Warzone: Nemesis: A Novel of Mars (7 page)

Dr. Jan Eichmann

Dept. of Research and Development,

Alpha One Test Center

The president’s secretary buzzed the president, who was finishing up some notes for a speech. He was scheduled to meet this afternoon with a group of supporters.

“Yes, Janet.”

“A courier is waiting to see you with a message from GEN Colson, sir.”

“Send him in.”

“Yes, Mr. President.”

The young officer entered and, surrendering the case, assumed his waiting stance. The president unlocked the case, retrieved the letter, and started to read…

To the President of the United States

From GEN Carter F. Colson

Dear Mr. President, COL Edwards has discovered and removed a Soviet mole here. We can only assume the Soviets have all of the information we have. Until now, they were able to keep an eye on us the inside. Security has been increased significantly, and we shouldn’t have any more trouble. It was as you’ve said. We have sufficient enough technology to complete the assignment and also the means from the commercial development of the other technologies to fund our organization independently as you requested.

GEN Carter F. Colson,

Alpha One Test Center

The young president frowned and rubbed between his eyes to relieve the beginning of a headache. He sighed and shredded the paper. The space race was on, not just the public one, but the real one.

To GEN Carter F. Colson

From the accounting office of Newberg, Klein, and Hoffman

Mr. Colson, the corporation and its subsidiaries have been established under the name of the Investco Corp, as you requested. Your organization is in good condition, being in the black with no outstanding debt at start up. Since this is a privately owned company, I assume you’ll be appointing your own staff and board members.

Respectfully yours,
Joseph Klein

From Rear Admiral Perry Dubois, USN

To GEN Carter F. Colson

GEN Colson, I accept your offer to head the Investco Corporation. I also understand the importance of making this work for our country. I assure you that lower level management will know nothing of our true purpose. This corporation will essentially be run to make a profit like any other well-run business. My retirement from the Navy will be in effect at the end of the month. I’ll then be fully able to devote my time to the business at hand. I have many connections within the government to be able to get bids for us on defense contracts. If what you’re telling me about having a steady stream of advanced technology to market is true, we should have no problem becoming very profitable to fund our war effort.

Respectfully,

Rear Admiral Perry Dubois, USN

The courier by now was getting accustomed to these trips to Washington. His main qualifications were that he didn’t talk unless he needed to and was very discreet in discussing his work. He also understood the contents of the case were above his pay grade. It was a need to know kind of thing, and he was satisfied he didn’t need to know. He once more stood before the most powerful man in the free world. It was getting pretty much routine by now: salute, hand him the case, and wait for an answer. The president unlocked the case and read the letter.

To the President of the United States

From GEN Carter F. Colson

Dear Mr. President, we’re on schedule with our project code name Desert Jewel. I’ve established a corporation which will provide independent finances. All the board members are good men who understand our cause and the cause of freedom. The corporation’s structure makes it impossible to turn it into a dictatorship. Power is shared among the board, which is comprised of career military officers, and legal and financial counselors. As we’re a capitalist country, you can see the irony in the checks and balances in our organization existing at the financial level. Lenin and Marx should roll over in their graves.

GEN Carter F. Colson,

Alpha One Test Center

Inside the Kremlin office of the First Secretary of the CPSU

First Secretary Khrushchev greeted GEN Andropov. The general had a worried look on his face.

“Comrade First Secretary, our agents within the secure American facility were discovered and killed, but not before a wealth of technical information was received by us. It is a pity that we will get no more information from them.”

“Comrade General, it does not matter. Our source sold us the research the Americans had collected for nearly ten years. The damage to the Americans’ exclusive ownership of the information is irreparable. We will proceed as planned and start our colonization of the cosmos. It is of little importance if we’re first in that race. We must be the first to establish production facilities on the moon if alloy-x does indeed exist there. We must get to the Moon as soon as possible in a disc large enough to transport equipment and an expedition team. If we find alloy-x there, a post must be built. Once we have a military post there, we should destroy the Americans and take full possession of the Moon and all of its resources.”

Courier dispatch from GEN Mikhail Andropov to First Secretary Nikita Khrushchev.

To Nikita Khrushchev, First Secretary of the CPSU

From GEN Mikhail Andropov, Army of the USSR

Comrade Secretary, I am reporting today the successful formation of the SCA-Soviet Cosmonaut Agency. With the technologies our operatives stole from the Americans, combined with the alloy-x we’ve harvested, we are poised to win the struggle. We should be able to build transport space vessels to transport our troops and equipment to the moon to establish our permanent post within a few months.

The SCA shall remain completely secret to keep the Chinese in the dark. Our greatest concern is the Chinese may somehow be able to join us in this race and become the dominant Marxist superpower. I advise the “public space race” continue, and the real one remain secret. Our agents discovered that President Kennedy is the only government official that knows about the disc and the secret test center’s existence. Our sources stressed that even the vice-president does not know. President Kennedy’s failure at the Bay of Pigs invasion and his executive order to withdraw from Vietnam has earned him many enemies within his own military and the CIA. Our mole within the CIA Black Operations assures us it would be possible to motivate the CIA to eliminate him on their own. Kennedy should be killed before the Americans have a chance to establish their space organization to compete with us. This in itself may be enough to give us the momentum to beat the Americans to the moon to establish our post first.

Please advise,

GEN Mikhail Andropov, SCA

The First secretary wrote his response and placed it in the locked attaché case and gave it to the courier to return to the general, who was on army business doing an inspection along the Chinese border. The courier took the first plane to the army post where the general was staying. He surrendered the case to the general, who eagerly unlocked it. The Soviets had never assassinated a sitting United States president before. He was concerned the first secretary would consider the plan too risky. He read the response.

To GEN Mikhail Andropov, SCA

From Nikita Khrushchev, First Secretary of the CPSU

Comrade General, I approve of your plan to assassinate President Kennedy. It is imperative no evidence of Soviet involvement be discovered. As soon as the mission is accomplished, our agent within the CIA should conveniently have a fatal heart attack, so no link to the Soviet Union should be discovered in any investigation sure to follow. I understand he has had a history of heart trouble, so this should not arouse any suspicion.

Nikita Khrushchev,

First Secretary of the CPSU

General Andropov was pleased with the response. It was time to plan the American president’s demise. He’d thought of nothing else since the Cuban Missile crisis and the Bay of Pigs incident. It is time to stop this arrogant young man dead in his tracks, the operative word being
dead
.

Memorandum from Dr. Jan Eichmann

October 8, 1963

To: GEN Carter F. Colson

General, we will launch the three discs we replicated from the alien disc in T-24 hours, at zero eight hundred hours MST. We’re also able to make twelve transport vessels out of alloy-x to transport troops and supplies to set up our post on the moon. There’s going to be a clear blue sky, so we painted all of the discs and transport vessels sky blue. We’ve set up security to clear all civilians from the area and have arranged for satellite blackouts during the launch time. We’re going to set up a rash of false UFO sightings all over the west, so most serious people will ignore our launches. We’ve enough water, food, fuel, equipment, and a recycler to start up our post. When the American public celebrates the public moon launch in a few years, we will already be standing on the moon.