The Moscow Offensive

Twenty-Five

National Security Adviser Edward Rauch tugged at his tie, loosening it while he clicked through to the next image in his situation update. His forehead and palms felt damp. Despite a climate-control system that continuously recirculated air scrubbed of all possible radioactive, chemical, or biological contaminants, the atmosphere in the lower-level briefing room tasted stale and felt unpleasantly warm. And while it might only be his imagination, he could swear that he could smell the stomach-churning traces of lubricating oils and acrid cleaning solvents wafting sporadically out of the bunker’s air vents.

Or, it might just be that I hate being the bearer of never-ending bad tidings, he thought gloomily, seeing the look of barely suppressed fury on President Stacy Anne Barbeau’s face. Like the Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland, she seemed on the verge of snarling, “Off with his head!” For the thousandth time since joining her administration, he wondered what had possessed him to yield so easily to ambition. It was one thing to write learned papers about the ins and outs of high-level statecraft and national security policy. It was quite another to learn, from harsh personal experience, that serving in the White House — at least under this president — meant stumbling through a maze of narrow political calculations and even more narrow-minded bureaucratic rivalries.

“Jesus,” Barbeau said softly, staring up at the picture he’d selected.

Taken only hours after the terrorist attack, it showed the interior of U.S. Air Force Plant 4. Scorched and melted heaps of wreckage were only barely recognizable as the remains of F-35 Lightning II fuselages, tail assemblies, and wings. The vast assembly floor was a jumble of mangled machinery, equipment hoists, ladders, and work platforms. Tarp-covered bodies were strewn in every direction.

With obvious difficulty, she turned her gaze away from the image of so much death and destruction. “Is this as bad as it looks?”

Rauch nodded. “Every single one of the sixteen F-35s that were being assembled is a total write-off. Even more wing and fuselage components that were waiting their turn on the line were destroyed. Of the aircraft assembly stations themselves, our best estimate is that more than half will have to be rebuilt from scratch. The rest suffered so much damage that it will take weeks, maybe months, before we can get them back into operation.”

“Wonderful,” Barbeau muttered. Her jaw tightened. “How long will the Fort Worth plant be out of commission?”

“At least four months.” Rauch sighed. “But that’s the contractor’s optimistic assessment. My personal bet is that it’ll require a lot more time to get that fighter assembly line up and running again. And ramping back up to full production will take even longer — at least another twelve to eighteen months.”

Barbeau frowned. “Why so long? If it’s a question of money to buy and build more machinery and tools, we should be able to slide an emergency appropriation through Congress toot-sweet.”

“It’s not just a question of replacing damaged or destroyed equipment,” Admiral Firestone explained. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs looked haggard. Like Rauch, he’d been up all night trying to piece together more details about the attack. “In some ways, the horrible losses we took among the plant’s workforce are our biggest problem. The F-35 is an incredibly complex aircraft. Key components are manufactured by contractors in nine separate countries. Assembling each of these fifth-generation warplanes requires tens of thousands of hours of work by highly trained and skilled technicians.”

Rauch nodded, grateful for the other man’s intercession. The president had an unfortunate habit of focusing her anger narrowly, trying to fix the blame for everything that went wrong on a single person or cause. Anything that spread her irritation more widely was welcome. “From the numbers I’ve seen, well over a thousand people inside that plant were killed or very badly wounded. That represents close to half of those who were on shift. Training that many replacement workers is going to require a tremendous investment of money and time.” He shrugged his shoulders. “And that’s not counting the skilled people we’re likely to lose going forward.”

“Lose how?” Barbeau demanded.

“We can expect a pretty big fraction of the workforce to walk away,” Rauch pointed out delicately. “Yes, these are good-paying jobs and the people there are deeply patriotic, but all the money and patriotism in the world aren’t enough to compensate for the risk of being killed or maimed in another attack by these terrorists and their war robots and missiles.”

“Then we guarantee their damn safety!” Barbeau snapped. “Tell the commander down at Fort Hood that I want heavy armor from the First Cavalry Division deployed north. And have him rustle up some of the air defense units he’s got in the garrison there, too.”

With obvious reluctance, Admiral Firestone shook his head. “Ringing what’s left of that aircraft plant with troops and tanks might reassure the surviving workers, Madam President. But it won’t solve our bigger problem. We can’t possibly station Army units around every defense industry facility and military base that might be a target for these terrorists.” He spread his hands apologetically. “We just don’t have enough troops or equipment. We’d have to reintroduce the draft and radically increase the size of the armed forces even to come close.”

“I am getting awfully tired of you people telling me what cannot be done,” Barbeau said. There was a dangerous edge to her voice. “I think it’s high time I started hearing some solutions to this mess… instead of more pathetic hand-wringing.”

Rauch winced. There was no doubt about it: she was sharpening up her ax. Hastily, he said, “There are two other F-35 assembly plants. One in Italy, at Cameri, northeast of Turin. The Italians are turning out F-35As and the short-takeoff/vertical-landing F-35B version for themselves and for the Dutch. And the Japanese have a plant at Nagoya to assemble their own fighters. As a stopgap measure, we could ask for the delivery of some of the production from those two factories to our own Air Force squadrons.”

“No,” Barbeau said flatly. She scowled. “It’s bad enough that so many of my shortsighted predecessors farmed out so much of the production work for F-35 components to foreign companies. But I’ll be damned if I let the American people see me going begging, hat in hand, to the Europeans or the Japanese for a few spare fighters… fighters that we designed in the first place!”

For “people” read “voters,” Rauch thought wearily. Somehow, the realization that the president would prefer to see the Air Force go without its own chosen top-of-the-line multirole fighter longer than necessary rather than risk her standing in the polls didn’t come as much of a shock as it should have.

“What I want from you gentlemen is a plan to track down and destroy these terrorists before they hit us again,” Barbeau said acidly. “So far, everything I’ve heard here today is the equivalent of rearranging the deck chairs on the goddamn Titanic.”

In for a penny, in for a date with the headsman, Rauch decided. A few months ago he would have seen the prospect of being fired — especially for telling the truth — as the worst thing that could happen to him. Now that possibility was beginning to look considerably more appealing. “Unfortunately, we’re no closer to being able to formulate a plan to do so than we were yesterday, Madam President,” he said, not bothering to sugarcoat his assessment. “None of the police roadblocks thrown up around the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex have stopped any plausible suspects so far. Nor were any unidentified aircraft picked up on radar either before or after the attack. Without a better idea of just who we’re fighting and how they’re evading our efforts to find them, we are inherently limited to purely reactive and defensive measures.”

To his surprise, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs nodded in agreement. “Dr. Rauch is quite correct. While these enemy war machines, the CIDs, are obviously dangerous opponents, I’m confident that our conventional forces — our armor, artillery, and airpower — could whip them in a stand-up fight. But to do that, we have to pin this enemy force down in a fixed location… or at least intercept them on the way to or from a target.”

“The very fact that these damned machines keep appearing and disappearing so quickly and easily is a key piece of the evidence pointing straight at that bastard Martindale… or at least his Scion mercenaries,” Barbeau said through clenched teeth. “Thanks to those money-grubbing cretins at Sky Masters, they’re the ones with advanced stealth aircraft, remember?”

Rauch saw no point in replying to that. Even if the president’s fixation on Scion was justified — and it was, at least as long as you only focused on known technological capabilities without considering rational motives — it didn’t get them any closer to figuring out a way to find their elusive enemies.

Luke Cohen couldn’t stay quiet any longer. In a cracked and urgent voice, the White House chief of staff broke into the discussion. “For God’s sake, this is all just spinning our wheels here. We have to do something. And fast. Or we’re screwed.”

Barbeau whipped around on him. “Oh, by all means, do feel free to give us the benefit of your wisdom, Luke,” she said with venom dripping from every word. “I’m sure Dr. Rauch, the admiral, and I have all missed some perfectly obvious course of action.”

Helplessly, the lanky New Yorker shrugged. “I’m not saying that, Madam President. But we both know you pay me mostly to keep tabs on politics, right?”

“Go on,” Barbeau said coldly. Her mantra had always been: Policy followed politics. If you were operating from a position of political strength, you could eventually shove through any piece of policy, whether good or bad. But if you were seen as politically damaged, you were finished… because Washington was a town that revered popularity and despised weakness.

“Look, what happened at Barksdale was terrible. But from a political point of view, seeing the bad guys walk all over us again down in Fort Worth is going to be a lot worse,” Cohen said rapidly. “We got a little bump in our numbers at first. But the polls are already starting to skew fast in Farrell’s direction — even with the press playing it pretty much our way.”

“And why is that?” Barbeau demanded.

Cohen swallowed hard. “I put in a call to our campaign people before this meeting,” he said. “They’ve been running focus groups with swing voters, the folks who’ve been hard for either campaign to lock down so far. But the longer this situation drags on, the more they see you as weak and even afraid… hiding out here while the bad guys whack our troops and factories at will.”

Despite himself, Rauch felt a new surge of respect — both for Cohen for daring to tell his boss something so unpalatable… and for the focus-group swing voters who seemed to have figured her out.

Obviously pushed to the brink and beyond, Barbeau slammed a hand down on the table. “Enough!” She fought to regain her composure for a moment and then went on in a quieter voice: “You want action, Luke? You want a big show for the low-information bozos who’re buying Farrell’s BS? Well, so be it.” She pushed back her chair and stood up. “In fact, this is something I should have done a long, long time ago.”

Icily, she turned toward Firestone. “Admiral, my understanding is that the Insurrection Act of 1807, as amended in 2006, gives me the authority to deploy the armed forces for the purpose of maintaining law and order on U.S. soil.”

Warily, he nodded. “That’s correct, Madam President. At least, in certain limited conditions. For example, you can use regular troops or the National Guard to restore order and enforce the law in cases where a terrorist attack makes it impossible for the local authorities to handle the situation.”

“Very well,” Barbeau continued coolly. “As your commander in chief, I now declare those conditions met.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Firestone agreed slowly. “That is your prerogative.” He seemed to sit up straighter in his chair. “May I ask what you intend?”

Listening while she outlined her plan, Rauch felt his eyes widening in disbelief.

Stripped down to shorts and a T-shirt, Brad McLanahan lounged in the pilot’s seat of the XCV-62 Ranger. Even with the shade provided by the camouflage netting draped across the aircraft, the cockpit was uncomfortably hot, though more bake oven than steam room, because the air was so dry. Since they couldn’t afford to run down the fuel cells in their auxiliary power unit, cooling the aircraft’s interior spaces was out of the question. They were operating on minimal power, drawing just enough juice to run the Ranger’s secure satellite communications system and some of its computers.

He finished reading the message from his father, typed in a short acknowledgment, and hit the send button on his MFD. It beeped once, confirming that his reply had been uploaded and transmitted to Poland.

Besides trying to figure out how Gryzlov’s mercenaries were hiding their movements, the older McLanahan had been riding herd on a group of Scion weapons analysts and cybernetics experts. They were tasked with preparing quick-and-dirty intelligence assessments of Russia’s new combat robots. Knowing how important any information — even of the sketchiest and most speculative kind — was to the Iron Wolf CID team lying in wait outside Sky Masters, his father had been sending them updates on a regular basis.

Brad sat back, thinking through the tactical implications of what he’d just read. Like the rest, this most recent assessment was long on guesswork and short on confirmed facts, but it was all they were going to get… at least until he and the others met Gryzlov’s machines in combat. Figuring out tactics that would give them a shot at winning that first fight was a daunting task. Sure, the battle simulations they’d run through back in the spring gave him a rough framework to work with. But those sims had been purely hypothetical. And tactics and maneuvers that worked well in the computer could fail miserably against actual machines whose speed, agility, armament, armor, and sensors varied significantly from their imaginary digital counterparts.

Ideally, they’d have been able to run through a new series of mock battles — this time against computer-generated enemies whose capabilities more closely matched those of the real-world Russian robots. He snorted. Yeah, Brad, he told himself, and in an ideal world you also wouldn’t be sitting sweating your ass off in this cockpit under the high desert sun. In the here and now, they were just going to have to suck it up and do their best.

“Wolf Two to Base Camp.” Major Nadia Rozek’s voice sounded in his headset. “I am just outside the perimeter. Request clearance to enter.”

“Copy that, Wolf Two,” Ian Schofield replied. “You’re clear to come on in.”

Smiling, Brad yanked off his headset and climbed down through the open hatch. This was what he’d been waiting for. Since relieving him shortly before dawn, Nadia had been on watch at their observation post overlooking Battle Mountain. Now it was Whack’s turn to keep an eye on things… which meant this was another of those all-too-brief periods when he and Nadia were both in the same place at the same time.

Outside the Ranger, the air was even hotter.

Schofield and Mike Knapp, a former sergeant in the U.S. Special Forces, had already rolled back a section of the camouflage net. Sunlight, impossibly bright after the dim cockpit, streamed through the opening.

Brad squinted against the brightness. A patch of the clear blue sky and sagebrush-strewn high desert plateau outside shimmered strangely, almost as though it were some kind of weird, moving mirage.

And then, accompanied by a faint whir from its actuators and hydraulics, Nadia’s Cybernetic Infantry Device was inside the shelter — apparently appearing out of thin air when she shut down the robot’s chameleon camouflage system. The two Iron Wolf recon troopers dragged the net back into place behind her.

The CID came to a halt and crouched down. A hatch on its back cycled open. Nadia swung herself out and dropped easily to the ground. After a quick, friendly nod to the other two men, she walked over to Brad with a big, heartfelt smile. She was already unzipping her black flight suit, revealing a skintight gray tank top and khaki shorts. Brad’s pulse quickened a bit. For the moment, she looked completely cool and comfortable. And, as always, incredibly alluring… at least to anyone who wasn’t scared of her physical prowess and intellect.

Climate control was one of the few good things about pulling a duty stint inside one of the robots here, he decided. If you had to isolate yourself from the human race inside a machine for an eight-hour stretch, at least you got air conditioning.

“Nice to see you, Major Rozek,” he said gravely. “Anything new down in the world?”

With equal gravity, she shook her head. “Nothing, Captain McLanahan. Even the FBI agents sound bored to death when they report to each other over the radio.”

Brad couldn’t help wincing. “Yeah, well, after learning what happened in Fort Worth last night, I’m starting to think the Russians aren’t coming after all.” Though he tried hard to keep his tone level, he knew she would be able to sense both his frustration and the nagging fear that he’d taken them on a wild-goose chase. Certainly, every day that passed without any sign of hostile activity made that seem more and more likely. “This stakeout operation could be a total waste of our time and resources.”

“I do not agree.” Nadia looked thoughtful. “Your reasoning was sound. And while our enemies clearly are not operating on the precise timetable you predicted, they still have every incentive to destroy Sky Masters. Unless they wreck the Battle Mountain labs and production facilities, all the Russians will have done is make the high-tech weapons Dr. Noble and his colleagues are developing even more valuable to your country — and to mine.”

“Maybe so.” He frowned. “But I can’t help worrying about the fact that Gryzlov really seems to enjoy putting together complicated plans — the kind where he sets up a series of moves he can use to achieve very different objectives… depending on how we react.”

“Like the fork tactic in chess,” Nadia said slowly. “Where a single piece threatens two or more defending chessmen simultaneously. So that no matter how the defender reacts, he will lose something of value.”

Brad nodded.

“You may be right,” she agreed. “But even then, the defender still has a choice of which piece to sacrifice. And since Sky Masters and the weapons and equipment it provides are beyond price, we must protect it. Gryzlov is not a fool. He knows this as well as we do. Which is why you should consider the possibility that last night’s attack may have been at least partly intended to draw our force away from this place.”

“You’re assuming that the Russians know we’re here,” Brad objected.

Nadia shrugged. “As I said, Gryzlov is not a fool. He, more than anyone in the world, understands and fears what the Iron Wolf Squadron can do. You must look at this from his perspective: If we are deployed to protect Battle Mountain, he loses nothing by trying to lure us out of position. And if our CIDs are not here after all, he loses nothing by attacking other, equally vulnerable targets first.”

“Frankly, trying to think like that son of a bitch makes my head spin.”

She smiled wryly. “Well, you Americans do talk a lot about ‘wheels within wheels.’”

Almost against his will, Brad laughed. “Okay, I give. We won’t slink away with our tail between our legs just yet. We’ll hold here awhile longer… at least until our water runs out.”

Nadia raised an eyebrow suggestively. “And in the meantime?” Silent laughter danced in her big blue-gray eyes. “How do you suggest that we occupy our time, Captain McLanahan?”

“Well, I—” Brad felt a lot hotter all of sudden. To his chagrin, he noticed Schofield and Knapp studiously pretending to look in every other direction but at them. Oh, just great, he thought. Nadia had decided to push all his buttons right when they were about as likely to get some much-desired privacy as a guy who never bought a ticket was to win the lottery.

Then, suddenly, an idea percolated into his overheated mind. He almost gave it away by grinning back at her, but instead he forced himself to look virtuous — donning the air of eager, dedicated determination used by junior officers everywhere to bullshit their superiors. He carefully avoided Mike Knapp’s eyes. Sergeants always seemed immune to the “look.”

Brad nodded toward the Ranger. “Well, Major, I suggest we work some more on tactics we might use against the enemy’s robots.”

For just a moment, Nadia seemed surprised. “Really?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said forthrightly. “Scion intelligence just sent us another classified assessment on those Russian machines. And I really think you should read it for yourself.”

“I see,” she said carefully. “Yes, perhaps I should.”

Brad saw one corner of her mouth twitch upward. He maintained his own devoutly serious expression with the greatest difficulty.

Once they were alone in the Ranger’s cramped and darkened cockpit, Nadia squirmed across and took the copilot’s seat. She offered him a challenging stare. “Do you actually believe that incredibly transparent ploy of yours fooled any of our comrades?”

“What ploy?” Brad asked innocently. Two can play the “wheels within wheels” game, he thought. He reached over and brought one of her multifunction displays to life. The intelligence summary his father had sent flashed on-screen. “I was being perfectly serious. The Scion team really did send a new report. And you do really need to see it.”

“Oh,” she said, sounding surprised. With a tiny frown, she leaned forward and started reading. Her eyes narrowed in concentration. “So your father’s analysts are now confident that these Russian robots are smaller than our own CIDs?”

He nodded. “Yeah. But not by much.” Careful scrutiny of every piece of footage shot during the Barksdale attack had finally given Scion’s photo interpreters enough separate data points to peg the height of Gryzlov’s machines at a little over ten feet. “What that size differential means in terms of relative combat endurance, speed, and agility is anyone’s guess, though.”

“They seemed fast enough in those videos,” Nadia pointed out.

“That they did,” Brad agreed. “Our guys clocked at least one moving at more than seventy klicks per hour. But what’s not clear is how long the Russians can operate at speeds that high without draining their batteries and fuel cells.”

“It would be safest to assume their endurance is comparable to ours,” she said seriously. “Since they are using technology they stole from us, that is probable.” Her mouth turned down. “Which means we must count on these enemy robots being our equal in every important respect.”

Brad shook his head. “Not quite, fortunately.” He pointed to the conclusions listed at the bottom of the report. “For example, the Russians don’t seem to have our rail-gun technology. At least not yet.”

“For that I am grateful,” Nadia said somberly.

Brad nodded. No armor in the world could stand up to a rail-gun slug if it scored a solid hit. On the other hand, he wasn’t sure how effective their own CID rail guns would be in a dogfight with other combat robots. The weapons were deadly against tracked and wheeled armored vehicles, aircraft, and fixed fortifications… but their relatively slow rate of fire might be a handicap against smaller, far more agile machines. “The better news is that the Russians don’t have anything comparable to our thermal and chameleon camouflage systems. Which gives us a decent shot at pulling off an ambush under the right circumstances.”

“Gryzlov’s pilots could have stripped their camouflage equipment off before launching that attack,” Nadia said stubbornly. “As we did before the raid on Perun’s Aerie.”

“My dad’s team has pretty much ruled out that possibility,” Brad said. “Our people studied highly magnified imagery of the different sections of those robots. And they couldn’t find any attachment points for additional gear or systems.”

“So then, how best do we fight them?” she asked. Her eyes were half closed in thought.

“Well, see, that’s where I think the two of us should thoroughly explore different tactical concepts,” Brad said, unable to stop himself from grinning. “While we have some private time together, I mean.”

Nadia must have heard the eager note in his voice, because she looked up quickly with a lopsided smile of her own. “And just which tactic do you propose we explore first?” she challenged.

“Close-quarters action,” he said cheerfully. “Really close.” And with that, he leaned over, picked her up, and put her down on his lap. Her lips parted and he kissed her deeply.

Coming up for air, he asked, “So what’s your view on my plan, Major Rozek?”

She smiled back at him. “Well,” she said reflectively, “I don’t know how well it would work against the Russians, but I like the way this is shaping up so far.”