"I imagine it's a way for them to keep their peckers up when the going turns frightful, wouldn't you say?"
"Right." Sir Timothy drained his cup. "My good man, I never asked which of Her Majesty's regiments enjoyed your service, now have I?" he continued. "Why, the First Ptarmigans."
"Is that right? Now, there's a noble bird, the ptarmigan. Knows when to seek cover. Just like the infantry."
Lieutenent General Sir Timothy Plum enjoyed a hearty laugh with his aide. When it had subsided, he remarked, "Do you know what I heard this morning? Rumors of troop movements near the DMZ."
"Imagine that? I wonder whose?"
"I think the American spy satellites have some novel bugs in them if their lenses detect troop movements from on high."
"Perhaps they are soldier ants. Or Goliath beetles, which rather resemble tanks."
The tent shook with laughter in the windless desert, and when it again died away, the roar and growl of approaching tanks came clearly through the tan-colored canvas.
"I say, hello. Are we on maneuvers?" said Sir Timothy, whipping open the tent flap. His smile froze, cringed and shrank with alarming rapidity.
For he was looking at a line of sand-colored tanks and APCs coming toward them at full gallop.
The aide joined him, a scone crumbling in his half-open mouth. "Those aren't Americans," he said, dripping crumbs.
"I believe they constitute Kuwaiti armor."
"Is there an alert?"
"I do not know."
"We should ask."
"We shall ask," said Sir Timothy, striding out into the open. "Halt. Lieutenent General Sir Timothy Plum here, ordering you to cease."
The line of tanks, which he now saw stretching from east to west, rolled on past them with a determined fury that actually made the Brit's heart quail even though technically it was but a wog maneuver.
Turning their heads north, Sir Timothy and his aide fully expected to see Iraqi forces descending to meet the Kuwaiti countercharge. They did not.
"I do not believe that is a Kuwaiti countercharge that we just witnessed," he told his aide.
"If not that, what then?"
The explanation came a moment later when a limb of the Kuwaiti column broke off and surrounded a unit of white UN Challenger tanks and APCs.
"I do not like the looks of this, Sir Tim," the aide muttered, finishing his scone with nervous bites.
"I think we'd best intervene. This is most unsettling."
They hurried up to the encircled UNIKOM unit and jostled through.
"What is the meaning of this?" Sir Timothy demanded of a Kuwaiti officer in full battle regalia, including bloodred beret and gold-headed swagger stick.
"We are commandeering your armor."
"For what purpose?"
"For the invasion of Iraq, of course."
"Beg pardon. Did I hear you correctly? You fellows are invading Iraq, and not the other way around?"
The Kuwaiti officer flashed teeth like rows of tiny light bulbs. "It is a necessary self-defensive action."
"And pray tell, what necessity necessitates this action?"
"If we do not crush Iraq before they launch Al Quaaquaa, there will be no Kuwait to defend."
Sir Timothy and his aide exchanged blank looks.
"Al Quaaquaa?"
"There is no time to explain. I must have your tanks and your uniforms and your blue helmets."
"I can understand why you might wish to commandeer UN armor—it is done all the time, after all—and it is a matter of supreme indifference to me personally and professionally if you conquer Iraq, but I must object in the most strenuous terms to the confiscating of UN uniforms and helmets. We stand squarely for peace. Not bloodshed."
"You will stand naked for peace or you will taste royal Kuwaiti sand as your last meal."
This seemed quite clear to Sir Timothy, so he surrendered his blue beret and his uniform. They let him keep his underthings, which was jolly decent of them, after all.
And as the newly impressed UNIKOM armor grumbled to life to tear off toward the north, Sir Timothy turned to his aide and shivered under the beating desert sun.
"I say, I shouldn't wish to fight an actual shooting war riding a white charger and wearing a blue bucket on my head, would you, Colin?"
"Whatever could they be thinking, Sir Tim?"
"Who can fathom the wog mentality? Well, I imagine we'll be getting complaints from all quarters after this unhappy day."
"Especially inasmuch as our armor is charged with practice rounds."
"Oh, I say, we really should have warned the blokes, now shouldn't we?" Sir Timothy said.
"Too late now. Shall we see about more tea?"
"I think it a necessity under the circumstances. I fear we are at the very least in for a rough time filling out bloody replacement-armor requisition forms."
"I suppose this means you shall be reassigned once again."
"A bit of a bother, perhaps. But with Generalissimo War-War in charge, we shan't lack for trouble spots to muck about in, now shall we?"
"I hear Haiti is rather balmy this time of year, Sir Tim."