Constitution. And both of us have sworn to defend the United States against all enemies, both foreign and domestic. What Dr. Fowler proposes seems to me to fall into a gray area between those two responsibilities.”
The admiral continued, “I can’t make this decision for you, sir. But I believe that it’s a risk worth taking.”
The President sat quietly for several minutes after the admiral had finished speaking. Then, suddenly, he looked over at Blake.
“Did you vote for me in the last election, Dr. Fowler?” he asked.
Startled, Blake never even considered lying. “No, sir, I didn’t.”
The President smiled thinly. “Hell. If you can be that honest, I guess I can trust you on this.”
He slapped a hand down on his desk. “Very well, gentlemen. I’ll take your advice. Somebody gave me bad advice, worse than bad, and I made a mistake. We’ll delay our pull-out from South Korea as long as we possibly can, and use that time to try and correct the error.”
He stared hard at them. “But I don’t want a single goddamned thing about this on paper. You understand? No memos. Nothing on disk. Got it?”
They nodded.
“Great.”
Simpson looked curiously at the President. “What about Putnam? If you take any action against the lying bastard, his congressional patrons may guess that we’re up to something they’d want to know about.”
The President smiled grimly. “Don’t worry about Mr. Putnam, gentlemen. We’ll keep him on in his old job — at least as far as he and the outside world are concerned. But I’ll be goddamned if I ever believe a word that man says from now on. He’ll attend every national security meeting, but when he speaks, I’m not listening. If I want to know something about this Korean situation, I’ll arrange a little private get-together for just the three of us. Clear?”
They nodded again.
The President turned to Blake. “You know, Dr. Fowler, while this whole troop withdrawal thing is playing out, you’re going to have a keep treating Putnam as though he were still your trusted, all-powerful, all-knowing boss. Is that going to be a problem for you?”
Blake shook his head.
“Okay, then. That’s settled.” The President picked up the phone. “June, I want you to put together some travel arrangements for a member of my staff: Blake Fowler. Yes, I want him in Seoul by tomorrow, if possible.”
He hung up and smiled again at Blake. “No need to look so surprised, Dr. Fowler. I’m making you my go- between with General McLaren on this thing. You’re going to be in it up to your neck.”
Blake couldn’t think of anything to say except, “Yes, sir. I sure as hell will be.”
The clattering, ear-splitting roar of the Cobra gunship’s rotor hammered through McLaren’s helmet as he looked out through the front windshield.
The Cobra skimmed low over rice paddies as it raced toward a jagged ridge flanking the multilane Main Supply Route. Then it climbed, following rising ground in a smooth curve to the left just fifty meters above a hillside orchard. Fallen leaves caught in the helicopter’s downdraft swirled high into the air in its wake.
McLaren kept his eyes focused on the small valley they were rushing toward at a hundred and twenty knots. Without looking, he held up his right hand, palm forward. The chopper pilot obeyed his signal and eased back on his collective, slowing the gunship as they flew by the valley’s tree-lined entrance.
McLaren studied the ground carefully, first with unaided eyes and then with a pair of binoculars as they orbited past the valley again. Nothing. Not a single radio aerial in plain view. Good, there weren’t any telltale signs that might reveal his camouflaged headquarters to an airborne enemy.
He pulled his head back into the cockpit and cut in his throat mike. “Okay, Jim. You can take us down now. I think I’m getting airsick.”
The pilot grinned at him and sketched a mock salute before pushing the stick over to send the helicopter into a long slide up the valley toward a small clearing. They settled in to land in a hail of rotor-blown dust, small pebbles, and dead grass.
McLaren slid down out of the gunship, bent low holding his helmet, and scuttled out from under the slowing rotor blades. He straightened up and strode past a headquarters detail waiting with the netting to conceal his personal chopper from prying eyes.
He returned their salutes and kept going down the path toward the tangle of tents and M577 command vehicles that marked his army’s “bare-bones” field headquarters. Bare bones, my ass, he thought, looking at the crowded vehicle park. Still, it was smaller than his predecessors’ traveling circuses. Doctrine said an army-level field HQ needed dozens of trucks, command trailers, and personnel carriers to operate properly. But McLaren knew that doctrine didn’t mean diddley-squat if it made you a big, juicy, and obvious target for an enemy airstrike or artillery barrage. He preferred to travel light.
His staff looked up when he walked into the main command tent but then bent back down to their work. He’d made it plenty clear early on in his tour that he didn’t have time for a lot of meaningless saluting and ass-kissing — especially not in the field.
His aide came up to take his helicopter crewman’s headgear. McLaren shrugged it off and took his old- fashioned steel pot in return. He didn’t like the new, plastic-armored “Fritz” helmets prescribed by Army regulations. He’d seen the studies showing they were more effective at keeping out fragments, but there was something unsettling about them nonetheless. He’d told Doug once that a man needed to have steel on his head to feel secure under an airburst. “Damn it,” he’d barked, “plastic’s only good for two things — model airplanes and some bimbo’s shopping trip.” He remembered that his aide had smiled gamely and packed McLaren’s new-style helmet away for good. Humoring him, no doubt. But what the hell, he was a general and rank should have some friggin’ privileges after all.
McLaren settled the steel pot on his head and looked back at his aide. “That fella from Washington get here yet?”
“Yes sir, about half an hour ago. I’ve got him waiting in your trailer. Do you want me to send for him?”
“Nah. Muhammad will go to the mountain this time. Keep an eye on things here for me, will you?”
McLaren climbed the steps to his command trailer and looked in through the door. The President’s highly unofficial “emissary” stood. McLaren liked the look of him. Tall, rangy, and with an open, honest face. Smart enough not to wear a suit out here, too.
He nodded his head toward the hillside rising above the camp. “Let’s take a walk.”
McLaren and Fowler hiked up through the tall grass far enough to be out of earshot of anyone else in the HQ. McLaren pulled his helmet off and turned to face Blake. “Okay, Dr. Fowler, what gives?”
Blake filled him in, speaking quickly at first but then slowing to emphasize each word as he got closer to the President’s “suggestion” that McLaren delay his planning for the congressionally mandated withdrawal from South Korea.
When he’d finished, McLaren stood silently for several minutes, looking out across the hill to the north — toward the DMZ. Then he shook his head in disbelief. “Jesus Christ, Dr. Fowler. I’ve never heard anything like that in my whole friggin’ Army career.”
Then he grinned. “But I’m damned glad I finally got the chance to.”
Fowler grinned back at him. The general had reacted just the way Admiral Simpson thought he would.
“Just one question. Are we going to let the South Korean government in on this little secret?”
“No. The President doesn’t want any leaks on this. And he doesn’t want to blow any chance that the government here just might make the reforms Congress is insisting on.”
“Okay.” McLaren settled his helmet back on his head. “You go back to Washington and tell the President that he can count on the most screwed-up evacuation planning process he’s ever seen.”
They shook hands and headed back down the hill toward the headquarters of the Eighth Army.
CHAPTER 15
If at First…
