Power Games: Operation Enduring Unity I (34 page)

29 March: 1500

“Pray tell, General, how did the Feds just waltz into Alaska without a fight? What are we paying you for? One week into the job and you’ve already lost an entire state! I can’t wait to see what you’ll do next week.”

The head general in charge of the “free” US Armed Forces withered under the fire of this tiny woman. California’s Governor Salazar, or the Provisional President of the United Republics of America as she called herself, was not the quiet type. This short, slightly chubby woman had more ambition and drive in her little finger than most of her advisors had in their whole families. Unfortunately, her military experience did not match that passion.

“Well, Ms. President, except for a small contingent in Anchorage, they’ve only reoccupied the military bases. Bases that we stripped of personnel and equipment to reinforce the border, at your request.”

“Spare me the excuses. You’re missing the big picture. From a propaganda standpoint, with the capitol in their hands, they own the whole place. Do you realize how much work went into getting Alaska on board? All that politicking pissed away by raw military force. Damn if there’s not a lesson to be learned there. What are you going to do to retake it?”

“Ma’am, we don’t really have any options at the moment. After the surprise federal assault Canada began enforcing their declared neutrality. They’ve ordered their borders closed to military traffic from both sides. With the Feds having such naval superiority in the Pacific, I don’t see how we can risk an amphibious operation either. For the time being, we just have to move on.”

“And what about our navy? I thought we captured something like 100 ships. I saw two aircraft carriers just the other day in San Diego. Surely that’s more than what the Feds have in Hawaii.”

“The paper strength is misleading, ma’am. Combat power is not simply the sum of our weapons and delivery systems. These ships require a vast number of highly trained technical specialists. With our extreme manpower shortages, we can sortie only about 50 major vessels. Maybe including one carrier, with a reduced crew complement, if we accept lower overall combat efficiency. Even that small force would strain our limited resources. No ma’am, at best we can scrounge up half the naval assets we believe the Feds could muster.”

She wasn’t terribly interested in the details. “Fine, then. Alaska will have to wait. What about that scheme in Florida? Have we made any progress?”

The general couldn’t help but sigh as he sourly answered, “Mr. Esterline can best field that question, ma’am.”

The fledging new government didn’t have an official intelligence service yet. The few professional spies and analysts that “came over” were obviously a little suspect. The best they had was this freelancer. You couldn’t tell by that expensive suit and slowly graying hair, but this ex-Green Beret had trained and advised paramilitary forces in a half-dozen exotic locales. Even that wasn’t the primary qualification on his impressive resume.

Back in his CIA days, they called him a top-notch strategic operations officer. Hell, one referral claimed he was the acknowledged master at waging proxy wars. He manipulated or outright bribed God knew how many Arab and African dictators into launching seemingly random military interventions against extremists. While the official records were sealed for 70 more years, legend has it that with a single well-timed drone strike he once sparked a short but deadly power-struggle war between the original Al Qaida group and their affiliate branch in Yemen.

After abruptly leaving civil service, “tossed out on his ass,” according to most insiders, he joined the private sector as “a troubleshooter, of sorts.” Since he was fired in an embarrassing manner back before The Split, and had an obvious axe to grind with his former employers, his loyalty wasn’t such a mystery. His sanity was an entirely different question.

“Yes, ma’am. We’ve rearmed the exiled Florida guardsmen in Cuba. Our negotiations with the People’s Republic there have paid off handsomely. The Reconquista will handily liberate Miami. Those few thousand fighters will lead a People’s uprising of millions well beyond just Florida. Within a week, I will raise for you fresh armies inside the walls of Rome! Despite the general’s skepticism, success is assured.”

General Stewart smacked his palm on the polished mahogany round table. He had everyone’s undivided attention. “What the hell are you talking about? Ma’am, please tell me you’re not actually considering this fantasy? As we’ve discussed, we need to focus all our energy on building a viable defensive force. That’s your only chance to negotiate peace from a position of strength. The last thing we can afford is to escalate things. Especially not with such off the wall stunts like this.”

President Salazar appeared genuinely surprised. “General, we are way beyond finding ‘a peace we can live with.’ I’m in this to win it, and you can bet that the Washington crowd is as well. I want to make sure you’re not laboring under any false pretenses. We’re at war!”

Salazar took a deep breath and fixed her hair. She forced down her dragon instincts, which only made her snark more threatening.

“In this war, Mr. Esterline has so far gathered us much more success than your dawdling. His maneuverings brought Kansas and Nebraska into our corner, without even holding referendums. He’s why our soldiers are facing off with the Feds across the Missouri River and not in the streets of Denver! With that record, when he speaks, he will be listened to.”

For his part, Esterline wasn’t smug about the public dressing down the boss gave his uniformed rival. He was so self-assured he didn’t need any external validation. Those puckered lips held pity and not spite for the poor general who lacked his brilliance.

Esterline jumped up and buzzed about the room with his usual intensity, shoving printouts into everyone’s hand. “As I was saying, there’s more combat power over there than you think. Here are the details. I’ve worked everything out with the Cubans. In exchange for most favored nation trade status and some other direct aid, they will support the liberators with the full weight of the Revolutionary Armed Forces.”

Another military man took over for the smarting general. “Um, I’m not seeing much in the way of weight here. A few dozen obsolete planes and even older warships. Where are the troops?”

Esterline grinned knowingly, or psychopathically, as some critics worried. “That’s where our brave Floridian Freedom fighters come in. Come now, we will
use
the barbarians, but we won’t repeat Rome’s mistake. No foreign fighters on our soil! But we can take advantage of their support to get our people into Miami.”

With a flourish, he produced his own digital projector and computer. The leadership crowd stared awestruck at the fabulous projections on screen. Crazy or not, you have to admit he believed every word he said. Sincerity always lends a certain credibility.

“If we launch a diversionary attack along the border, where they’re expecting us anyway, the Gaul’s, I mean Feds, will leave Florida totally exposed. Their occupation forces are scattered all over the state. They aren’t ready to meet an external invasion. Practically all of the Air Force and Navy are deployed along the border or in transit to blockade our coast. They are naked. We need to hit now! While they’re still weak and disorganized.”

More heads nodded than at the beginning. President Salazar carefully studied their expressions. Even a few of the military ones were in grudging agreement.

“Ok, I think we have plan. This is a low risk, high payoff proposition. Unless we come up with something better, it’s time to set a date. Can we be ready by next Monday?”

The general knew when he was beaten. Well, at least they’d have the element of surprise. Who in the USA would guess they’d do something so reckless? “Yes, ma’am. We can be. On 17 April, we’ll launch our offensive.”

Esterline’s face held no sense of triumph. He didn’t feel any obstacle had been overcome. The outcome of this meeting was never in doubt. His scheme was the best way to go; anyone could see that. He refilled his water glass yet again and let his mind run loose with the million little details to be worked out. No matter who ran the operation, this was still his war.

1 April: 1500

Where the name United Republics of America came from is still shrouded in historical uncertainty. The favorite story claims it was first used in a heated exchange between Ms. Salazar and the president shortly after his emergency term extension. During one of the last conference calls, just before reunification negotiations broke down for the last time, her assistants and their federal counterparts were at each other’s throats. She and her rival president ignored the insults and teenager-like threats their staffs traded. Mostly.

The president’s staffers mocked the concept of a rival government and in particular her status as the legitimate president. In response to the remark that, sure, there were two Americas, the USA and the United Sociopaths of America, she stepped into the debate and coined a new term.

“The first President of the United Republics of America would like to speak to the last President of the United States of America privately.” The legitimate sounding URA silenced the president’s men. She drew a solid and dangerous line in the sand by showing that they’d moved well beyond legal squabbling and headline grabbing.

The least favorite, though most likely story, claimed the name was a product of some LA advertising agency. The well-crafted result of countless focus groups. It’s also possible that both versions hold a little truth.

Origins aside, a name was finally necessary if they were ever going to achieve complete legitimacy. It was getting confusing every time so-called federal officials warned of the dangers from other people calling themselves federal officials. URA authorities vehemently denied they were in any way, shape or form seceding from the Union, even as they redesigned the flag. Those early days were confusing, to say the least.

One unintended consequence of the title adoption is that it gave foreign powers a government to recognize. Not that anyone in Sacramento had sought such recognition. Some back channel feelers were put out, but the initial feedback wasn’t reassuring. Formal requests were not sent out to foreign governments over fear of the political embarrassment rejection could cause.

But this didn’t keep some traditional enemies of the US from immediately recognizing the newly minted URA as a legitimate nation. Iran and North Korea issued friendly press releases the same day California passed the Freedom referendum. The compliments were accepted by Sacramento with awkwardness. Unsure of the appropriate response to this unwelcomed support, URA politicians did the same as their USA counterparts: they ignored it.

One nation no one could ignore, however, was the People’s Republic of China. In a tongue in cheek mocking of the USA’s long standing quasi-recognition of Taiwan, they announced their own “One America” policy shortly after the name adoption. While publically stating that there was only one America and one legitimate American government, they chose to remain neutral and not oppose either claimant. This roundabout granting of legal status to the new regime from someone actually important opened the diplomatic floodgates.

Within weeks, most non-NATO members accepted some variation of China’s policy. Not that China offered only moral support. Apparently, in the diplomatic world, there is a huge difference between “not opposing” and “not supporting” something. In less than two weeks, a private, nonprofit “Chinese Institute of America” opened in Sacramento.

This new nongovernmental organization graciously offered to perform citizen and consular services, as well as serve as a point-of-contact for trade issues in America. Not in the USA or URA, but simply in “America,” according to their website. That this company employed double the staff in their sprawling office park as the official embassy in DC surprised no one.

That the onsite manager of this firm was not a high-ranking Chinese bureaucrat, but a senior Chinese military officer was surprising, though. Oh, the general resigned his post to work “in the private sector,” but the deputy operations officer of the Chengdu Military Region Special Forces doesn’t walk off the job without official sanction. In fact, the company had a strange habit of recruiting almost exclusively from ex-military, intelligence and foreign ministry workers in the PRC. All mundane administrative details were outsourced to some local US company.

Washington’s reasoned response to this insult was to return the PRC ambassador’s passport. At the urging of Congress, the president reluctantly ordered all PRC missions in loyal areas closed. Two weeks later, a terrified Taiwan received the official recognition from a spiteful US Senate they always wanted…just as all US military forces were being withdrawn from the Pacific. Mainland China’s outrage was epic. Who cared though? What could they do way over there?

The greatest annoyance for the California led republic was how helpful the PRC’s were. In Beijing’s eyes, the only thing better than one giant export market like the US were two markets. They were supposedly the communists, but man oh man, did they have a lot of ideas on how to profit from the crisis.

From day one, they’d been proposing one scheme after another to increase military cooperation between the two countries, in order to strengthen “mutual defense.” Proposals to trade military technology fell through when it was clear they had little to offer. Their hopes to sell arms to the provisional government likewise fell on deaf ears.

Never mind that there were good reasons the Chinese government stole weapon designs from the US and not the other way around. The big driver behind the growing military buildup in the URA was as much economic as political or strategic. Too many jobs had already been lost in the economic devastation of the last few months. Sacramento officials tactfully, but firmly made it clear that these new defense contracts would go to domestic sources.

Undaunted, their representatives persevered with one creative scheme after another. The solution they pushed the hardest, though politely rejected every time, involved getting Chinese troops stationed in the new country. With foreign peacekeepers on hand, the USA would never dare attack for fear of starting World War 3. The Chinese seemed genuinely interested in the security of the new government. They were even surprisingly frank about their rationale. A hot war would be a disaster…but an inter-American Cold War would be pretty damn good for business.

To be fair, that last point was echoed by many movers and shakers throughout both Americas.