"Von Neumann’s War" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ringo John, Taylor Travis S.)Chapter 17“Mr. President, this is Dr. Carolyn Mayer from the National Security Agency’s ELINT branch. She has compiled some information that we thought you would want to see,” Vicki Johnson said as she introduced the forty-three year old blonde analyst to the President and the secretary of defense. The two men had been in the War Room looking over possible defensive and offensive strategies in the event the probes made it to the U.S. That would happen soon enough as far as anybody could tell, but with no recon on the situation in Europe nobody had a clue how bad the situation was. There were no orbital platforms and it appeared that the aliens were enforcing a no-fly zone over most of the Atlantic and eastern Eurasia. The Americas still had air travel below thirty thousand feet — nobody had tried to go higher. Naval boundaries seemed to be about the same. Anything traveling eastward past about the forty-five degree latitude line was never heard from again. The President looked up at the NSA and the pleasingly plump lady she had brought with her. He always found the diversity of individuals who came together in times of crisis to be intriguing. This young lady could have been a model for an oversized-women’s clothing store, not a black-program analyst. “Nice to meet you Dr. Mayer. This is Secretary Stensby.” He motioned to the secretary of defense. “What is this all about, Vicki?” “Dr. Mayer,” the NSA motioned for the analyst to begin. “Uh, right. Here, Mr. President,” Carolyn said. She pulled out her laptop and toggled to a map of Europe. “Here is where the probes have gotten to.” The map of Europe was a standard map package with an overlay of red growing on it. The red blotch covered all of Western Europe and even had spread to Iceland. On the eastern side of the region the red covered parts of Russia all the way from Rostov in the south to St. Petersburg in the north. Stockholm and Helsinki were red also. Due south, all of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, and parts of Saudi Arabia were red. “How do you know this, Dr. Mayer? We’ve been trying to get recon for weeks with no luck. About all we can discern is the no-fly zone.” The SecDef shrugged his shoulders in disbelief. “Right. Well, you see, before all of this it was my job to track Al Qaeda operatives using electronic intercepts. Most of that has been using Ferret satellites, but I specialized in Internet communications. I spent the better part of the last four years finding and geolocating every Internet hub and router and every webcam in existence around the world. Oh, I only made a drop in the bucket, but I made a pretty good map of the world and had several known routers and webcams per region.” Dr. Mayer paused for a second and toggled some keys on her laptop. “I see, so how does this help us now?” The President looked over at the painting on the wall behind his desk in the War Room. He missed the Oval Office. He missed being above ground and he hated all this hiding and waiting. “Ah yes, it’s actually kind of simple, Mr. President. This map of red is a map of lost Internet routers, hubs, power grid stations, phone hubs, webcams, etc., all compiled into one graphic. I’ve even got several images from many of the webcams before they failed. Here.” Carolyn turned the laptop back around for them to see. “What is that?” the SecDef asked. The President nodded. “It looks like a battleship aground.” “Well, actually it’s one of the aircraft carriers that we’ve been missing from the Mediterranean. And if you look here in the background you’ll notice the Coliseum.” She paused to let that sink in. “Rome! These things have picked up an aircraft carrier and set it in Rome!” SecDef Stensby was stunned. “What on Earth for?” “I don’t know, sir. I’m a data collector and analyst not an exoroboticist. But this is just one image. Look at this one.” Carolyn tapped the touchpad button. “Hundred of ships, airliners, trucks, and cars and God knows what. It looks like a junkyard,” the NSA said. “And from this image the landscape can’t be identified. I’ve tried.” “Then where is it, Dr. Mayer?” “It’s Cairo, sir. This is a webcam that used to have the Pyramids in view. They’re still there probably, just under a mountain of junk,” Dr. Mayer said. “Jesus Christ!” the SecDef and the President chorused. “Vicki, has the Neighborhood Watch seen this?” “Not yet, Mr. President.” “Get her down there. And I want a real-time feed of this map right here in this room. Hell, I want it in a similar room in every redoubt across the world.” “Right.” “They’ve spread too far to nuke now, Mr. President.” Jim Stensby sat back in his chair looking at a printout of the map. Technicians were hard at work putting together a real-time version of the analysis for a display console. “You and I know that, Jim. And besides, we don’t know if the people are still alive there or not. Nuking was never, “The contingency is set in place, sir. If the probes cross the sixty-degree lat line moving west we’ll fill the sky with nuclear airburst. If they cross the one-hundred-fifty degree line moving east we’ll do the same.” “Do you think that will work?” “Perhaps the first time, Mr. President. It might be a good tactic to buy us time. Without destroying the majority of them around the globe though, I’m not sure what good it would do. And like you said, what about all the people there? Like in France, are they still there? Are they still alive? Have all of the survivors resorted to cannibalism like the recon team discovered?” “Right. Those poor people…” the President muttered. “Well, let’s pray the eggheads come up with something before the Chinese or the Russians or the Indians or whoever decide they’re threatened enough to start setting off nukes willy-nilly,” SecDef Stensby said. “I’ve relayed my concerns to the UN Security Council on several occasions but I’m not certain they listened. I’ll resend a message across what is left of the world hot lines again with my concerns here.” The President felt somber and was not sure of the chances that even if the message went through to the remaining world leaders that it would “Okay, Ronny, this should give us a better idea of what is going on around the world.” Roger Reynolds, wearing a clean suit and latex gloves, sat what appeared to be a miniature model of a satellite about the size of a coffee can with small solar panels wrapped around it on the clean room table — the culmination of about seven weeks of work. “How so, Roger? This looks like it would be any other satellite when it’s built. Why won’t the probes eat it, too?” Ronny adjusted the paper bonnet on his forehead so it would be more comfortable. “This is so cool,” Alan said as he rolled the device over and examined it closer. “Uh, Ronny, you don’t understand. This “How did you shield it without metal for a Faraday cage?” “Oh, that’s the neatest part,” Alan interrupted. “We used RAM.” “Yeah, Ronny. We thought on that one a while and came up with making a cage out of radar absorbing material since we couldn’t use metals. It works pretty well, actually; we’re starting to use it in some places where we want shielding but don’t want to put in Faradays.” Roger pointed out some of the RAM materials inside a panel on the little spacecraft. Ronny’s eyebrows went up as he nodded. “We even used inefficient highly resistive carbon wiring on the major wiring harness from the panels to the power supply to reduce the need for metal there.” “How do we get intel down from it?” Ronny asked while taking a more detailed look at the little spy satellite’s articulate components. “And what type?” “Okay, it has a ten-centimeter glass optic aperture. We plan to orbit at LEO around four hundred kilometers so that will be about three meters per pixel on the ground. We’re gonna try a real ccd camera instead of film — well shielded from emissions. We also added a little commercial-off-the-shelf tip-tilt atmospheric distortion corrector in the optical path to clean up atmospheric scintillation and such. We should get good three-meter resolution images.” Roger paused for a second and pointed out the primary optic and the optical train of the telescope. “I see,” Ronny nodded again. “Very interesting, fellas.” “And this little gadget here,” Roger said, pointing to a black-composite material box with three small windows on the side, “is how we’ll get the data out. It’s a little diode laser communicator. We’ll download each time it comes over our ground stations in the U.S. and that means any place in the country with a meter aperture telescope or bigger will work. We’ve also built several portable ones.” “Uh, Roger, how does the picosat know where the ground stations are if they’re mobile?” Alan asked. “That is the beauty of it,” Roger said. “Tom has worked out the orbit model and each time we get a download it will get better. All we do is drive out in the path of the thing and send up a quick coded laser pulse train. The input to the optical system of the satellite detects it and turns on the downlink.” “Won’t that tip off the aliens?” Ronny asked. “Possibly, but we’ll send a weak signal and only for a few hundred microseconds. Besides, Ronny, this is laser. It’s monodirectional as hell. In fact, if we use a one-meter aperture beam-directing telescope on the ground, the laser spot size at the picosat including atmospheric spread of the beam will be less than four meters in diameter. We can spot the satellite passively with a telescope and fire the laser on boresight. And in case we can’t get the mobile units in the right place at the right time, the onboard system tracks landmarks of four ground-station locations. When the computer recognizes those landmarks it’ll link up automatically.” “What type of bandwidth can we get?” Ronny asked. “Well, we based the point-to-point laser communications system on an old Ballistic Missile Defense Organization program called the Space Technology Research Vehicle-2. That system could achieve 1.2 gigabits per second at eighteen hundred kilometers. We’ll only be at four hundred kilometers. So, rough calculations suggest about 2 to 3 gigabits per second. That’s about one 4 megapixel image per second. We’ll be in line of sight with the sat for about two minutes with each downlink, so, that’s over a hundred images per orbit and that’s about all the solid-state memory capacity the little picosat has anyway. We can also use them to send up a communication and downlink them back to a ground station. It’ll give us some minimal satcom capabilities back.” Roger watched for Ronny’s reaction, but wasn’t sure what he was thinking. “I like it,” Ronny said, nodding somberly. “I mean, what’s the point of being the DDNRO if you don’t have any satellites? How are we going to put it up?” “How are we going to put “ “That’s right, “Very nice indeed!” “They’re so small that we can put them all into two fairly small sounding rockets. John and Tom have already worked it out and one rocket is being put together out at Vandenberg and the other at the Cape right now.” Roger said. “Why the two different launch sites?” Ronny wiggled uncomfortably in his paper jumpsuit. “We’ll put half of them in staggered polar orbits and half of them in staggered standard orbits. We’ll maximize our coverage that way. For that matter, we’re moving the tech to make the sounders not on site into the redoubts. As long as the redoubts hold out, we’ll continue to have limited sat-com and ISR.” “Good, Roger, good,” Ronny said, sighing tiredly. “We need the eyes. Although I’m almost afraid of what we’ll see. When do we launch?” “Two weeks from today.” “Good. Let’s hope it works. You got a backup plan if it doesn’t?” “Yep. We’re almost through with a composite Corona setup. But I hope we don’t need it because the information from that will be much less useful than from these little bad boys right here.” Roger patted the little satellite lovingly as if it were his child. “Cady, you awake?” “Yes, sir?” the sergeant major answered as he raised his cap to look over to the major. Gries’ feet were propped in the window of the open Humvee door and Cady could tell he was focusing on something in the sky. “They’re here. Time to dance.” “Yes, sir.” Cady rubbed his face and straightened up in the driver’s seat. “Where, sir?” “There!” Gries pointed at a spot in the sky just beyond the Tennessee River south of the airport. Then two F-16s zipped over the trees and touched down side by side. Those two were followed by two more and then two more and so on. The fighters taxied in to the parking area and parked in formation about a hundred meters from where the Humvee was parked. “Let’s go, Sergeant Major.” “Sir.” Cady started up the vehicle and drove them up to the base of one of the fighters that had “Colonel Matthew ‘Bull’ Ridley” painted just beneath the cockpit. There were also eight shiny boomerangs painted on the nose of the plane. The sergeant major noted that they were unusually small. The pilot obviously intended to add lots more. “Colonel Ridley, sir! I didn’t expect to see you so soon, and congratulations,” Major Gries saluted the colonel as he climbed down from the F-16. “If the Major may make so bold, Colonel, sir, you’re looking one fuck of a lot better than the last time I saw you.” “Greetings, greetings Major,” the colonel said, smiling as he returned the salute. “Good to see you too, Sergeant Major. At ease, gentlemen. No need to stand at attention for the newly promoted full colonel; kissing my ring is sufficient.” “Yes, sir,” Gries replied, grinning. “I’ll keep that in mind. How’re the shoulder and the feet, Colonel?” “Hurt like hell before it rains, but other than that I’m good to go according to the flight surgeon.” “Hard to keep an old dog down, right, sir?” Cady smiled. “Damn skippy, Sergeant Major. Now, let me find Rene and get my boys situated and one of you two can buy me a drink.” “We’ll have to skip the drink, sir,” Gries replied, shrugging. “Dr. Guerrero told us to get you and Rene over to the AS HQ asap. There’s a liaison here waiting to get your squadron situated.” “A woman she work from sun to sun but a cunnel’s work is never done?” Ridley tucked his flight gloves into his new all composite helmet and started loosening the g-suit. “Sir, let’s make sure your fellows are taken care of. That seems soon enough for me.” Shane grinned thinly and turned to Cady. “Sergeant Major Cady?” “Sir?” Cady barked, snapping to attention theatrically. “Sergeant Major, it looks like that damned motor pool gave us another Humvee with shit tires. Looks like that right rear is running on the run-flat. How long do you think it will take you to get it fixed?” Shane asked. “Yes, sir, Major, sir! That is so totally my fault. I should’ve given that damned specialist at the pool an earful when we picked up that shit-ass vehicle this morning! I guess it should take, oh…” Cady paused and consulted his watch. “Carry the two…” “About an hour and a half,” Ridley said, smiling. “I’d say about an hour and forty-five minutes, Major, sir!” Cady finished. “Good, see to it, Top.” “Colonel,” Cady winked and saluted, then boarded the Humvee. “Now Colonel, let’s see about your squadron.” Support for the Huntsville Redoubt Air Support Squadron had been trickling in for the better part of the week before Colonel Ridley and the “Rednecks,” as they were calling themselves, landed. Ridley had decided if they were going to be assigned to protect the rednecks down in Huntsville, Alabama, that they might as well fit in. An equipment hangar had been designated on the commercial side of the airport where the FedEx aircraft had been maintained before the alien invasion. The USAF was in full swing, commandeering and operating the fighter wing out of the commercial side of the airport. On the other hand, somebody had dropped the damned ball figuring out where thirty new pilots were going to bunk once they got there. Shane and Colonel Ridley spent the better part of an hour kicking people out of the Airport Hotel and having them relocated to hotels farther away, Ridley’s reasoning being that in case of an air attack, the pilots had to be right there on call and only minutes from take-off; civilian contractors could stay anywhere. The entire town had pretty much been turned into a redoubt, so moving folks farther from the center of the base or the airport was not a major issue from a protection standpoint. Hell, Gries or Ridley didn’t think it would matter much anyway having seen first hand how the probes attacked. But, of course, they never said anything like that. At times Shane had wished he hadn’t sent Top off on a boondoggle, as there was nobody better at rattling cages than Sergeant Major Thomas Cady. Oh well, the colonel and the major did all right for themselves in that regard and the pilots were well taken care of. “Nice to meet you, Colonel Ridley. Major Gries has told us a lot about you.” Ronny shook the fighter pilot’s hand and offered him a seat. “Thank you, sir. The major here told me I should come visit but I had no idea that I would be assigned the fighter protection here.” Ridley took a seat in one of the leather guest chairs in Ronny’s office. “Well, we have the task of spearheading development of the technologies that might give us the edge we need to defeat these alien probes. And you, your Belgian friend, Major Gries, and Sergeant Cady are the only folks with any real experience with them. So I got you pulled down here.” “I see,” is all Ridley said, realizing that this Dr. Guerrero must have pretty big pull. The squadron had originally been designated to the defense of Washington. “We hope you saw something that when you relay it to our team here, it will mean something to us. And at the same time we plan to use your squadron as a test bed for any new weapons or capabilities we can come up with,” Ronny said. “Normally we’d run that sort of thing out to Dreamland for testing. But since most of the work is being done right here, we can shorten the feedback cycle by putting your squadron directly in touch with the designers.” “Great, sir, we’re gonna need something,” Ridley admitted darkly. “My pilots are ready and willing to take on the enemy, sir. But I’ll admit that right now we don’t have the chance of a sparrow against an eagle. They took our ships apart like ants eating a grasshopper, but faster. Anything we can do to improve the situation has my full and complete support, sir. What do you want me to do?” “There are some very bright minds running around on this base and they’ll be picking yours for anything that might help. Let the major show you around and get another debrief. He understands the lay of the land around here. And in general, pitch in however you can. Don’t hesitate to ask questions; don’t hesitate to make suggestions. Be foolish if that’s what it takes.” “Clear, sir. Can do. I’ll have my guys do the same.” Ridley began thinking about any way to fight the probes. Off the top, nothing came to mind. “Hey, Colonel,” Shane said as he walked in the squadron office. He gave the Air Force officer a gesture that was more wave than salute. It wasn’t disrespectful, just a friendly greeting between warriors. “How’re you settling in?” “We’re good,” Bull replied, returning the waved salute. “We’ve gotten our full delivery of squadron equipment and we’re finally at over ninety percent on personnel. We’re missing some critical areas, but since they include weapons techs and avionics…” “And you’re in one of the nerve centers for both…” Shane said, chuckling. “We’ve got civilian contractors out the ass in the area,” the colonel replied, nodding. “So we’re farming out most of it. I mean, the contractors around here come up with the They seem to enjoy working on “off the shelf” equipment for a change.” The “off the shelf” equipment was the most advanced installed in any aircraft in the world. But the reality of electronics advances made it already obsolete by the time it was installed. “There are some big brains around here.” “Tell me about it,” Shane said, shaking his head. “As an infantry officer I, of course, can never feel the slightest hint of doubt about my overall intelligence, good looks and sex appeal. But I’ll admit that from time to time I feel challenged in the intelligence area when dealing with some of these guys. But, speaking of which, is Rene around?” “Down in the briefing room,” the colonel said, nodding. “He’s conducting a class on threat assessment.” “Well, it’s nearly quitting time,” the major replied, glancing at his watch. “What say we have our first debrief with the Asymetric Soldier team?” “A woman she work from sun to sun…” Bull said, shrugging. “Over at the comm facility? We’ve got secure rooms set up now.” “Nah,” Shane said, grinning. “We’ve got a better place…” |
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