A Very British Coup (22 page)

With the exception of McLennon, they were all big men with heavy jowls and large bellies. The heaviness of their jowls lent gravity to the occasion.

The President spoke first. “Let's be clear. There is no way we can afford to lose Britain. No way at all.” Zablonski was nodding in agreement. The President went on, “We lost China in 1949 and got by. We lost Vietnam in 1975 and got by. But if we lose Britain, we're done for.”

“Right on, Mr President,” whispered Zablonski.

“If we were prepared to invest two-billion dollars a year and forty thousand American lives to try and save a dump like Vietnam, then the sky's the limit when it comes to saving Britain.” The President spoke slowly, every phrase punctuated by the sound of his jaws processing chewing gum. “Whatever the cost we've got to stop those bases falling into enemy hands – and by enemy I mean the British government.”

For a moment there was no sound save the crackling of the log fire. The President looked at each man in turn. “Gentlemen, this is war. I want to know how we get rid of Harry Perkins and his government.” He nodded towards Morgan. “Marcus, you first.”

The Secretary of State ran a plump hand across the stubble on his unshaven chin. “To start with, Mr President, we gotta play for time. Emphasise the technical difficulties. Slam in a nice bill for compensation. Demand the return of every piece of equipment that we've ever installed in the British defence system, down to the last paper clip. Meanwhile we get our European allies to pile on the pressure, get the bankers to heat up the economy a little and quietly prepare for the worst.”

“Anton?”

Zablonski sat up straight, slicked back his hair and tightened the knot of his tie as though he were rising to address an audience of thousands. “I reckon,” he said firmly, “it's about time we stopped babying the British. Tell them straight to get into line or else. We could start by organising a trade boycott and, if it comes to the worst, we could blockade the ports.”

“That's plain crazy.” McLennon could not restrain himself. “If we do that we'll end up taking on the whole world.”

“So what would you do,” snapped Zablonski, “put Perkins down for a Nobel Peace Prize?”

McLennon ignored this. In his view Zablonski was a dangerous lunatic who enjoyed far too much access to the President. Lunatics like Zablonski had already driven half the
world to Communism and, if they continued to have their way, it would not be long before the other half followed.

“We have one thing going for us,” said McLennon. “British public opinion. Perkins is not as popular now as he was six months ago. That dispute with the power workers was very damaging. On top of which many people in Britain are worried about the Soviets. We must play that one for all it's worth.” He paused to look across at the President who was making notes.
Play Soviets
, the President had written on a pad of white paper embossed with his seal.

“And here,” McLennon went on, “I must pay tribute to the British intelligence boys. We often laugh at them, but I must say they have got their media sewn up tighter than a gnat's ass-hole. Apart from a Communist rag, which no one takes seriously anyway, every national daily, every Sunday paper, just about every local newspaper from Surrey to the Scottish Highlands is on our side on this one. So is the BBC and most other television networks. All hammering Perkins and his crew every day. All playing the Soviet threat for everything it's worth. In most countries we have to pay for that kind of coverage. In Britain we get it for free.” There was envy in his voice. If only the American establishment had a media half as friendly, half as unenquiring. “Sooner or later,” he said, “public opinion in Britain is bound to swing our way.” He paused and looked at Zablonski. “Unless we screw it all up by declaring war on them.”

“George is right Mr President, we gotta play this cool.” It was Marcus Morgan. McLennon looked up in surprise. It was not often he had the Secretary of State on his side.

“What we need,” Morgan went on, “is a bit of so-phist-ication.” The word rolled slowly off his tongue. Sophistication was not something widely associated with corporate lawyers. “If Anton had his way, we'd be training British mercenaries in Camp Hale by now.”

“As I see it,” said Admiral Glugstein, who until now had sat back in silence, “our key objective must be to maintain the installations.” He pinched his trousers at the knee to preserve the crease. “The warheads are no problem. If the worst comes
to the worst we can play the Brits along by flying them out to Germany or Spain. The submarines can also be temporarily relocated, if necessary. But the infrastructure, that's another matter.”

The admiral's polished shoes gleamed in the light of a lampshade. His cuffs protruded a full two inches from the sleeve of his dinner jacket. “Yes sir,” he went on, “we got thirty billion dollars tied up in infrastructure. Communications, storage facilities and the like. If we lose that little lot we're in trouble deep.”

“That's where the British military come in.” Morgan had taken a cigar from his top pocket and was fumbling for a lighter. “Providing we hand over to the British military, they should be able to babysit for us until the next election.”

“And if Perkins wins the next election?” jeered Zablonski.

“That,” said the President with a thin smile, “is item two on today's agenda.”

The RAF DC10 bringing Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Gibbon to Washington touched down at Andrews Air Force Base at around 9 am Washington time. Officially he was coming to talk to the American air force about an updated version of the F-18 which the RAF were hoping to buy. The visit had been scheduled months in advance. Unofficially, however, he had come to give the Americans a full briefing on the Chequers weekend and to sound them out on what was to be done. Although he was met at the airbase by a USAF staff car, he was driven not to the Pentagon, but to the State Department. To avoid the possibility of recognition he was dressed in civilian clothes. He entered the State Department by a service entrance at the rear of the building and was taken immediately to the office of the Secretary of State.

If anyone had suggested to the air marshal that what he was engaged upon was treason he would have replied crisply that, on the contrary, he was engaged in an act of patriotism. If pressed, the air marshal would have argued that the citizen's loyalty to the State was conditional upon the State recognising a responsibility to provide protection for the
citizen. By withdrawing from the Atlantic alliance the British government was failing to honour its share of the bargain. Therefore, the air marshal was perfectly entitled to withdraw his loyalty from the State. He was not alone in this line of thinking. In one way or another such arguments were to be heard around the dinner tables and in the drawing rooms of gentlemen's clubs the length and breadth of St James's. They were to be heard in the officers' mess at the Army Staff College at Camberley. And in the boardrooms of some of Britain's grandest corporations. They were even, on occasion, to be heard between the four walls of a permanent secretary's office in Whitehall.

Very often such arguments were embellished by the suggestion that the loyalty of many government ministers was in doubt. If there was any treason going on, it was argued, it was more likely to be found in the Cabinet Room or behind the Georgian façade of Labour party headquarters at Walworth Road. To say nothing of some of the Marxist trade union leaders who made no secret about where their loyalties lay. This reasoning rarely made the newspapers, at least not in so crude a form. But it was what many very important people in Britain were thinking as the winter of 1989 faded into spring of 1990.

Of course no one in their wildest dreams would have envisaged a situation where any British Cabinet minister or even a Marxist trade union leader would actually undertake a trip to Moscow for the specific purpose of briefing the Soviet Foreign Minister on the secret deliberations of the British government. Everyone knew that Soviet sympathisers were a little more subtle than that.

Yet here was an air marshal, who only hours before had been party to the highest level and most secret deliberations of the British government, seated in the office of the American Secretary of State, spilling the beans with gusto. Call it treason or patriotism or what you will.

Marcus J. Morgan was in shirtsleeves, which did justice to his mighty biceps. Cold winds blew outside, but inside an air conditioner hummed gently. Or was it an extractor fan absorbing
the endless screen of cigar smoke which wafted up from behind his paper-strewn desk? On a table by the window was a scale model of the B-1 bomber, the biggest, fastest and most expensive ever built. The air marshal gazed longingly at it and wondered aloud if the Royal Air Force would ever be able to afford a squadron of B-1s. “Don't worry,” Morgan assured him, “Britain will get her share just as soon as we've extended the runways at Mildenhall.”

“Let's get one thing straight right from the start,” said Morgan after the air marshal had told him there was talk of resignations, “we don't want to see any resigning. The battle's only just beginning and we're going to need you boys to stick in there. So stay stuck in.” The air marshal nodded. He could see the point, though he had never before heard the Chiefs of Staff of His Majesty's armed forces referred to as “you boys”.

“Another thing,” said Morgan after the air marshal had told him of the plan to dismantle the British warheads. “Instead of taking the warheads to Burghfield, just fly them to Germany and we'll take care of them for you until the all clear sounds. Then you can have them back again.” He flicked the ash from his cigar into an ashtray made from the wing of a Soviet MIG shot down over Afghanistan. “You can put a few through Burghfield to keep Perkins happy. If necessary, soup up the figures a bit.” The air marshal nodded again. Yes, he thought that could be done. The real problem would be when the time came for Burghfield and Aldermaston to be dismantled. When that happened there would be no hope of Britain ever again maintaining an independent deterrent.

“That's when you start to take it easy. Throw a spanner or two in the works. Tell the government it's more complicated than you thought. Get the workers to go-slow.” Morgan chuckled. “Going-slow is what you British are good at, isn't it?”

The air marshal managed only a weak smile. At home he would have been the first to laugh at any joke about the idleness of the British working man, but he did not like to see a foreigner running down his countrymen. “That might not be as easy as you imagine,” he said, “the running down operation
is likely to be in the hands of the chief scientific adviser to the MoD, an old Pole named Kowalsky. We're not sure we can count on him to play ball. At Chequers on Sunday I rather got the impression that he might actually be in favour of doing away with nuclear weapons.” The air marshal's voice betrayed incredulity, as though he could not conceive a scientist, let alone one working for the Ministry of Defence, who would be against the bomb.

“A pinko?” asked Morgan, one eyebrow raised.

“I wouldn't go
that
far,” said Sir Richard quickly.

They talked for another half hour. Mainly about the chain of communications bases run by the American National Security Agency. This was really not Sir Richard's department. More an intelligence matter. But he knew enough to venture an opinion. He was slightly taken aback when Morgan remarked casually that it was being used to monitor all British government communications, including the Downing Street switchboard. “There's virtually nothing that bastard Perkins says that won't find its way to this desk within six hours,” said Morgan patting a file of computer print-outs in his in-tray. At first Sir Richard assumed that American bugging the British government communications had been prompted by recent events, but Morgan soon put him straight. America, he said, had been bugging friendly governments for the last thirty years. Including all British governments, Conservative and Labour. “We started during the Suez crisis,” beamed Morgan, “and never kicked the habit.”

From the State Department Sir Richard was taken to see the President. They went in Morgan's car. To avoid leaks the meeting took place not in the Oval Office, but in a suite in the Executive Office Building which the President used for off-the-record meetings. The President asked mainly about the political situation in Britain. How long did Gibbon think Perkins would last? Was there anyone else in the Labour Party who could take over if Perkins was ousted? Gibbon had replied that being a military man he was not well up on politics, but it was his impression that Perkins would lead the
Labour Party into the next election and that he stood a good chance of winning.

With that Gibbon was driven to a house in Georgetown which the State Department used for VIP guests. Here he bathed, shaved and changed into his air marshal's uniform. From there he was taken to the Pentagon where he lunched with the USAF Chief of Staff. Even here the F-18s were discussed only perfunctorily. Most of the talk was about the bases in Britain. Finally he was driven back to the RAF DC10 which was refuelled and waiting for him at Andrews Air Force Base. By the small hours of Tuesday morning he was back in London.

The spring brought out the crocuses and daffodils in St James's Park. On the Thames the pleasure boats made their first trips of the season to Kew Gardens, and in Hyde Park military bands began playing again on Sunday afternoons.

Spring also saw the launch of a huge offensive against the government's plan to do away with nuclear weapons. It started a few days after the Chequers conference with a statement from the US State Department to the effect that while the United States would always respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the United Kingdom and any other NATO member, there were wider issues at stake. By effectively withdrawing from the alliance, the statement continued, the government of the United Kingdom places in jeopardy not merely the security of their own people, but that of Western Europe as a whole. The German, the Spanish, Belgian and Italian (though not the Dutch) governments each delivered separate protest notes. Meanwhile the Chiefs of Staff made what was supposed to be an unpublicised visit to Perkins to protest at the decision, but when they arrived at Downing Street batteries of cameras were waiting to record the event.