Armageddon_ A Novel of Berlin - Leon Uris [212]
“Neal. Get Falkenstein and the other leaders together and get them calmed down.”
“They don’t believe us any more, sir. We’re sitting on our prats letting them shove our traffic all over Germany. General Hansen, we’ve got to face up to the fact that their next move is going to be a complete blockade.”
“I haven’t come to that opinion yet. The Russians are going to be careful about turning world opinion against them.”
“The Russians don’t give a Chinese fart what the world thinks of them as long as they get away with what they’re trying. We’re the ones who are always afraid of how we look.”
“That will be all, Neal.”
“Yes, sir.”
He left. Hansen pushed away from his desk and looked at Sean.
“Colonel Hazzard is right, sir. They’re going to blockade.”
“I know it, Sean, but I can’t let either Neal or the Germans know that I believe it, yet.”
The general left to pick up Senator Blanchard for a luncheon at British Headquarters. The senator’s people were so proud of the headlines they urged him to remain in Germany another week or two. Hansen dreaded the consequences. He considered the matter in the back seat of the longest, blackest, shiniest Cadillac in the American garrison as it sped toward the VIP guest house surrounded by a covey of motorcycles.
The house was a magnificent affair once belonging to Himmler. It sat on the Wannsee Lake. The living room had a great plate-glass wall that could be raised and lowered, a velvetlike lawn that swept to the water’s edge, and a private dock.
Senator Blanchard got into the car beside Hansen, the sirens screamed and the flags on the fenders fluttered as they moved north, skirting the Grunewald and the chain of little lakes as they moved toward Charlottenburg Borough.
Adam Blanchard was a handsome, lean man in his early sixties. He spoke with the smooth assurance of one who had survived many political dogfights over three decades.
He was aware of the coldness of the Berlin garrison after his press conference. In a very nice way he let Hansen know he was annoyed.
“As a matter of fact, Senator, this gives you and me a chance to talk. We are having a very bad time straightening out some misunderstandings as a result of your statements.”
Blanchard knew he was sitting beside one of the few military men he could not bully. He decided upon the blunt route himself. “Your record of antagonism toward the Congress is well known.”
“The basis of my antagonism has always been that the military has been more farsighted than the Congress. The fact that our country was forced to enter World War II unprepared because of a lack of appropriations or appreciation of the danger vindicates my position. You know, Senator Blanchard, if the United States had been strong, there might never have been a Second World War. And only strength will stop a third World War.”
The slap was unmistakable. Before the war Blanchard was among those die-hard isolationists; his new position on the Foreign Relations Committee had not changed the spots on the leopard.
“General Hansen, I admire your candor. Let me speak with equal candor. I have found waste and inefficiency in this military government operation appalling. Incompetence in the military is a subject with which I am familiar.”
“Senator, have you ever been aboard an aircraft carrier?”
“Certainly.”
“That piece of machinery is worth over a hundred million dollars. It takes three thousand men to operate her. She is the most advanced product of the nation’s talents, carrying the most sophisticated electronic devices known to man. Yes, sir, an aircraft carrier is something.”
“What is your point, sir?”
“The officer who commands such a ship makes nine to eleven thousand dollars a year. What do you suppose such a man would get from private industry running a hundred-million-dollar corporation with three thousand employees?”
“Now just a minute ...”
“I haven’t finished yet. It has become fashionable again to portray the military as stupid, shiftless clods. I’ll tell you something about what we’ve got here in Berlin. We have a cross section of the most brilliant