Vortex

Depressed and angry, he’d left his generals and deputies arguing over the map while he retreated to his private office. He slumped in his leather-backed chair, feeling his age and a few years more. None of those idiots had anything useful to contribute. Instead, they bickered and squabbled, interfering with every political and military step he took.

Some were traitors, Vorster knew. A few were actively in league with the enemy, and others would rather serve themselves than South Africa. Most of his advisors, though, were simply fools, unable to see with his vision or act with his daring. Panicked, they waffled and wailed while their nation was being shattered simultaneously both from within and from without.

Cut off from outside supply, invaded by Cuban and Allied armies, and with rebels and guerrillas running wild inside its borders, South Africa was on the verge of complete defeat.

Vorster scowled. He had no allies left. Even his most trusted political supporters counseled abject surrender.

Still, he had faith that his nation would rise again. Defeat by foreign armies was part of the Afrikaner heritage, but his people, the sturdy

Boer farmers, had always survived and ultimately triumphed. It was the farmer, the man of the earth, who had always saved South Africa.

Vorster frowned. The mines with their diamonds and gold and platinum had been a source of power, but now they were attracting the hyenas. The republic stood like a wounded lion at bay with the scavengers closing in.

The lion might put up a heroic fight, but it would fall in the end.

He glanced at the small, but beautifully detailed, map of South Africa hung on his office wall. It showed every major road, city, and industrial center. It didn’t show the territories captured by the advancing enemy armies-but it didn’t have to. Those lines were burned in his very brain.

The Cubans, the Americans, and the British were all closing in like a vise around the Witwatersrand and its rich mineral resources.

His hands tightened into clenched fists. If he and his followers went down in blood and flame, he only hoped his enemies would choke on their newfound wealth. God grant that they would fight over the mines and smelters until only a wasteland remained…. Karl Vorster stopped there, suddenly struck by an idea breathtaking in its very boldness. South Africa’s fate had seemed sealed, its future dark and grim. But now he saw a new road, a new option-one aimed squarely at the heart of his enemies’ plans.

STATE SECURITY COUNCIL CHAMBER, PRETORIA

Vorster’s cabinet meetings always started quietly. This day’s afternoon session was no exception. The intelligence briefer, an SADF major, gave the assembled group the latest batch of bad news in a steady monotone, his body subconsciously poised for flight. The President’s rages were legendary, and even the carefully filtered data he saw was often enough to send him into orbit.

Today, though, Vorster sat quietly, almost calmly. He seemed preoccupied by the document in front of him, and utterly uninterested in the briefer’s recitation of battlefield disasters and guerrilla attacks. He only nodded as the major finished and hastily excused himself.

Then Vorster looked up and smiled, an expression that seemed almost frightening on his haggard face.

“I bring good news, my friends. God himself has shown me the way to defeat our foes and save our people.”

What? He’s done it, thought Gen. Adriaan de Wet, he’s finally retreated completely into his world of fantasy. The general quickly studied the faces of the surviving cabinet members. Working with Karl Vorster forced one to develop a poker face, but he could read them well enough.

Marius van der Heijden looked troubled, but seemed the least affected.

The minister of law and order even seemed ready to believe the President really had found an answer to their problems. The rest showed their disbelief in a dozen different ways. Many of the military men on de Wet’s staff stared down at the map, looking for some operational scheme that they had overlooked.

“The solution to our present situation is clear if we go back to basics.

Our enemies are not attacking us for political reasons, but for economic ones. ” Vorster rose from his chair, towering over his assembled followers.

“The West gladly suffered our existence for forty years. The communists attacked us verbally and sent black guerrillas to terrorize us, but they did not move openly. Behind the scenes, the Soviets were very happy to make joint agreements on gold and diamond sales.”

De Wet and the others nodded, a little impatiently.

Vorster continued, “As long as the gold and platinum and chromium and all the rest were produced in steady stream, the world was happy. But at the first sign of trouble in the mines, they turned on us. The world’s two biggest power blocs, with everyone else cheering them on, have attacked our nation-nearly tripping over each other in their greed. “

Vorster smiled again, even more grimly this time.