The War Cloud Read online

  “Courage, Colonel, before the storm,” Marshall said and raised his glass in a toast and gulped it down.

  Quinn took a sip and coughed. “Sir, we have to get to our posts.”

  “We are at our posts.” Marshall set down his glass. “Remember when I asked you for your launch key and told you to shoot me next time?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “This is next time.” In one fluid movement, Marshall drew out his M9 sidearm and shot Quinn between the eyes.

  The officer crumpled to the floor. With the ease of a weightlifter, Marshall grabbed Quinn’s body by the leg with one hand and dragged it into his open closet. Then, before he closed the door, he bent over and removed the launch key from Quinn’s neck and put it around his own.

  36

  1502 Hours

  Air Force One

  Sachs was on the floor groaning when the emergency lights kicked on and Kozlowski rushed over. She thought she heard him say, “Are you OK, Madame President?” But she wasn’t sure. Her ears were ringing. “What was that?” she asked as she let him help her to her feet. She felt wobbly.

  He told her, “Omaha, I think.”

  She heard more ringing, but it was her desk phone beeping. Captain Li came through on the speaker. “NORAD has confirmed another nuclear detonation in the continental United States. General Block at Northern Command is onscreen in the conference center.”

  She felt Koz reach over her shoulder to the button and say, “The president is on her way.”

  The ringing had faded for the most part by the time she entered the conference room. Block’s sour face was already on the big screen when she sat at the end of the table. Koz stood by her side. This was going to be ugly.

  Sachs asked, “How many hits did we take, General Block?”

  “Two,” Block growled. “They took out our Tier-One Defender anti-ballistic missile site in Alaska and paused, glaring at her, “and Strategic Command.”

  Sachs swallowed. “General Carver?”

  “That’s right, Madame President,” Block said, holding his stare. “This country has lost yet another great leader today, this time because of your indecision.”

  Sachs felt herself shaking. She desperately wanted to hold her voice steady. “Unleashing our Minutemen III missiles wouldn’t have saved Carver.”

  “No, but he would have died like a soldier in the line of fire and not like a sitting duck,” Block shot back. “And with our puny excuse for what was supposed to be a full, four-tier Defender system taken out, we have no way of intercepting the next wave.”

  She exhaled and paused. “General Block, what happened to all those other missiles the early warning systems said were supposed to hit?”

  Block grew quiet. “Ghosts, ma’am. They were ghosts.”

  Sachs blinked. “How can several independent warning systems project so many false radar images?”

  “At this point, ma’am, we have to assume it’s the work of the War Cloud, like you suggested.”

  “But why would they do this, knowing we might have launched?”

  Block said, “I believe they did this to prove they knew you didn’t have the political will to act, ma’am, and to prove their cyber superiority. If they can do this, they own our defense networks.”

  Sachs was bewildered. “Maybe. But what’s the point of destroying the Strategic Command in Omaha if all its planes and nukes were already in the air?”

  “Hard to say, ma’am,” Block said. “Because Marshall can still launch our land-based ICBMs from Looking Glass.”

  Sachs started. “Pardon me?”

  “The Post Attack Command Control System, ma’am,” Block explained. “If nukes destroy the Strategic Command or other command centers on the ground, Looking Glass can command American forces from the air and launch our ICBMs by remote control.”

  “Let me guess,” Sachs said. “The man who designed this brilliant Post Attack Command Control System is Brad Marshall?”

  Block paused. “Uh, yes.”

  37

  1503 Hours

  Looking Glass

  Marshall had assumed his command post in the battle staff compartment and was reviewing his NSTL targets in China on his digital tablet when Major Banks beeped him.

  He ignored the interruption. That he could reprioritize targets with a simple drag and drop on a handheld touch-screen display was something he never would have imagined even five years ago. Harney and Wilson, meanwhile, were establishing the SIOP operations plan with 50 ground-based launch control centers that controlled more than 300 Minuteman III nuclear missiles.

  Banks beeped him again. He saved his screen and spoke into the comm.: “You’re patching me to our B-2s with the Mavericks, Major?”

  His hope was that President Sachs would finally use the simplest strategy he had gift-wrapped for her: the decapitation of the Chinese high command with the Maverick bunker-busters, followed by the swift threat of nuclear annihilation to any successors.

  “I’ve got AF1 on line,” she said instead, her voice hard and edgy. “Colonel Kozlowski is asking for Colonel Quinn.”

  Marshall noted several of the battle staffers, not part of his team, exchange glances before they got back to their work. He was playing for two audiences now. “Put him through on speaker.”

  “Here he is, sir.”

  Marshall pressed the button. “Marshall here. Has the president assessed the damage yet from the Alaska and Omaha hits, Colonel Kozlowski?”

  “She’s reviewing them now, sir.”

  Marshall nodded. “Then why are we talking?”

  “The president would like to speak with your second, sir. Colonel Quinn. The roster says he holds the second launch key.”

  “Quinn is busy,” Marshall said. “So am I. We’re trying to re-establish links with several launch control sites that lost contact with Strategic Command. Those boys are in the dark and might launch if we can’t reach them.”

  “That is a grave situation, General Marshall, and I will report it to the president. Nevertheless, launch authority for ground missiles has been transferred to Looking Glass. We must ensure procedures—”

  Marshall said, “The Chinese have nuked Washington and SAC headquarters. Now you want to quote regulations to me?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Marshall said, “Listen to me, Colonel. We have a commander-in-chief who can’t pull the trigger. I need you. America needs you. The people of China, the real Chinese, need you. Are you on board?”

  “Of course, sir.”

  Marshall said, “Then quit clogging secure channels. I’ll reconvene with the president at the attack conference in six minutes. Over.”

  Marshall disconnected Kozlowski and hit his comm. “You catch that, Major?”

  Banks’ voice said, “Yes, sir.”

  “Clear skies,” Marshall said, and looked at Harney and Wilson, who had already drawn their M9 side-arms with silencers and began firing, taking out half the battle staffers while the others scrambled, too stunned to figure out what was going on. Banks got them on her way in and then sealed the compartment shut behind her, breathless.

  Marshall, disturbed that a bullet ricochet had nicked his forearm with a red skid burn, hit the comm again. “Cockpit now,” he said, and another communications tech upstairs put him through to Captain Delaney.

  Delaney said, “General Marshall, sir.”

  Marshall knew he couldn’t hide everything from the Looking Glass crew, but he could spin it just enough to give him the time he needed. He had trained them all at one time or another, but he couldn’t include them in his plans. He was counting on personal loyalty and the cloud of war to bridge whatever cognitive dissonance was going through their minds.

  “I want you and Rogers to seal off the cockpit, Captain,” Marshall said. “Launch control from Offutt has been transferred to Looking Glass, and we’ve had gunfire here in the battle staff compartment. You know the procedures. Take us down to 18,000 feet and extend the VLF antenna. We need
to establish links with both our underground launch centers and our submarines. No line-of-sight communications, not even AF1 for the time being. We can’t reveal our location to enemy aircraft. If we are engaged, prepare to deploy all countermeasures at my orders.”

  “Copy that,” the pilot said. “Over.”

  Marshall stared at the only three officers still standing in the compartment — Banks, Wilson and Harney. Only Banks had broken a sweat.

  “A bit early, sir?” she asked.

  “Sachs is on to us,” he said and removed the two keys around his neck.

  38

  1504 Hours

  Air Force One

  Koz was still processing his bizarre and disturbing exchange with Marshall when he walked up to Captain Li on the communications deck. “Marshall blew me off,” he told her. “Something’s wrong.”

  “Way wrong, sir,” Li said. “I have something the president needs to see.”

  Koz had them meet in Sachs’ suite, where Li showed the president satellite surveillance video over Washington, D.C., before the nuke attack. She zoomed in on a railyard not far from Union Station.

  “According to the last communications between the Pentagon and White House, it seems the nuclear device was delivered by rail on a Metro subway train right beneath the Pentagon,” Li explained. “So I crosschecked D.C. police dispatch records, what’s left of their remote backups, and learned that a Metro security guard was found slain this morning at this railyard.”

  Sachs remembered seeing the story that morning in the Post. “That’s where the Chinese must have hitched the nuke to the train.”

  “Now watch this,” Li said and zoomed in until two Chevy Suburbans popped out of the pixels. “Those are military plates, ma’am. And they belong to this man.”

  The picture on the screen changed and an ugly, familiar face filled the screen.

  Sachs said, “That’s Colonel Kyle, the Green Beret.”

  “And you’ll recognize this other man, too, as the one after your daughter,” Li said, and sure enough the next picture that came up matched the one Jennifer had sent.

  Sachs leaned closer to the image, fear and rage swirling inside her. “You’re telling me that these men — our men — may actually have betrayed America and helped the Chinese perpetrate this attack on our capital?”

  Li said, “We think it’s more likely they and the ones they report to are in fact behind these attacks and not the Chinese.”

  “Proof, Captain,” Sachs demanded. “We don’t have a lot of time here.”

  Captain Li nodded. “You can thank your daughter Jennifer.”

  “What?”

  “I found this on her USB flash drive from school.” Li pulled Jennifer’s PowerPoint slide presentation for school. The top slide was Brad Marshall waving to reporters aboard an aircraft carrier. As the slides flashed, Sachs was embarrassed at Jennifer’s obvious hero worship — or more — for Marshall.

  Li said, “This is a Time magazine photo of Marshall after he escaped Iraqi capture during the first Persian Gulf War in 1991. Kyle led the team that rescued Marshall when his plane was shot down.”

  It was Colonel Kyle, an arm around a beaming Marshall.

  Koz said, “So Marshall and Kyle have a history. I’ve been through this with the president. It’s not enough.”

  Li said, “How about this?”

  Next up came a recent picture of Marshall inspecting the Tier-One Defender ABM complex in Alaska, and then a haunting longshot of him crossing the tarmac at Offutt AFB. Both came from a Time Magazine “Man of the Year” cover story titled “An American Hero: Forgotten But Not Gone.”

  Sachs said, “I still don’t get it. You’d expect Marshall to be at these places. They’re all he has left.”

  “Had left,” Li said. “Both have been blown to bits. Before they were, each was visited by Colonel Kyle and other men from Marshall’s past for base parties. Swipe card records place them all in highly sensitive areas at both bases.”

  Koz said it out loud. “One stolen SS-20 nuke. Three warheads. Each planted at a strategic location to make it look like a Chinese attack and force us to respond.”

  Sachs sat back in her chair, everything sinking in. “Maybe Marshall feels his country doesn’t recognize his contributions, but could he really hate America so much kill innocent lives?”

  Li said, “The rest of your daughter’s report argues the opposite, Madame President. That Marshall loves America and feels his warnings about an ascendant China and declining America have been ignored. His very public statements underscore his belief that if we — the United States — don’t act aggressively now, we will lack the weapons and will to do so later. According to that logic, he’s saving American lives.”

  “And clearly will stop at nothing,” Koz said. “Madame President, we have to warn General Block at Northern Command to strip Marshall of launch authority immediately, before Marshall does anything crazy.”

  “Stop,” said Sachs suddenly, thinking out loud. “Would Marshall have access to this plane?”

  Koz turned pale. “We share the same maintenance crews as Looking Glass.”

  Sachs said, “I want you to sweep for explosives right now.”

  39

  1508 Hours

  Four minutes later they all stood in the cargo hold, looking at an open box of toner cartridges wired together with enough explosive to bring down Air Force One in seconds. The red blinking light on the small BlackBerry phone showed it was armed.

  Koz swore. “God in heaven.”

  Sachs and Li stood behind Koz as he studied it. The red light bathed his face.

  “Look like Marshall tore a page from the Yemen terrorist playbook,” Koz said. “Pack high explosives into printer cartridges to avoid detection by scanners. Poetic, too, since toners are used for all our EAM printouts.”

  Sachs said, “Still think I made up the attack on my chopper?”

  Koz shook his head and studied the bomb. “This is bad,” he said. “The phone still has its battery. That means it’s not a timer. It’s a remote detonator. Probably synced to the VLF receiver. That’s what our submarines use to receive launch orders.”

  Sachs said, “Meaning?”

  Koz said, “Meaning Marshall can basically blow us up from any point on the planet as soon as we try anything. Hell, he might have been listening to all our internal communications all along too.”

  Sachs paused. “Just how easy is it for Marshall to launch our missiles?”

  “Once the eight-digit enabling code is dialed into the launch system, the procedure is simple. It’s not like a sub where you need several other officers involved in the launch. The Looking Glass plane is essentially a remote-control unit.”

  Sachs said, “But don’t you still need two officers turning their keys at once to launch?”

  “Trust me,” Koz said grimly. “Marshall’s already taken care of that.”

  “Then we have to somehow override the Looking Glass controls so he can’t launch,” she said.

  “Same problem,” Koz said. “Assuming we can pull it off, as soon as he figures it out he’ll vaporize us.”

  Sachs looked him straight in the eye. “I have an idea.”

  40

  1510 Hours

  Air Force One

  Sachs entered the cockpit, a finger to her lips and whiteboard in front of her. The two pilots and navigator looked up in surprise, then gaped as they read the words she had written:

  Turn off your headsets.

  Don’t say a word.

  Enemy listening.

  The men exchanged glances, then slowly removed their headsets and turned them off.

  Sachs said, “There’s a bomb on board and we need to get off this plane. Preferably after we’ve landed safely on the ground.”

  The navigator scrambled to check his charts. “We’re over the North Dakota badlands, ma’am. No airstrips or predesignated alternative bases in the vicinity, and Minot and Grand Forks are too far away.”
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  “Improvise,” Sachs said. “Find a stretch of highway if you have to. But make sure it’s near a truck stop or some place with food and facilities. If we land in one piece, we’ll need to set up a new command post.”

  As she left the cockpit, already she could feel the plane making a sharp descent. She rejoined Koz in the battle staff compartment, where he was poring over an operations manual while battle staffers worked furiously at their consoles.

  ed over Koz. “How are you doing?”

  “It’s tricky, but I should be able to override the Looking Glass launch procedures without Marshall catching on.” Koz looked up at her. “I just don’t understand why he’d do this. I do but I don’t.”

  Sachs said, “Decapitation. By blowing up D.C., Marshall ensures we go to war with China — while we can still win it on our terms.”

  “Until you came along,” said Koz, as he started reprogramming the overhead launch console.

  Sachs said, “Well, clearly he made contingency plans. You said all Marshall has to do is dial in the eight-digit enabling code.”

  “Yep. Once you have the code, it’s simple.”

  Sachs asked, “How simple?”

  41

  1520 Hours

  Looking Glass

  Marshall waited until they had descended to 18,000 feet before he removed the key he wore around his neck and inserted it into one of two locks in the red safe next to his desk console in the battle staff compartment. He then removed the second key he had taken from Quinn and opened the second lock.

  As soon as he opened the safe, the alarm went off, a clattering sound like a woodpecker. But there was no intelligence officer to stop him now. Nobody.

  The launch procedure was so simple, really.

  Let Deborah Sachs keep American bombers and subs at bay, he thought. He was going to launch those missiles at China. At least he could be sure they would launch under attack. Then the war would be underway. A war the United States would win.