Chapter 165: Survival

From Erbil, we flew back to Incirlik, where I met Erdogan one more time and spent a last night in Turkey. We switched back to the 747. I found out that my promise of matching funds to rebuild the hospital had ended up going world-wide! In just a matter of days, the Buckman Foundation was on the hook for over $12 million for that hospital! This thing was going to be gold-plated by the time we were done. Marilyn just told me that I was rich and to get over it. Well, she was right, I was rich, so I got on television and promised matching funds for all private donations to build schools and clinics in Kurdistan as well. In for a penny, in for a pound.

Originally the plan had been to fly home from Turkey, but we had added one last stop. From Incirlik we flew to Ramstein Air Base in Germany. I had two purposes to this side trip. First was to visit Landstuhl Hospital, which was just a few miles away, and was where all the serious wound cases from Kurdistan ended up being flown to. They were even treating Kurdish Peshmerga and civilian casualties. That was really heart-wrenching. You had these great kids, many of whom, especially from the Azwya Valley battle, had lost arms and legs, and they wanted to get fixed up so they could go back to their buddies. I understood it, but it was still very tough to see. On a brighter note, Roscoe’s fiancée managed to make it there, and we were able to tell her that Roscoe was in good shape and safe. She was a very nice girl.

Secondly, Condi and Tom Ridge managed to call a NATO summit meeting at Ramstein. This was going to be a quick meeting, just a long day or so, and I was going to thank the NATO members who had been part of the Kurdish Coalition. The biggest help had come from the British, who had sent the 7 ^th Armored and a squadron of Tornado fighter-bombers, and Germany and Norway, who had sent chemical decontamination teams, medical units, and transport battalions. Foremost, of course, was Turkey, without which we couldn’t have done anything. I met with the various NATO representatives, and Tony Blair flew in from London, so I made sure I met with him and Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor. The countries that didn’t provide assistance, or weren’t supportive? They didn’t get too many smiles and handshakes, and they might find the next NATO summit meeting a little chillier.

From there, we went home. It had been a long day, and we climbed back onto Air Force One, and I planned to sleep a chunk of it. It was about a nine-hour flight, although with the time change, we would arrive back in D.C. about three hours after we took off. Very weird. We would sleep most of the night on the plane, and then land in the middle of the night, and I would be up all night after that.

Marilyn and I loaded last, and we simply settled into some of the seats in the front. Think first class, only nicer. Anyway, once we got on board, we were seated, and a few minutes later the engines spooled up and we began to roll. There is no waiting around when you are the President. We went to the head of the line.

Marilyn told me, while we were taxiing, “You need to call your daughter when we get airborne.”

“Which one?”

“Molly.”

I shrugged. My baby was twenty-two and had one more year to go to graduate with her master’s. She and Bucky were still going out, and she was spending her summer working at an internship at Harley-Davidson that Tusker had arranged. He was a major dealer for them and had some pull at their Milwaukee headquarters. Holly would be moving out completely in the fall when she went to Princeton for her doctoral program. She hadn’t settled down on any one guy, but by all accounts, she was as heterosexual as her siblings. She had told me she didn’t have time right now to settle down. Neither did Charlie, for that matter, who seemed to prefer slinky blonde models that he met at various races. He called them ‘bike bunnies.’

Once we were at altitude, I picked up the handset in the console next to me and asked to be connected to Molly. I hung up, knowing the massive telecommunications capabilities of the United States Air Force, the National Security Agency, and the White House Communications Center would be able to track down a college kid who was under surveillance and wasn’t trying to hide from anybody. A few minutes later, the phone rang again, and I picked it up. Marilyn had an amused look on her face, so I suspected I was being set up. I wondered what my daughter wanted now. “Hello?”

“Daddy? I am so glad you called! Mom said I had to talk to you. Actually, Bucky has to talk to you. Hold on!”

“Bucky?” I was talking to dead air. I looked over at my wife. “Do you know what is going on?”

She laughed and didn’t answer. After about sixty seconds I heard some scrambling on the phone, and then Bucky Tusk came on the line. “Uh ... Mister President ... I mean, Uncle Carl...”

I had a funny feeling about what was coming next. “I’m here, Bucky. What’s up?”

“Uh, well, Molly and I, we ... Uh, I am asking for your daughter’s hand in marriage ... uh, sir.”

I rolled my eyes and looked at Marilyn. I cupped the mouthpiece in my hand, and said, “You knew about this, right?”

She laughed. “Molly called me this afternoon, while you were busy. Quick, say yes before they get scared.”

I snorted and took my hand down. “Okay, Bucky, it’s not like we’ve never met you. You will be a welcome addition to the Buckman family.” I could hear Molly squealing in the background, so she must have been hanging over his shoulder. “Now, let me talk to my daughter.”

“Oh, Daddy, thank you, thank you, this is great!” She babbled on for a minute or so.

“Hold it, young lady. Let me ask you a question. When does the wedding have to be?”

“What do you mean?”

I grimaced and shook my head. “Is this a quickie wedding, as in we need to marry you off right away?”

“Huh?”

“Before nine months pass?”

“DADDY! NO!”

“Hey, I have to ask.” Marilyn smiled and punched my shoulder. “Okay. Listen, we are going to need to make an announcement pretty quick. If you told your mother, she’s probably told a dozen people already...” I got punched again for that one! “ ... so you’d better figure on an official announcement sometime tomorrow or the next day.”

“Uh, yeah, okay.”

“Here’s your mother.” I handed the phone to Marilyn.

She took the phone and told me, “You are a rat!” Then she spoke into the handset. “Molly? I just told your father he’s a rat!”

They started running me down, and I simply waved over one of the stewards, who was grinning. He must have either heard, or equally likely, Marilyn had said something. “I think we are going to need a bottle of champagne, please.”

“Yes, sir. Congratulations!”

“Yeah? Do you know how much weddings cost? It’d be cheaper if they just eloped!”

He laughed and went towards the galley. The rest of the crew around us was smiling, too. Marilyn must have said something! When he returned, Marilyn was hanging up the phone. She told me, “You really are a rat, and a cheap rat, too!”

“I love you, too, honey.”

The steward popped the cork and poured us some champagne, and we toasted an engagement. Then I asked the steward, “Do me a favor. Don’t say anything but go back and find Fletcher Donaldson and drag his lazy carcass up here, please. Thank you.”

“Yes, sir.” He set the bottle in a cooler and headed to the back of the plane.

A couple of minutes later Fletcher Donaldson came forward. He glanced around and saw it was simply Marilyn and me and a steward and an agent. “Celebrating, Carl? What’s up?”

Fletcher was probably the reporter who had been following me the longest, since the days I had been running for Congress while still running the Buckman Group. He had been calling me by my first name since those days, including through my days in Congress. Now, while he was deferential when others were around, when it was just us, he used my name, and I didn’t correct him.

The same was true for a few other top people and close friends. Certainly, my family and personal friends didn’t call me ‘Mister President’, and my Vice President called me Carl, as did most of the Cabinet, and the Core Four - State, Treasury, Defense, and Justice. Fletcher was one of only a handful of reporters who did so, and that group included Tim Russert and George Will, who I had known almost as long.

As a President I had to balance between an ‘Imperial Presidency’ and something a lot less formal. Both Nixon and Reagan were probably the most imperial Presidents, with a general disdain for Congress, a love of the perquisites of office, and an out of control ‘court’ of subordinates who frequently broke the law. At the other end you had Jimmy Carter, who would be seen carrying his own luggage and wearing sweaters while turning the heat down in the White House. He didn’t look non-imperial, he looked cheap! For what it was worth it seemed like I had managed to strike some sort of balance. No, I didn’t carry my own bags, but I did work with Congress, and while I certainly relied on my staff to get things done, I was more than happy to hold them accountable for their actions.

“Have a seat, Fletcher. Champagne?” I pointed at a seat facing back towards Marilyn and me and motioned the steward over. “Another glass, please.”

“Yes, sir.”

He was back a few seconds later, and promptly poured some champagne into it. I immediately protested, “Hey, wait, that’s the good stuff! He’s a reporter. He can’t tell the difference between champagne and swill!”

Fletcher grabbed the glass before the steward could take me seriously. “Ignore him. He’s heading back to America, where the people don’t like him nearly as much as the Kurds do.”

Marilyn laughed at that. “That is cold, Fletcher!” she said.

“But true, so true. What’s up?” he asked.

“Fletcher, I have decided to take pity on you for teasing you about jumping out of planes. I am going to bless you with an exclusive!”

Marilyn gave me a curious look, but Fletcher’s ears twitched, and he suddenly got a look like a pointer aiming for a quail. “An exclusive?”

“You are going to get one day, maybe two, before the rest of the world gets informed of one of the most momentous events of the Buckman presidency!”

He looked over at my wife and said, “Why do I have the funny feeling I am being set up for something?”

“Because you’re smart?” she answered.

“Nuts to the pair of you! Okay, Fletcher, actually it’s not going to be that helpful to you, but your editor and publisher might appreciate it,” I said.

He sipped about half his champagne. “Oh? While that might be enjoyable to the average reporter, I don’t live in Baltimore any longer. I moved to D.C. a few years ago, so I don’t have to see them all that much. What’s going to make them appreciate me?”

“Maybe the Sun’s Society page editor might like you.” I shrugged. “Anyway, I figure the Sun is our hometown paper, so you guys might as well hear about it first. Molly just got engaged. We just found out tonight.”

Fletcher grinned and said, “Congratulations! Who’s the lucky fellow? Anybody I know or might have heard of?”

I poured Marilyn and myself some more champagne and gave her a funny look. “You know, he might know him, after all.” I turned back to Fletcher. “Actually, I think you do know him, or at least his family. It’s Bucky Tusk, Tusker and Tessa’s boy. I know you’ve met them.”

“Ummmm, your business partner, long red hair? Him?”

I nodded. “It’s got a lot of gray these days. That’s Bucky’s dad, and we weren’t exactly partners. I was simply an investor in his bike shop. We’ve known Bucky since he was a baby.”

“Bucky and Charlie were business partners in a race team for a bit,” added Marilyn.

“Huh. How’s that going?”

“Pretty good, I guess. He’s defending his national championship again. We’re planning on going to see a few of his races at some point. There’s one up in New York at Unadilla where we can go see the races and see some of Marilyn’s family at the same time,” I said.

“So, when’s the wedding?”

I had no clue, so I shrugged and looked at Marilyn. “Nothing definite, but she graduates next May, so it will probably be next summer,” she answered.

“Are you doing the big White House wedding?” he asked, as he poured himself some more champagne.

That finished the bottle, and the steward brought out another bottle. I thanked him and said, “No idea. When was the last one? Didn’t one of Nixon’s daughters get married at the White House? Or was that just the reception?”

“My daughters are getting married in a church!” announced the bride-to-be’s mother.

I glanced at Fletcher. “I guess that settles that! Listen, we’ll be issuing a formal announcement after we get home and talk to the kids and the Tusks. Feel free to give your people a head’s up. It will all be official in a day or two, tops.”

With that I yawned, and Fletcher took the hint. He stood up and then refilled his glass. “I think I am going to take this back with me and make everybody in the press section jealous.”

I laughed at that, and after he left, Marilyn and I headed towards our room at the front, and we took our glasses and the rest of the bottle with us. Time for a little Mile High Club action.

Over the next few days, I needed to consider my schedule. It was now the middle of the summer, and we had a mid-term election to win. There were a few advantages to winning a war. My approval ratings had shot back up following Kurdish Dawn and Kurdish Dragon. I was now in the mid-80s, which I hadn’t seen since Enduring Freedom had destroyed Al Qaeda and the Taliban. I had a full schedule of campaign appearances across the country, assisting various Congressional and Senatorial candidates either hold their seats or unseat those pesky Democrats. That was going to take up the balance of my summer and go on into the fall.

One of the first things that happened, though, was a joint interview with the various armed services journals. Army Times, Proceedings of the Naval Institute, Air Force Magazine, Coast Guard Magazine, and Leatherneck all wanted to speak to me about the Kurdish War and my efforts on behalf of my fellow veterans. We agreed to a meeting in one of the conference rooms. The service magazines had an interesting readership. If you are in the service, you have probably run across them, and might even have a subscription, but otherwise the odds are you’ve never even heard of them. Certainly, long term veteran non-coms and officers would be familiar with their own service’s magazine. In addition, the writers and journalists are often ex-military, or if civilian, would have decent knowledge and familiarity. I wouldn’t have to explain the difference between a tank and an armored personnel carrier, for instance.

I think a big part of the interview request was that Al Jazeera had managed to tape my meeting with the Kurdish soldier in the hospital in Erbil. They had broadcast it throughout the Muslim world, translated into the local language, and the original English language version made its way to the American networks. American commentators mentioned that this was like my long efforts to ramp up employment and education opportunities for American veterans. Now reporters wanted to know my thoughts on the subject.

Each reporter had their own list of questions, but I suspected the interview would be reported in each magazine almost verbatim. I tried to give thoughtful answers.

Q: “Were you aware, when you spoke to the Kurdish soldier that your response would end up going world-wide?”

A: “Not really. Oh, I am always aware that just about everything I say or do is being recorded, and I knew there were reporters along, but otherwise never gave it too much thought. I was just trying to cheer up a wounded soldier, one ex-soldier to another.”

Q: “And what do you feel about the response to that, here at home and world-wide? It has been played in just about every VA hospital in the country.”

A: “What I told that soldier applies to any wounded or injured soldier, in any country. Many years ago, when I was injured, I received the same talk from another soldier. We are only as handicapped as we think we are. Life does not end when we leave the service. That service just takes a different shape.”

Q: “You have often told veterans and people ending their service to go into politics. Why is that?”

A: “Interesting question. I think, historically, that if we go back to the foundations of what we consider Western Civilization, and by that, I mean the Athenian democracy and the Roman Republic, military service was practically a requirement for political office. They didn’t expect you to be a general, but they did expect you to know which end of the spear to hold, and which end went into the other guy. That has certainly been the case in America as well, at least until recent years. Up through the Korean War, I think the percentage of the Congress which had served was in the eighty to ninety percent range. That changed after Viet Nam. Nowadays it is somewhere around ten to twenty percent. I think this country would be better served if that ratio were to rise again.”

Q: “How so?”

A: “One of the things I hear constantly are calls by what I call ‘chickenhawks’ to go to war somewhere in the world. These types have never served, and their children have never served, but boy are they happy to tell me and my children what to do! In my experience, the last people who actually want a war are the people who have already been in one. I might not be a war hero, but I saw enough in the Army to know just how bad it can get.”

We also got into some social issues affecting the services.

Q: “You are a proponent of gay rights. Do you plan on repealing ‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’?”

A: “I don’t know as I am a proponent as much as somebody who doesn’t think people should be judged based on who they sleep with. It’s not so much ‘don’t ask don’t tell’ as it is ‘don’t ask, don’t care.’”

Q: “But do you plan to repeal the current law?”

A: “No. I think that would be premature. However, I do think that time is coming, and sooner than you might think. My bet is that the current ruling on homosexuality in the military will be finished in ten years or less. It’s a generational thing. People my age or older want the rule, but not the younger generation. They don’t understand it or agree with it. Every time they take a poll on this the responses from the senior people in the services are starkly different from those of the junior people. Ten years from now ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ will be history. Twenty years from now nobody will understand why we had it in the first place.”

Q: “There are those who argue that having gays in the military will cause a decrease in unit cohesion and efficiency.”

A: “I seem to recall we had that same argument about blacks in the military and women in the military. We seem to have survived those two crises. In addition, I just love the people who claim that in combat having to share a foxhole with a gay comrade will be a problem. This just shows they don’t know what they are talking about! I’ve been in a foxhole, and the only thing I cared about the guy in it with me was whether he had enough ammo and whether he was going to do something that might get me killed. Never share a foxhole with anybody braver than you are!”

Q: “Are you going to loosen the restrictions on women in combat?”

A: “That one I’m not in favor of, but I’ll be honest about it. I think it’s because I’m enough of a dinosaur to think that combat is a man’s job, not a woman’s. Not everybody agrees with that, of course, and the law allows women into most military fields, and I have no intention of changing that. My biggest issue, however, is simply whether a woman is qualified or not. Men and women are different. On average, men are bigger and have much greater upper body strength. Now, I am perfectly aware that there are any number of women out there who can probably kick my butt, but on average the loads we carry are more than what the average woman can handle. Gender norming is what they use to get around this fact, and I think it is a pernicious problem. If I was going to be in combat, I would want the people around me to be able to carry the load, which just might include me. Then again, my wife and daughters tell me I’m just a grumpy old man, so I don’t think I am going to win this argument.”

My responses on women and gays made the Sunday morning shows the week after the interviews were published. As always, the religious right considered my remarks a sign of the end times and the collapse of civilization, and the liberals thought I was a hidebound antique. Some days you just can’t win.

At the start of September, I had one event which I was the host of and wasn’t political. The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra was beginning their fall season at the Meyerhoff. As one of their larger patrons, and the honorary chairman of their fundraising committee (funny how that worked out!) I had the privilege of opening the season up. As President I had missed some years because of scheduling conflicts, but this year I was available. It was a black-tie affair, a real gala event, and I would play host and shake hands with the powers that be in Maryland. Bob Ehrlich, the Governor would be there, along with Martin O’Malley, the Mayor of Baltimore, and any number of other state and city politicians, several Congressmen, at least one Senator, and a variety of bigwigs. The concert would be an evening of Wagner and would be preceded by a very nice (expensive!) cocktail party, my treat.

Marilyn and I arrived at the main entrance on Cathedral Street. We had driven up in the limo from D.C., which took no longer than flying from the South Lawn to somewhere in Baltimore and taking a limo from there. I was sure there was a place, a park or something, we could land in, but it’s rude to simply take over a public park and land your helicopter there. Once we pulled up to the front, we waited while the agents looked around at the rope line, and then a door was opened, and I stepped out, and then gave Marilyn my hand to help her out.

Camera flashes began going off, and I waved to the crowds on the other side of the rope line, mostly reporters and photographers. It was guaranteed that this would make the front page of the Society section in the next Baltimore Sun. From there we would head inside to the cocktail reception, which was invitation only. You couldn’t even get in the building without an invitation, and people would be entering through a discreet magnetometer system. I knew that agents were out in the crowd, and probably on some nearby roofs, and just inside the rope line was a line of Baltimore City Police officers.

Marilyn slipped away for a second and went over to say hello to Cheryl Dedrick. I waved, but then saw Bob Ehrlich waving and trying to catch my eye. I moved towards him.

“GUN!”

I didn’t even have a chance to look around. I heard a few muted POPs, but I was being bodily dragged back to the limo and was thrown inside. Tires squealing and sirens flashing, we were gone in a matter of seconds.

“WHAT ... WHAT HAPPENED?” I managed to get out. ‘WHERE’S MARILYN?” I looked around, but she wasn’t in the limo with me. I could taste blood, so I must have bitten my tongue when they grabbed me.

“There was a gun, sir! Mrs. Buckman is in the next car!” I was told.

I wondered vaguely where we were going, but they really don’t tell you that stuff. They had the plan, and the protectee doesn’t need to know all the details. Besides, I was feeling a little off, probably from nerves, and I knew I must have bitten my tongue, since I could taste a lot of blood, and my breathing was a bit difficult.

“Where...” I managed to say, and I could feel some blood dripping out of my mouth onto my dress shirt. The Residence staff was going to be pissed. It would never get clean...

“SHIT! JUMPER IS HIT, REPEAT, JUMPER IS HIT! DIVERTING TO SHOCK TRAUMA!”

Somebody must have been hit by something. I vaguely wondered who, and why everybody was grabbing me and tearing off my shirt. Then I didn’t remember anything more.

The next thing I knew, I was waking up in some place that seemed like it was a hospital room, but that didn’t make any sense. I hadn’t been hurt or sick, so why was I in a hospital? I tried to move around some, but I was stiff, and had a bunch of tubes going into both arms, and some more going around my head. None of this made any sense, so I tried to sit up, and that didn’t work either. I lay back down to try and figure it out.

I woke up a second time in the same place, but things seemed a little clearer. I was able to open my eyes, and the ceiling above whatever I was on had tiles and what looked like wires and hangers and medical type stuff around me. I was able to twist my head slightly to the right, and I saw some medical equipment, and I could hear a BEEP ... BEEP ... BEEP like on some hospital show on television. I could hear a few muted voices, but maybe that was on that hospital show. I tried to speak, but my mouth was pretty dry. I turned to look at my left but didn’t make it that far.

The third time was the charm. I came to and felt awake and conscious. I was able to turn my head and see that I was hooked up to a monitor that was showing my pulse and breathing and blood pressure, and it was obvious that I was in a hospital bed. A nurse was down at the end, and she was talking to somebody on a phone. And my wife was there. Marilyn was sitting in a chair staring at me and crying. What happened? Was I dead, and I was now in some out-of-body experience watching people hover around my corpse?

“What happened?” I tried to say it again, but it was just hoarse croaking. The nurse came over with a small cup of water and a flexible straw, which she held to my lips. Marilyn was now standing on the other side and holding my hand in a death grip. The nurse only let me drink a bit, and I moved my tongue around to wet everything. Then I had another sip, and could ask, clearly, “What happened? Where am I?”

“Oh, God, Carl, you were shot!” exclaimed Marilyn.

I gave her a funny look. “No, I wasn’t shot! Where am I?”

At that point, a couple of doctor types came in. “Good morning, Mister President,” said the first one. “Yes, you were shot. You are in the Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore.” The pair of them began peering at me and poking and prodding and shining lights in everything.

“Hey, wouldn’t it hurt if I had been shot?”

The second one snorted. “Trust me, sir, you’ll be feeling it soon enough.”

“Who are you?”

The second guy said, “I’m Doctor Hawley. This is Doctor Renfrew. He’s the surgeon. I’m the infectious disease guy.”

“Infectious ... what the hell is going on?” I demanded.

“You were shot last Friday at the Symphony, sir. They brought you here, and we got the bullet out, but then you got an infection, and it was pretty bad,” answered Renfrew, the first doctor.

I looked at my wife. “Last Friday? What day is it now?”

“Wednesday. You’ve been unconscious for over four days!” She squeezed my hand.

“Four...” I shook my head in disbelief. “What happened?” Nobody answered that.

I looked around the room, and noticed that there was an agent, one of my detail in the corner, and he was nodding his head. “Welcome back, Mister President. Director Basham will explain it to you. He’s on his way over now.”

“Who’s running the country now?”

“John was named Acting President,” answered my wife.

My eyes popped open at that phrase! “I think I’ve seen this movie before! Let’s hope it doesn’t end the same way.” Marilyn broke down at that and bent down over me, and simply began to hug me and cry. My right arm was relatively free, and I brought it up to rub her back, and in doing so, I felt that pain I had been expecting, in my chest. That made me groan, and I looked over at Renfrew. “Where was I shot? What happened?”

The agent nodded to the doctors, and Doctor Renfrew answered, “You took a bullet to the upper right chest. It wasn’t really big or powerful, but it went through one of your ribs and ended up in your right lung. You were brought here, and we were able to get it out fairly quickly, but you got an infection, either from the shooting or from here in the hospital, and we’ve been treating that since then.”

Doctor Hawley added, “It was pretty serious. We’ve kept you unconscious and on some pretty heavy antibiotics and painkillers for a few days. Yesterday you began to improve, so we began backing off on the sedatives, and here you are, awake again.”

“Huh. Four days. I guess I’m not all that important after all,” I mused, smiling. “So, I’m going to live?”

“Probably another thirty or forty years, sir, at least,” Hawley answered with a smile.

I snorted and smiled at that, as Marilyn rubbed my head. “Twenty, twenty-five, max, Doc. Alzheimer’s, strokes, and dementia run in my family. I doubt I’ll make it much past seventy and still be functioning.”