from the Chancellor's office in Berlin that the reserve battalions of Seydlitz's brigade, as well as other brigades, were liable for immediate recall, seemed unnecessarily provocative on Germany's part. Diplomatic, not military, action was what his government should have been using to resolve the issue. Yet nothing, at least nothing that he knew of or had heard on the radio, even suggested that Chancellor Ruff or the Americans were interested in pursuing active talks. Instead, as the brigade watched and waited for the Americans to test the resolve of the German government, a test every officer and soldier in the brigade knew would come, Berlin continued to issue new pronouncements, new directives, and new deployment orders that could only serve to increase rather than decrease the tension. So, as for many of his fellow officers, the news that a parachute brigade had seized the American air base where the nuclear weapons in question had been only brought dread and foreboding. For the Army better than anyone else knew that the Americans could not ignore the German challenge. Unless cool heads and common sense were allowed to prevail, it would, Seydlitz knew, have to come to a fight.
With his mind cluttered by such weighty concerns, Seydlitz did not notice the driver of his tank as he carefully climbed on board, taking great pains not to spill the contents of his commander's breakfast. Only after he offered the steaming plate of food did Seydlitz acknowledge him. Forcing a smile across a face still clouded by deep worries and personal doubts, Seydlitz thanked his crewman and took the plate. Looking down at the plate, Seydlitz made a face, then asked his driver what, exactly, he'd been handed.
The loader smiled. 'Well, Herr Captain, when I was training at Minister, my cadre sergeant told us never bother asking where we were going, since we had no choice in the matter anyway, never ask what we were going to do when we got there, because chances are the officers taking us there probably didn't know either, and never, never, never ask an army cook what he is serving, because even they didn't know what it used to be.'
Seydlitz looked at his loader and laughed. The German Army didn't need to spend millions and millions of marks on training its officer corps, Seydlitz thought, in military theory and tactics. His loader, with just a few weeks of training, understood things far better than he did. All that was necessary, it seemed, was for officers to act more like their crewmen; shut up, go where you were told, don't worry about what's going to happen, and eat what you are given. For a lowly panzer captain such as himself to worry about anything else was, Seydlitz realized, a waste of time.
After two days of nonstop lectures and one-way speeches, Ed Lewis was ready to give up. Actually, he thought, as he listened to Chancellor Ruff, there was nothing really to give up, since that phrase implied that there had been a two-way struggle. If anything, there had been no room, as far as the Germans were concerned, for any kind of open dialogue. From the beginning of his round of official and unofficial meetings, Ed Lewis had been stonewalled by a solid party line that none of the German players were deviating from. From Thomas Fellner, Minister of the Interior, and to the left of the political spectrum, to Rudolf Lammers, the Minister of Defense and a staunch conservative, the only difference in their presentations had been the intensity of the speaker's emotions.
Not that even that point made a difference. Even now, as he listened to Chancellor Ruff go over the same ground covered by the members of his cabinet, Lewis was reminded how much he disliked listening to German. It was to him a very harsh language. The sharp, crisp manner in which the northern Germans spat out their words almost seemed to assault his ears. Though he imagined that he was just being a little hypersensitive because of the content, Lewis found his mind wandering as he tuned out Chancellor Ruff, just as President Wilson had when it had become obvious to her that direct talks between her and Ruff were fruitless. So, instead of paying attention to what was being said, he found himself wishing that it had been the French and not the Germans who had precipitated this crisis. The French language at least was more pleasing to the ear.
The American congressman's lack of interest in what he was saying was not lost on Ruff, and it angered him. It angered him more than the fact that a mere congressman, and not a member of the President's own council, was picked to come to Germany to hear them out. Well, Ruff thought, if the Amis are going to hold us in such low regard, then perhaps I can do something to make them see this whole affair in a new light.
Standing up, Ruff caught both Lewis and the German translator by surprise. 'I see, Herr Congressman, that you are tiring of hearing the same thing over and over again. Perhaps you do not believe our resolve.'
Caught off guard and regretting that his disinterest had been so obvious, Lewis sat up and began to apologize. He was, however, cut short as Ruff began to speak without pause, making it difficult for the translator to keep up. 'The realities of world politics and diplomacy in the modern world are both harsh and obvious. For years the great struggle was, as many have pointed out, between the haves and the have nots. But what few people have understood, or cared to understand, was that when the terms 'have' and 'have not' were used by the United States and the former Soviet Union, the speaker was not talking about monetary or mineral resources. No, Herr Congressman, have and have not, when it came to determining who would be listened to and who could be ignored, meant having the bomb or not having the bomb.' Ruff paused, allowing this statement to take root as he limped from behind his desk over to a wall where a map of Germany, with its 1938 borders lightly highlighted and extending from its current borders, was displayed. Stopping next to a German flag, Ruff turned back and looked at Lewis, ready to continue where he had left off.
'During the eighties, a great famine swept through much of Africa. Though the United States was concerned, officially it did little. The result, Herr Congressman, was millions of deaths, deaths of innocent women and children that were recorded on film and shown almost nightly in every home in America. In the early nineties, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when the new republics of the Commonwealth faced the same fate, the nations of the world, led by the United States, tripped over themselves in an effort to rush aid to the poor Russians. And why, Herr Congressman, such a difference? The reason is obvious. Ethiopia had no nuclear-tipped missiles that could reach the United States.'
Lewis, shifting in his chair, finally found a chance to speak as Ruff paused. 'That, Herr Chancellor, is a rather cynical view. Surely you must realize that?'
With a clearly discernible edge in his voice, Ruff cut Lewis off. 'This, Herr Congressman, is a very cynical world. Only those who are willing to accept that and deal with the reality of things as they are and not as they would like them to be will survive. Fifty years ago, Germany was a broken country. Mentally and physically we had reached the zero point. There was nothing.
Lewis, for the first time since arriving in Germany, found himself becoming uneasy. The words 'new order' and the mention of the Jews in a negative connotation caused Lewis to visibly twitch. Satisfied that he was having the desired effect, Ruff continued, speaking now in a rather matter-of-fact tone. 'I have been informed that your President demands that we turn the nuclear weapons we seized from Sembach back over to your control. That, in our view, would be akin to a policeman returning stolen goods to a thief and helping the thief load them into his car. Your nation has no legal right to those nuclear weapons. None. That you think you do is simply another example of the contemptuous self-righteousness that you use to cloak your misguided and haphazard foreign policy. Rather than return those weapons, it is the decision of this government to keep them and incorporate them into a Central European arsenal that will allow all the nuclear 'have nots' in this part of the world to deal with the United States on an equal footing. Even you, Herr Congressman, can understand that.'
After considering his response for several seconds, Lewis began to speak slowly, carefully choosing his words. 'This is, I am sure, a matter that concerns more than the United States. You realize that the other nuclear powers in Western Europe, the French and British, not to mention the Russians to the east, are very concerned about a new nuclear power in Europe.' Lewis was about to add 'especially a nuclear arsenal controlled by Germany,' but decided not to.
