Chapter 59

December Twenty-fifth 9:00 a.m. EST

Admiral Robert Hastings, Commander of the United States Second Fleet, glared dismally around the crowded bridge of his flagship, the USS Wasp. No matter where he looked, there was no good news to be had.

On one screen was a map of the military bases in the continental United States. Nearly every one east of Kentucky was marked in red, indicating that his communications ship had not been able to establish any contact. In the Midwest, there were a smattering of blue dots, showing that some form of communication had been established. The blue dots grew in frequency the farther west he looked until, on the west coast, there were only a few red ones. This was little cause for comfort, however. Even those who had responded had reported being attacked by their own soldiers. While damage and casualties varied widely, overall both had been catastrophic, particularly on air bases and army equipment depots.

The only source of relief on that front was that the nation's strategic assets hadn't been compromised. Indeed, it appeared that the attackers had intentionally avoided the silos and storage facilities that housed the U.S.'s nuclear arsenal. Even that news was bittersweet. Although it appeared unlikely that the weapons were going to be turned against the people they were built to protect, they also did the country no good. There didn't seem to be anyone left who could order their launch, and, even if there was, they could hardly nuke their own cities.

A second map showed the nation's cities and large towns. Most of the interior of the continent was grayed out, indicating that the status wasn't known. The only contacts that had been made were to CB radio owners along the coast a few miles to the west. All told stories of police turning against civilians, evacuation routes blocked, raging fires, and rabid mobs roaming the streets killing indiscriminately with their bare hands and teeth. A shudder that threatened to become a sob passed through him, and he wrenched his eyes away.

Next to the map of North America was one of the Middle East. It was covered so thickly with arrows and notations concerning troop concentrations and movements that it was difficult to make out the borders of Israel. His counterpart in command of the Sixth Fleet had indicated that, while the Israelis were holding their own so far, there was no longer a big disparity in equipment quality such as had existed during the Six Day War thirty odd years before. He feared that numbers would eventually carry the day, but without orders he could not intervene.

The Commander of the Sixth Fleet had also reported that his assets were divided, with some in the Mediterranean and the rest in the Persian Gulf. Reunification was impossible, or at least impractical, as a Greek freighter loaded with homemade explosives had rammed a supertanker at the Gulf end of the Suez Canal, closing it for the foreseeable future.

Yet another screen showed a series of high resolution aerial photos taken by the manned and unmanned reconnaissance planes he had been sending out from the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt since his task force's arrival shortly after dawn. The towns and cities of Norfolk, Portsmouth, D.C., and Baltimore were all in flames, and the most recent photos showed furtive groups of refugees fleeing inland on foot.

In each of the ports, ships, both Navy and commercial, had been scuttled in the harbors or in the channels leading to the docks. Other ships remained tied to the piers or at anchor, but the pictures showed that their decks were empty when the nearby fires would dictate that they be swarming with sailors.

He had dispatched planes to reconnoiter the other ports along the East Coast. If they were in a similar state, his task force was faced with an additional difficulty as they only had enough provisions and fuel remaining for a few more weeks.

Looking out over the waves, he could see the two Perry class frigates and the Burke class destroyer that were the only ships that had been in Norfolk the prior night and made it out. He had spoken to their captains, and all three had reported savage fighting originating in the ships' berthing compartments. Quick thinking by the officers on watch and the courageous defense mounted by the crews had allowed those ships to escape, but all three remained severely short handed. The reports of sailors attacking their mates using their teeth like some kind of animals made him sick to the stomach.