“But, sir, by all accounts, the mayor of Philadelphia and the entire Philly city council have been wiped out. A nuclear blast here…”
“If I turn tail and run, they have won. I’m simply not going to do it, Erwin.”
“Well, sir, would you at least consider getting the vice president, along with a number of deputy cabinet secretaries, up in an airplane for the next three or four days so that we will have a functioning government if Washington blows?”
Mack looked up and saw that all eyes in the Situation Room were suddenly upon him. The moment had become an eerie pregnant pause in the hubbub of frantic activity. He looked over at his vice president, Douglas Surber.
“Yes, Mr. Secretary, that’s a good idea. Mr. Vice President, let’s have Marine Two airlift you over to Andrews and get you up in the air immediately.”
“Yes, sir,” the vice president said.
“Then let’s get the top deputy secretaries of all cabinet positions up in the air ASAP.” Mack looked around. Their eyes were still glued on him. This wasn’t happening. “God forbid that we have to run this government from thirty-thousand feet.”
“One other thing, Mr. President.”
“What is it, Erwin?”
“I recommend the immediate establishment of a no-fly zone around Washington other than military aircraft.”
“Okay. Sure. Good idea.”
“That would mean at least temporarily closing Reagan Airport.”
Mack winced. “Closing Reagan shuts down the main artery of air traffic into DC.” He wrung his hands together. “I just don’t like the idea of them controlling us like that.”
“I understand, Mr. President. But I don’t think we have a choice. Suppose they try to deliver their next bomb by air? I’m sure that the FAA can reroute flights to Dulles and BWI.”
Mack exhaled. The secretary of defense was right and he knew it. “Fine. Effective immediately, instruct the FAA to redirect all inbound domestic flights from Reagan to Dulles and BWI. And while we’re at it, I think we should get the speaker of the house and the president pro tem of the Senate out of town. Arnie”-he looked at his chief of staff-“will you get me Senator Boylan and Speaker Crane on the line? I’d like to make this request personally.” He looked out at the National Security Council, whose members were collectively soaking up his every word like sponges sucking water. “I want to make sure this country still has a semblance of a government if they do to Washington what they did to Philadelphia.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. President.”
United States Embassy
Singapore
12:01 a.m.
First Lieutenant Barry Porter, United States Marine Corps, the officer in charge of embassy security for the evening, had just started swilling his second cup of black coffee when the secure telephone for Ambassador Griffith rang. Only another embassy or the US State Department would ordinarily call on this line. Porter put down the coffee mug and checked the caller ID.
Embassy of the Apostolic Nunciature-Singapore.
“The Vatican Embassy?” he said aloud, then picked up the phone and began speaking rapidly and crisply.
“United States Embassy. This is First Lieutenant Porter, US Marine Corps. May I help you?”
“This is Father DiNardo with the Embassy of the Holy See here in Singapore.”
“Yes, sir, Father. How may I help you, sir?”
“The nuncio would like to arrange an immediate meeting with Ambassador Griffith.”
“Yes, sir, Father. I don’t keep the ambassador’s schedule, sir. His appointment secretary will be in at zero-seven-hundred hours in the morning. Would you like me to have her call you when she comes in?”
“I’m afraid it cannot wait until the morning, Lieutenant. With advance apologies from the nuncio, he is asking that you alert the ambassador now, and the nuncio would like to call on the ambassador at approximately 1:00 A.M. or sooner.”
“Zero-one-hundred hours?” Porter checked his watch. “Approximately one hour from now?”
“Yes, that’s correct, Lieutenant. Please inform the ambassador that the meeting may have sensitive and extremely important national security implications for the United States, and that the highest ranking military and intelligence officers who may be available should attend.”
Porter jotted a note on his legal pad. Extreme National Security Implications. “Yes, sir, Father. I will awaken the ambassador and deliver this message immediately.”
The White House
12:15 p.m.
The sudden explosion of a national crisis had the effect of forming alliances and relationships that in normal circumstances could not be anticipated.
Up until about nine-thirty-five that morning, the president of the United States had not been particularly close with any of his cabinet members. Oh, he had been cordial and friendly, and relied on them for advice. But he had intentionally kept just a bit of an arm’s length so as to avoid any appearance of favoritism.
But in the tremendous heat brought about by this unforeseen tragedy, Mack had found himself in the past few hours relying more and more on the guidance of his secretary of defense, Erwin Lopez. The SECDEF had seemed the calmest of all the president’s inner circle, and something in Mack’s gut told him that this guy was destined for such a time as this, to provide clear-headed advice to the president in this unprecedented time of death and destruction that had been heaped on the United States.
“Okay, what’s our situation with getting our people airborne, Mr. Secretary?”
“Air Force Two is in the air already, sir. The vice president should be over West Virginia by now. A second plane, carrying several cabinet undersecretaries…defense, state, homeland security, treasury, agriculture, and transportation, is on the tarmac at Andrews and should be in the air in less than ten minutes. The navy has sent a chopper over to Capitol Hill to airlift the speaker of the House and the president pro tem of the Senate.”
“Excellent,” Mack said. Then it hit him. The United States government consisted of three branches. Not two. “Mr. Secretary, we need to get the chief justice of the Supreme Court airborne for a while too. This government has a judicial branch as well as an executive and a legislative.”
“Good point, Mr. President. I hadn’t thought of that.”
“Arnie, please get Chief Justice Wood on the line.”
“Yes, sir,” the press secretary said. “Right away!”
“Mr. President, look!” Cynthia Hewitt was pointing at the television monitors. The face of the tinhorn dictator of Indonesia was on the screen again, and under his face, CNN was reporting that the broadcast was live.
“Turn it up,” Mack ordered.
Perkasa was wearing his green, drab army uniform, replete with three rows of shiny medals on his chest, and was staring into the screen, seemingly waiting, as if he was trying his hardest to suppress a grin.
“Good day. To the people of America and the people of the world. The last few days, and indeed the last few hours, have brought about perhaps the greatest change in the history of the world that any forty-eight-hour period has ever brought.
“There are some who would rue this day…That is, the day when-in just a twenty-four-hour period of time-a great Islamic nation would become a nuclear superpower, and the world’s last superpower of the twentieth century would be crippled by a nuclear strike at its very heart.
“Those who would rue this day are those who would preserve the status quo…Who would long for the superrich to remain rich, and for all the poor of the world to be suppressed by the evils of satanic materialism.
“Others would rejoice for this day…for this…the beginning of a new shift of power to those whom Allah has foreordained to receive it.”
He stopped and somberly looked into the camera. “The Islamic Republic of Indonesia neither rues nor rejoices in its great ascendency nor the terrible loss of life in America.”