oil and gas. We ship new supplies. They blow up a tanker. We provide naval escorts. They attack. We defend.”
Quinn leaned forward. “I think it’s high time we made the enemy dance to our tune. What Ross has in mind might just do the trick. If not, we haven’t lost much — just a little time and maybe some diplomatic face.”
The President nodded slowly and rocked back in his own big, leather chair, thinking over what he’d been told. When he looked up, his gaze fastened on his old friend’s face. “How about it, Ross? You’re sure you’re up to this?”
“I feel fine, Mr. President,” Huntington said with as much conviction as he could muster. He was determined not to let ill-health or fear sideline him again. Though he didn’t harbor any illusions about being irreplaceable, he was pretty sure that none of the State Department’s bright-eyed boys had the inside knowledge and official anonymity that would be needed to pull this thing off successfully.
The faint trace of a smile flashed across the President’s weary face. “Could you get a doctor’s note to prove that, Ross?”
Huntington shrugged noncommittally. “Given enough time, I could. But do you really want me to go doc- hunting? Now?”
The President laughed softly. “No, I guess not.” His smile faded, replaced by the firm-jawed, determined look that signaled his mind was made up. “Okay, gentlemen, I’m sold.”
He turned to Galloway. “Issue the necessary orders, General. I want the military side of this operation in gear within thirty-six hours.”
“Yes, sir.”
The President swiveled his chair to one side and punched the intercom button on his black phone. “Maria? I need you to make some arrangements for me. Ready? First, rustle up an air force flight for Mr. Huntington. Where? To London. After you’ve done that, get on the horn to Number 10 Downing Street. Fix up a time this afternoon our time for a secure-channel videoconference with the Prime Minister.” He looked at Huntington over the phone. “Better get packed, Ross. You’ll be on your way just as soon as I hang up.”
Huntington grinned. “Yes, Mr. President.” He stood up, amazed by the sudden surge of energy coursing through his body. In some strange way, the prospect of another important mission made him feel ten years younger. After months of watching Paris and Berlin wreak havoc on America’s friends and allies, he was going to get the chance to wreak a little havoc of his own.
Metz lies almost two hundred miles east of Paris, close to the border with Germany and Luxembourg. Nestled in the Moselle River valley, the town stands on the northern edge of Lorraine — a countryside of rustic farmland and rusting heavy industry, a land marked by more than a thousand years of war. Down through the centuries, knights in surcoats and chain mail, the Sun King’s proud musketeers, Napoleon’s grumbling foot soldiers and dashing cavalrymen, the Kaiser’s spike-helmeted infantry, Hitler’s grim, merciless panzers, and the GIs of George Patton’s Third Army had fought and bled from one end of the province to the other. Metz had seen its share of those battles.
Now a web of military installations, headquarters, and supply depots sprawled in an untidy arc around the town’s western suburbs. Among others, Metz was the permanent headquarters site for the First French Army and France’s northeast military defense region.
Although most of EurCon’s combat troops were fighting in Poland, Hungary, or the Czech Republic, Metz was still swarming with military activity. Its storehouses and repair facilities bustled as French soldiers and civilian contractors labored overtime — shipping the munitions, spare parts, and other supplies needed by their comrades in the field.
Their jobs had little to do with direct combat, but they knew how important their work was. Without supplies and maintenance, any but the most primitive army would grind to a halt in days. So the men who manned the Metz logistics centers thanked their lucky stars that they had an important job to do — especially one that did not routinely involve getting shot at.
Of course, there were air raids. Since the air war over France escalated, Metz had been hit twice by American bombers. But the damage and casualties inflicted by both raids had been relatively light — certainly nothing compared to the carnage at the front. No, most of the French soldiers were happy with their assignment, even if it meant toiling in round-the-clock shifts. Few of them were glad to hear they were about to be freed for combat duty by units of the Belgian Army. Camp rumors said the Belgians would arrive within the next twenty-four hours, and for once the camp rumors were right.
But America’s airmen got there first.
It was just before dawn when air raid sirens sounded across the city. Even as crews ran to man their missile and gun batteries, explosions split the darkness, silhouetting weapons and men. A few defenders caught angular outlines against the sky, and recognized F-117 stealth fighters.
Almost before the sirens finished wailing, the black jets were gone. Only the air defenses had been attacked, but they had been thoroughly and systematically pulverized. The Americans had used laser-guided bombs and cluster weapons to smash each battery’s weapons, early warning radars, control bunkers, and ammunition storage sites.
American bombs had also flattened the fire department, leaving nothing but piles of broken concrete and shredded metal. Understanding the implications, the French general commanding the base tried desperately to rebuild his shattered defenses. He wasn’t given enough time.
Moments after the F-117s disappeared, forty B-1B Lancers roared overhead, hugging the earth. With the air defenses destroyed, there could be no warning. Anyone caught out in the open could only throw himself flat and hope to be spared.
The huge, swept-wing bombers laid patterns of death across the military compounds outside Metz. Each plane carried fifty-six 500-pound bombs, and from two hundred feet, they might as well have been placed by hand. Deadly accurate, devastating in their numbers, the Lancers disappeared as suddenly as they came. Behind them, warehouses, freight yards, and repair facilities lay in ruins.
Even as the smoke still boiled out of the bombs’ explosions, the stunned French troops turned in horror to see more bombers flying toward them. These were not the sculpted shapes of B-1s, but thin-winged, slab-sided B-52s. More explosions rippled across the military compounds — leveling almost any building larger than a guardhouse. Even the water and sewage treatment plants were shambles.
Those few surviving SAM and antiaircraft batteries that did try to attack the bombers were quickly smothered by Wild Weasels and other escorting planes. Two squadrons of F-15s kept close watch on the operation, while further out, U.S. Navy Tomcats made free-ranging sweeps — hunting down the few EurCon interceptors that tried to interfere.
When the B-52s turned for home, the sun was still not completely over the horizon. Battered survivors pulled themselves from the wreckage. Some turned back to help those who were still trapped. Others, driven mad by the noise and confusion, wandered at random through a sea of smoke and fire.
About an hour later, with most of the explosion-churned dust blown away and some of the fires burned out, the sirens wailed again. Too exhausted to run, the survivors were spared an attack this time. Instead, a lone American reconnaissance aircraft, heavily escorted, swept overhead, photographing the devastated logistics complex. Those on the ground breathed a small sigh of relief, even as they cursed the enemy plane. This poststrike reconnaissance flight should be the final note in a deadly song.
Four squadrons of U.S. Navy attack aircraft, escorted by another four fighter squadrons, hit Metz again just around noon. Soldiers, already battered and stressed by a morning of terror, collapsed or cried or fled. Their comrades dragged them to shelters if they had the strength.
With measured aggression, the Navy Intruders and Hornets carefully blasted every remaining structure with a shred of value. Only the hospital and civilian housing tracts were again spared. By the time the strike was over, half an hour later, they stood alone in a Hiroshima landscape.
The skies were barely clear when another formation appeared. The exhausted defenders could only cower, as straight and level, and completely unmolested, U.S. Air Force F-15E Strike Eagles streaked overhead and released their own payloads. As if sowing a freshly plowed field, they scattered mines and delayed-action bomblets everywhere. The lethal devices would drastically slow down any attempt to rebuild, or even clear the wreckage.
