The Sum of All Fears

13 PROCESS

Why did I ever accept this job?

Roger Durling was a proud man. The upset winner of what was supposed to have been a secure Senate seat, then the youngest governor in the history of California, he knew pride to be a weakness, but he also knew that there was much to justify his.

I could have waited a few years, maybe returned to the Senate and earned my way into the White House, instead of cutting a deal, and delivering the election to Fowler… in return for this.

“This” was Air Force Two, the radio callsign for whatever aircraft the Vice President rode on. The implicit contrast with “Air Force One” made just one more joke that attached to what was putatively the second most important political post in the United States, though not as earthily apt as John Nance Garner's observation: “A pitcher of warm spit.” The whole office of Vice President, Durling judged, was one of the few mistakes made by the Founding Fathers. It had once been worse. Originally, the Vice President was supposed to have been the losing candidate who, after losing, would patriotically take his place in a government not his and preside over the Senate, setting aside petty political differences to serve the country. How James Madison had ever been that foolish was something scholars had never really examined, but the mistake had been corrected quickly enough by the 12th Amendment in 1803. Even in an age when gentlemen preparing for a duel referred to each other as “sir,” that was something that pressed selflessness too far. And so the law had been changed, and the Vice President was now an appendage instead of a defeated enemy. That so many Vice Presidents had succeeded to the top job was less a matter of design than happenstance. That so many had done well — Andrew Johnson, Theodore Roosevelt, Harry Truman — was miraculous.

It was in any case a chance he would never have. Bob Fowler was physically healthy and politically as secure as any President had been since… Eisenhower? Durling wondered. Maybe even FDR. The important, almost co-equal role for the Vice President that Carter had initiated with Walter Mondale — something largely ignored but highly constructive — was a thing of the past. Fowler did not need Durling anymore. The President had made that quite clear.

And so Durling was relegated to subsidiary — not even secondary — duties. Fowler got to fly about in a converted 747 dedicated to his use alone. Roger Durling got whatever aircraft might be available, in this case one of the VC-2oB Gulfstreams that were used by anyone who had the right credentials. Senators and House members on junkets got them if they were on the right committees, or if the President sensed a need to stroke their egos.

You're being petty, Durling told himself. By being petty, you justify all the crap you have to put up with.

His misjudgment had been at least as great as Madison 's, the Vice President told himself as the aircraft taxied out. In deciding that a political figure would place country above his own ambition, Madison had merely been optimistic. Durling, on the other hand, had ignored an evident political reality, that the real difference in importance between President and Vice President was far greater than the difference between Fowler and any of a dozen committee chairmen in the House or Senate. The President had to deal with Congress to get any work done. He didn't need to deal with his Vice President.

How had he allowed himself to get here? That earned an amused grunt, though the question had occurred to Durling a thousand times. Patriotism, of course, or at least the political version of it. He'd delivered California, and without California he and Fowler would both still be governors. The one substantive concession he'd gotten — the accession of Charlie Alden to the post of National Security Advisor — had been for naught, but he had been the deciding factor in changing the Presidency from one party to another. And his reward for that was drawing every crap detail in the executive branch, delivering speeches that would rarely make the news, though those of various cabinet officials did, speeches to keep faithful the party faithful, speeches to float new ideas — usually bad ones, and rarely his own — and wait for lightning to strike himself instead of the President. Today he was going out to talk about the need to raise taxes to pay for the peace in the Middle East. What a marvelous political opportunity! he thought. Roger Durling would outline the need for new taxes in St Louis before a convention of purchasing managers, and he was sure the applause would be deafening.

But he had accepted the job, had given his word to perform the duties of the office, and if he did any less, then what would he be?

The aircraft rolled unevenly past the hangars and various aircraft, including NEACP, the 747 configured as the National Emergency Airborne Command Post, known as “Kneecap,” or more dramatically as “The Doomsday Plane.” Always within two flying hours of wherever the President might be (a real headache when the President visited Russia or China), it was the only safe place the President might occupy in a nuclear crisis — but that didn't really matter anymore, did it? Durling saw people shuffling in and out of the aircraft. Funding hadn't been reduced on that yet — well, it was part of the President's personal fleet — and it was still kept ready for a rapid departure. He wondered how soon that might change. Everything else had.

“We're ready for departure. All buckled, sir?” the sergeant-attendant asked.

“You bet! Let's get this show on the road,” Durling replied with a smile. On Air Force One, he knew, people often showed their confidence in the aircraft and the crew by not buckling. More evidence that his airplane was second-best, but he could hardly growl at the sergeant for being a pro, and to this man Roger Durling was important. The Vice President reflected that this made the sergeant E-6 in the U.S. Air Force a more honorable man than most of the people in politics, but that wasn't much of a surprise, was it?

“That's a roger.”

“Again?” Ryan asked.

“Yes, sir,” the voice on the other end of the phone said.

“Okay, give me a few minutes.”

“Yes, sir.”

Ryan finished off his coffee and walked off towards Cabot's office. He was surprised to see Goodley in there again. The youngster was keeping his distance from the Director's cigar smoke, and even Jack thought that Marcus was overdoing the Patton act, or whatever the hell Cabot thought he was trying to look like.

“What is it, Jack?”

“C AMELOT,” Jack replied with visible annoyance. “Those White House pukes have bowed out again. They want me to join in instead.”

“Well, are you that tied up?”

“Sir, we talked about that four months ago. It's important for the people at the White House to—”

“The President and his people are busy on some things,” the DCI explained tiredly.

“Sir, these things are scheduled weeks in advance, and it's the fourth straight time that—”

“I know, Jack.”

Ryan stood his ground. “Director, somebody has to explain to them how important this is.”

“I've tried, dammit!” Cabot shot back. He had done so, Jack knew.

“Have you tried working through Secretary Talbot, or maybe Dennis Bunker?” Jack asked. At least the President listens to them, Jack didn't add.

He didn't have to. Cabot got the message. “Look, Jack, we can't give orders to the President. We can only give advice. He doesn't always take it. You're pretty good at this, anyway. Dennis likes playing with you.”

“Fine, sir, but it's not my job — do they even read the wash-up notes?”

“Charlie Alden did. I suppose Liz Elliot does, too.”

“I bet,” Ryan observed icily, ignoring Goodley's presence. “Sir, they are being irresponsible.”

“That's a little strong, Jack.”

“It's a little true, Director,” Ryan said, as calmly as he could.

“Can I ask what C AMELOT is?” Ben Goodley asked.

“It's a game,” Cabot answered. “Crisis-management, usually.”

“Oh, like S AGA and G LOBAL?”

“Yeah,” Ryan said. ”The President never plays. The reason is that we cannot risk knowledge of how he would act in a given situation — and yes, that is overly Byzantine, but it's always been that way. Instead, the National Security Advisor or some other senior staff member takes his place, and the President is supposed to be briefed on how it goes. Except that President Fowler thinks that he doesn't have to bother, and now his people are starting to act the same dumb way.“ Jack was sufficiently annoyed that he used the words ”President Fowler“ and ”dumb" in the same sentence.

“Well, I mean, is it really necessary?” Goodley asked. “Sounds like an anachronism to me.”

“You have car insurance, Ben?” Jack asked.

“Yes, sure.”

“Ever have an auto accident?”

“Not one that was my fault,” Goodley replied.

“Then why bother with insurance?” Jack answered the question: “Because it's insurance, right? You don't expect to need it, you never want to need it, but because you might need it, you spend the money — or time, in this case — to have it.”

The Presidential Scholar made a dismissive gesture. “Come on, it's a different thing altogether.”

“That's right. In a car, it's just your ass.” Ryan stopped the sermon. “Okay, Director, I'm off for the rest of the day.”

“Your objections and recommendations are noted, Jack. I will bring them up at my first opportunity — oh, before you leave, about NIITAKA…”

Ryan stopped in his tracks and stared down at Cabot. “Sir, Mr. Goodley is not cleared for that word, much less that file.”

“We are not discussing the substance of the case. When will the people downstairs”—Ryan was grateful he didn't say M ERCURY —“be ready for the, uh, modified operations? I want to improve data-transfer.”

“Six weeks. Until then we have to use the other methods we discussed.”

The Director of Central Intelligence nodded. “Very well. The White House is very interested in that, Jack. Good job to all concerned.”

“Glad to hear that, sir. See you tomorrow.” Jack walked out.

“NIITAKA?” Goodley asked after the door closed. “Sounds Japanese.”

“Sorry, Goodley. You can forget that word at your earliest opportunity.” Cabot had only spoken it to remind Ryan of his place, and the honorable part of the man already regretted having done so.

“Yes, sir. May I ask an unrelated question?”

“Sure.”

“Is Ryan as good as people say?”

Cabot stubbed out the remains of his cigar, to the relief of his visitor. “He's got quite a record.”

“Really? I've heard that. You know, that's the whole reason I'm here, to examine the personality types that really make a difference. I mean, how does someone grow into the job? Ryan's skyrocketed up the ladder here. I'd be very interested in seeing how he managed to do that.”

“He's done it by being right a lot more often than he's wrong, by making some tough calls, and with some field jobs that even I can hardly believe,” Cabot said, after a moment's consideration. “And you can never, ever reveal that to anyone, Dr. Goodley.”

“I understand, sir. Could I see his record, his personnel file?”

The DCI’s eyebrows arched. “Everything you see in there is classified. Anything you try to write about it—”

“Excuse me, but I know that, sir. Everything I write is subject to security review. I signed off on that. It's important that I learn how a person really fits in here, and Ryan would seem to be an ideal case study for examining how that process happens. I mean, that's why the White House sent me over here,” Goodley pointed out. I'm supposed to report to them on what I find.”

Cabot was silent for a moment. “I suppose that's okay, then.”

Ryan's car arrived at the Pentagon's River entrance. He was met by an Air Force one-star and conducted inside, bypassing the metal detector. Two minutes later, he was in one of many subterranean rooms that lie under and around this ugliest of official buildings.

“Hello, Jack,” Dennis Bunker called from the far end of the room.

“Mr. Secretary.” Jack nodded as he took his National Security Advisor's chair. The game started immediately. “What seems to be the problem?”

“Aside from the fact that Liz Elliot has decided not to grace us with her presence?” The Secretary of Defense chuckled, then went serious. “There has been an attack on one of our cruisers in the Eastern Med. The information is still sketchy, but the ship has been severely damaged and may be sinking. We presume heavy casualties.”

“What do we know?” Jack asked, settling into the game. He put on a color-coded name tag that identified which part he was playing. A card hanging from the ceiling over his chair had the same purpose.

“Not much.” Bunker looked up as a Navy lieutenant entered the room.

“Sir, USS Kidd reports that Valley Forge exploded and sank five minutes ago as a result of the initial damage. There are no more than twenty survivors, and rescue operations are underway.”

“What is the cause of the loss?” Ryan asked.

“Unknown, sir. Kidd was thirty miles from Valley Forge at the time of the incident. Her helo is on the scene now. Commander Sixth Fleet has brought all his ships to full-alert status. USS Theodore Roosevelt is launching aircraft to sweep the area.”

“I know the CAG on TR, Robby Jackson,” Ryan said to nobody in particular. Not that it mattered. Theodore Roosevelt was actually in Norfolk, and Robby was still preparing for his next cruise. The names in the wargame were generic, and personal knowledge of the players didn't matter, since they were not supposed to be real people. But if it were real, Robby was Commander Air Group on USS Theodore Roosevelt, and his would be the first plane off the cats. It was well to remember that, though this might be a game, its purpose was deadly serious. “Background information?” Jack asked. He didn't remember all of the pre-brief on the scenario being played out.

“CIA reports a possible mutiny in the Soviet Union by Red Army units in Kazakhstan, and disturbances in two Navy bases there also,” the game narrator, a Navy commander, reported.

“Soviet units in the vicinity of Valley Forge?” Bunker asked.

“Possibly a submarine,” the naval officer answered.

“Flash Message,” the wall speaker announced. “USS Kidd reports that it has destroyed an inbound surface-to-surface missile with its Close-in Weapons System. Superficial damage to the ship, no casualties.”

Jack walked to the corner to pour himself a cup of coffee. He smiled as he did so. These games were fun, he admitted to himself. He really did enjoy them. They were also realistic. He'd been swept away from a normal day's routine, dumped in a stuffy room, given confused and fragmented information, and had no idea at all what the hell was supposed to be going on. That was reality. The old joke: How do crisis-managers resemble mushrooms? They're kept in the dark and fed horseshit.

“Sir, we have an incoming H OTLINE message…”

Okay, Ryan thought, it's that kind of game today. The Pentagon must have come up with the scenario. Let's see if it's still possible to blow the world up…

“More concrete?” Qati asked.

“Much more concrete,” Fromm answered. ”The machines each weigh several tons, and they must be totally stable. The room must be totally stable, and totally sealed. It must be clean like a hospital — no, much better than any hospital you have ever seen.“ Fromm looked down at his list. Not cleaner than a German hospital, of course. ”Next, electrical power. We'll need three large backup generators, and at least two UPSs—"

“What?” Qati asked.

“Un-interruptible power supplies,” Ghosn translated. “We'll keep one of the backup generators turning at all times, of course?”

“Correct,” Fromm answered. "Since this is a primitive operation, we'll try not to use more than one machine at a time. The real problem with electricity is ensuring a secure circuit. So, we take the line current through the UPSs to protect against spikes. The computer systems on the milling machines are highly sensitive.

“Next!” Fromm said. “Skilled operators.”

“That will be highly difficult,” Ghosn observed.

The German smiled, amazing everyone present. “Not so. It will be easier than you think.”

“Really?” Qati asked. Good news from this infidel?

“We'll need perhaps five highly trained men, but you have them in the region, I am sure.”

“Where? There is no machine shop in the region that—”

“Certainly there is. People here wear spectacles, do they not?”

“But—”

“Of course!” Ghosn said, rolling his eyes in amazement.

“The degree of precision, you see,” Fromm explained to Qati, “is no different from what is required for eyeglasses. The machines are very similar in design, just larger, and what we are attempting to do is simply to produce precise and predictable curves in a rigid material. Nuclear bombs are produced to exacting specifications. So are spectacles. Our desired object is larger, but the principle is the same, and with the proper machinery it is merely a matter of scale, not of substance. So: can you obtain skilled lens-makers?”

“I don't see why not,” Qati replied, hiding his annoyance.

“They must be highly skilled,” Fromm said, like a schoolmaster. “The best you can find, people with long experience, probably with training in Germany or England.”

“There will be a security problem,” Ghosn said quietly.

“Oh? Why is that?” Fromm asked, with a feigned bafflement that struck both of the others as the summit of arrogance.

“Quite so,” Qati agreed.

“Next, we need sturdy tables on which to mount the machines.”

Halfway point, Lieutenant Commander Walter Claggett told himself. In forty-five more days, USS Maine would surface outside Juan de Fuca Straits, link up with the tugboat, and follow Little Toot into Bangor, where she would then tie up and begin the hand-off process to the “Blue” crew for the next deterrence-patrol cycle. And not a moment too soon.

Walter Claggett — friends called him Dutch, a nickname that had originated at the Naval Academy for a reason he no longer remembered; Claggett was Black — was thirty-six years old, and it had been known to him before sailing that he was being “deep-dipped” for early selection to commander and had a chance for an early crack at a fast-attack boat. That was fine with him. His two attempts at marriage had both ended in failure, which was not uncommon for submariners — thankfully, there were no kids involved in either union — and the Navy was his life. He was just as happy to spend all of his time at sea, saving his carousing time for those not really brief intervals on the beach. To be at sea, to slide through black water in control of a majestic ship of war, that was the best of all things to Walter Claggett. The company of good men, respect truly earned in a most demanding profession, the acquired ability to know every time what the right thing to do was, the relaxed banter in the wardroom, the responsibility he had to counsel his men — Claggett relished every aspect of his career.

It was just his commanding officer he couldn't stand.

How the hell did Captain Hairy Ricks ever make it this far? he asked himself for the twentieth time this week. The man was brilliant. He could have designed a submarine-reactor system on the back of an envelope, or maybe even in his head during a rare daydream. He knew things about submarine design that Electric Boat's shipwrights had never even thought about. He could discuss the ins and outs of periscope design with the Navy's chief optics expert, and knew more about satellite-navigation aids than NASA or TRW or whoever the hell was running that program. Surely he knew more about the guidance packages on their Trident-II D-5 sea-launched ballistic missiles than anyone this side of Lockheed's Missile Systems Division. Over dinner two weeks earlier, he'd recited a whole page from the maintenance manual. From a technical point of view, Ricks might have been the most thoroughly prepared officer in the United States Navy.

Harry Ricks was the quintessential product of the Nuclear Navy. As an engineer he was unequaled. The technical aspects of his job were almost instinctive to him. Claggett was good, and knew it; he also knew that he'd never be as good as Harry Ricks.

It's just that he doesn't know dick about submarining or submariners, Claggett reflected bleakly. It was incredible, but true, that Ricks had little feeling for seamanship and none at all for sailors.

“Sir,” Claggett said slowly, “this is a very good chief. He's young, but he's sharp.”

“He can't keep control of his people,” Ricks replied.

“Captain, I don't know what you mean by that.”

“His training methods aren't what they're supposed to be.”

“He is a little unconventional, but he has cut six seconds off the average reload time. The fish are all fully functional, even the one that came over from the beach bad. The compartment is completely squared away. What more can we ask of the man?”

"I don't ask. I direct. I order. I expect things to be done my way, the right way. And they will be done that way,” Ricks observed in a dangerously quiet voice.

It made no sense at all to cross the skipper on issues like this, especially when he posed them in this way, but Claggett's job as executive officer was to stand between the crew and the captain, especially when the captain was wrong.

“Sir, I must respectfully disagree. I think we look at results, and the results here are just about perfect. A good chief is one who stretches the envelope, and this one hasn't stretched it very far. If you slap him down, it will have a negative effect on him and his department.”

“X, I expect support from all my officers, and especially from you.”

Claggett sat straight up in his chair as though from a blow. He managed to speak calmly. “Captain, you have my support and my loyalty. It is not my job to be a robot. I'm supposed to offer alternatives. At least,” he added, “that's what they told me at PXO School.” Claggett regretted the last sentence even before it was spoken, but somehow it had come out anyway. The CO’s cabin was quite small, and immediately got smaller still.

That was a very foolish thing to say, Lieutenant Commander Walter Martin Claggett, Ricks thought with a blank look.

“Next, the reactor drills,” Ricks said.

“Another one? So soon?” For Christ's sake, the last one was friggin’ PERFECT. Almost perfect, Claggett corrected himself. The kids might have saved ten or fifteen seconds somewhere. The Executive Officer didn't know where that might have been, though.

“Proficiency means every day, X.”

“Indeed it does, sir, but they are proficient. I mean, the ORSE we ran right before Captain Rosselli left missed setting the squadron record by a whisker, and the last drill we ran beat that!”

“No matter how good drill results are, always demand better. That way you always get better. Next ORSE, I want the squadron record, X.”

He wants the Navy record, the world record, maybe even a certificate from God, Claggett thought. More than that, he wants it on his record.

The growler phone on the bulkhead rattled. Ricks lifted it.

“Commanding Officer… yes, on the way.” He hung up. “Sonar contact.”

Claggett was out the door in two seconds, the captain right behind him.

“What is it?” Claggett asked first. As executive officer, he was also the approach officer for tactical engagements.

“Took me a couple minutes to recognize it,” the leading sonarman reported. “Real flukey contact. I think it's a 688, bearing about one-nine-five. Direct-path contact, sir.”

"Playback,” Ricks ordered. The sonarman took over another screen — his had grease-pencil marks on it and he didn't want to remove those yet — and ran the display back a few minutes.

“See here, Cap’n? Real flukey… right about here it started firming up. That's when I called in.”

The Captain stabbed his finger on the screen. “You should have had it there, petty officer. That's two minutes wasted. Pay closer attention next time.”

“Aye aye, Cap’n.” What else could a twenty-three-year-old sonarman second-class say? Ricks left the sonar room. Claggett followed, patting the sonar operator on the shoulder as he went.

God damn it, Captain!

“Course two-seven-zero, speed five, depth five hundred even. We're under the layer,” the Officer of the Deck reported. “Holding contact Sierra-Eleven at bearing one-nine-five, broad on the port beam. Fire-control tracking party is manned. We have fish in tubes one, three, and four. Tube two is empty for service. Doors closed, tubes dry.”

“Tell me about Sierra-Eleven,” Ricks ordered.

“Direct-path contact. He's below the layer, range unknown.”

“Environmental conditions?”

“Flat calm on the roof, a moderate layer at about one hundred feet. We have good isothermal water around us. Sonar conditions are excellent.”

“First read on Sierra-Eleven is over ten thousand yards.” It was Ensign Shaw on the tracking party.

“Conn, Sonar, we evaluate contact Sierra-Eleven is a definite 688-class, US fast-attack. I can guestimate speed at about fourteen-fifteen knots, sir.”

“Whoa!” Claggett observed to Ricks. “We picked up a Los Angeles at IO-K plus! That's gonna piss somebody off…”

“Sonar, Conn, I want data, not guesses,” Ricks said.

“Cap’n, he did well to pick that contact out of the background,” Claggett said very quietly. Summer in the Gulf of Alaska meant fishing boats and baleen whales, both in large numbers, making noises and cluttering up sonar displays. “That's one hell of a good sonarman in there.”

“We pay him to be good, X. We don't award medals for doing an adequate job. I want a playback later to see if there might have been a sniff earlier that he missed.”

Anybody can find something on playback, Claggett thought to himself.

“Conn, Sonar, I'm getting a very faint blade-count… seems to indicate fourteen knots, plus or minus one, sir.”

“Very well. That's better, Sonar.”

“Uh, Captain… may be a little closer than ten thousand… not much, but a little. Track is firming up… best estimate now nine-five hundred yards, course roughly three-zero-five,” Shaw reported next, waiting for the sky to fall.

“So he's not over ten thousand yards off now?”

“No, sir, looks like nine-five hundred.”

“Let me know when you change your mind again,” Ricks replied. “Drop speed to four knots.”

“Reduce speed four knots, aye,” the OOD acknowledged.

“Let him get ahead of us?” Claggett asked.

“Yep.” The Captain nodded.

“We have a firing solution,” the weapons officer said. The XO checked his watch. It didn't get much better than this.

“Very well. Glad to hear it,” Ricks replied.

“Speed is now four knots.”

“Okay, we have him. Sierra-Eleven is at bearing two-zero-one, range nine-one hundred yards, course three-zero-zero, speed fifteen.”

“Dead meat,” Claggett said. Of course, he's making it easy by going this fast.

“True enough. This will look good on the patrol report."

“That's tricky,” Ryan observed. “I don't like the way this is going.”

“Neither do I,” Bunker agreed. “I recommend weapons release to the TR battlegroup.”

“I agree, and will so advise the President.” Ryan placed the call. Under the rules for this game, the President was supposed to be on Air Force One, somewhere over the Pacific, returning from an unspecified country on the Pacific Rim. The President's decision-making role was being played by a committee elsewhere in the Pentagon. Jack made his recommendation and waited for the reply.

“Only in self-defense, Dennis.”

“Bullshit,” Bunker said quietly. “He listens to me.”

Jack grinned. “I agree, but not this time. No offensive action, you may act only to defend the ships in the group.”

The SecDef turned to the action officer: “Forward that to Theodore Roosevelt. Tell them I expect full combat air patrols. Anything over two hundred miles I want reported to me. Under two hundred, the battlegroup commander is free to act at discretion. For submarines, the bubble radius is fifty — five-zero — miles. Inside that, prosecute to kill.”

“That's creative," Jack said.

“We have that attack on Valley Forge.” The best estimate at the moment was that it had been a surprise missile attack from a Soviet submarine. It appeared that some units of the Russian fleet were acting independently, or at least under orders not emanating from Moscow. Then things got worse.

“H OTLINE message. There has just been a ground-force attack on a Strategic Rocket Regiment… SS-18 base in Central Asia.”

“Launch all the ready bombers right now! Jack, tell the President that I just gave the order.”

“Comm-link failure,” the wall speaker said. “Radio contact with Air Force One has been interrupted.”

“Tell me more!” Jack demanded.

“That's all we have, sir.”

“Where's the Vice President now?” Ryan asked.

“He's aboard Kneecap Alternate, six hundred miles south of Bermuda. Kneecap Prime is four hundred miles ahead of Air Force One, preparing to land in Alaska for the transfer.”

“Close enough to Russia that an intercept is possible… but not likely… have to be a one-way mission,” Bunker thought aloud. “Unless they strayed over a Soviet warship with SAMs… Vice President is temporarily in charge.”

“Sir, I—”

“That's my call to make, Jack. The President is either out of the loop or has had his comm links compromised. SecDef says that the Vice President is in charge until the comm links are reestablished and validated by codeword authentication. Forces are now at D EF C ON — O NE on my authority."

One thing about Dennis Bunker, Ryan thought, the man never stopped being a fighter jock. He makes decisions and sticks to them. He was usually right, too, as he was here.

Ryan's file was a thick one. Almost five inches, Goodley saw in the privacy of his seventh-floor cubbyhole. Half an inch of that was background and security-clearance forms. The academic record was fairly impressive, especially his doctoral work in history at Georgetown University. Georgetown wasn't Harvard, of course, but it was a fairly respectable institution, Goodley told himself. His first Agency job had been as part of Admiral James Greer's Junior Varsity program, and his first report, “Agents and Agencies,” had dealt with terrorism. Odd coincidence, Goodley thought, given what had happened later.

The documents on Ryan's encounter in London occupied thirty double-space pages, mainly police-report summaries and a few news photos. Goodley started making notes. Cowboy, he wrote first of all. Running into things like that. The academic shook his head. Twenty minutes later, he read over the executive summary of Ryan's second CIA report, the one which confidently predicted that the terrorists would probably never operate in America — delivered days before the attack on his family.

Guessed wrong there, didn't you, Ryan? Goodley chuckled to himself. As bright as they said he was, he made mistakes like everyone else…

He'd made a few while working in England, too. He hadn't predicted Chernenko’s succession of Andropov, though he had predicted Narmonov was the coming man well in advance of nearly everyone, except Kantrowitz up at Princeton, who'd been the first to see star quality in Andrey Il’ych. Goodley reminded himself that he'd been an undergraduate then, bedding that girl at Wellesley, Debra Frost… wonder what ever happened to her…?

“Son of a bitch…” Ben whispered a few minutes later. “Son of a bitch.”

Red October, a Soviet ballistic missile submarine… defected. Ryan was one of the first to suspect it… Ryan, an analyst at London Station had… run the operation at sea! Killed a Russian sailor. That was the cowboy part again. Couldn't just arrest the guy, had to shoot him down like something in a movie…

Goddamn! A Russian ballistic-missile defected… and they kept it quiet… oh, the boat was later sunk in deep water.

Back to London after that for a few more months before rotating home to be Greer's special assistant and heir-apparent. Some interesting work with the arms-control people…

That can't be right. The KGB Chairman was killed in a plane crash…

Goodley was taking furious notes now. Liz Elliot could not have known any of this, could she?

You're not looking for good stuff about Ryan, the White House Fellow reminded himself. Elliot had never really said that, of course, but she had made herself clear in a way that he'd understood… or thought he'd understood, Goodley corrected himself. He suddenly realized just how dangerous a game this might be.

Ryan kills people. He'd shot and killed at least three. You didn't get that from talking to the man. Life wasn't a Western. People didn't carry revolvers with notches cut in the handles. Goodley didn't feel a chill over his skin, but he did remind himself that Ryan was someone to be regarded warily. He'd never before met someone who had killed other men, and was not foolish enough to regard such people as heroic or somehow more than other men, but it was something to keep in mind, wasn't it?

There were blank spots around the time of James Greer's death, he noted… wasn't that the time when all that stuff was happening down in Colombia? He made some notes. Ryan had been acting DDI then, but just after Fowler took over, Judge Arthur Moore and Robert Ritter had retired to make way for the new presidential administration, and Ryan had been confirmed by the Senate as Deputy Director of Central Intelligence. So much for his work record. Goodley closed that portion and opened up the personal and financial side…

“Bad call…” Ryan said. Twenty minutes too late.

“I think you're right.”

“Too late. What did we do wrong?”

“I'm not sure,” Bunker replied. ”Tell the TR group to disengage and pull back, maybe?"

Ryan stared at the map on the far wall. “Maybe, but we've backed Andrey Il’ych into a corner… we have to let him out.”

“How? How do we do that without cornering ourselves?”

“I think there was a problem with this scenario… not sure what, though…”

“Let's rattle his cage hard,” Ricks thought aloud.

“Like how, Cap’n?” Claggett asked.

“Status on Tube Two?”

“Empty, it was down for maintenance inspection,” the weapons officer replied.

“Is it okay?”

“Yes, sir, completed the inspection half an hour before we got the contact.”

“Okay…” Ricks grinned. “I want a water slug out of tube two. Let's give him a real launch transient to wake him up!”

Damn! Claggett thought. It was almost something Mancuso or Rosselli would have done. Almost… “Sir, that's kind of a noisy way to do it. We can shake him up enough with a ‘Tango’ call on the Gertrude.”

“Weps, we have a solution on Sierra-Eleven?” Mancuso wants aggressive skippers, well, I'll show him aggressive—

“Yes, sir!” the weapons officer snapped back at once.

“Firing Point Procedures. Prepare to fire a water-slug on Tube Two.”

“Sir, I confirm torpedo tube two is empty. Weapons in tubes one, three and four are secure.” A call was made to the torpedo room to re-confirm what the electronic displays announced. In the torpedo room, the chief looked through the small glass port to make certain that they wouldn't be launching anything.

“Tube Two is empty by visual inspection. High-pressure air is online,” the chief called over the communications circuit. “We are ready to shoot.”

“Open outer door.”

“Open outer door, aye. Outer door is open.”

“Weps?”

“Locked in.”

“Match generated bearings and… SHOOT!”

The weapons officer pushed the proper button. USS Maine shuddered with the sudden pulse of high-pressure air out of the torpedo tube and into the sea.

Aboard USS Omaha, six thousand yards away, a sonarman had been trying for the past few minutes to decide if the trace on his screen was something other than clutter when a dot appeared on the screen.

“Conn, Sonar, transient, transient. Mechanical Transient bearing zero-eight-eight, dead aft!”

“What the hell?” the Officer of the Deck said. He was the boat's navigator, in the third week of duty in the new post. “What's back there?”

“Transient, transient — launch transient bearing zero-eight-eight! I say again, LAUNCH TRANSIENT DEAD AFT!”

“All ahead flank!” the suddenly pale lieutenant said a touch too loudly. “Battle stations! Stand by the five-inch room.” He lifted the command phone for the captain, but the general alarm was already sounding, and the Commanding Officer ran barefoot into the attack center, his coveralls still open.

“What the fuck is going on?”

“Sir, we had a launch transient dead aft — Sonar, Conn, what else do you have?”

“Nothing, sir, nothing after the transient. That was a launch-transient, HP air into the water, but… sounded a little funny, sir. I show nothing in the water.”

“Right full rudder!” The OOD ordered, ignoring the Captain. He hadn't been relieved yet, and conning the boat was his responsibility. “Make your depth one hundred feet. Five-inch room, launch a decoy now-now-now!”

“Right full rudder, aye. Sir, my rudder is right full, no course given. Speed twenty knots and accelerating,” helmsman said.

“Very well. Come to course zero-one-zero.”

“Aye, coming to new course zero-one-zero!”

“Who’s in this area?” the CO asked in a relaxed voice, though he didn't feel relaxed.

“Maine's around here somewhere,” the navigator answered.

“Harry Ricks.” That asshole, he didn't say. It would have been bad for discipline. “Sonar, talk to me!”

“Conn, Sonar, there is nothing in the water. If there was a torpedo, I'd have it, sir.”

“Nav, drop speed to one-third.”

“Aye, all ahead one-third.”

“I think we scared the piss out of him,” Ricks observed, hovering over the sonar display. Seconds after the simulated launch, the 688 on the scope had floored his power plant, and now there was also the gurgling sound of a decoy.

“Just backed off on the power, sir, blade count is coming down.”

“Yeah, he knows there's nothing after him, now. We'll give him a call on the Gertrude.”

“That dumbass! Doesn't he know that there may be an Akula around here?” the Commanding Officer of USS Omaha growled.

“We don't show him, sir, just a bunch of fishing boats.”

“Okay. Secure from general quarters. We'll let Maine have her little laugh.” He grimaced. “My fault. We should have been trolling along at ten instead of fifteen knots. Make it so.”

“Aye, sir. Where to?”

“The boomer ought to have a feel for what's north of here. Go southeast.”

“Right.”

“Nice reaction, Nav. We might have evaded the fish. Lessons?”

“You said it, sir. We were going too fast.”

“Learn from your captain's mistake, Mr. Auburn.”

“Always, sir.”

The skipper punched the younger man's shoulder on the way out.

Thirty-six thousand yards away, the Admiral Lunin was drifting at three knots just over the thermocline layer, her towed-array sonar drooping under it.

“Well?” her Captain asked.

“We have this burst of noise at one-three-zero,” the sonar officer said, pointing to the display, “and nothing else. Fifteen seconds later, we have another burst of noise here… ahead of the first. The signature appears to be an American Los Angeles class going to full power, then slowing and disappearing off our screens.”

“An exercise, Yevgeniy… the first transient was an American missile submarine… an Ohio-class. What do you think of that?” Captain First Rank Valentin Borissovich Dubinin asked.

“No one has ever detected an Ohio in deep water…”

“For all things, there is a first time.”

“And now?”

“We will hover and wait. The Ohio is quieter than a sleeping whale, but at least we know now that there is one in the area. We will not chase after it. Very foolish of the Americans to make noise in this way. I've never seen that happen before.”

The game has changed, Captain,“ the sonar officer observed. It had changed quite a lot. He didn't have to say ”Comrade Captain" anymore.

“Indeed it has, Yevgeniy. Now it is a true game. No one need get hurt, and we can test our skills as in the Olympics.”

“Critique?”

“I would have closed a little before shooting, sir,” the weapons officer said. ”Even money he might have evaded that one."

“Agreed, but we were only trying to shake him up,” Ricks said comfortably.

Then what was the purpose of that exercise? Dutch Claggett wondered. Oh, of course, to show how aggressive you are.

“I guess we accomplished that,” the XO said to support his captain. There were grins all around the control room. Boomers and fast-attack subs often played games, mostly pre-planned. As usual, the Ohio had won this one, too. They'd known that Omaha was around, of course, and that she was looking for a Russian Akula that the P-3s had lost off the Aleutians a few days before. But the Russian ”Shark" class sub was nowhere to be heard.

“OOD, take her south. We went and made a datum with that launch transient. We'll clear datum back down where Omaha was.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

“Well done, people.” Ricks walked back to his cabin.

“New course?”

“South,” Dubinin said. ”He'll clear datum by going into the area already swept by the Los Angeles. We'll maintain position just over the layer, leave our ‘tail’ under it, and try to reacquire." There wasn't much chance, the Captain knew, but fortune still favored the bold. Or something like that. The submarine was due to go back to port in another week, and supposedly the new sonar array she was due to receive during his scheduled overhaul was a major improvement over the current one. He'd been here south of Alaska for three weeks. The submarine he'd detected, USS Maine or USS Nevada, if his intelligence reports were correct, would finish this patrol, refit, conduct another, refit again, then yet another patrol in February, which coincided with his deployment schedule after his overhaul. So, the next time he was back, he'd be up against the same captain, and this one had made a mistake. After a refit, Admiral Lunin would be quieter, and would have better sonar, and Dubinin was starting to wonder when he'd be able to play his game against the Americans… Wouldn't it be nice, he thought. All the time he'd spent to get here, the wonderful years learning his trade in Northern Fleet under Marko Ramius. What a pity, for such a brilliant officer to have died in an accident. But duty at sea was dangerous, always had been, always would be. Marko had gotten his crew off before scuttling… Dubinin shook his head. Today he might have gotten assistance from the Americans. Might? Would have, just as an American ship would get one from a Soviet. The changes in his country and the world made Dubinin feel much better about his job. It had always been a demanding game of skill, but its deadly purpose had changed. Oh, yes, the American missile submarines still had their rockets pointed at his country, and Soviet rockets were pointed at America, but perhaps they would be gone soon. Until they were, he'd continue to do his job, and it seemed ironic indeed that just as the Soviet Navy was on the threshold of becoming competitive — the Akula class was roughly equal with an early Los Angeles class in a mechanical sense — the need for it was diminishing. Like a friendly game of cards, perhaps? he asked himself. Not a bad simile…

“Speed, Captain?”

Dubinin considered that. “Assume a range of twenty nautical miles and a target speed of five knots. We'll do seven knots, I think. That way we can remain very quiet and perhaps still catch him… every two hours we'll turn to maximize the capacity of the sonar… Yes, that is the plan.” Next time, Yevgeniy, we'll have two new officer sonar operators to back you up, Dubinin reminded himself. The drawdown of the Soviet submarine force had released a lot of young officers who were now getting specialist training. The submarine's complement of officers would double, and even more than the new equipment, that would make a difference in his abilities to hunt.

“We blew it,” Bunker said. “I blew it. I gave the president bad advice.”

“You're not the only one,” Ryan admitted, as he stretched. ”But was that scenario realistic — I mean, really realistic?"

It turned out that the whole thing had been a ploy by a hard-pressed Soviet leader trying to get control over his military, and doing so by making it look as though some renegades had taken action.

“Not likely, but possible.”

“All things are possible,” Jack observed. “What do you suppose their war-games say about us?”

Bunker laughed. “Nothing good, I'm sure.”

At the end, America had had to accept the loss of its cruiser, USS Valley Forge, in return for the Charlie-class submarine that USS Kidd's helicopter had found and sunk. That was not regarded as an even trade, rather like losing a rook to the other fellow's knight. Soviet forces had gone on alert in Eastern Germany, and the weaker NATO forces had been unsure of their ability to deal with them. As a result, the Soviets had won a concession on the troop-pullback schedule. Ryan thought the whole scenario contrived, but they often were, and the point in any case was to see how to manage an unlikely crisis. Here they had done badly, moving too rapidly in non-essential areas, and too slowly on the ones that mattered, but which had not been recognized in time.

The lesson, as always, was: Don't make mistakes. That was something known by any first-grader, of course, and all men made mistakes, but the difference between a first-grader and a senior official was that official mistakes carried far more weight. That fact was an entirely different lesson, and one often not learned.