’ll be working up on scaling up the design, wouldn’t they?” Truman said. “Might they succeed in hitting the United States?”
“I don’t believe that they could,” Hanover assured him. “They can launch long-range rockets, but their guidance systems are clearly not perfect yet.”
“I hope you’re right,” Truman said. “What sort of response are you going to send?”
“Parliament has insisted on voting on the matter,” Hanover said. He scowled; Mortimer had insisted upon it, and he had been able to convince enough of the Opposition that the vote had passed. “That should happen later today.”
Truman chuckled. “Congress has already issued its opinion,” he said. “No peace with Russia; peace with Germany only on our terms.”
“God bless America,” Hanover said wryly. “Do you intend to make the refusal permanent?”
“Yes,” Truman said. “In fact, I would like to launch B-29 strikes against Germany and targets in France, just to make our refusal clear.”
Hanover smiled. “That would seem like a good idea,” he said, thinking rapidly. A thought struck him and he cursed. “Can you hold off until after the Parliament has voted?” He asked. “They might not be happy.”
Truman made a frustrated noise. Hanover understood; if Britain was forced to leave the war, America would be forced to slog its way through Finland, something that would strain even American logistics to the limit. Even with the SAS teams working in Finland, it would be tricky beyond belief.
“I’ll order the bombing force to be ready,” Truman said finally. Hanover didn’t argue. “They have the IFF transmitters, so there’s no chance that your missiles will mistake them for a German aircraft.”
“That’s a good thing,” Hanover said dryly. Whatever the weaknesses of German air defences, the radar-guided British machine guns would have slaughtered anything without a proper IFF that looked like a German plane. “We’ll send the launch signal as soon as Parliament has voted.”
Truman snorted. “How long will that take?”
“I don’t know,” Hanover admitted. “The Speaker has proven agreeable to a quick debate; only myself, the Leader of the Opposition and that rat bastard Mortimer.” And Hanover thought cold thoughts about him. “Once that’s done, we’ll issue the orders and launch the retaliatory strike.”
“Good luck,” Truman said. “Over and out.”
Houses of Parliament
London, United Kingdom
23rd April 1942
“We don’t want to accept the peace offer as it stands,” Elspeth said firmly. Travis Mortimer lifted a single eyebrow as his valet checked his suit and tie. “It’s too much like appeasement.”
“It’s a way of offering a peace deal,” Mortimer said. “We can negotiate, can we not?”
“Yes, but what do we want from Germany that Himmler will give us without a war?” Elspeth asked dryly. She counted off on her fingers. “We want them to withdraw from their conquests, stop exterminating the Jews and install a democratic government, ideally one without any nuclear ambitions. Now… how many of them will Himmler give us?”
“Probably only the first one,” Mortimer said.
“Precisely,” Elspeth said. She smiled wryly as the valet left the room. “only someone as stupid as that reporter could believe otherwise.”
Mortimer scowled at her. “I thought she was cute,” he said.
“It’s a wonder we let you think that you’re running the world,” Elspeth said. Mortimer faked a slap at her. “Naughty boy.”
Mortimer glared. “We have to end the war,” he said. “Our society will not stand a rain of missiles.”
“We cannot end the war except by accepting a democratic German government,” Elspeth said. “We have to bring that about as soon as possible, or that bastard Hanover will build the British Empire again under cover of the war.”
Mortimer shook his head slowly. He didn’t care about the Empire, except that it had been an imperial undertaking and therefore bad by definition. If the Indian Provisional Government wanted to keep British forces in the country, as they certainly seemed to want to do, he found it hard to argue – as long as the Indians paid for the deployment.
He scowled. Sooner or later, Hanover would overreach… and there were too many unanswered questions around the conduct of the war. The war itself was popular, but some decisions had been… questionable.
“My brother would have wanted that,” he said, and scowled. Captain Jake Mortimer had been a British zealot. He’d seen the Transition as an opportunity of limitless… well, opportunity. “He was enjoying the war… until Hanover’s incompetence cost him his life.”
“He was my brother too,” Elspeth reminded him dryly. They’d never gotten on. “The point is simple; we want power, and we have to be careful to ensure that we get it.”
Mortimer shuddered. His sister’s naked ambition was disconcerting at times. “We have to stand for reform and justice,” he said firmly. “If we cannot argue for the peace agreement” – Elspeth shook her head, she was fiendishly intelligent at times – “then we must keep channels of negotiation open.”
Traditionally, MPs would remain bunched up in their parties, exchanging comments, questions, or merely discussing the weather. As they filed into the main chamber of the House of Commons, they exchanged covert glances of concern or amusement. Many of them had benefited from the measures taken to combat a social collapse, in the weeks following the Transition, and they didn’t want the war to end. Others hated the war and wanted it over, whatever the cost.
Hanover, dressed in a dark suit he felt suited him, smiled to himself. The global peacenik movement of people who felt that the world would be fine if everyone showed a little tolerance had never really existed. It had been a uniquely western delusion, like the international solidarity of the Workers and Peasants. The young band of idiots who’d rescued Trotsky had chosen to believe that their hero was a genuine communist, a flat figure of stage and screen.
Hanover grinned. The real Trotsky had been intelligent, intelligent enough to admit that he’d gotten it wrong. The latest report had the teams in Russia burying deeper and deeper into the power structure, hacking away at Stalin’s rule. Inserting small teams into the Ukraine had only made matters worse; the Ukrainians were almost in open revolt. Ten NKVD battalions were tied down in the Ukraine, trying to keep the peace.
If the entire northern hemisphere and a large part of the southern hemisphere becomes democratic on our terms, we might just be looking at peace in our time, Hanover thought. It would have been the culmination of the project that had started back when the Transition had offered them a second chance. Confronting the real axis of evil had only strengthened Britain… and while the long hard road still lay ahead, success was certain now.