Joe Steele (32 page)

Kurusu knew what he wanted. He wanted Japanese assets in America unfrozen. And he wanted the United States to start selling his country raw materials again. Joe Steele asked him whether Japan would clear out of China if the USA did that.

Unlike the talks with Churchill, Charlie didn't get invited to these. He wasn't broken-hearted. He had nothing to say about Japan or to the Japanese. He heard about what was going on from Vince Scriabin.

“That slant-eye flat-out said they wouldn't pull back,” Scriabin reported. “He said America held an empire and Russia had one and England
had one, and now it was Japan's turn to take one if she was strong enough—and she was. He thinks he's as good as a white man, is what he thinks.” By the way Scriabin rolled his eyes, that was an opinion he didn't share.

“Yeah, Japan's strong enough, as long as they get our scrap metal and our oil,” Charlie said. “But what happens when they run out of oil?”

“Everything they've got with a motor in it grinds to a stop, that's what.” Scriabin sounded as if he was looking forward to it. “From what the War Department brass says, they'll have trouble lasting a year on their own.”

Charlie had heard the same thing. He didn't let on; the dumber you acted, the more interesting things other people said to you and around you. “How long has it been now since the President slapped that embargo on them?” he asked. Again, he knew the answer, but this way the Hammer could feel superior for a little while.

“Just about five months,” Scriabin said. “So they've got to be feeling the pinch already. That stupid Kurusu will be singing a different tune the next time he comes here, I promise you.”

“He sure will.” Charlie had about as much trouble taking Orientals seriously as Scriabin did. He liked Chinese food, though he'd never found a place in Washington he enjoyed as much as Hop Sing's back in the Village. That was as far as it went. He no more thought Asians deserved to put themselves on an equal footing with whites than the Hammer did. The idea seemed too silly for words. So did a lot of Orientals, come to that.

*   *   *

O
ne chilly Sunday morning, Charlie and Esther and Sarah went out to breakfast at a waffle place not far from their apartment. Esther had the waffles, and cut up some for Sarah. Charlie got pancakes and a side of bacon. One slice went to his daughter. Sarah made it disappear.

After they got home, he read the papers and goofed around and eventually turned on the Redskins–Eagles game on the radio. If the Redskins won, they'd finish third in the Eastern Division with a 6-5 mark. If they lost, they'd finish third at 5-6. The Eagles, the team behind them, had only two wins all year. Charlie figured their chance of breaking .500 was pretty good.

In spite of their crappy record, the Eagles took the early lead. The
Redskins had the ball when the signal cut out for a moment. Before Charlie could do more than start to turn his head toward the radio, it came back. “We interrupt this broadcast for a special news flash!” said a different announcer, one who had to be back at the radio station's headquarters. “The White House reports that Japanese planes have bombed the American naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, in an unprovoked attack. Casualties are believed to be heavy. That is all that is known at this time. We now return you to our regularly scheduled program.” The football game came back on.

“Oh, God!” Esther exclaimed.

“Couldn't put it better myself,” Charlie said. The Redskins had picked up another first down while the bulletin ran, but he didn't care any more. He wondered how long it would be before he could care again about something as silly as a game of football or baseball. He grabbed his shoes and put them on. “I better get over to the White House right now.”

The telephone rang. Esther picked it up. “Hello?” she said, and then, “Yes, he's here.” She thrust the phone at Charlie, mouthing
Mikoian
.

He nodded. “Hello, Stas,” he said.

“You need to come over right now,” Mikoian said without preamble.

“I was already on my way. I just heard the news flash,” Charlie said. “All hell must be breaking loose.”

Stas Mikoian's chuckle was perfect gallows. “It's nowhere near that quiet. We haven't announced it yet, but the Japs have attacked in the Philippines, too. Doesn't look good there, either.”

“Happy day!” Charlie exclaimed.

“Now that you mention it,” Mikoian said, “no.”

“Right,” Charlie said. “I'll see you as soon as I can.” He hung up. Then he called for a taxi. He didn't want to waste forty-five minutes standing on the corner waiting for a bus. They didn't run as often as usual on Sundays. He kissed Esther and Sarah—who, luckily, couldn't have cared less about Pearl Harbor—and hurried down to the street.

“The Japs've gone crazy,” was what the cabby greeted him with.

“I've heard,” Charlie said. “Take me to the White House. Step on it.” He hadn't wasted time putting on a tie. His brown checked jacket didn't go with his gray pants. It was the one he'd pulled out of the closet, that was all.

But his voice must have carried the snap of authority, because the driver said, “You got it, Mister.” He touched the patent-leather bill of his cap in an almost-salute as the Chevy shot away from the curb.

Charlie gave him a buck and didn't wait for change, though the fare was only sixty cents. Reporters stood on the White House lawn, waiting and hoping for more news. When they spotted Charlie, they converged on him like ants going after a forgotten picnic sandwich. He fended them off with both hands. “I don't know any more than you guys do,” he said. “I was listening to the football game with my wife and little girl. I had Sunday off, or I thought I did. Soon as I heard the bulletin, I figured I'd better come in.”

Some of them wrote that down. White House speechwriter Charlie Sullivan was somebody who made news, not somebody who reported it. Charlie knew that was true, but it still struck him as crazy.

He got through the crowd and into the White House. Vince Scriabin said, “We have a Cabinet meeting set for half past eight. Some Senators and Congressmen will join in at nine.”

“Okay,” Charlie answered. His guess was that most of the decisions would get made before the meeting convened. Except perhaps for Andy Wyszynski, Joe Steele's Cabinet members were there to tell the lesser folk under them what to do, not to shape policy. Joe Steele figured that shaping policy was his bailiwick, no one else's.

“We'll declare war on Japan, of course,” Scriabin said. “The boss will need to make a speech in front of Congress before they ratify the declaration. You may want to start thinking about that.”

“Gotcha,” Charlie said. In fact, he'd already started thinking about that. But showing up Scriabin in any way, small or large, was one of the dumber things anybody in the White House could do. Like him or not, the unpleasant little man was Joe Steele's right hand and a couple of fingers of the left. Charlie asked, “Do we know any more than we've told the radio and the papers?”

“Not much,” Scriabin answered. “It's bad in Hawaii, and it's not good in the Philippines. Oh, and I just now heard that the Japs have started
bombing the English in Malaya, and Japanese troops have crossed the Malayan border from Siam. They're going all out.”

“Misery loves company,” Charlie said. Scriabin's mouth twisted, though his mustache made the motion hard to see. It came closer to a smile than Charlie had expected.

Joe Steele met with his unofficial aides (the Pain Trust, people sometimes called them, though not where the GBI could hear) before the Cabinet meeting. He was not a happy man. “We got caught with our pants down around our ankles in Hawaii,” he growled. “I will want the admiral and the general who were in charge there recalled for interrogation. They should have had more on the ball.”

“I'll take care of that, boss,” Lazar Kagan said. Charlie wondered whether anyone else would see those officers after Joe Steele's interrogators got through with them. He wouldn't have wanted to be in their shoes.

“Well, we're in the war at last,” the President said. “We didn't start it, but we'll finish it. By the time we get through with the Japs, there won't be one brick left on top of another on those islands.”

The Cabinet meeting was the same thing on a larger scale. Charlie sat off to one side, listening. When he heard a phrase he liked, he noted it to toss into the draft he'd give the President. Kagan talked to the Secretary of War and the Secretary of the Navy in a low voice. Neither man looked thrilled at what Joe Steele's aide told them, but they both nodded.

Charlie was up late, finishing the draft for the speech Joe Steele would give when he asked a joint session of Congress for the formal declaration of war against Japan. Millions of people across the country would hear that speech when the President gave it. They might not love Joe Steele—he was one of the least lovable men Charlie had ever known. But when foreign enemies attacked the country he led, who wouldn't rally behind him?

With Senators crowding in along with Representatives, the House chamber was packed for the joint session. Charlie counted himself lucky to get a seat in the visitors' gallery. You didn't watch and listen to history being made every day.

The ferocious roar with which the members of both houses greeted Joe
Steele and the way they sprang to their feet to applaud him even before the Speaker of the House could introduce him told Charlie there'd be no trouble over the declaration of war. He hadn't expected any, but finding out you were right always felt good.

“Members of the Congress of the United States, people of America, yesterday the Empire of Japan attacked Pearl Harbor and the Philippines without warning in time of peace,” the President said. “This act of vicious treachery will never be forgotten. Because of it, I ask the Congress to declare that a state of war exists between the United States and the Empire of Japan.”

More roars. More cheers. Joe Steele went on, “A grave danger hangs over our country. The perfidious Japanese military attack continues. There can be no doubt that this short-lived military gain for the Empire of Japan is only an episode. The war with Japan cannot be considered an ordinary war. It is not only a war between two armies and navies, it is also a great war of the entire American people against the Imperial Japanese forces.

“In this war of freedom, we shall not stand alone. Our forces are numerous. The arrogant enemy will soon learn this to his cost. Side by side with the U.S. Army and Navy, thousands of workers, community farmers, and scientists are rising to fight the enemy aggressors. The masses of our people will rise up in their millions.

“To repulse the enemy who used a sneak attack against our country, a National Committee for Defense has been formed, in whose hands the entire power of the state has been vested. The Committee calls upon all people to rally around the party of Jefferson and Jackson and Wilson and around the U.S. government so as self-denyingly to support the U.S. Army and Navy, demolish the enemy, and gain victory. Forward!”

Forward they went. Two Representatives and one Senator voted against the declaration of war. Nothing, it seemed, was ever unanimous, but that came close enough.

When Charlie got back to the White House, Stas Mikoian greeted him with a long face. “The Japs just smashed our planes on the ground at Clark Field, outside of Manila,” Mikoian said.

“Wait,” Charlie said. “They did that today?” Mikoian nodded. “A day after the fighting started? On the ground? Flat-footed?” Mikoian nodded again. Charlie found one more question: “How, for Chrissake?”

“That, I don't know,” the Armenian answered. “The boss doesn't, either—he just found out, too. But he'll want to know. He'll have some interesting questions for General MacArthur, don't you think?”

“I wouldn't be surprised,” Charlie said. Douglas MacArthur was five thousand miles from the American West Coast. The big naval base between the West Coast and the Philippines had just been blown to hell and gone. All things considered, though, Charlie figured MacArthur was much safer fighting the Japs where he was than he would be if he had to come home and answer those questions from Joe Steele.

*   *   *

T
hree days after the United States declared war on Japan, Germany did—and overdid—an ally's duty and declared war on the United States. Charlie thought Hitler did Joe Steele a favor. The President hadn't declared war on the Nazis, even though the U.S. Navy and German U-boats had been skirmishing for months. Now the
Führer
had done it for him.

Three days after that, Admiral Kimmel and General Short arrived in Washington. Husband Kimmel looked handsome in his gold-striped sleeves. Charlie remembered Walter Short from the days when he'd sat on a military tribunal. Now he and Kimmel found themselves on the wrong end of one of those proceedings.

The questions the officers who served as judges asked the admiral and the general were the obvious ones. Why hadn't somebody spotted the Japanese fleet before the carriers started launching planes? Why were so many American planes lined up on the runways almost wingtip to wingtip? Why didn't more of them get airborne once the authorities realized the war was on?

Admiral Kimmel said, “We searched the areas where we thought the enemy was most likely to appear. Our patrols to the west and to the southwest of Pearl Harbor were thorough and diligent.”

“But you had no airplanes searching to the north, the direction from which the Japs really came?” a judge asked.

“No, sir,” Kimmel answered somberly. “We did not look for an approach from the North Pacific. We thought the weather and the waves at that time of the year made it too dangerous for the Japanese to attempt.”

“You were mistaken, weren't you?”