Executive orders - Tom Clancy [45]
I see. Ryan closed the binder and handed it back to the warrant officer, who immediately locked the now-lighter document away. I take it there's nothing going on which is likely to require a nuclear strike of any kind?
Correct, Mr. President.
So, what's the point of having this man sitting outside my office all the time?
You can't predict all possible contingencies, can you, sir? the general asked. It must have been difficult for him to deliver the line with a straight face, Ryan realized, as soon as the shock went away.
I guess not, a chastised President replied.
THE WHITE HOUSE Protocol Office was headed by a lady named Judy Simmons, who'd been seconded to the White House staff from the State Department four months earlier. Her office in the basement of the building had been busy since just after midnight, when she'd arrived from her home in Burke, Virginia. Her thankless job was to prepare arrangements for what would be the largest state funeral in American history, a task on which over a hundred staff members had already kibitzed, and it was not yet lunch time.
The list of all the dead still had to be compiled, but from careful examination of the videotapes it was largely known who was in the chamber, and there was biographical information on all of them-married or single, religion, etc.-from which to make the necessary, if preliminary, plans. Whatever was finally decided, Jack would be the master of the grim ceremony, and had to be kept informed of every step of the planning. A funeral for thousands, Ryan thought, most of whom he hadn't known, for most of whose as yet unrecovered bodies waited wives and husbands and children.
National Cathedral, he saw, turning the page. The approximate numbers of religious affiliations had been compiled. That would determine the clergy to take the various functions in the ecumenical religious service.
That's where such ceremonies are usually carried out, Mr. President, a very harried official confirmed. There will not be room for all of the remains-she didn't say that one White House staffer had suggested an outdoor memorial service at RFK Stadium in order to accommodate all the victims-but there will be room for the President and Mrs. Durling, plus a representative sampling of the congressional victims. We've contacted eleven foreign governments on the question of the diplomats who were present. We also have a preliminary list of foreign-government representatives who will be coming in to attend the ceremony. She handed over that sheet as well.
Ryan scanned it briefly. It meant that after the memorial service he'd be meeting informally with numerous chiefs of state to conduct informal business. He'd need a briefing page for each meeting, and in addition to whatever they all might ask or want, every one would be checking him out. Jack knew how that worked. All over the world, presidents, prime ministers, and a few lingering dictators would now be reading briefing documents of their own-who was this John Patrick Ryan, and what can we expect of him? He wondered if they had a better idea of the answer than he did. Probably not. Their NIOs wouldn't be all that different from his, after all. And so a raft of them would come over on government jets, partly to show respect for President Durling and the American government, partly to eyeball the new American President, partly for domestic political consumption at home, and partly because it was expected that they should do so. And so this event, horrific as it was for uncounted thousands, was just one more mechanical exercise in the world of politics. Jack wanted to cry out in rage, but what