Drone

ARGUS-IS was an ideal surveillance platform for battlefield commanders, but civil libertarians in the United States claimed that such “persistent stare” capabilities were the equivalent of warrantless searches of private individuals. Ashley deployed ARGUS-IS over her U.S. targets anyway because Lancet had drafted an executive order exonerating Drone Command from any such legal liabilities should the issue arise.

With the proven ARGUS-IS system in place, Ashley decided to experiment with two other systems. She paired the new Stalker drones that, in theory, could stay aloft forever by means of an electric battery that was recharged by either a ground-based or air-based laser, to the new Hitachi camera facial-recognition systems, capable of scanning 36 million biometric faces per second—equal to the entire population of Canada. A perfect combination for finding their target needles in human haystacks.

Ashley even managed to borrow one of NASA’s repurposed RQ-4 Global Hawks. With a range of over eight thousand miles and an integrated sensor suite of infrared, optical, and radar systems, the Global Hawk could provide reliable high-altitude surveillance capacity if needed.

All the data collected by these various systems would be bounced off of satellites and then pumped into a specially designated terminal at the Utah Data Center, the NSA’s massive, multibillion-dollar data collection, storage, and processing facility near Bluffdale.

Ashley’s strike plans also fell into place rapidly. Radar-jamming UAVs would provide electronic cover in Mexican airspace if needed. She was confident that Drone Command would be ready to launch by the time Myers gave her the command to strike. Once the first attack was launched, Ashley and her team had just sixty days to complete the mission in the unlikely event that War Powers would be invoked by Congress and funding withdrawn for operations. Her personal goal was to complete the mission in twenty.

39

Washington, D.C.

On the morning of August 11, the White House communications director made a surprise announcement to the networks, notifying C-SPAN and the other news media outlets that President Myers was going to make a major policy address that evening at the unusual hour of 11 p.m. EST.

When asked what the announcement was, or why it was being held at such a late hour, the director replied, “No comment,” because she did not, in fact, have any idea what the speech was all about, which was highly unusual, and even more startling was the lack of a written transcript of the speech, which was typically provided several hours before any presidential broadcast so that both pundits and producers could prepare. Speculation was rampant.

Myers had been famously frustrated by the petty politics of state government as a governor, but that was high school locker room stuff compared to what one female senator termed “the jail shower free-for-all cocksmanship” that was Washington, D.C. Perhaps Myers was tired of the whole mess and craved the simplicity of just being the CEO of her own privately held firm, or so the speculation ran.

“Distracted” was the word most frequently used to describe her of late, but the frequency of use was due primarily to the fact that journalists were among the least original thinkers on the planet. The pseudopsychologists suggested that the death of her son had taken a deeper psychic toll on her than she or anyone else had imagined and that she was entering into a kind of post-traumatic stress syndrome. They further speculated that the stress of the office hadn’t given her the time to grieve, but they were unaware of the fact that Myers had refused to allow her grief to be televised for political gain.

Vice President Greyhill was on a trade mission in Toronto when he was asked by the Canadian media about the president’s announcement, and he also issued a “no comment.” That was because he, too, lacked any insight, and his own attempts to secure a private meeting or even a phone call with Myers were politely rebuffed by Jeffers. Greyhill wondered if the oil rig catastrophe had finally overwhelmed Myers and her staff. He’d long felt that the office was far above her limited capabilities and had raised that very issue in the primaries. She was an ingénue when it came to international politics, and practically a rube off the turnip truck when it came to the Beltway.

Greyhill had inherited both his father’s patrician good looks and his Senate seat, but it was his late mother’s Calvinist conviction that he was predestined for greatness that drove him. Why was he standing in a hotel room in Toronto instead of in the White House?