Midnight by Anna Dove (books for new readers .TXT) 📕

a low tone at first, and he asked why they, whoever he was talking to, were worried. And then he said that they shouldn’t be worried, because he had orchestrated it perfectly. He said he had talked to the generals, to the Pentagon, and to Quantico. He said a whole bit about the country going to change - that whoever was a survivor after this would help make the country safe, strong again. And then he told them to get rest, because the next day they would be--they would be going to Chimaugua. And then he said goodbye, and hung up, and he left. That was all.” Her mouth was dry, her head rang. The room seemed stifling. She was trembling a little.

The Senator said not a word, but there seemed to be hundreds flitting through his mind. Haley could see his brain churning, running at lightning speed through all the possible scenarios, as his gaze flicked to her, and then Tom, and then dropped to the table in front of him. Tom was wearing a watch, and it ticked on with the most irreverent audibility in the silence, laughing in their faces that there was nothing they could do to stop the seconds and the minutes from passing. The Senator looked at Landon.

“Damn it,” whispered Landon.

“What?” said Haley, her voice catching in her throat.

“No drill,” said Landon. “There’s no drill tomorrow. I’m on the list for Chimaugua. There’s no drill. And I have heard of no communications between Reed and the Pentagon. If it was something big I would have known about communications.” His voice was barely audible.

Tick, tick.

The room seemed to be getting smaller, as if the walls were buckling under an immense pressure. Haley’s heart sank to the very pit of her stomach, and her hands grew cold, and her mouth dry as a bone.

“Could it be anything else? Maintenance?” murmured Elizabeth dully.

“The maintenance staff is there 24/7. No high level official actually goes to Chimaugua unless it is a drill or a nuclear attack. Ever.” Landon spoke in a hoarse tone.

Haley felt light-headed and raised her hand to her forehead as her vision blurred slightly.

“Don’t any of you dare tell anyone else,” interjected Tom all of a sudden. His voice was tight and choked and he looked at all of them with glistening brown eyes. “Not yet. We have to wait and see, Joe. It’s no use. There’s no line now, no way of knowing who’s in it and who’s not. If a nuke hits New York, or Los Angeles, then we watch the reaction. Anywhere it hits, we watch who says what, and we figure out who is doing what part of this horrible game. If we reveal our cards too soon, the gig’s up. And we know it won’t hit D.C.; Reed is not selfless enough to sacrifice his own life toward whatever end he’s pursuing here.”

“The process,” murmured the Senator. His piercing gaze stayed on Landon. “Tell me what is the process for a launch. I want to know the exact chain of command, the exact process.”

“The President is obviously the only person authorized to launch a nuclear weapon, whether as a first strike or as retaliation,” replied Landon quickly in a low voice. “There are over 3,000 warheads both non-deployed and deployed that the United States owns. Our allies own another 3,000 roughly, cumulatively. There are two possibilities. Either the U.S. weapon is housed here on domestic soil or it is located remotely. In both situations, the launch process is the same. President gives the command, and then the Secretary of Defense has to concur--”

“What is the process of command,” interrupted the Senator.

“The President has the Gold Codes, provided to him daily by the NSA. The codes are stored in the nuclear football, that case that the President has always available. The codes change daily. No one except for the President--and I suppose the individual or individuals who created them--knows the pattern that the codes must be delivered in. The nuclear football also has the location where the President must be relocated in case of an attack as well as instructions on launch and where the classified site locations are.”

“And the Vice President has one too,” said Tom.

“Yes. The Vice President has his own nuclear football but only to be used in case of the invocation of the 25th amendment. His codes are useless outside of that.”

“Yes,” said the Senator and waved his hand impatiently.

“Every day the codes are issued to the President and Vice, to the Pentagon, to the U.S. Strategic Command, and TACAMO, which is the secure military communications system. If the President decides to launch, he first decides an attack option from the nuclear football, and then the Joint Chiefs of Staff are put on alert. Then the President and SECDEF both pass on the order to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.”

“Can SECDEF veto it? Not that he would, since he’s in Gilman’s pocket.”

“No, he can’t. No one can veto it. They can fail to execute but they cannot veto. If they fail to execute I am sure there are severe legal ramifications. After this, the president’s aide who carries the nuclear football--this is a military officer who has passed the highest background check possible, the Yankee White--he creates secure communication with the National Military Command Center and with North American Aerospace Defense Command. Following this the launch order is passed to the nuclear launch facility, where it is then subject to the two-man rule. The codes must be authenticated individually by two separate Nuclear and Missile Operations Officers, who then if the codes are verified, must simultaneously participate in the physical launch. It literally cannot be done by one individual. The slots for the two launch keys are positioned far enough apart to make it physically impossible for one person to reach both of them