populous democratic nations on earth. By 1988 the Reformed Jan'ta party, a coalition of reform groups, was led by Moslems. Amid these delicate adjustments came the River War with Pakistan.
Moslem Pakistan had several times struggled to produce a democracy, falling back on martial law each time. Thanks to her draconian rule she lost her eastern half to India in 1971, and when India annexed Bangladesh she welcomed more Moslems into parliament. Still devoutly Moslem, still incapable of sustaining a democracy, still wrangling with India and fumbling with nuclear energy, Pakistan existed largely with western aid until 1988, when she lost the River War.
The Sutlej River cascades from Himalayan headwaters, crossing India's Punjab before entering Pakistan. Pakistan was well into her project to irrigate fallow land with Sutlej water when India, with desert property of her own, began to divert too much of the Sutlej. Pakistan protested. India borrowed a smile from Buddha. And while debate smouldered in the UN, Pakistan's agribiz choked on dust. Pakistan gathered her American tanks and RUS Kalashnikovs, and struck.
Twenty days later, Pakistan was only a memory. If India was poor in fertilizer, it was because a full one-third of her national budget was spent on arms. As her exports of steel, cement, and machinery mushroomed, so did her imports of French helicopters. Profits from her new shipyards funded her navy. Pakistan had suicidally attacked a nation whose one prosperity lay in arms, a growing giant with growing power.
India overflew Sukkur and Karachi in two waves. The first was a horde of small choppers firing minicannon and homing missiles; the second was a wave of larger choppers transporting whole infantry companies. Pakistan surrendered, obtained recognition as the State of Sulaiman, and was instantly absorbed by India as educated Moslems everywhere gave thanks. It was thought possible that India had deliberately provoked the River War. Perhaps 'possible' was too weak a word.
Now, in 1996, the fifty million Moslems of Sulaiman formed a gentle buffer as India's border with the AIR crescent. India was now one-third Moslem; her Hindu majority found it easier to accommodate Islam every day.
In capitals from Moscow to Washington — with a studied pause in Brussels, the real nerve center of common-market Europe — one glance at a map could bring cold sweat. The Islamic co-prosperity sphere ran from Gibraltar to Indonesia; and now that China had made her peace with Islam and forged links to Japan, the still- floundering RUS might be excused for fearing herself savaged by COMECON, the Asiatic common market. It was well-known that India had taken Chinese aid to build her 'irrigation' conduits near the old Pakistani border. But the RUS had only now discovered that China was irrigating her subterranean tanks with oil via the new conduit.
The RUS sabotage, then, was a ploy to reveal SinoInd duplicity, while interrupting it, using American hardware so that retaliation might be delayed and, when it came, less tightly-focused on a RUS barely able to defend its huge perimeter since 1985. Surely the RUS never expected the reprisal to spread across the globe as World War Four.
So much for expectation. India's furious militants scanned American foreign and domestic crises, judged despite Peking's counsel that Washington's response to the tanker reprisal was one of weakness, and made a terrible mistake.
Chapter Fifteen
Ted Quantrill surged up from his mummy bag, mumbling, then fully awake as Ray Kenney continued to shake him. 'Ah, jeez, I thought we'd settled all that last night,' he said. '
Ray's eyes were haunted. 'On your radio,' he said. 'Everybody's at Little's tent; come on!' With that Ray ducked out, leaving Quantrill to translate as he would.
In jeans and sneakers, Quantrill plodded to Little's tent. He could hear his radio before he arrived; saw in Purvis Little's face a bleakness deeper than ever before.
'…in Trincomalee fear that the Indian assault group has subdued the leased US base on Sri Lanka. From New Delhi comes a warning that captured American personnel will be held hostage against any loss of Indian lives. This, unless American cruise missiles are turned back from their present course toward New Delhi.
'A report just in — did you check this, Curt? — A report from UPI confirms the Xinhua announcement that a Chinese
'Meanwhile, sources in Washington remain silent after the early-morning White House statement aired earlier. In the words of Press Secretary Newhouse, 'A measured reprisal, a demonstration of American determination designed to halt the unprovoked Indian aggression in Sri Lanka, is now underway from elements of our Seventh Fleet in the Arabian Sea. The President has asked me to stress that this demonstration is against Indian property, and not against the blameless Indian people. For the duration of this emergency, all military reserve personnel are ordered to report immediately to their units; all leaves are cancelled. We pray God that the modest American response will terminate this rash military adventure by India.'
'We have no more word on that report of general mobilization in the SinoInd countries. Stay tuned. Now this.'
A syrupy baritone began. 'Tired, listless, logy this summer? Don't be downcast on dog-days, ask your pharmacist—' Click.
Purvis Little drew a shaking hand from Quanta-ill's radio, saw that it
'My mother's in the reserve. Will she be gone when I get home?' This from Thad.
Tom Schell: 'Indian bastards! We'll show 'em.'
Wayne Atkinson: 'Indians and Chinese
Ray Kenney: 'I want to go home—'
A chorus tuned up, its most prominent word being 'home'. Without a word, Little began to strike camp, ignoring the narrowed eyes of a watchful Wayne Atkinson. Slowly at first, then with haste that bordered on panic, the troop repacked.
Quantrill tarried to help Thad stuff his pack, saw Atkinson take up his rearguard position, smiled reassuringly as Thad watched them stumble out of sight at a half-trot. 'They aren't waiting, Teddy! What're they doing?'
'I don't know;
Thad shouldered his pack, tried a tremulous smile. “If we hurry, we can catch up and listen to your radio.'
'If we hang back, we still can,' Quantrill said. He held up his hand, and Thad saw that Quantrill had quietly stolen his radio back. They headed for the trail, switching frequencies, making no effort to catch the others. Long before he reached the trailhead and the rest of the troop, Quantrill knew the target of the Allied US/RUS reprisal.
Chapter Sixteen
India's Uttar Pradesh region lay between New Delhi and Nepal, fed by Himalayan silts, feeding much of India from her huge grain fields on either side of the upper Ganges. Kanpur was more than a railhead: it was the nexus of mountainous wheat surpluses on which India depended. During last-second attempts to flee in half-light over New Delhi's hopelessly choked thoroughfares in a chopper, the co-pilot called back to Prime Minister Casimiro: 'Hostiles still twenty minutes from us—'
Punjabi State Minister Mukkerji, trading frowns with Casimiro: 'Impossible! Can cruise missiles hover?'
Casimiro licked dry lips, lurched forward as his stomach lurched upward, fought his innards and grabbed for
