“Is there any response from North Korea or China?”
“No, sir, we haven’t intercepted any at the moment, but things can change at any second.”
“Very well. Keep me informed of anything and everything of significance.”
“Yes, Mr. President. I or one of the staff will call you in seconds of anything occurring.”
In the ten-minute interval of flight time to cover the three hundred miles, a phone call went from Peking to an underground bunker complex two hundred feet below a granite mountain. The call was taken as the warhead exploded. In the phone call, the launch site was identified, it’s plotted trajectory, and the size of the warhead the missile carried.
At the same time, just north of Taegu, three maneuver battalions of the People’s 24th Infantry Regiment were converging for an assault on the critical road junctions of the Taegu and Hayang road. The South Korean self propelled 155mm. howitzer battalion received the fire order. The battalion commander checked the classified message against his code, had the special munition loaded into his Jeep and drove to Alpha battery, his “Go-To” battery, and informed the battery commander to load and fire it. “Captain, you are to personally check the firing data and lay of the firing gun yourself. You know what the warhead is.”
Very grimly, the Korean artillery captain nodded, “Yes, sir, I do. I just hate to use it over our own soil.”
“I know, Captain, we all do. There is little else we can do. The North is at the final line of resistance. We will retreat no more. Without United Nations or at least American support, we will cease to exist in a week if we do not use all of our assets. Fire the damned thing.” The Captain did as he was ordered. The special warhead was loaded into the 155 mm. howitzer, and fifteen seconds and twelve miles away, a one-half-kiloton nuclear weapon detonated over the North Korean Peoples 24th Infantry regiment at an altitude of five hundred feet. A very small mushroom cloud arose in a matter of seconds. Fires began to rage on the north side of Taegu. The southerly breezes began to gently move the cloud of alpha particles northward. The 24th Infantry Regiment of the Peoples’ Army no longer existed. Those in the supply trains who survived the initial blast and heat would die in forty-eight hours of gamma radiation poisoning, in seventy-two hours to ninety-six hours of bacterial infection of their massive third degree burns, all in spite of the anti-radiation pills issued to them by their government.
Ten minutes after the phone call from Peking was received, the North Korean leadership gave the launch order. The first missile struck the South Korean missile launch site. The island and the city of Makp’o disappeared under a ten-kiloton blast.
Jason Thornton’s phone rang again. Thornton dreaded picking it up. He knew what it meant and was overwhelmed with apprehension.
“What do you have, General?” not knowing for certain with whom he spoke.
“Mr. President, the North has retaliated with a nuclear strike on the South Korean launch site. We have no idea how many exchanges will occur before it ends. This one was a rather small blast, smaller than the one the South hit Pyongyang with. We figure in the ten- to twelve-kiloton range. The launch site was a small island off the southwest tip of South Korea. The provincial capital of Makp’o will get a good dose of the fallout, and sure felt the heat and blast. Damage assessment with greater detail will take a couple of hours pending analysis of satellite photos after the smoke clears. The fires will obscure the pictures to some degree. We believe the North Korean leadership was not in Pyongyang, but rather are orchestrating the war from an underground bunker deep within a mountain. There are several such possible sites, and we don’t know for sure which one they are at. It might be that different divisions of the leadership are in different ones; the military in one, Kim, jong un in another, other aspects of government in others.”
“I will have the Press Secretary call you for whatever details you think are appropriate for a press release. I would like to get that out in thirty minutes, before the news networks scoop us again. Have a list ready, and Roger McCall will call you in about fifteen minutes. I’ll leave it to your discretion as to what constitutes pertinent details.”
“Yes, Mr. President, I’ll have something together in the next few minutes. Thank you, Mr. President.” Jason Thornton hung up the phone. He punched his intercom button for his secretary, Peggy Parsons. “Peggy, get Roger McCall on the phone. Have him call General Craig at the Pentagon bunker right now. I mean, right now!”
Thirty minutes later, a second missile launched by North Korea streaked one hundred and twenty miles into space where over half a dozen satellites were orbiting overhead.
The small nuclear blast of three kilotons was designed to maximize the electromagnetic pulse of the nuclear explosion. All the satellites within three thousand miles went blank. Their cameras were burned, their communications circuits fried by the electromagnet energy from the pulse of the blast.
Roger McCall was giving his press briefing on the first exchange when President Thornton’s red phone rang again.
“General Craig here, sir. It has escalated. The South took out a North Korean regimental sized unit with a battlefield sized nuke, Mr. President.” There was a pause, some yelling was heard in the background, and then a hush, followed by a loud “Oh, shit!” from General Craig came over Thornton’s phone.
“Sir, the North just launched a missile into space. It took out our satellites over that region as well as the South’s. We’re pretty blind as of right now, sir! It took out some of our Global Positioning Satellites as well as some of our observation and communications satellites. I’ll order an AWACs into the area ASAP, Mr. President, but it might be several hours before we can get something there. Right now, we’re blind.”
“How much will this hurt South Korea, General? I suspect it is a devastating blow.”
“It is, sir. It should have affected the South Korean AWACs as well. We presume it is still in flight, circling around fifty thousand feet, but we can’t detect that. This loss of satellites also crippled our carrier battle groups standing in international waters. We’re waiting on reports from those carrier battle groups on damage assessment from the electromagnetic pulse right now. Reports would routinely come over the Integrated Link 16 Network where we would all receive the same information simultaneously. Now, without those satellites, it might have to be transmitted the old way, and up through the chain of command. If our Link 16 is down, we’re back to Cold War level war fighting, Mr. President, at least for that area of the world.”
As General Craig was speaking, a flight of three Mig 31s was climbing to fifty thousand feet altitude and engaging the South Korean AWACs with air to air missiles. The AWACs went down in flames after the missile hit the fuselage just behind the port wing. The entire plane was engulfed in flames and disintegrated. No parachutes opened.
“I’ll call Ed McCluskey and see what he can get out of the National Reconnaisance Office for replacements or repositioning some of our other satellites. I’ll get back to you, General.”
At that moment, Peggy Parsons walked into the Oval Office. “Mr. President, the DCI is on the line for you.”
“Thank you, Peggy.” Thornton punched another button on the phone. “I guess you just got the word, Ed. What’s your assessment, or is it too early? You couldn’t have had more than five minutes.”
“Less than that, Mr. President. The Director of the National Reconnaisance Office just called me. We’re pretty blind at the moment. He and his staff are working on an assessment and how we can best get back online, so to speak.”
“Ed, do we have to have a meeting here, or would the time be better spent working on solutions with the various staffs? Your people at CIA and the National Recon Office boys, doing your thing, I hope together. You know I would rather have people working on the problem than sitting in a meeting jawing about potential solutions.”
“I appreciate that, Mr. President. For right now, I think it is better if we have time to get our potential responses and alternatives together. We need a little time down here, but if you feel the need, we can fly up there from here in Langley.”
“No, Ed, stay down there and let me know when you feel a meeting is appropriate. I am sure you will liaison as required with the Joint Chiefs. They are mad as hell, I’m sure. I don’t like our carrier battle groups sitting out there blind. While there is no threat to them that I am aware of, I don’t like them compromised in any way.”
“Roger that, Mr. President. I’ll get back to you with something ASAP. I’ll get on the horn with the Joint Chiefs for their input.”
“Thank you, Ed.” Jason Thornton hung up the phone. “Peggy, get Roger McCall in here, ASAP,” Thornton spoke into his intercom. Three minutes later, McCall was standing before the President.
“Roger, the North Koreans just took out a bunch of our satellites, along with South Korea’s, with a nuclear blast in space.”
McCall whistled. “That’s why all the cell phones on those reporters in the press room starting going off as I was leaving. They want to know why their communications are down. What are we going to do, Mr. President?”
“Well, for starters, we are going to tell those news vultures out there that a North Korean missile aimed at South Korea’s communications satellites also took out ours. At the moment, we are compromised on communications with that area of the world. We are working to restore those communications by alternative means as soon as possible. Military requirements will, of course, have precedence. Civilian communications satellites will have to be addressed later. You are authorized to release that to the public. You will be bombarded by questions of how severely we are hurt, how long to get communications back up, both military and civilian, yak yak yak. Tell them there will be more details released as solutions are implemented. Don’t really let them know how bad we are hurt. Go to it, Roger.”
“Yes, Mr. President.” Roger McCall went back to the press room. Johnny Withers poured the President a cup of tea and set it on his desk in front of him and just stood there. Jason Thornton looked back, and then nodded. Withers took the hint and returned to the antechamber.
The President’s phone rang. Again. This time it was Marge Talbott.
“Mr. President, the Chinese Ambassador just arrived at my office. He would like to meet with you and me immediately at your office, if that is possible.”
“By all means, Marge, get your butts over here.” That was the first time the Secretary of State heard the President speak in street language.
Thirty minutes later, the Secretary of State and the Chinese Ambassador were escorted in by Johnny Withers.