First Among Equals (36 page)

“Certainly,
Minister,” said Sir John, pushing up his glasses again before opening a large
blue file in front of him.

Simon listened
intently as Sir John went over his provisional strategy.

Around the
table sat eight of the seniorranking staff officers of the army, the navy and
the air force, and even the first draft plan bore the stamp of their three
hundred years of military experience. Simon couldn’t help remembering that his
call-up status was still that of a 2nd Lieutenant. For an hour he asked the
Joint Chiefs questions that ranged from the elementary to those that
demonstrated a clear insight into their problems. When Simon left the room to
attend the Cabinet meeting at Number 10, the Joint Chiefs were already updating
the plan.

Simon walked
slowly across Whitehall from the Department of Defense to Downing Street, his
private detective by his side. Downing Street was thronged with people curious
to see the comings and goings of Ministers involved in the crisis. Simon was
touched that the crowd applauded him all the way to the front door of Number
10, where thejournalists and TV crews awaited each arrival. The great
television arc fights were switched on as he reached the door, and a microphone
was thrust in front of him, but he made no comment. Simon was surprised by how
many of the normally cynical journalists called out, “Good luck,” and “Bring
our
boys
home.”

The front door
opened and he went straight through to the corridor outside the Cabinet room,
where twenty343 two of his colleagues were already waiting. A moment later, the
Prime Minister walked into the Cabinet room and took her seat in the center of
the table, with Charles and Simon opposite her.

Mrs. Thatcher
began by telling her colleagues that she had been unable to make any contact
with Colonel Qaddafi and that they must therefore decide on a course of action
that did not involve his acquiescence. She invited the Foreign Secretary to
brief the Cabinet first.

Charles went
over the actions in which the Foreign Office was involved at the diplomatic
level. He reported his meeting with Ambassador Kadir, and the resolution which
had been proposed at the UN and which was already being debated at an emergency
session of the General Assembly. The purpose of asking the United Nations to
back Britain on Resolution 12/40, he said, was to capture the diplomatic
initiative and virtually guarantee international sympathy. Charles went on to
tell the Cabinet that he expected a vote to take place in the General Assembly
that evening which would demonstrate overwhelming support for the United Kingdom’s
resolution and which would be regarded as a moral victory by the whole world.
He was delighted to be able to report to the Cabinet that the foreign ministers
of both the United States and Russia had agreed to back the UK in her
diplomatic endeavors as long as she launched no retaliatory action. Charles
ended by reminding his colleagues of the importance of treating the whole
affair as an act of piracy rather than as an injury at the hands of the Libyan
government itself.

A legal nicety,
thought Simon as he watched the faces of his colleagues around the table. They
were obviously impressed that Charles had brought the two superpowers together
in support of Britain. The Prime Minister’s face remained inscnitable. She
called upon Simon to air his views.

He was able to
report that Broadsword had, since the 344 last meeting of the Cabinet, been
towed into the Bay of Surt and
moored,
there was no
hope of boarding her except by sea. Commander Packard and his crew of two
hundred and seventeen remained under close arrest in the engine room on the
lower deck of the ship. From confirmed reports Simon had received in the last
hour, it appeared that the ship’s company were bound and gagged, and that the
ventilation systems had been turned off. “I therefore suggest,” said Simon,
“that we have no choice but to mount a rescue operation in order to avoid a
protracted negotiation that can only end in grave loss of morale for the entire
armed forces. The longer we put off such a decision, the harder our task will
become. The Joint Chiefs are putting the final touches to a plan codenamed
‘Shoplifter,’ which they feel must be carried out in the next forty-eight hours
if the men and the ship are to be saved.” Simon added that he hoped diplomatic
channels would be kept open while the operation was being worked out, in order
that out rescue team could be assured of the greatest element of surprise.

“But what if
your plan fails?” interrupted Charles. “We would risk losing not only
Broadsword and her crew but also the good will of the free world.”

“There is no
serving officer in the British navy who will thank us for leaving Broadsword in
Libyan waters while we negotiate a settlement in which, at best, our ship will
be returned when it suits the guerrillas-to say nothing of the humiliation of
our navy.

Qaddafi can
laugh at the United Nations while he has captured not only one of our most
modem frigates but also the headfines of the world press. Unlike the St.
James’s Square siege, he has the initiative this time. These headlines can only
demoralize our countrymen and invite the sort of election defeat Carter
suffered at the hands of the American people after the Iranian Embassy
debacle.”

“We would be
foolish to take such an unnecessary 345 risk while we have world opinion on our
side,” protested Charles. “Let us at least wait a few more days.”

“I fear that if
we wait,” said Simon, “the crew will be transferred from the ship to a military
prison, which would only result in our having two targets to concentrate on,
and then Qaddafi can sit around in the desert taking whatever amount of time
suits him.”

Simon and
Charles weighed argument against counterargument while the Prime Minister
listened, taking note of the views of her other colleagues around the table to
see if she had a majority for one course or the other. Three hours later, when
everyone had given his opinion, she had “14-?” written on the pad in front of
her.

“I think we
have exhausted the arguments, gentlemen,” she said, “and having listened to the
collective views around this table I feel we must on balance allow the
Secretary of State for Defense to proceed with ‘Operation Shoplifter.’ I
therefore propose that the Foreign Secretary, the Defense Secretary, the
Attorney General and
myself
make up a subcommittee,
backed up by a professional staff, to consider the Joint Chiefs’ plan. The
utmost secrecy will be required from us at all times, so the subject will not
be raised again until the plan is ready for presentation to a full meeting of
the Cabinet. Therefore, with the exception of the subcommittee, all Ministers
will return to their departments and carry on with their normal duties. We must
not lose sight of the fact that the country still has to be governed.
Thank you, gentlemen.”
The Prime Minister asked Charles and
Simon to join her in the study.

As soon as the
door was closed she said to Charles, “Please let me know the moment you hear
the results of the vote in the General Assembly. Now that the Cabinet has
favored a military initiative, it is important that you are seen to be pressing
for a diplomatic solution.”

“Yes, Prime
Minister,” said Charles without emotion. 346

Mrs. Thatcher
then turned to Simon.

“When can I have a rundown on the details of the Joint Chiefs,
plan?”

“We anticipate working
on the strategy through the night, Prime Minister, and I should be able to make
a full presentation to you by ten tomorrow.”

“No later,
Simon,” said the Prime Minister.

“Now our next
problem is tomorrow’s proposed emergency debate.

Raymond Gould
will undoubtedly put in a second request for a full debate under Standing Order
Number Ten, and the Speaker gave the House a clear hint today that he will
allow it. Anyway, we can’t avoid making a policy statement without an outcry
from the Opposition benches – -and I suspect our own-so I have decided that we
will grasp the nettle and no doubt get stung.”

The two men
looked at each other, united for a moment in exasperation at the thought of
having to waste precious hours in the Commons.

“Charles, you
must be prepared to open the debate for the Government, and Simon, you will
wind up. At least the debate will be on Thursday afternoon; that way some of
our colleagues may have gone home for the weekend, though frankly I doubt it.
But with any luck we will have secured a moral victory at the United Nations,
and we can keep the Opposition minds concentrating on that. When you sum up,
Simon, just answer the questions put during the debate. Do not offer any new
initiative.”

She then added,
“Report any news you hear directly to me. I shan’t be sleeping tonight.”

Charles walked
back to the Foreign Office, thankful at least that Amanda was off somewhere in
South America.

Simon returned
to the Joint Chiefs to find a large map of Libyan territorial waters pinned to
a blackboard.

Generals,
admirals and air marshals were studying the contours and ocean depths like so
many children preparing for a geography test.

They all stood
again when Simon entered the room. They looked at him in anticipation, men of
action who were suspicious of talk. When Simon told them the Cabinet’s decision
was to back the Ministry of Defense, the suggestion of a smile came over the
face of Sir John. “Perhaps that battle will turn out to be our hardest,” he
said, just loud enough for everyone to hear.

“Take me
through the plan again,” said Simon, ignoring Sir John’s comment.

“I have to
present it to the Prime Minister by ten o’clock tomorrow.”

Sir John placed
the tip of a long wooden pointer on a model of HMS

Broadsword in the middle of a stretch of water in a well-protected
bay.

When Charles
reached his office, the international telegrams and telexes of support for a
diplomatic solution were piled high on his desk. The Permanent
Under
Secretary reported that the debate in the United
Nations had been so onesided that he anticipated an overwhelming majority when
they came to vote. Charles feared his hands were tied; he had to be seen to go
through the motions, even by his own staff, although he had not yet given up
hopes of undermining Simon’s plan. He intended the whole episode to end up as a
triumph for the Foreign Office and not for those warmongers at the Ministry of
Defense. After consulting the Permanent
Under
Secretary, Charles appointed a small “Libyan task force” consisting of some
older Foreign Office mandarins with experience of Qaddafi and four of the
department’s most promising “high fliers.”

Oliver Milas,
the former ambassador to Libya, had been dragged out of retirement from his
comfortable Wilshire home and deposited in a tiny room in the upper reaches of
the Foreign Office so that Charles could call on his knowledge of Libya at any
time, day or night, throughout the crisis.

Charles asked
the Permanent
Under
Secretary to link him up with
Britain’s ambassador at the United Nations.

“And keep trying
to raise Qaddafi.”

Simon listened
to Sir John go over the latest version of Operation Shoplifter. Thirty-seven
men from the crack Special Boat Service, a branch of the SAS regiment which had
been involved in the St. James’s Square siege in April 1984, were now in Rosyth
on the Scottish coast, preparing to board HMS

Brilliant, the
sister ship to Broadsword.

The men were to
be dropped from a submarine a mile outside Rosyth harbor and swim the last mile
and a half underwater until they reached the ship.

They would then
board Brilliant and expect to recapture her from a mock Libyan crew in an
estimated twelve minutes. Brilliant would then be sailed to a distance of one
nautical mile off the Scottish coast. The operation was to be completed in
sixty minutes. The SBS planned to rehearse the procedure on Brilliant three
times before first light the following morning, when they hoped to have the
entire exercise down to the hour.

Simon had
already confirmed the order to send two submarines from the Mediterranean full
steam in the direction of the Libyan coast. The rest of the fleet was to be
seen to be conspicuously going about its normal business, while the Foreign
Office appeared to be searching for a diplomatic solution.

Simon’s request
to the Joint Chiefs came as no surprise and was granted immediately. He phoned
Elizabeth to explain why he wouldn’t be home that night. An hour later the
Secretary of State for Defense was strapped into a helicopter and on his way to
Rosyth.

Charles
followed the proceedings at the United Nations live in his office.

At the end of a
brief debate a vote was called for. The Secretary General announced 147-3 349
in Great Britain’s favor, with twenty-two abstentions. Charles wondered if such
an overwhelming vote would be enough to get the Prime Minister to change her
mind over Kerslake’s plan. He checked over the voting list carefully. The
Russians, along with the Warsaw Pact countries and the Americans, had kept
their word and voted with the UK. Only Libya, South Yemen and Djibouti had voted
against.

Charles was put
through to Downing Street and passed on the news. The Prime Minister, although
delighted with the diplomatic triumph, refused to change course until she had
heard from Qaddafi. Charles put the phone down and asked his Permanent
Under
Secretary to call Ambassador Kadir to the Foreign
Office once more.

“But it’s two
o’clock in the morning, Foreign Secretary.”

“I am quite
aware what time it is but I can see no reason why, while we are all awake, he should
be having a peaceful night’s sleep.”