Two days after that,
Operation Interdiction had begun in earnest.
One week later the ships of Operation Red Hammer, amid much fanfare and media coverage, broke orbit one by one and assembled into a broad formation between the Earth and the moon. The core of the armada was the twenty-five Panama class transports. They were each more than a thousand meters long, with a beam of more than two hundred meters. Each was loaded with 20,000 combat and support marines and all of their equipment. Each held sixteen huge landing craft, twelve of which were loaded with armor, fuel, and weapons, the other four of which were loaded with the marines themselves, 5000 combat troops per ship. The landing craft containing the troops did more than merely provide a ride to the surface. They were also set up to function as a self-contained housing quarters for them, both in transit aboard the ship and while parked on the ground of an enemy planet.
The Panamas were the focus of the convoy and they took up position in the middle of the formation. Keeping a minimum of one thousand kilometers distance between them, they formed up in two lines — twelve ships in one line, thirteen in the other. Taking up positions on the front and rear of the armada were the California class superdreadnoughts, each one of which carried a complete wing of space fighters, space attack craft, and atmospheric attack craft that could operate within the upper reaches of the Martian atmosphere if they so desired. The Californias were the main defense of the formation, both during the transit period and after establishing orbit. Each one of these huge ships was escorted by several anti-stealth destroyers, missile armed capital ships, ammunition and fuel carriers, and a hospital ship that was not expected to be used during the coming operation (except maybe to treat captured greenie prisoners of course). Owls, one for each far corner of the group, would be joining up in a few days. Since they could not accelerate as fast as the other ships they had already left twenty-four hours before.
Onboard the WHSS
In all, more than 50 ships containing more than 700,000 people, both military and civilian, were formed up, the largest such fighting group ever assembled. At a command from Admiral Jules, who was of course in the view of the cameras when he made it, the entire fleet lit up their fusion engines and began to accelerate towards the planet Mars nearly three hundred and seventy million kilometers away. The ships moved slowly at first, accelerating at a rate of .4Gs, which was the maximum acceleration of the most lumbering members of the group: the Panamas. At this rate of acceleration it would take almost five hours to reach their cruising velocity of 240,000 kilometers per hour, at which point the engines would be shut down and they would coast until it was time to decelerate. Their course would take them directly towards the sun, which they would pass within ten million kilometers of before starting the final leg towards their destination. It was assumed that there would be EastHem Henry's station along the way to keep an eye on the fleet and report the movements and composition to the Martians (not that the Martians really needed this information since the media were reporting absolutely everything about the fleet's composition and plans for the entire solar system to see). None of the ship commanders, none of the admirals, none of the divisional commanders of the marines, and certainly none of the line soldiers themselves had been advised of the possibility that there might be an armed Owl in the possession of the Martians waiting for them out there. The very thought was assumed to be ridiculous.
Chapter 10
During this period of time, while a huge armada of ships and marines were heading towards their planet, intent upon taking it back from them, the Martians went through several varieties of turmoil as the fact that they had really broken ties with WestHem and made themselves independent gradually sank into the collective consciousness. That they had disconnected themselves from their economic system was a major worry. WestHem owned all of the banks, all of the financial institutions, and controlled all of the money. Did that mean that the money circulating on Mars was now worthless? If WestHem didn't approve of the transactions now occurring independent of them — and it seemed that they most certainly did not — didn't that mean that no one on the planet no longer had any money?
This fear led to a brief work slowdown in the vital factories and agricultural fields as the rumor that everyone was, in effect, working for nothing spread like wildfire across the planet. This occurred just as the various workplaces were just starting to get themselves into something approaching optimum production, just as the issues of who was going to run things began to hash out. In this instance the workers had, in almost every instance, done exactly as Laura Whiting had suggested they do. They had gotten together and had appointed supervisors and managers from among their own ranks, for the most part electing people to the position that it was mutually agreed would do a good job of it. But the thought that no one would get paid for his or her labors was almost too much. Work suddenly became shoddy and even non-existent in a few places. Newly hired workers, and even some of the veteran workers, started not showing up for their jobs, leaving holes in the various production lines.
Laura Whiting, with her gift for putting things into perspective, was able to ease the situation with one of her speeches.
'People,' she told her citizens during a live broadcast on MarsGroup, 'I'm afraid that you are all caught up in WestHem economic thinking here and you are missing the big picture. What is money? Think about that for a moment. Money is nothing more than a notation in a computer somewhere. It does not exist anywhere else. This is not the old pre-colonization days after all. We do not have pieces of paper or metal coins to represent dollars and cents. We have notations in computers telling you that you have this much money, that you owe this much money, that you are paid this much money. This money has value because WestHem says it has value.
'Well I'm here to tell you that the money still has value because we of the interim Martian government now say it has value. Each one of you will be paid for the work you do at the rate that has always been paid for that work. You will have these computer notations deposited in your accounts, just like always, and you may use that money to pay your rent, buy food for your tables, buy intoxicants at the shops, or do whatever else you wish with it. All prices on everything have been fixed in place at the level they were at the day before we took this planet from the WestHems. Your money is still good and will continue to be good until such time as we come up with a new economic system under our new constitution.
'In fact, there are some distinct advantages to you now that we have taken WestHem out of the equation. Most of you were horribly in debt, the result of credit lines with outrageous interest rates that were given to you by various WestHem financial systems. My understanding was that the average Martian citizen, like the average WestHem citizen, was more than sixty thousand dollars in debt to these thieving schemers. The payments on these amounts were set up so that the interest was the only thing that ever got paid. The principal never seemed to get any smaller. Well I for one see no reason to continue to pay on these particular bills. When we are triumphant in this upcoming war, such debts will become uncollectable anyway since we will be setting ourselves up on a different system of currency than WestHem. So my suggestion is that you keep your money for yourselves and pay nothing to any WestHem corporation of any kind.'
This speech did just the trick for the sagging faith in the currency. The Martians were made to believe that the money still had value and, as such, it did. Workers returned to their jobs and production reached an all time high days later.
As that particular crisis was going on however, another, more serious one was taking place as well. It was a crisis of confidence. Since the very first day of the revolution, Laura and the legislature that was loyal to her had allowed WestHem Internet broadcasts to continue to be seen on Mars uncensored.
'It is not our intention or our wish to block out information from the other side of this debate,' Whiting had been quoted as saying on more than one occasion. 'Let the people hear presentations from all concerned parties, evaluate them for what they are worth, and make their decisions based upon that.'
And so the big three Internet and media providers information was widely seen throughout the planet during the preparations for Operation Red Hammer. Every day the Martian citizens, many of whom were enlisted in the MPG and preparing to fight, watched dissertations on the composition of the forces that were being assembled to
