This 44-part series began running in WCT Nov. 8. Readers can read all the installments to date at www.windycitymediagroup.com
From the journal of John 'Jack' Quincy Adams, Chief Secret Service Special Agent in Charge, The White House. Code Name: One.
Part 30. Chaos in the Supreme Court
Jack Adams, the Secret Service agent charged with assassinating President George W. Bush and being held for psychiatric evaluation, is telling about the political maneuvering in the Oval Office after the Democrats took back the House in the midterms and the surprise 'event' that occurred in the middle of it.
During the first week of January as everyone in Washington, including new members of Congress, was settling into being back from the holidays, yet another 'event' occurred. I was in my usual spot in Diadem, listening to Rumsfeld, General Myers, Condi, and Trailblazer debating the administration's policy on small nuclear devices and whether they could be used in the Middle East.
Trailblazer was seated at the desk eating peanuts and tossing the shells into a wastebasket about three feet away. The others were in a semicircle in front of the desk.
'All you have to do is be honest with yourself,' Rumsfeld said.
'And look at history. History is the best teacher in this department,' Myers added. 'You only win a war by making an all-out assault. Exactly what we didn't do in Vietnam.'
'Well, that's open to debate,' Rumsfeld said.
General Myers went on. 'My point is that it is the most cost effective way to run the military. We have to realize Al Qaeda is never going to let up. They are going to be at each other's throats—and ours—until we make it unmistakably clear that we will exterminate them unless they stand down.'
'Mr. President, really, I….' This from Condi.
'I don't like it any better than you do, Condi,' Rumsfeld said, 'but we have the capabilities, the bombs are shockingly powerful, yet not so lethal that the fallout would ever reach us and they tell me—they promise me—that the fallout won't drift more than 500 miles.'
'That's true, ma'am,' Myers said.
'Don, do you want me to list for you all the promises from Lockheed, Hughes, General Dynamics, Martin-Marietta and all the others that were just smoke up our skirts? I can do that if you like. Practically any American citizen on the sidewalk can do that. You're talking about nuclear weapons, Donald. Nuclear. Is that the legacy you want to leave behind?' Condi was already talking like a vice president.
'Yeah, that's my big point, Rummy,' Trailblazer said, taking a shot at the waste basket and missing. He cracked open another peanut. 'I don't want to be remembered as the president who nuked the Middle East.'
'Sir, they're small bombs. They're more or less underground bunker-buster bombs. They will just scare the hell out of them,' the general put in. 'Think of it as your Okinawa, your Nagasaki, as it were.'
'Call them what you like, Donald. They are nuclear weapons. Sir, you can think of signing this policy as signing your own death warrant,' Condi said. 'And I may not be speaking just figuratively. Do you know what we would unleash politically if we were to use nuclear weapons in a third-world country? Think of the publicity. Imagine what the Democrats would do with that, not to mention the French and the Germans and the Chinese.'
These were the times when I most missed Colin Powell and Dick Armitage. They always played Devil's Advocate in these meetings. Or maybe Heaven's Advocate, depending upon the subject and one's point of view. When those two left there was no one to balance out the pro-War, pro-everything-our-way advice given to Trailblazer.
'I wish Karl was here,' Trailblazer said. 'I need to hear from a political advisor on this. Where is he anyway? It's not like him to….'
Just then the door to Rover's office flew open and he came rushing in. 'Mr. President,' he began, rather breathlessly—always a bad sign when it was Rover talking.
'Karl, where the hell have you been? We've been talking about….'
'Sir, right now I'm afraid we've got bigger problems than Iraq,' he said. 'Justices Roberts, Ginsburg, and Thomas have just been shot. Maybe others as well.'
'Oh my God!' Condi said softly. The men stared at Karl in silence.
'Are any of them dead?' Trailblazer asked.
'We don't know yet. They're all en route to the hospital. Someone said Roberts took a direct hit to the head,' Karl said. 'It doesn't look good.'
