your team makes it that far, which I doubt, Dennis.”
“We'll see,” Bunker snorted.
The President laughed as he arranged his papers. Liz Elliot tried and failed to hide her disapproval, Jack noted from twenty feet away. Her papers were already arranged, her pen in its place to make notes, and her face impatient at the locker-room talk at her end of the table. Well, she had the job she'd angled for, even if it had taken a death — Ryan had heard the details by now — to get it for her.
“I think we'll call the meeting to order,” President Fowler said. Noise in the room stopped cold. “Mr. Adler, could you fill us in on what happened on your trip?”
“Thank you, Mr. President. I would say that most of the pieces are in place. The Vatican agrees to the terms of our proposal unconditionally, and is ready to host the negotiations at any time.”
“How did Israel react?” Liz Elliot asked, to show that she was on top of things.
“Could have been better,” Adler said neutrally. “They'll come, but I expect serious resistance.”
“How serious?”
“Anything they can do to avoid being nailed down, they'll do. They are very uncomfortable with this idea.”
This was hardly unexpected, Mr. President,' Talbot added.
“What about the Saudis?” Fowler asked Ryan.
“Sir, my read is that they'll play. Prince Ali was very optimistic. We spent an hour with the King, and his reaction was cautious but positive. Their concern is that the Israelis won't do it, no matter what pressure we put on them, and they are worried about being left hanging. Setting that aside for the moment, Mr. President, the Saudis appear quite willing to accept the plan as drafted, and to accept their participatory role in its implementation. They offered some modifications, which I outlined in my briefing sheet. As you can see none of them are substantively troublesome. In fact, two of them look like genuine enhancements.”
“The Soviets?”
“Scott handled that,” Secretary Talbot replied. “They have signed off on the idea, but their read also is that Israel will not cooperate. President Narmonov cabled us day before yesterday that the plan is wholly compatible with his government's policy. They are willing to underwrite the plan to the extent that they will restrict arms sales to the other nations in the region to cover defensive needs only.”
“Really?” Ryan blurted.
“That does clobber one of your predictions, doesn't it?” DCI Cabot noted with a chuckle.
“How so?” the President asked.
“Mr. President, arms sales to that area are a major cash cow for the Sovs. For them to reduce those sales will cost them billions in hard-currency earnings that they really need.”
Ryan leaned back and whistled. “That is surprising.”
“They also want to have a few people at the negotiations. That seems fair enough. The arms-sales aspect of the treaty — if we get that far — will be set up as a side-bar codicil between America and the Soviets.”
Liz Elliot smiled at Ryan. She'd predicted that development.
“In return, the Soviets want some help on farm commodities, and a few trade credits,” Talbot added. “It's cheap at the price. Soviet cooperation in this affair is hugely important to us, and the prestige associated with the treaty is important for them. It's a very equitable deal for the both of us. Besides, we have all that wheat lying around and doing nothing.”
“So, the only stumbling block is Israel?” Fowler asked the table. He was answered with nods. “How serious?”
“Jack,” Cabot said, turning to his deputy, “how did Avi Ben Jakob react to things?”
“We had dinner the day before I flew to Saudi Arabia. He looked very unhappy. Exactly what he knew I do not know. I didn't give him very much to warn his government with, and —”
“What does 'not very much' mean, Ryan?” Elliot snapped down the table.
“Nothing,” Ryan answered. “I told him to wait and see. Intelligence people don't like that. I would speculate that he knew something was up, but not what.”
“The looks I got at the table over there were pretty surprised,” Adler said to back Ryan up. “They expected something, but what I gave them wasn't it.”
The Secretary of State leaned forward. “ Mr. President, Israel has lived for two generations under the fiction that they and they alone are responsible for their national security. It's become almost a religious belief over there — and despite the fact that we give them vast amounts of arms and other grants every year, it is their government policy to live as though that idea were true. Their institutional fear is that once they mortgage their national security to the good will of others, they become vulnerable to the discontinuance of that good will.”
“You get tired of hearing that,” Liz Elliot observed coldly.
Maybe you wouldn't if six million of your relatives got themselves turned into air pollution, Ryan thought to himself. How the hell can we not be sensitive to memories of the Holocaust?
“I think we can take it as given that a bilateral defense treaty between the United States and Israel will sail through the Senate,” Arnie van Damm said, speaking for the first time.
“How quickly can we deploy the necessary units to Israeli territory?” Fowler wanted to know.
“It would take roughly five weeks from the time you push the button, sir,” the SecDef replied. The 10th Armored Cavalry Regiment is forming up right now. That's essentially a heavy brigade force, and it'll defeat — make that 'destroy'—any armored division the Arabs could throw at it. To that we'll add a Marine unit for show, and with the home-port deal at Haifa, we'll almost always have a carrier battle-group in the Eastern Med. Toss in the F-16 wing from Sicily, and you've got a sizable force. The military will like it, too. It gives them a big play area to train in. We'll use our base in the Negev the same way we use the National Training Center in Fort Irwin. The best way to keep that unit tight and ready is to train the hell out of it. It'll be expensive to run it that way, of course, but —'
“But we'll pay that price,” Fowler said, cutting Bunker off gently. “It's more than worth the expenditure, and we won't have any problems on the Hill keeping that funded, will we, Arnie?”
“Any congressman who bitches about this will have his career cut short,” the Chief of Staff said confidently.
“So, it's just a matter of eliminating Israeli opposition?” Fowler went on.
“Correct, Mr. President,” Talbot replied for the assembly.
“What's the best way to do that?” This Presidential question was rhetorical. That answer was already delineated. The current Israeli government, like all which had preceded it for a decade, was a shaky coalition of disparate interests. The right kind of shove from Washington would bring it down. “What about the rest of the world?”
“The NATO countries will not be a problem. The rest of the UN will go along grudgingly,” Elliot said, before Talbot could speak. “So long as the Saudis play ball on this, the Islamic world will fall into line. If Israel resists, they'll be as alone as they have ever been.”
“I don't like putting too much pressure on them,” Ryan said.
“Dr. Ryan, that's not within your purview,” Elliot said gently. A few heads moved slightly, and a few eyes narrowed, but no one rose to Jack's defense.
“That is true, Dr. Elliot,” Ryan said, after the awkward silence. “It is also true that too much pressure might have an effect opposite from what the President intends. Then there is a moral dimension that needs to be considered.”
“Dr. Ryan, this is all about the moral dimension,” the President said. “The moral dimension is simply put: there has been enough war there, and it is time to put an end to it. Our plan is a means of doing that.”
Our plan, Ryan heard him say. Van Damm's eyes flickered for a moment, then went still. Jack realized that he was as alone here in this room as the President intended Israel to be. He looked down at his notes and kept his mouth shut. Moral dimension, my ass! Jack thought angrily. This is about setting footprints in the sands of time, and about the political advantages of being seen as The Great Peacemaker. But it wasn't a time for cynicism, and though the plan was no longer Ryan's, it was a worthy one.
“If we have to squeeze them, how do we go about it?” President Fowler asked lightly. “Nothing harsh, just to send a quiet and intelligible message.”
“There's a major shipment of aircraft spares ready to go next week. They're replacing the radar systems on
