Chapter 8

“No, I have a good brain, but most people don’t see beyond my height. I am five foot nine, if you wanted to ask. Similar height to you, Reg?”

“Should think so. Let’s check. Come and stand in front of me, Prudence, and we’ll see.”

She and Reg moved to face each other, and sure enough, they were eye to eye. Reg smiled at her and moved forward to kiss her gently on the lips. She was startled at that familiarity, but reacted by kissing him in return, then stepped back.

“Wow! Do you do that with every girl you meet?”

“No, only with the nice ones.”

“Don’t your girlfriends object?”

Reg stopped to consider. “Um ... I hadn’t thought about that in advance. It just happened. I looked into your eyes and thought, ‘I want to kiss this girl’. Sorry if I caused offence to you or the girls.”

“Oh, it didn’t offend me,” said Prudence. “I haven’t been kissed by a boy in years. It was just the surprise.”

Frances came in at this point. “Reg, it is all right. Giving Prudence a gentle kiss was not a social offence. If you had gone for a full-on kiss, she might have been offended, and I would have wanted to know what you were playing at, but what you gave to Prudence was okay.”

Reg relaxed. “Thanks, Frances. I would not want to do anything to upset you or Erika or Freda.”

Prudence spoke to Frances now.

“Frances, would you mind if Reg gave me a full-on kiss, now that we have been introduced? I’d like to see what it feels like. Please?”

Frances looked at Reg’s face. He was very unsure of himself, not knowing what he should do or say. Frances glanced over at Erika and Freda for a sign, and they both nodded, so she responded, “Very well. We have no objections. Reg, give Prudence a proper kiss, like you give your girlfriends.”

Reg was like a rabbit caught in a searchlight, afraid to do things wrong.

“Uh, you really want me to give Prudence a proper kiss, Frances?”

“Yes, really, Reg. That is what I said. Go ahead, Prudence is waiting.”

Reg turned back to Prudence and opened his arms in welcome. She moved forward and put her own arms round him, bring her small breasts against him and offering her lips.

He almost shuddered in anticipation, but brought his lips to bear, and his arms went round her back. Once again, he didn’t have to bend down to kiss her; her lips were right before him.

He started out with another soft kiss, and when Prudence did not push back, he increased the pressure of his lips and held her tight at the same time. This time she reacted, kissing him back with fervour, and he did the same in return, enjoying the moment.

Reg dared to let his hands slide down her back, and he gripped the cheeks of her bottom, pulling her hips towards him. This brought his now stiffening penis to become a rigid presence against her; but she continued to participate in this closeness. The kiss seemed to go on forever.

It took Frances to tap him on the shoulder and say “Down, boy. That’s enough.”

Reg jerked back, suddenly panicking. “What is it? What am I doing wrong, Frances? Sorry, my darling.”

Frances took him in her arms. “No, Reg. You were doing it all right; in fact, too much of an all right. I just thought it was time you finished kissing Prudence, as she is not one of your girlfriends.”

Reg subsided, panic draining out of him. “I didn’t do wrong then? Please don’t do that to me, Frances. My heart nearly stopped there.”

Frances patted his arm in sympathy. “Your heart means a lot to me, Reg. You can be assured I will do nothing to make things difficult for you.”

“Thanks, Frances. I am afraid I am inclined to panic at something unusual. For years I’ve been keeping to a routine I was comfortable with, having no-one else to engage with beforehand. You moved me into a new and less secure routine, and when that suddenly changes, I become insecure again. Please forgive me, Frances my love.”

Prudence intruded, “Reg. I know I am new to your routine, but rest assured that I don’t intend to make things awkward for you. I am open to suggestions, but anything I can do to make things easier for you, I will attempt to do.” She added, “I like your kisses, though.”

“Thanks, Prudence. You are a nice girl; nicer than I expected after that fracas with Erika and Freda.”

She grimaced. “Yeah, that was a mess. It was Beth that pushed me into it. She never considers what might possibly happen, does Beth. She only thinks of what she wants to happen, and ignores all the other probabilities. Sorry about that, the three of you. I didn’t want to get off on the wrong foot with you, but Beth ... well, Beth is underhand in her dealings with people, I discovered. She gets someone else to act as front man, so that if it goes pear-shaped, she can get out quick; but if it goes well, she takes over the lead position. Sneaky, eh?

It took me until yesterday to see that was what she was doing to me. I am not one of your popular students, so if things did not go as she wanted them, I could be brushed off as, ‘you know Prudence, she keeps saying the wrong things... ‘, and I would be dropped like a heavy hammer, or a sharp cactus spine.

I told her today that I was wise to her ways, and she should steer clear of me for a while. I didn’t tell her I was coming here tonight, either. She was not too pleased, but seemed to accept that she was busted with me.”

Freda was conciliatory. “Let’s hope that is the end of it, Prudence. As for tonight, is there anything in particular that you need help with?”

“Not really, but in history I keep being puzzled by this idea that if things are not going your way, you resort to war. That general concept I follow, but the risk factors often seem to be ignored. Many of these battles did not go the way the aggressor expected and so their plans go to pot entirely. Take for example Croesus, whose advice from the Oracle at Delphi was that if he crossed the river (to attack Persia), a great empire would be destroyed. Thinking this meant the Persian empire, he attacked, but it was his own empire that was destroyed. That is what I mean – risk taking.

Perhaps Reg, with his male viewpoint, might have a better understanding of what was going on with all that warfare...”

Reg was interested. “I like your idea about risk, Prudence, but it is more than bad calculation. Many leaders have gone to war not because the war was inevitable, but because their own society was unstable. There is nothing better than a war for unifying your people behind you. Margaret Thatcher was a beneficiary of that sort of event, even though it was not directly of her own making.

Her government unknowingly gave Argentina signals encouraging them to take over the Falklands. Cutting back military forces, including the icebreaker that served the Falklands, was one factor. Another was being amenable about negotiating sovereignty there. With Argentina being run by a military junta not well versed in political manoeuvring, the Argentines jumped to the wrong conclusions. They thought the UK would just stand back and allow the takeover to happen.

They got a shock when the opposite happened. They had taken a risk, and miscalculated their chances of success. The UK population were fiercely protective of their citizens inhabiting the Falklands, and expected action. Mrs Thatcher was told by her naval chiefs that retaking the islands could be done, but it would be costly in ships.

She calculated that losing ships was acceptable if the UK won, for that would restore her standing in the population. Her risk calculations proved correct.

Saddam Hussein is another example. He worked on the basis that the West depended on his oil, and what he purchased from them with the income. Mostly, that was true: he got away with many crimes against his people, because the West deliberately looked the other way, regarding it as an ‘internal matter’ only.

Saddam had overspent on a recent war with Iran, and need more oil to sell, so gambled on taking over Kuwait’s reserves. He knew his army could overwhelm Kuwait’s meagre forces, so he dug up a spurious claim that Kuwait was historically an Iraqi province, so ‘Iraq was simply restoring a province to its rightful owners’.

The Kuwaiti rulers escaped and asked the world to help. The West saw this as a means to secure oil supplies without being held over a barrel by Saddam, and so set things up to invade and kick out Iraqi forces from Kuwait.

Just like the imbalance between Iraq and Kuwait, there was a similar imbalance between the West and Iraq: not in numbers this time, but in superiority. The Allied tanks easily out-ranged Iraq’s Russian tanks. The build-up was done while prevaricating by engaging in fruitless talks through the UN, aided by Saddam’s own intransigence, until the allied forces were assembled and ready to move. The war was over quickly. The massed air fleets devastated the Iraqi defences, then the tanks rolled in at night.

Arab forces were given important parts to play in the battles, and everyone except Saddam was happy; but with one vital flaw.

That flaw was in negotiating with the Iraqi army when President George Bush wanted the fighting to stop in line with the UN’s wishes. The truce document included a clause inserted by the Iraqis, permitting the Iraqis to fly helicopters, supposedly for humanitarian purposes, but not specifically stated in the document.

Saddam used the helicopters to attack his internal enemies from the air, and subdue them to retain his power in Iraq. The west found to their dismay that their truce document allowed him to do that. That stupidity led to another invasion ten years later, all because there had been such a rush to get a document signed to end the first war.

It shows that many conflicts can arise not because there is a military imperative, but because the politicians get things wrong, just like the Argentinian junta.”

Freda asked Reg, “Does that apply to all of history, or only specific instances?”

Reg spread his hands. “I can’t categorically say so, but look at the opposite scenario. The US and the USSR squared up to each other after World War 2, but they were seen as pretty evenly matched. Thus, for decades there was an uneasy peace, but that is what it was – peace. No leader on either side wanted to do anything to cause a war to break out, because of MAD – Mutually Assured Destruction – and it stayed that way until the Soviet Union gave up the ghost through an economic collapse. They couldn’t any longer afford to match the USA on weapons technology.”

Erika suggested, “So, it is almost always sociological or economic factors that trigger wars?”

Reg nodded, “Yes, I believe that is a reasonable assumption to make. Of course, having a clear imbalance in military capability makes it easier for politicians to make decisions for war. Most of the wars that led to the British Empire and its expansion were of that nature – guns against spears in many instances. Afghanistan was one case where the natives were armed with rifles and fought the Brits to a standstill.

Remember that Falklands war? The Argentinians thought the UK couldn’t and wouldn’t fight a war from 8,000 miles away. They were wrong, and when a Vulcan bomber bombed the Stanley runway, that was a real shock. That single bomb run lasted 16 hours, took eleven tanker aircraft to keep refuelling two bombers – one turned back as no longer required by a certain point — and the journey was 12,600 kilometres in total. It was a world record then, but it was slapped together with whatever the Brits could find at the time. Half the U.K.’s air tanker fleet was on Ascension Island for the duration. They were all so old that several had to be on standby to replace ones on task that encountered problems, like leaks. It was amazing how well they held up.