FACT: The federal government in Los Angeles gave no hint of any such plan, nor is there any functional national governors’ organization.
RUMOR: Even though it was terribly damaged, the Soviet Union remained in one piece while the U.S. did not. Thus the Russians won the war, but they need time to rebuild before they occupy America. Stories to the effect that the USSR has broken up are planted by Soviet intelligence to lull the Americans into complacency and create a false sense of security.
We think this rumor is false, and here’s why: First if Russia were still intact, Europe and Japan would be arming themselves as quickly as possible. There is little evidence of this. And the Russians apparently do nothing to resist the Royal Navy’s attacks on isolated Soviet submarines, of which we have an excellent account elsewhere in this book.
Second, an intact Russia would already have invaded western Europe. The Russian armies in Poland and in some of the other Eastern Bloc countries disintegrated after the war because they had no orders from Moscow and no idea what had happened at home.
Third—the smallest but most telling fact—during the clothing shortage in 88–89. the British brought in freighters loaded with uniforms. Everybody remembers them because we were all wearing them. They were dyed black, but they were Soviet summer uniforms, apparently liberated and sold to the U.K. as surplus by the Poles when the Soviet armies stationed in Poland collapsed.
INTERVIEW
General George Briggs, New York Military Area
What the U.S. Army is engaged in here is the mission of protecting the property of American citizens and managing the most massive salvage operation in the history of the human race.
This salvage will continue until everything of value is physically removed from this area. And I mean everything. Let me read some statistics. In the past four years we have salvaged, among other things, 816,000 typewriters, 235,561 automobile parts, 199,021 kitchen appliances, over seven thousand tons of steel, four thousand tons of aluminum or other sheathing, more than three million meters of copper wire, eighty-eight thousand windows, 199,803 business suits and 204,381 articles of women’s clothing from stores and factories, 9,100 toupees, 6,170 pieces of bridge-work and artificial teeth, and one set of prosthetic rear legs suitable for a medium-sized dog, which were found at the Animal Medical Center. We have also saved 14,126,802 books, 2,181,709 phonograph records, and enough video and audio tape to stretch to the moon and back twice. Working in association with various art galleries and other types of museums, we are aiding in the salvage of such institutions as the Museum of Modern Art, the Metropolitan, the Museum of Natural History, the Guggenheim, the Whitney, the Frick, and many others. Among the items we have saved are the entire contents and paneling of the Fragonard Room at the Frick, which was transferred to the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. We have also saved the embalmed brain of a Mr. A. J. Carnegie, which was found in a closet at New York University. The how and why of that one remains a mystery. If you wish, you can see the brain. It’s in our collection here at the armory, along with a number of other especially unusual exhibits.
The decision to salvage New York rather than attempt to repopulate it was made by the Joint Chiefs of the Continental Military Command, which consists of General Youngerman, USA, General Joe Point of the USAF, Admiral Whitaker, General Sir Malcolm Law of the British Continental Military Advisory Command, and General Topp of the Canadian Army.
Their decision was made as a result of the water and pollution problems I outlined to you earlier. The chemical spills have created an effective Dead Zone in eastern New Jersey every bit as lethal as any nuclear-impact area. Thus this region, in which most of New York City’s primary petrochemical, food, and fuel supply points were located, has been evacuated. There is also the matter of the abandoned nuclear power plants, and the possibility that one or more of them could emit radioactive materials at some time in the future. Also, whenever the wind comes in from the east, Manhattan receives a dusting of thousands of particles of strontium 90 and cesium 137. Unfortunately, the bombs were so designed that the primary issuing particle was strontium 90 which has a half-life of nearly thirty years. Of the particles we collect, fifty-six percent are this element, thirty-one percent are carbon 14, and thirteen percent are cesium 137.
Thus there are so many obstacles to the repopulation of the city that the Joint Chiefs were compelled to make the determination to undertake salvage instead of resettlement.
As you know, Manhattan is identified as a Red Zone, which means that unauthorized persons are liable to be shot for intruding. Nevertheless, the island supports a small population consisting of people who either refused to leave or have returned and are intent on protecting their former property. There is even an impromptu real-estate market. A few months ago, two individuals applied to the State Office of Title Reclamation in Albany for a grant to clear title to a property in the city, then the right to transfer that title between them. It turned out that both were active in this strange Manhattan real-estate market, and they lived in the city.
Both were arrested.
Of course, what they were doing is meaningless. All property in Manhattan has been sequestered by the Army. The state government in Albany has no authority over military areas. Salvage proceeds go to the Special Refugee Account for use in areas where the most former New York City residents now live.
You requested that I add as much personal color to this report as I can. I am married and have three children. My wife is Joyce Keltie Briggs. The kids are George Junior, Mark, and Nancy. We are members of the Baptist Church. My age is forty-three, and I have no living parents, sisters, or brothers. I was born on June 12, 1950, at Fort Sam Houston, Texas. I am an army brat, the son and grandson of army brats. I live with my family in Bronxville, in a home on Birchbrook Avenue, which has been designated as Residence, Commanding General, New York Military Area, by the Continental Army Command. This home was not owned or occupied at the time it was commandeered by the U.S. Army.
I have held a commission since 1972, when I graduated from West Point. I was promoted to general officer on January 14, 1990, and assumed this command in February of the same year.
I see that I have a couple of minutes remaining before I have to inspect the Critical Minerals Salvage Holding Depot in the rail-yards, so I would like to make a statement to all Americans who read your book. My statement is this:
Since the war I have seen a tremendous change in our country.
It has been terrible for us all, but nevertheless it has revealed toughness and gristle and fellow-feeling that we didn’t even know we had. There was a time when I might have said, “If a nuclear war will toughen us up, let it come.” Having lived through one, I would not say that now. I was a damned fool ever to have thought such a thing. By 1984 there was a substantial body of opinion in the military that a nuclear war was possible, and that we should therefore devote our attention to planning methods that would encourage the Soviets to engage in a limited rather than an all-out exchange, or reduce their ability to project their warheads into U.S. territory. This is an error.
Not a day passes that I don’t wish for the soft old America with all its faults. But everything has an end, and that world and way of life ended.
Those were good times. May God grant that we remember them always, but also give us the strength not to torment our children with tales of what has been denied them.