Chapter 141

At 1600 shit hit the fan again in several ways; the Oregon governor held a news conference announcing an agreement with the White House to end the homeless problems.

He explained that the state government would fund this project with one hundred million a year for five years. Twenty five million was authorized immediately to HUD and FEMA to supply temporary shelter, food, medical and clothing. The homeless were to be moved from the streets to FEMA tents as in California. The state was going to borrow the money if necessary.

He explained that martial law would be in effect to help carry out the military working with FEMA. There would be no arrests of state and local officials.

The next thing, someone had leaked from Gitmo the growing list of charges against the California politicians. The emails and bank accounts collaborated millions in bribes and kickbacks between officials and unions along with the Chinese running the state’s largest international port.

In the news, the Chinese managers of the port were seen leaving for China on private jets.

Tonight was my turn to host Caroline and her family in the political barrel. I was hosting another meet and greet and fancy meal for selected people.

Members of the Senate judiciary committee were on the list. Chief Justice Burger, Justice Copeland and Curtis Warren were also in attendance. Marcy, Jenny and my little men would be here in a few minutes. Ching Lee and Vicky were at home resting up from too many hours in the air.

Justice Copeland and her family were leaving for Hawaii on Saturday in one of the long range business jets.

It was another great meal put on by the White House chefs. There was no doubt that I had to schedule time in the gym every day - or else. The conversation was lively and friendly.

We had been talking after the meal for two hours when an aide from downstairs almost ran into the room and handed me a note.

Most of the downstairs offices were staffed twenty four hours a day. The second floor was Joint Chiefs, the intelligence group, CIA, NSA, and the group that fed information to the two guys handling the football.

The note was from the CIA desk, ‘‘You need to come down here ASAP.’’

I excused myself and almost ran to the elevator. At the Joint Chiefs station the CIA guys were there. On the wall screens were satellite images - the best the CIA could produce.

There was a firefight going on. On the ground and in the air, there was aviation involved. I recognized aviation as JBG Air Tractors and I was willing to bet the helicopters were JBG as well. I looked at the location index at the bottom of the picture. The location was forty miles west of Kano, Nigeria, which was sixty miles west of where the last village was destroyed by Boko-Haram and all the bodies were found.

I sent an aide upstairs to get Marcy, Jenny and the two boys, ‘‘Tell the guests I will be back in a few minutes.’’

The room had multiple computers and screens attached to big flat screens. I sat at the nearest one and logged into the internet, then onto JBG’s system and then onto the ID card system. The ID card system was what JBG issued to every employee; all forty five thousand of them and all seventy thousand college students and administrators.

The card had a locator and identification chip in it that could be activated by satellite to identify, locate and track the individual, if necessary. These cards were expensive as hell. They had helped us locate missing college students, cleared others of crimes and helped convict a few of crimes.

Now only IF there was a satellite connected to the system and IF it was close enough and powerful enough to activate it and receive the responding signal. The vendor promised worldwide coverage; did it really cover the most god forsaken places in the world?

The system was searching and the CIA guys were watching, wondering what the hell I was doing with a classified White House computer on open internet.

The satellite finally found something and the whole screen flashed tags. Lots of tags.

Jenny, Marcy and the two little ones came in. I put the two little ones in a chair beside me, ‘‘Sit, look and don’t touch anything, please,’’ I said.

‘‘These are the JBG men in Africa in this area. They are in the fight we are looking at,’’ I said for the CIA men.

By looking at the satellite screen and the screen with the IDs, we could put names with the tags. I clicked the search box and added a tab to each tag giving the name and rank. There were one hundred and thirty names on the screen.

‘‘Son of a bitch, look at that,’’ one of the CIA guys said louder than he intended. Rockets were being fired from the aircraft and helicopters. The puff of ignition and the explosion of what it hit could be seen on the CIA screen.

On the satellite screen four Air Tractors were flying with two helicopters and on the ground were three dozen vehicles or more.

We watched the dance as the Air Tractors were rolling and diving, getting set up and firing more rockets. On the other screen, there were men moving and running.

They had changed flying tactics now. They were flying straight. I knew what they were doing, they were street sweeping using the mini-guns. Killing everything in the brush and on the ground.

After a few minutes the helicopters moved in replacing the planes. The planes only carried five thousand rounds for the mini guns. The helicopters carried twenty five thousand in two racks and the barrels were water cooled.