Following the Kremlin’s surrender, President Mayne thought he had finished with the White House’s subterranean “simulation room.” Now, two floors below his oval office, he found himself once again walking past the Marine guards into the “bunker,” its fluorescent light, oppressive as usual, illuminating the huge map stand with its clusters of blue and red pins showing the disposition of Allied and Russian forces at the moment of Moscow’s unconditional capitulation. Glancing at the alert board, however, he saw there’d been a change. All Allied forces had been placed in DefCon II— “attack believed imminent.” Press aide Trainor, who had been normally gung-ho even in the worst moments of the war, looked drained, as pale as the bluish white light. The silence among the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Allied liaison officers was deafening. Trainor handed the president the message. It was from SACEUR — Supreme Allied Commander Europe — Lieut. Gen. William Merton, and read:
Autonomous Siberian republic has disregarded Moscow’s surrender. Novosibirsk has issued orders for all Siberian armies to resist “Anglo-American-European aggression against the ‘Motherland.’ “ We are now facing forty Siberian divisions along Sino-Soviet border plus TVD air forces commanded out of Khabarovsk and entire Soviet Pacific Fleet egressing Vladivostok. Our forward units one hundred miles east of Moscow already under attack by elements of West Siberian Second and Fourth—
“Jesus Christ!” It was the first time Trainor had heard the president blaspheme, and despite Trainor’s secularity it made him wince.
“Where’s the rest of the message?” asked President Mayne, looking up at Trainor and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
“Satellite communications were cut, Mr. President,” answered Trainor. “Or rather jammed. By the Siberians.”
“God Almighty!” said Mayne, looking down again at the message in disbelief. Brigadier Soames, Britain’s European-U.S. liaison officer, cleared his throat politely. “London’s received the same response, Mr. President,” advised Soames. “Looks rather sticky, I’m afraid. But your chap Merton is in error regarding the Siberian divisions. There aren’t forty.”
“Well, thank God for that!” said the president. The brigadier looked around, untypically nonplussed, glancing for help at the Chiefs of Staff, but found he was on his own. “I’m sorry, Mr. President, but what I mean is that there aren’t forty divisions. It’s fifty-seven to be exact. With — ah — four Mongolian divisions in reserve around Lake Baikal.”
President Mayne sat down, the message dangling from his left hand, his right unconsciously massaging his temple. “What the hell’s happened? I mean, these divisions must be reservists?”
Army Chief of Staff Grey shook his head. “Afraid not, Mr. President. The Siberian divisions have a combat, Afghanistan-trained cadre of officers and NCOs. Crack divisions trained for a Sino-Soviet conflict. Moscow used to be more scared of China than NATO. Trouble is, it’s not only the number of Siberian armies we’re faced with — the place is so damn big. Westernmost border of Siberia doesn’t even start till you get a thousand miles east beyond Moscow — then it goes on for more than three and a half thousand miles to the Pacific and, despite popular misconception, it has as varied a topography as the U.S. Far as the Siberians are concerned, Moscow’s in another country.”
Looking at the map, Mayne saw the Siberian divisions were stretched out from Siberia’s East Cape then inland behind the mountainous Kamchatka Peninsula all the way down to Vladivostok and the Manchurian border, a dark red cluster showing enemy surface vessels and submarines off the coast around Vladivostok and Nakhodka. “Thought we gave their Pacific Fleet a bloody nose off north Japan?” he asked Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Horton.
“Elements of the Pacific Fleet, yes, Mr. President,” answered the CNO. “But the hemorrhaging stopped apparently.”
“Their air forces?” Mayne asked Air Force Chief Allet.
“Fifteen hundred tactical aircraft, including MiG 29E fighters and Backfire bombers. The Fulcrums — MiG 29Es — are faster and more maneuverable than our F-18s. To qualify for Siberian station you have to have had combat experience in western Europe. Only the best, Mr. President.” General Allet indicated airfields far to the northeast, near Siberia’s East Cape. “They clearly don’t intend letting us get across the Bering Strait from Alaska.”
The president was shaking his head. The vastness of the new threat had descended like sheet lightning upon what, until only moments ago, had been the promising dawn of the Russian surrender. Blindsided by Siberia — the essence of the awful Allied blunder the assumption that all the Soviets would automatically follow Moscow’s decree. It was so obvious now that Mayne wondered why they hadn’t thought of it before. The only comparable miscalculation he could think of was the CIA’s confident report, several months before the Shah of Iran’s fall, that no such overthrow was in the offing. But men, the more he thought about it, the more he understood how the seed of the blunder had taken root; for he, too, had always lumped Soviets and Russians together. Oh yes, he’d known how dissident the Baltic republics were, and some of the Asian republics, but Siberia— so far from Moscow, a place where Moscow sent dissidents — had never been thought of as a separate entity. But now the full impact of the differences between the two Russian republics — the United Soviet Socialist Republics and the newly declared United Siberian Soviet Republics — hit him as the CIA overlay, each color representing a different ethnic group in the mix that was the Siberyaka, covered the huge expanse of Siberia which, in turn, overlaid the map of the Americas on the same scale, completely obscuring the U.S. The region of the Yakut alone was three times the size of Texas. The other Siberian regions— the Tartar, Kalmyk, Komi, Bashykur and the Karelian autonomous republic — were all united in their common determination with Novosibirsk not to surrender.
“Won’t they deal?” asked the president.
“Why should they?” proffered the brigadier, realizing at once that he’d overstepped the line of deference accorded the president of the American republic. “With all due respect, Mr. President, our Allied forces in and around Moscow are, by all accounts, battle weary — quite simply worn out. Our supply lines through western Europe are overextended to say the least.” Soames glanced at the American Joint Chiefs of Staff, their glum faces evidence enough that they agreed. Then he turned back to address Mayne. “Holding Moscow might seem a compelling victory to the general public in the West, sir, but—” He turned toward the map, his hand making a small arc across the expanse of Siberia. “Capturing Moscow, I’m afraid, is nothing geographically or strategically speaking. And now, it seems, not even politically. Our troops have, as General Grey pointed out, another thousand miles to go before they even reach the Urals, the western border of Siberia. Then there’s the rest — almost four thousand miles of mountains, taiga, rivers and plains, deep in snow — thrown in for good measure. They’ve got the Ural Mountains on their western flank and the more mountainous Kamchatka Peninsula on the east. They could give away half of it and we’d still be in enormous difficulty. No, sir, I’m afraid the Siberian chiefs of staff in Novosibirsk have thought this one out rather carefully. It’s a very sticky wicket indeed.”
The president frowned, not because he didn’t know what “sticky wicket” meant — the tone conveyed all the meaning he needed — but because the Englishman was right. What in hell could the Allies do?
“Sticky wicket means being between a rock and a hard—” began Trainor.
“I know what it means,” snapped the president. “What I want someone to tell the is what in hell are we going to do about this mess?” He looked up at his CNO, the chief of naval operations, Admiral Horton. “Can we bracket them with our boomers, Dick?” He meant the Allies’ ICBM submarines.
“Already have, sir. The Trident subs can drop an ICBM on them anywhere, but they can do the same to us even without their subs. Most of their ICBM sites are now in Siberia. Especially on the eastern flank down Kamchatka Peninsula. It would mean all-out nuclear war. And one thing the Russians — including the Siberians — were always ahead of us in, Mr. President, is civil defense for such an eventuality. We’d come out much worse than they would.”
“Yes, yes, I know that. A nuclear strike’s no option.” Next he turned to the army chief of staff.
“Sir,” said General Grey, “Brigadier Soames is correct in his estimation. We’ve shot our wad for the time being in and around Moscow. It’d be another two months at the very least before we could muster enough men even to attack the Urals with any hope of breaking through. Best we can hope for there is to keep it at a stalemate.”
“What about their eastern flank?” shot back the president.
“If we could get enough men across the Bering Strait fast. Perhaps. But there’s still Kamchatka Peninsula further south. It’s heavily garrisoned. And now it looks as if the whole coast— from the East Cape all the way south to Vladivostok — is also well protected. They’ve even got Soviet forces on the Kuril Islands running down from Kamchatka — case the Japanese move to reclaim the islands they lost in the Second World War. But either way we’d have to get men across the strait — take command of their East Cape airfields. Once we did that we could hit them further south without constantly worrying about their East Cape planes.”
“How about our air force?” cut in the president. “General Allet, can you secure air cover over the Bering Strait so that we can get our boys across to their East Cape — secure a beachhead? What is it across there? Only fifty miles or so from Alaska?”
“Fifty-two miles, sir.”
“Well then?”
“Sir, before we could move anybody across there we’d have to have air supremacy. We’d have to take out the AA missile batteries, SAM sites, and the like on Big Diomede. It’s shallow around there, some places no more than twenty fathoms — not deep enough for our subs.”
“Big Diomede?” asked the president.
“Largest of two islands, sir. Little Diomede, ours, is the smallest — on our side of the international date line. Big Diomede is theirs. High and solid rock. Locked in by ice and covered in snow this time of year. It’s a fortress — five miles long, one-and-a-half to two miles wide, with deeply recessed and super-hardened AA missile and AA gun battery defenses. They’ve also got half a dozen long-range naval guns in place that can shell Alaska’s Cape Prince of Wales — our staging area for any invasion.”
“You telling the that they can shell us from over twenty miles away?”
Admiral Horton looked surprised that the president didn’t know this. “They’ve had the long-barrelled gun — got it from South Africa after that Canadian inventor Bull sold it to Iraq and—”
“Never mind the history lesson,” cut in Mayne. “I want to know what the hell we’re going to do. If the air force can’t guarantee it can take out this Big Diomede, can we try naval bombardment?”
“Too much ice for the battle wagons to get within range,” said the CNO. “But we can try carrier-borne aircraft from further south.”
“Then get ready to try, Dick, and while you’re doing that I want you,” he turned to General Grey, “to send this to the Siberians and all Allied commands.” As he began writing the message, he asked, “Our K-16 satellite still operational?”
“Far as I know, Mr. President. But with all that snow in Siberia and the Siberians’ camouflage, it’s going to be difficult even for our satellite to pinpoint their positions.”
“Maybe so, General,” said President Mayne, his writing hand moving with singular determination. “But I have a hunch the Siberians might just be bluffing. I don’t mean about what They’ve got to throw at us but whether this central committee or whatever it is in Novosibirsk has really been able to break free of Moscow’s political arm.” The president depressed the tip of his ballpoint, adroitly slipping it inside his suit jacket. “Has it occurred to you gentlemen that we might be getting all steamed up for nothing? Anyway—” He handed the message to General Grey. “—this’ll answer that.”
The president’s message to the Novosibirsk central Siberian command read, “You have twenty-four hours in which to surrender all your forces to Allied command. If you have not done so by 0800 tomorrow Washington time, the Allied armies will reengage with maximum force.”
“Mr. President,” asked General Grey, “you think there might be some confusion about what we mean by ‘maximum force’?”
The president smiled. “Yes. That’s for them to figure out, Jimmy.” He turned to Air Force General Allet. “Bill, I want ‘covers off’ at least a dozen. Midwest. And just in case the Siberians aren’t getting any satellite readings of their own, have our K-16 photographs of our MX silos when their lids are off beamed down to Siberian air space. Put them clearly in the picture.”
Brigadier Soames felt it his duty to voice his skepticism.”Mr. President, I really don’t think the Siberians would have gone on the offensive against our troops in the Urals in the western sector if they didn’t think they could win this thing. And if we use nuclear weapons no one wins. I don’t think they’re bluffing, Mr. President. I didn’t want to unduly depress anyone, but my aide informs the that I’m also incorrect in my estimate of how many divisions the Siberians have at hand. It is in fact in excess of sixty-five. That’s well over a million and a—”
“Yes, yes, I know, Brigadier, but threatening to use the MX doesn’t mean we have to. Our bluff could work. They might just cave in when they see our determination.”
“I beg to differ, sir. I think—”
“Well, let’s give it the old college try, shall we, Brigadier?”
“By all means, sir. By all means.”
Just as Press Secretary Trainor had never heard the president take, as Mayne would have put it, “the Lord’s name in vain,” neither had he heard the president use “shall we?” before. The president, he thought, had handled the brigadier — and thus in effect the joint Allied high command’s anticipated criticism— rather well. “Shall we?” had just the right tone to it — one of confident authority, unbowed by the frightening possibility of having to confront more man sixty fresh, highly trained Siberian divisions — twice the total number of U.S. divisions. Perhaps the president was right. Maybe the Siberian colossus had not shucked off the long political reach of Moscow and would think twice about it, seeing the missiles “standing proud”—that is, their warheads above the silo openings. Perhaps the Siberians would blink.
The president’s message was transmitted in plain language so that all the Siberian forces would be aware of it. A smart move, Trainor acknowledged, in that there might have been some Siberian units reluctant to go along with Novosibirsk’s decision to attack the Allied forces east of Moscow.
Though he didn’t know it, Trainor was right. There had been such resistance, notably in the person of Vladimir Cherlak, the general commanding the Siberian Third Motorized Rifle Division at Tyumen, halfway between Novosibirsk and Moscow. Though no friend of President Chernko, Cherlak, like so many senior Russian officers, had attended the Frunze Military Academy. Using this tenuous connection with Chernko to maximum effect, Cherlak stated flatly that he had no intention of disobeying Moscow’s directive to surrender.
Novosibirsk’s Central Committee said it respected his loyalty to Moscow but appealed to Cherlak to place his responsibility to the United Siberian Soviet Republics above any personal loyalty to a defeated Moscow. Cherlak replied that his hesitancy to throw in his lot with Novosibirsk was not merely a matter of personal loyalty but one stemming from the oath he had taken to the Russian federation which Chernko now headed.
Novosibirsk decided there were only two ways of dealing with Cherlak: shoot him as an example to any other undecided officers or show him Chernko’s plan. They sent an emissary to Tyumen. Cherlak was notoriously self-centered — some said he was so full of himself he must think himself a czar. But he knew when he had met his match, and upon seeing Chernko’s plan was unabashedly awed.
“It’s brilliant,” he conceded. “Tell Novosibirsk the Third Motorized is with them.”