A Rising Thunder

Chapter Thirty-One

Fleet Admiral Winston Seth Kingsford was barely half the age Rajampet Kaushal Rajani had attained, Innokentiy Kolokoltsov thought as Kingsford stepped into his office. He was also at least twice Rajampet’s size.

And unlike Rajani, he’s still alive, Kolokoltsov reflected. Which may or may not be a good thing.

“Mr. Permanent Senior Undersecretary,” the fleet admiral said respectfully, and Kolokoltsov nodded back to him.

“Fleet Admiral Kingsford. Thank you for coming so promptly. I didn’t really expect you to be able to get here for another couple of hours.”

“I won’t pretend things aren’t still in an uproar at the Admiralty,” Kingsford said. “There’s not much I can contribute there at the moment, though, and it seemed important to get over here and touch base with you as quickly as possible.” His mouth twisted briefly. “Admiral Rajampet’s suicide leaves a lot of things up in the air at the worst possible moment.”

Kingsford, Kolokoltsov thought, had a genuine gift for summing up the obvious. Then the permanent senior undersecretary kicked himself mentally. Nobody else was doing any better coping with Rajampet’s death. Irritating as the man had been, he’d also been a serving officer of the Solarian League Navy for the better part of a hundred and ten T-years and chief of naval operations for almost four decades. Getting used to his absence was going to take time.

But at least Kingsford — or anyone, really — is bound to be an improvement!

“Please, sit down, Fleet Admiral,” he said, and watched Kingsford seat himself. Once the naval officer had settled, Kolokoltsov sat back down himself and cocked his head. “I understand you’re Admiral Rajampet’s proper successor?”

“I was next in seniority, and that makes me the acting CNO, Sir,” Kingsford replied. “Filling the post on a permanent basis is a bit more complicated. Ministry of Defense Taketomo needs to formally nominate someone for the position. Then, under the Constitution, the Assembly has to confirm the nomination.”

He actually said that with a straight face, Kolokoltsov observed. Ministry of Defense Taketomo Kunimichi was a complete nonentity in terms of real power. He’d nominate whoever Kolokoltsov and his colleagues suggested, and “Assembly confirmation” would follow with automatic precision.

“I see.” The permanent senior undersecretary of state smiled. “Given the fact that it’s been — what? Thirty-seven T-years? — since we last had to replace a chief of naval operations, everyone’s going to be a little rusty on the procedure, I suppose. I think we can assume your acting status will be confirmed and made permanent as soon as possible.”

“I appreciate that, Sir,” Kingsford said, then allowed himself a wry smile of his own. “Under the circumstances, I’m not sure it’s going to be a very enjoyable job, you understand.”

“Oh, believe me, I understand. I understand completely.”

There was silence for a moment, then Kolokoltsov leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers across his chest.

“I realize you’ve been acting CNO for less than twelve hours, Fleet Admiral, and I don’t want to pressure you unduly. At the same time, you were Battle Fleet’s commanding officer, and I have to assume you’ve worked closely with Fleet Admiral Rajampet for some time. Frankly, that continuity is one of the reasons I believe Minister Taketomo will definitely nominate you as Fleet Admiral Rajampet’s replacement. I hope it also means you’re in a position to give us your evaluation of the current military situation and of how you think we should best proceed.”

“That’s a pretty steep order, Mr. Permanent Senior Undersecretary,” Kingsford responded after a moment. “And a bit of an awkward one, too, given that Fleet Admiral Rajampet and I weren’t in complete agreement on either of those points.”

“No?” Kolokoltsov leaned a bit further back. “How so?”

“I had some reservations about Operation Raging Justice,” Kingsford said. “I didn’t oppose it. In retrospect, I wish I had, but at the time it was first discussed, I only suggested that rushing it as much as we did might not be the best approach. Rajani — Fleet Admiral Rajampet, I mean — scented a possible opening and wanted to get his blow in as quickly as possible, before the Manties had time to recover from the attack on their home system. I understood the logic, but I felt the inevitable delay in projecting an attack over that great an interstellar distance was likely to give the enemy too much time to recover his strategic balance.

“In fairness, I have to admit my reservations were nowhere near as pronounced as what I’ve just said might indicate. For one thing, I had no more idea than anyone else that the Havenites might actually ally themselves to the Manties. I don’t think anybody saw that one coming. I was simply concerned about getting in too deeply too quickly.” He shrugged. “In my worst nightmares, I never envisioned anything as disastrous as what happened to Fleet Admiral Filareta, however. It would be grossly unfair to Rajani — and, for that matter, to Filareta — to pretend I had any better idea of what was going to happen than they did.”

“Then why raise the point at all?” Kolokoltsov inquired.

“Because the reason I had my reservations about Operation Raging Justice is that I believed there was rather more truth — or could be, at any rate — than Rajani did to the stories about Manticoran missile ranges. I hadn’t realized how thoroughly they appear to have transitioned to pod-launched missiles, or that they’d incorporated an FTL component into their fire control, but I did think evidence suggested they truly had significantly increased their missiles’ effective range. Under the circumstances, I would have preferred to test the waters a little before we committed a wall of battle to action. Better to have lost a few battlecruisers here or there than to have three or four hundred SDs blown out of space.”

“I see.” Kolokoltsov wondered how much of that was true and how much spin. On the other hand, Kingsford had been around long enough to know how the game was played. He wouldn’t have said what he’d just said if there hadn’t been a paper trail of memos somewhere which could at least be interpreted to support the analysis he’d just delivered.

“Should I assume, then, Fleet Admiral, that you’d be opposed to any additional fleet actions at this time?”

“Mr. Permanent Senior Undersecretary,” Kingsford said flatly, “any ‘additional fleet actions’ could only be one-sided massacres. Even assuming what Harrington said to Filareta in the recordings they’ve sent us represents a full statement of their capabilities, without holding any nasty tactical surprises in reserve, we simply can’t match them at this time. There probably hasn’t been this great an imbalance in combat power since the introduction of the machine-gun put an end to massed infantry assaults.”

Kolokoltsov’s eyes widened, despite himself, at the frankness of that response. It was refreshingly — and utterly — different from anything Rajampet had ever said.

“It’s really that bad?” he asked, curious to see how far are Kingsford would go.

“It’s probably worse than that, frankly, especially with Haven added to the equation,” the acting CNO said unflinchingly. “For all intents and purposes, the Reserve has just become several billion tons of scrap material. The superdreadnoughts we have mothballed are the wrong ships for this war, and I don’t see any way the existing hulls could be refitted to turn them into effective combatants.”

Well, that’s a kick in the head, Kolokoltsov thought dourly. On the other hand, if Omosupe and Agatá are right, we won’t have the cash to reactivate the Reserve, anyway. Of course, that leaves the little problem of where we’re going to find the cash to build new wallers if we can’t even demothball the ones we’ve already got!

“Are you saying we should just go ahead and surrender?” he asked, deliberately putting an edge into his voice, and Kingsford shook his head.

“For better or worse, Sir, I don’t think we can. Whether we want to fight or not, we don’t have a choice after the defeats we’ve suffered. And that’s what they were, Mr. Senior Permanent Undersecretary — make no mistake about that, because nobody in the Verge will. It’s not just the Manties and Havenites we have to worry about. We’re going to have other people, other star systems, pushing to see how they can exploit the situation. We can contain a lot of that, since none of those other systems will have the kind of missiles the Manties and Haven do, but if we don’t ultimately defeat the people who’ve hurt us this badly, their example’s going to remain and we’ll be fighting smaller scale wars for decades.”

“I see. But if we can’t send our wall of battle out to fight their wall of battle, what do we do?”

“Actually, Sir, if I may, I’d like to bring in one of our analysts to present a little additional background before I respond to that question.”

“What sort of analyst, Fleet Admiral?”

“Captain Gweon, Sir — Captain Caswell Gweon. He’s the CO of the Office of Economic Analysis over at ONI.”

“Really? Only a captain?” Kolokoltsov said with a small smile, and Kingsford smiled back.

“He’s already been selected for rear admiral, Sir. His name’s on the next list to be submitted to the Assembly for approval.”

“I see,” Kolokoltsov repeated. “Very well, Fleet Admiral. How soon can Captain Gweon get here?”

“If you have the time for it now, Sir, he’s waiting with your assistant.”

“Ah.” Kolokoltsov touched a key on his chair arm. “Astrid?”

“Yes, sir?” a female voice said out of thin air.

“If you have a Captain Gweon squirreled away in your office, would you be kind enough to send him in now?”

“Of course, Sir.”

The office door opened to admit a somewhat taller than average, immaculately uniformed SLN captain with brown hair and brown eyes. He struck Kolokoltsov as looking even younger than his rank would have suggested, and the permanent senior undersecretary frowned slightly as Astrid Wang uploaded a brief bio on to the holo display which could be seen only from behind Kolokoltsov’s desk.

It was a very brief bio in this case, consisting of about the barest bone vital statistics he’d ever seen. Normally, he would have expected much more, but Gweon wasn’t one of the political figures Astrid would already have had prepackaged bios for.

Not as young as he’d thought, Kolokoltsov observed. Prolong could fool anyone, but it must’ve worked uncommonly well in Gweon’s case. He scarcely looked sixty-five T-years old, at any rate! Without a more detailed bio, Kolokoltsov couldn’t be certain, but it looked as if Gweon was well connected within the Navy’s hierarchy, which raised the interesting question of why he’d gone into intelligence. That wasn’t — or hadn’t been, anyway — the fast track to senior rank. For that matter, Gweon had only inherited his present position less than five T-months earlier, when Vice Admiral Yountz managed to slip and break his neck on the wet surround of his swimming pool.

“Mr. Permanent Senior Undersecretary, Fleet Admiral Kingsford,” Gweon murmured, bowing respectfully to both men.

“I understand you’re one of the Navy’s economic experts, Captain,” Kolokoltsov replied. “And Fleet Admiral Kingsford wanted you in here to talk to me about something. What would that happen to be?”

If the bluntness of the question flustered Gweon in any way, it wasn’t apparent. He only nodded, as if he’d expected it.

“I believe that would be in regards to my analysis of the economic consequences of a war with the Star Empire of Manticore, Sir.”

“I think we’ve already come to the conclusion that the consequences are going to be unhappy, Captain,” Kolokoltsov said dryly. “Should I assume you have some additional illumination to cast upon them?”

“I can’t really promise to cast any new illumination without having had access to the reports you’ve already seen, Mr. Permanent Senior Undersecretary,” Gweon replied calmly. “I do have the Navy’s perspective on them, however.”

“Then share that with me, if you would.”

“Of course, Sir.”

Kolokoltsov hadn’t invited the captain to be seated, but that didn’t seem to faze Gweon, either. The intelligence officer simply clasped his hands behind him, standing with the easy poise of someone accustomed to presenting briefings, and began.

“I’m going to assume, Sir, that you don’t want the detailed statistical basis for my analysis at this time. I have that material with me, on chip, and I can provide it if you’d prefer. I’ve also already left a copy of it with Ms. Wang for you to review at a later time, if you wish. For now, I’ll simply concentrate on the conclusions of our analysis, if that’s acceptable?”

Kolokoltsov nodded a bit brusquely.

“In that case, Mr. Permanent Senior Undersecretary, the critical point is simply that any extended war with the Manties is going to be an economic as well as an overtly military conflict. At the moment, their technological advantages are overwhelming, but our economic and industrial power is many times as great as theirs, even allowing for their new alliance with the Havenites. The essential question is whether or not our size and economic capacity are great enough to withstand a concerted attack by this new ‘Grand Alliance’ long enough for us to produce what we need to match its war fighting capability. And the answer, I’m afraid, is that they may well not be.”

“I beg your pardon?” Kolokoltsov’s brows lowered in surprise at hearing someone finally say that in so many words.

“A great deal depends upon the political cohesiveness of the two sides,” Gweon said. “Given the lengthy period of hostilities between Manticore and the Republic of Haven, one would anticipate internal strains within their alliance which would work against its stability. I wouldn’t invest much hope in that prospect, however, for several reasons, including the fact that I think both Manticore and Haven genuinely believe this nonsense they’re spouting about sinister Mesan manipulation of the League’s policies. Another factor would be their shared resentment for what they regard as Solarian arrogance. And yet another, frankly, would be the fact that both of them obviously smell the opportunity to make extensive territorial gains at the League’s expense.

“In the case of the Republic of Haven, we’re talking about a star nation with a long tradition of conquest. Even if we assume the Pritchart Administration might not wish to be as expansionist as the Legislaturalists and Committee of Public Safety, it’s still confronted with a military accustomed to thinking in terms of expansion by force of arms, and a civilian population habituated to accept that sort of foreign policy.

“In the case of the Star Kingdom — excuse me, the Star Empire—of Manticore, there’s no previous tradition of imperialism. Not in the territorial sense, at any rate. Manticoran power has traditionally been extended on an economic basis, by continually increasing the Star Empire’s inroads into the League’s shipping industries and penetrating market areas in the Verge and the Shell for its own goods. And, of course, there’s the enormous advantage the Manticoran Wormhole Junction bestows on its financial sector. Yet while all of that’s true, its recent expansion into the Silesian Confederacy and then into the Talbott Sector suggest there’s been a fundamental change in the Manticorans’ internal calculus. Our best guess over at Economic Analysis is that they believe it’s time to expand their political control in order to bolster their economic dominance and give them greater strategic depth. This may actually be a result of their conflict with the Havenites, a response to the awareness that a single-system star nation, however wealthy, is at a serious disadvantage when fighting a much larger multi-star system star nation because a single defeat can cost it everything. Which is rather ironic, I suppose, since the star nation it was worried about fighting is currently its ally against us.

“Regardless of the motivations in Haven and Manticore, however, we probably have to accept that the ambition for expansion will reinforce all the other reasons they believe they have for standing together against us. In which case, their alliance is going to have a lot more stability and staying power than anyone in the League would prefer.”

He paused politely to allow Kolokoltsov to digest what he’d already said, and the permanent senior undersecretary nodded slowly. He was impressed. Gweon might be young, but he was also articulate, and it sounded as if he had a much clearer and more detailed appreciation of the situation out in the Verge than any of the Navy briefers Rajampet had ever brought along with him.

“If I’m correct,” Gweon continued after he’d given Kolokoltsov a few moments, “and we can’t realistically expect the ‘Grand Alliance’ to self-destruct, we have to look at the balance of economic power as it exists and to consider just how stable we are ourselves.

“Economically, we have many times as many industrialized, heavily populated systems. Almost all of our Core Worlds have tech bases at least as good, overall, as the Manties and probably superior to anything Haven can produce at this time. Some of them don’t, and we need to be aware of that, as well. On balance, though, it would certainly appear the scales are heavily weighted in our favor.

“Appearances, I’m afraid, can be deceiving, however.” Gweon’s expression turned somber. “With the withdrawal of Manticoran freighters and the holes their closure of so many wormholes have blown in our shipping routes, our economy’s been very severely damaged. It’s not evident to most of our citizens yet, but I’m afraid they’ll be figuring it out shortly. With the curtailment of available shipping, our star systems are going to be thrown back on their internal resources. Most of them will ultimately be able to absorb the blow, especially if we can expand our own merchant marine to compensate for at least some of what we’ve lost. It’s going to take a lot of time, though, and there’s going to be a lot of pain involved. Civilian morale is going to suffer, and even worse from the federal government’s perspective, it’s going to mean a major loss in revenues at the very time military expenses are going to be skyrocketing.”

He must have been reading Wodoslawski’s and Quartermain’s reports, Kolokoltsov thought sourly.

“In the meantime,” Gweon continued, “Manticore’s dealt its own economy a very significant blow, especially coupled with the damage their home system apparently took from the recent ‘mystery’ attack upon it. However, they’re actually in a position to begin recovering from it much more rapidly than we are, for several reasons. One is that they have access to the Silesian Confederacy and now to the entire Republic of Haven. The latter, in particular, represents an entirely new market for them — one which has been completely closed for the last twenty or thirty T-years. In addition, they have control of the wormholes they’ve denied to us, which means they can continue to reach markets and trading partners in the Verge and even in the Shell we literally cannot reach. In those areas, they’ll be in a position to pick up the direct trade, not just the carrying trade, which was previously dominated by Solarian manufacturers and transstellars. When those opportunities are coupled with the fact that — unlike the citizens of the League — both Manticorans and Havenites are experienced in and thus far better inured to the strains and tensions of interstellar warfare, their alliance is probably in a position to recoup everything it’s lost as a result of the Manties closure of our trade lanes within a very few T-years. Certainly in a shorter time than we can recover. In fact, our projections over at Economic Analysis indicate that we’ll reach a tipping point at which the combined economies of Manticore and Haven will effectively match the economic power of the League within no more than ten to fifteen T-years.”

“You’re joking.” Surprise startled the comment out of Kolokoltsov. That was a considerably grimmer projection than Agatá Wodoslawski or Omosupe Quartermain had yet presented to him.

“No, Mr. Permanent Senior Undersecretary,” Gweon said respectfully. “I’m afraid I’m not. Those projections, including the data upon which they rest and the models and methodology we employed, are included in the data chips I’ve left with Ms. Wang. I’d be happy to sit down with your own analysts and explain our thinking to them. For that matter, I’d welcome an outside critique of our results. At the moment, however, I believe those projections are solid. And I’m very much afraid that even they rest on some fairly optimistic assumptions.”

“Optimistic?” Kolokoltsov’s eyes widened.

“Yes, Sir,” Gweon said grimly. “The two most problematic of those assumptions are that, first, we’ll be able to muster the resources on the federal level to support an ongoing, lengthy conflict. And, second, that the League will maintain its political cohesiveness long enough for us to overcome the other side’s technological advantages.

“As far as the first assumption is concerned, to be honest, we simply don’t know what revenues will be available. We can make a good guess at the percentage of revenues we’ll lose because of lost shipping duties, and it isn’t pretty. What we can’t begin to estimate at this point is how badly our revenue stream from the Protectorates is going to be affected. Frankly, if I were the Manties, I’d be doing everything I could to further disrupt the Protectorates. For that matter, I’d be stirring up all the unrest I could among the Office of Frontier Security’s…client states.”

The captain’s tone shifted very slightly on the last two words, and Kolokoltsov grimaced mentally. Apparently Gweon wasn’t one of the greater admirers of OFS’ policies in the Verge.

“Whether Manticore does that deliberately or not, there’s going to be a lot of unrest, anyway,” Gweon continued. “Worse, anywhere we lose control, the Manties will be able to move in and begin taking our place. So they’ll very probably gain most of the revenue we lose, which will have a highly adverse affect on the bottom line. In fact, that’s one of the main reasons we believe we’ll reach that tipping point I mentioned so quickly.

“It’s certainly possible we’d be able to compensate for those losses, but I’m afraid the only solution we’ve been able to see over at Economic Analysis would require an amendment to the Constitution.” Gweon met Kolokoltsov’s eyes with a levelness which told the civilian the naval officer understood the realities as well as he did. “Essentially, the federal government would have to impose direct taxation in some form in order to compensate. There’s an enormous amount of wealth in the League’s economy, even — or especially — in the Core Worlds, alone. If there were some way to tap that wealth, it would completely transform our current analysis of the competing economic trends.”

“Perhaps so, Captain,” Kolokoltsov said with a wintry smile. “Speaking as someone with a modicum of political experience, however, it might well be easier to beat the Manties militarily than to accomplish a structural change of that magnitude.”

“Obviously that’s outside my area of competence, Sir,” Gweon acknowledged. “Nonetheless, it brings me to my second optimistic assumption: that the League will maintain its political cohesiveness long enough to defeat its adversaries. Frankly, I think that’s unlikely.”

Silence hovered for several seconds and Kolokoltsov’s office. Then the permanent senior undersecretary of state cleared his throat.

“That’s a…remarkable assertion, Captain,” he observed.

“I realize that, Sir, and I don’t wish to appear alarmist. Nonetheless, I think we have to acknowledge that there’s enough resentment of current League policies in the Protectorates, the Verge, and even in some Shell systems to make their loyalty to the League…uncertain. Quite a few systems in those regions would ask nothing more than to slip out of the League’s control. They might or might not prefer some sort of arrangement with the Manties, possibly along the lines of what happened in Talbott, but they’d certainly like to throw out the transstellars and, undoubtedly, nationalize their investments and property. In terms of those systems’ contributions to the League, it doesn’t really matter whether they decide to remain independent or sign up with the Manties.

“That’s bad enough, but I think we also have to assume some of the systems in the Shell will see an opportunity to strike out on their own. They’re full member systems of the League, which means they have the constitutional right to secede whenever they wish. I realize that option’s never been exercised, but the League’s never been at war with a multi-system star nation with superior war-fighting capabilities, either. It seems extraordinarily unlikely that the possibilities inherent in the situation won’t occur to power-minded individuals and star systems throughout the Shell.

“And, finally, given that same constitutional right to secede, there’s no guarantee some of the Core star systems won’t follow suit. Especially not if they find themselves facing the sort of tax mechanism necessary to sustain a long-term war effort. And that situation would almost certainly be exacerbated in both the Shell and the Core by Manty offensive operations designed to erode our military capabilities, to encourage those who might wish to secede from the League or even align with them, and to punish those who do not choose to secede or align with them.”

He paused once more, then shrugged very slightly. It was a gesture of weariness, not dismissal, and he shook his head.

“I don’t like my own conclusions, Mr. Permanent Senior Undersecretary,” he said levelly, “but if those conclusions are accurate, we stand a greater chance of losing this war than we do of winning it, and even if we ‘win’ in the end, it’s likely the League will be severely damaged by the time the shooting stops.”

“I see,” Kolokoltsov said after perhaps thirty seconds. Then he gave himself a mental shake.

“I see,” he repeated. “And I thank you for a very comprehensive piece of analysis and for honestly presenting conclusions you obviously would have preferred not to have reached. If you’ll excuse us, now, though, I think Fleet Admiral Kingsford and I need a few moments.”

“Of course, Sir.”

Captain Gweon came briefly to attention, nodded courteously to both of his superiors, and quietly withdrew.

A fresh, lengthy silence lingered until Kolokoltsov finally broke it.

“I rather wish Fleet Admiral Rajampet had carried out that analysis before he advised us to launch Raging Justice,” he said bitingly.

“I’m not in a position to say why he didn’t, Sir,” Kingsford said, “and I have no desire to speak ill of someone under whom I served for so long. At the same time, I have to agree with you.”

“Yet you’re still saying you believe we have no choice but to continue this war that Captain Gweon’s just demonstrated we’re probably going to lose. Is that correct, Fleet Admiral?”

“Captain Gweon is a very skilled and insightful analyst, Sir. He’s not omniscient, however, and what he actually said was that we have a greater chance of losing than of winning, not that we can’t win. If we don’t even attempt to win, I’m very much afraid most of the catastrophic consequences he just painted are going to come to pass, anyway. If that’s the case, we won’t be any better off if we don’t fight or any worse off even if we fight and lose. If, on the other hand, we fight and win, our position at the end will probably be recoverable. I’m sure we’d still have to make a lot of changes and adjustments, but the League would survive. So it seems to me that it comes down to whether or not that possibility is worth fighting for. If it isn’t, if the decision — which is a political choice, not a military one — is that the price and risk aren’t worth the possible outcome, we need to stand down our forces immediately and ask the Manties and Havenites for terms.”

Kolokoltsov’s face tightened as Kingsford put the options so bluntly.

“What about a third possibility?” he asked. “What if we offered the Manties and Havenites terms to get the shooting stopped, then pushed our own R&D until we could match their weapons? Bought time to redress the military balance?”

“Again, that’s a political decision, not a military one, Sir. Having said that, I think the other side would have to anticipate that that was precisely what we were doing. That being the case, I don’t see them accepting any terms we might find bearable. I could be wrong, but even if I’m not, it’s going to take us a long time to duplicate their hardware, and they’ll be using all that time to consolidate their current position. I’m sure they’ll be pushing their own R&D, look for still more improvements in their existing capabilities, which will stretch out the time we’ll require to catch up with them. And I’m equally sure they’ll be consolidating their spheres of economic power, not to mention continuing to expand their own navies. The upshot will be that when we finally do face off with them again, they’ll be far more powerful in economic and territorial terms than they are right now. So even if we can match their technological capabilities, we’ll be facing a much tougher and more powerful adversary. In which case, the consequences of a long war like the one Captain Gweon just sketched out for us would probably come into play once again.”

“Well if we’re screwed if we do fight, and screwed if we don’t fight, exactly what do you propose we do?” Kolokoltsov demanded. He wished he hadn’t heard so much exasperation in his own tone, but he couldn’t help it, and Kingsford took it without apparent offense.

“As I said earlier, Sir, I think we have no choice but to fight. At the same time, as I also said, I don’t think we can afford to send our wall of battle out to fight their wall of battle. And what that leaves us, Sir, is a policy of commerce warfare. A raiding strategy.”

“Explain…please,” Kolokoltsov said.

“At the moment, the Manties’ problem is that the League is very, very big, and they have only a finite number of starships and a finite supply of manpower,” Kingsford responded. “The ability to control and consolidate territory is dependent upon the ratio of your available military power to the volume to be controlled and consolidated, and those sorts of duties actually eat up more manpower and more tonnage than pitched fleet combat does. I’m Battle Fleet, Mr. Permanent Senior Undersecretary, but the plain truth is that Frontier Fleet’s always had to have more hulls — more hyper-capable platforms — than Battle Fleet precisely because establishing and maintaining that sort of control was its primary mission.

“In addition, even including its Silesian territories, the Talbott Sector, and all of the Havenite star systems combined, their alliance has a much smaller number of star systems. They can’t afford the attrition we can, yet they have enough systems that if we can compel them to divert forces to protect them, we can significantly reduce the striking power of their fleets.

“Moreover, as Captain Gweon’s just pointed out, their ability to sustain the war effort against us is largely dependent on their ability to absorb the economic power we’re losing. So anything we can do to prevent them from doing that would be very much worthwhile. Attacking their commerce and the support facilities in areas trading with them — both of which are legitimate targets under the rules of warfare — is one way to slow that absorption down. If we can in the process inflict sufficient pain on people who’ve attempted to shift from our camp to their camp, we might also be able to discourage further defections. And perhaps most importantly of all, the real focus of the strategy would be to force them to divert combat power from offense to defense. If we’re hitting them everywhere we possibly can with in-and-out raids, they’ll be forced to tie down millions of tons of warships in system protection and convoy defense.”

He paused, and Kolokoltsov nodded slowly, expression thoughtful.

“All right, that makes sense,” he said. “I’m not clear on why you think we’ll be able to do that, though, given what you and Captain Gweon have both just said about the Manties’ current tactical advantages.”

“Sir, the strategy I’m proposing would depend primarily on battlecruisers and lighter units, not ships-of-the-wall. That would mean we wouldn’t face the expense of trying to mobilize a vast tonnage of capital ships that would only tie up manpower, suck up resources, and provide virtually nothing in terms of actual combat power. We already have a lot of battlecruisers in Frontier Fleet, plus those assigned to Battle Fleet, of course. And we can build more battlecruisers a lot faster than we could build more superdreadnoughts. Moreover, I think we have to assume the ‘exaggerated reports’ of Manty increases in inertial compensator efficiency may actually have been accurate. If that’s the case, our battlecruisers probably come a lot closer to being able to match the acceleration curves of their superdreadnoughts. Our capital ships certainly wouldn’t be able to.

“One of the points on which I differed with Rajani was his belief that even if the Manties had a significant missile advantage, a big enough force of superdreadnoughts would have the anti-missile defenses to blunt their attack. I felt what had happened to Admiral Crandall suggested that wasn’t necessarily true; in my opinion, what’s happened to Admiral Filareta confirms that it wasn’t. Until we can develop and build capital ships that can stand up to the kind of enormous salvos Harrington employed against Eleventh Fleet — and I’m sorry to say it, Sir, but that’s going to take quite some time — capital ships aren’t going to be any more survivable against heavy Manty or Havenite firepower than battlecruisers. Or, to put it another way, battlecruisers are going to be as survivable as superdreadnoughts under those circumstances.

“Considering all of that, and considering the pod-launched missiles Technodyne made available to Eleventh Fleet, I believe our best option at this time is to go with a commerce and infrastructure-raiding strategy, carried out by battlecruisers and lighter units equipped with missile pods, while simultaneously pushing further development of the new Technodyne birds with the greatest urgency possible. We know the Manties and the Havenites have developed missiles which are at least as long ranged and which clearly have heavier warheads and substantially better electronic warfare capabilities than Technodyne’s do. Knowing that, we also know it’s possible to develop such missiles, and I’m confident we’ll find it’s faster to duplicate what they’ve done than they found it to develop the capabilities from scratch.

“What I’m proposing is what I believe is our best option for driving them back onto the defensive, or at least blunting their own offensives against us, in a way which will give us time to improve on the present Technodyne platform until, hopefully, we’ll be in a position to match their performance. I think it’s likely our individual missiles’ performance will still be inferior to theirs, but with sufficient superiority in numbers, that’s acceptable.”

“And you believe this is an attainable strategy?” Kolokoltsov asked.

“I believe it’s the closest to an achievable strategy available to us, Sir,” Kingsford replied unflinchingly. “Obviously, there are political and economic aspects to it which I’m not in a position to address. For example, the point Captain Gweon raised about possible direct taxation, since we’d definitely require large amounts of money. Nowhere near as much as we’d require if we were trying to modernize the Reserve or build new capital ships, but still a far bigger budget than the peacetime Navy’s. I realize that’s going to open an entirely different can of worms for the political leadership, but I’m not really qualified to address that aspect of the problem.”

Kolokoltsov nodded once again, lying back in his chair and thinking hard.

It’s a pity Rajani didn’t shoot himself months ago, he thought sourly. Of course, Kingsford probably would’ve shot from the hip, too, if he’d been in Rajani’s position and known what Rajani knew at the outset. Even if that’s true, though, he’s clearly a wiser and more cautious man these days. The question is, is he wise enough?

“All right, Fleet Admiral,” he said finally. “You’ve given me a lot to think about. As you say, there are political aspects to this that lie outside the military’s purview. My colleagues and I will have to consider those aspects before we can decide whether or not to pursue the strategy you’ve sketched out. I’ll try to get that decision for you as quickly as possible. In the meantime, however, I’d like you — and perhaps Captain Gweon — to produce a more detailed strategic plan. One that shows us what forces you’d contemplate using, where and how you’d employ them, what the logistic requirements would be, and all of that sort of thing.”

“I’ve had Admiral Jennings, my chief of staff at Battle Fleet, working on the concept for several weeks, Sir. I’m pretty sure we could have what you’re asking for in no more than a few days.”

“Good.” Kolokoltsov stood and extended his hand across the desk, indicating the end of the meeting, and Kingsford rose and gripped the hand.

“I won’t say I’ve enjoyed hearing what you and Captain Gweon had to say,” Kolokoltsov continued. “I do, however, appreciate the clarity with which you both said it.”

* * *

“So how did it go?”

Captain Caswell Gweon looked up from his martini with a smile as the extremely attractive red-haired woman slid into the chair on the other side of the small, private table.

“Fine, dear. And how was your day?” he asked with a smile.

“Boring, as usual,” she replied. “And don’t change the subject.”

“It’s known as small talk, dear,” Gweon pointed out. “The sort of thing people who are seeing one another seriously or, oh, I don’t know, engaged to each other, tend to do when they meet.”

“Point taken,” she admitted with a smile, then leaned across the table, cupped the side of his face in the palm of her right hand, and kissed him with a thoroughness which drew at least one laugh of approval from the bar’s other patrons.

“Much better!” he told her with an even broader smile of his own. He looked around the dimly lit bar, as if seeking the person who’d laughed. Nobody confessed, but several people smiled at him, and he shook his head, then waved one of the waiters over.

“Yes, Captain?”

“Would it be possible for us to get one of the private booths?” Gweon produced a credit chip which somehow magically teleported into the waiter’s hand.

“Oh, I think we can probably arrange something, Sir,” the waiter assured him with a brilliant smile. “If you and the lady would follow me, please?”

Gweon stood and pulled back his companion’s chair, then offered her his arm as they followed along in the waiter’s wake. He showed them to a large, comfortable booth in the rear of the attached restaurant — one with first rate privacy equipment.

“Will this do, Captain?”

“It looks perfect,” Gweon said approvingly. “If you could, please let us have a few minutes before sending someone to take our order? We’ll signal”—he indicated the panel on the table—“when we’re ready.”

“Of course, Sir.”

The waiter bowed with another smile and departed.

Gweon watched him go, then ushered his companion into the booth, seated himself opposite her, and activated the privacy equipment. They were instantly enclosed in a bubble which allowed them to see the restaurant around them clearly, but prevented anyone else from seeing in. That bubble was also supposed to be impervious to any known eavesdropping equipment, but Gweon pulled a small device from his pocket, laid it on the table between them, and activated it.

“And how wise is that?” his companion asked a bit sharply, and he shrugged.

“I’m the head of one of ONI’s main sections, Erzi, and I’ll be a flag officer in another couple of weeks. Rank hath its privileges in the SLN, including the use of officially assigned anti-snooping equipment while necking with my fiancée. Trust me, nobody’s going to find this remotely suspicious unless they’re already suspicious for some reason. In which case, we’re already screwed and might as well not worry about it.”

“I hate it when you get logical this way,” she complained with a pout, and he chuckled.

He sat back, surveying her, and reflected that he could have done far worse for a control. Erzébet Pelletier was every bit as smart as she was attractive. She was also athletic, and a pleasant armful in bed. Not only that, they got along well, and he knew she genuinely liked him. In fact, it might even go a little further than that, although both of them had to remember the risks of getting overly emotionally involved in their roles.

“All right,” Erzébet went on after a moment. “You told that nice young man we’d order in a few minutes, so why don’t we go ahead and get the dreary details out of the way?”

“Suits me,” he agreed.

He wished they ocould have held this conversation in their comfortable apartment, but it was a given that the apartment was bugged. Not very effectively — Rear Admiral Yau’s Office of Counterintelligence was pretty inept, and its bugs were no more than pro forma, since it was extraordinarily unlikely anyone in OCI cherished any suspicions where Gweon was concerned. Unfortunately, there was no good excuse for using his anti-eavesdropping equipment at home, whereas there were plenty of reasons someone might do that in public. So it actually made more sense for the two of them to exchange critical information in a “public” venue.

“First,” he told her, “there’s no sign anyone thinks there’s anything suspicious about Rajampet’s suicide.” He shrugged. “Given all that’s happened and the grilling he could expect from Kolokoltsov and the others, it’s easy to figure he had more than enough reasons to kill himself.”

“So it went off cleanly?” she asked.

“Evidently. It was his pulser, after all.” He grinned suddenly; he’d never much liked Rajampet. “It was a thoughtful of him to keep the damned thing in the same place for so many years. It was a lot cleaner and neater to have him shoot himself with a gun we knew how to find. God knows what kind of mess it would’ve made if we’d had to jump him out of a window that high, instead!”

“True.” Erzébet’s tone carried a certain delicate distaste. She hadn’t been much fonder of Rajampet than Gweon, and she was pleased by how neatly his demise tied off that particular loose end, but she didn’t share her companion’s amusement at the circumstances of the ex-CNO’s death.

Gweon sensed her reaction and grimaced an apology.

“Sorry, Erzi. Maybe I shouldn’t be so flip about it, but if you’d had to put up with that arrogant little prick as long as all of us who had the joy of working for him did, you’d probably feel like hoisting a few, too.”

“You may be right about that, and I guess I’m glad I didn’t have to put up with him. Either way, we’ve got other things to think about, and the courier’s leaving for Mesa tomorrow evening, so let’s go ahead and get the rest of your report out of the way.”

“Fine.” He nodded. “First, I’m pretty sure I’m in the process of cementing my credentials with Kolokoltsov. I’m giving him good analysis, and he knows it. Same for Kingsford, although I’ve revised my opinion of his IQ upward. I always knew he was smarter than Rajampet; I’m beginning to think he may be smarter even than I’d allowed for, and I’d a lot rather be more cautious than I have to than not cautious enough.

“I wasn’t present when Kingsford pitched his new strategy to Kolokoltsov, but judging from the additional analysis he asked for after leaving Kolokoltsov’s office, it sounds to me as if—”