“The president needs this room in thirty minutes,” Austin Gage warned, “so let’s get a move on here.”
The national security advisor, Stockton Sloan, Ted Jameson and Hunt Daniels sat around the gleaming hardwood table in the Situation Room of the White House. Jasmine Ito, the Director of Intelligence Programs opened the door and slid into a chair next to Ted.
Hunt felt quite at home in this complex of small offices, a technical center and this conference room in the basement of the West Wing. He was in it at least once a day. The conference room, commonly called the Sit Room, was pretty compact and simple compared to Hollywood depictions.
Besides the table and leather chairs that could seat two dozen people in a pinch, it was equipped with the latest communication systems, worldwide video conferencing, television sets and impenetrable walls. Its only decoration was the large round presidential seal on the wall.
Hunt often conferred with the dozens of hand-picked technicians and watch officers who work in teams around the clock, just outside the Sit Room. They were the ones who received updates, reviewed intelligence from State, Defense, CIA, NSA and other agencies, read news reports and monitored television headlines.
They had to work fast to synthesize and summarize it all into two daily intelligence reports prepared for the president and top White House officials, and route over a thousand messages a day to various staff members. They also set-up, monitored and arranged translations for presidential phone calls and teleconferences with other heads of state.
The faces changed pretty often though. It was a tough job. So tough that the officers only served a two-year tour of duty there. But during those two years, they turned out to be the level-headed ones. During the horrific events of 9/11 when all the other White House people were ordered to leave the building for fear of another attack, the technicians refused to go home. They stayed and worked throughout the crisis, just as they had every other day of every other crisis.
Folks like that hadn’t always been stationed in this basement. He’d heard that the Situation Room complex was created by President Kennedy after the disastrous Bay of Pigs affair in 1961. JFK wanted a more up-to-date on-site intelligence center. He wanted it right there at the White House so he wouldn’t have to rely on reports that might be delayed from the State Department or the CIA.
Later, Lyndon Johnson had the habit of going down to the Sit Room at all hours to monitor events in Vietnam. And during the Gulf War, the first President Bush would check in between 4:00 and 5:00 every morning to read the latest intelligence.
The technicians were first with the news, first with the analysis, first with the reports. Usually, but not always.
Hunt remembered one story that went around about the female NSC staffer who was dating a minister at the Swedish Embassy a long time ago. Early one morning, he placed a call to her office to thank her for making him dinner the previous evening. In the course of the conversation, he said that he had been having a strange morning with phone calls back and forth to Stockholm about one of their power plants receiving weird readings. They had to evacuate the plant when some of the workers showed excess radiation.
She had gone back to the Situation Room and asked the Watch Officer to please check out any developments East of Stockholm. Two hours later, the officer raced into her office and exclaimed that they had just figured out that a disaster had occurred at a place called Chernobyl. Some of the staff joked that if she had been dating a Russian, the United States might have found out about it even sooner. Then again, staffers weren’t allowed to date Russians. At least not in those days.
Now, the NSC advisor used the Situation Room for his early morning staff meetings, small conferences like this one, and he had been managing various crises from this secure location for years. He unbuttoned the coat of his blue pin-striped suit and reviewed the paper in front of him.
“India is saying that the cruise missile fired at their military compound in Jammu and Kashmir killed one-hundred eighty-four and injured sixty more. Place is destroyed, and they’ve been meeting to discuss retaliation against Pakistan. As you know, the president has talked to the leaders of both India and Pakistan asking for restraint. But there’s precious little trust on either side. This is your basic disaster in the making. If another missile is fired and Delhi strikes back, we could see nuclear weapons being launched for the first time since Nagasaki!” He turned to Jasmine. “Any success in pinpointing the launch site?”
The Japanese American scholar answered briskly.” Not yet. We’re trying to determine if it came from Pakistan or Kashmir. We don’t have any assets in the Kashmir area, no actionable intelligence at this time. What we do know is that the main group fighting for the past several years in the Kashmir region is known as Lashkar-i-Taiba. They keep changing their name, but we’re using the original for now. We’re compiling more data. I’ll have it for you shortly.”
“Ted? Anything from your ISI contacts?”
“ISI agents are all over this because the Paks are petrified that India really will strike back.”
Austin nodded. “Ambassador Bhattia came rushing over here an hour ago. The man was apoplectic. He’s swearing that Pakistan did not fire the missile. He says it’s got to be one of the militant groups, but he doesn’t have any idea how they got it.”
Hunt broke in. “No idea? Give me a break. We all know that there were three missiles stolen, not one. The whole point is that this first one was a Pakistani missile, fired from Pakistani soil, or at least the Pakistani-controlled area of Kashmir. And that means that if it was one of those al Qaeda type groups, then Islamabad has an army depot with lousy security and army troops that collaborated with the bad guys. In other words, Bhattia’s ass is in a sling. Uh, sorry.”
“Never mind,” Austin said, “my view as well. Stock, what’s your take on this thing?”
The Deputy had a grim look on his face. “I don’t give a damn about Bhattia’s excuses. We’ve got to focus on New Delhi and make sure the Indians don’t fire back.” He passed around copies of a memorandum. “Hunt put this Decision Directive together about sending an advance team over there to set things up for a special envoy. The president’s going to name someone pretty soon, right?”
Austin answered, “Yes. He’s going through the motions and clearances right now. I think he’s leaning toward Senator Farrell. At least Farrell did a pretty good job when he was head of the Foreign Relations Committee. He’s only been out of office two years, so he’s still pretty up-to-speed on things.”
Stock nodded his approval. “Good choice.” He glanced down at the memo. “So as you can see, Hunt’s got a list here of people for the team. Ted, you’re an obvious choice to go with him on this one. You know the area.”
Ted said, “Yes. Hunt and I talked about the list. We need to keep it small. I think he’s right to get one agent from CIA, one from State, and one from DIA.”
“Even with the reorganization, Defense controls the lion’s share of the intelligence budget, so they can jolly well send their best analyst and pony up for the plane,” Stock said.
“I agree with that,” Austin replied. “The list looks good. Hunt, you firm up the plans and get ready to leave in a couple days . . . if we have a couple of days. I’m going to get the president to call the Indian prime minister again and talk to him about the envoy and our push for peace talks. We need time to get you all in there and get both sides up for some sort of agreement. And while you’re there, you can work with the Indian Defense Ministry and ISI to try and locate the rest of those damn missiles.” He turned to his left. “Ted, get me talking points for that phone call.”
Ted made a note and nodded.
Austin continued, “Stock see if you can get an emergency SIG together to examine all the intelligence from the area. Jasmine can chair it. Get a report together for Hunt’s team before they go over there. And, Jasmine, keep pushing for intel on those terrorist groups and their relationship, if there is one, to ISI.”
Hunt was taking notes. In spite of the gravity of the situation, he had to smile at the suggestion of yet another Senior Inter-agency Group. They set them up all the time with players from the different departments. The only trouble was that there were so many of them, they were kind of like congressional commissions. They tended to proliferate like kudzu. One of the NSC staffers had even circulated a list of suggested names like “Priority Inter-agency Group” (“PIG”) or even “Presidential Review Inter-agency Group” (“PRIG”). Hunt snapped back to attention.
“Let’s wind up here, unless there’s anything else . . . ?”
“If you have just one more minute,” Hunt said, “I wanted you to be aware of another matter. At least this one is more in the good news category.”
“I could use a little good news right now,” Austin said. “What is it?”
“There’s a brand new technology being developed over at Bandaq that’s pretty revolutionary. I mean it could be.”
“Bandaq? There was a hearing, but I haven’t read the details. What’s the latest?” Austin said as he was gathering up his papers.
“They’ll be testing it soon. It’s for missile defense.”
“Our systems are already deployed.”
“No, this isn’t for ballistic missiles. It’s for cruise missiles. Like the one the crazies just launched.”
“We’ve got the Patriot,” Austin said.
“The Patriot doesn’t always work,” Hunt countered. “Anyway, I just wanted you to know that we’re watching this one because it might be better.”
Stock interjected, “I saw a report on this one. Actually, it does look pretty promising. Hunt wants our legislative shop to give it a push on the Hill.”
Austin paused. “We can’t do that right now. Congress is complaining about the deficit as it is. The Armed Services Committee is swamped with requests for R&D money for everything from bazookas to blimps.”
“A request for Blimps?” Hunt asked. “I haven’t heard about that one. But I gotta say that I’d sure rather see money for Bandaq than for blimps.”
Austin cut him off and pushed back from the table. “You’ve got enough on your plate for the moment. Your first priority right now is averting a nuclear war.”