Tom Clancy's op-center_ acts of war - Tom Clancy [56]
Coffey was anxious too, though he calmed himself by half shutting his eyes and picturing himself driving with his father and brother across Death Valley. The three Coffey men always took days-long drives together. The Coffey Beans, his mother used to call them, because they were always packed together in a metal can. He would give just about anything to be able to do that again just one more time. The senior Coffey had died in a small-plane crash in 1983. Lowell's brother had graduated from Harvard two years later and moved to London to work in the U.S. Embassy. Their mother had gone with him. Since then, Coffey didn't feel as if he belonged to anything. He had gone to work for Op-Center not just to have some impact on peoples's lives, as he'd told Katzen, but also to feel as though he were part of a close-knit team. Yet even in the ROC, that sense of belonging wasn't quite there.
What did it take to create that? he wondered. His father spoke of his bomber crew having had that intense camaraderie during World War II. There had been some of that in Coffey's college fraternity. What caused it? Danger? Enclosure? A common purpose? Years of being together? Probably a little of all of that, he decided. But despite their present situation--or perhaps because of it?--there was still a sense of dreamy contentment that came from lowering his lids just a little and pretending that his father was to his left and the mountains he knew were out there were the Panamint Range he had marveled at as a boy.
Phil Katzen was sitting at Mary Rose's terminal in the ROC. He was watching the full-color map scroll by on her monitor. On Mike Rodgers's screen was a radar display of Turkish aircraft operating in central and southern Anatolia. Katzen turned to look at it every few seconds. There were no planes in the region as yet. If there were, he would have been forced to identify himself and do whatever he was told. The Operations and Protocol Manual was explicit about ROC activities in a war zone. The printout was on a clipboard in Katzen's lap.
Section 17:
ROC Operations in a War Zone
Subsection 1:
Undeclared War In Non-Combat Zone
A. If the ROC is conducting surveillance or other passive operations at the invitation of a country which is attacked by an outside force, or at the invitation of a government which is attacked by insurrectional forces; and participation on behalf of the attacked country is legal pursuant to United States Law (see Section 9) and Administration policy, ROC personnel are free to operate away from the field(s) of combat and to work closely with the local military to provide whatever services are required, feasible, or ordered by the Director of Op-Center or the President of the United States. See Section 9C for legal operations under the National Crisis Management Center Charter.
B. Any and all activities by ROC or ROC personnel as outlined in Section 17, Subsection 1A will be terminated at once if the ROC is ordered to depart the combat zone by a legally empowered officer or representative of the recognized government.
C. If the ROC is present at the invitation of the attacking country in a conflict in which the United States is neutral, ROC personnel are to operate pursuant to United States Law (see Section 9A) and provide only those services which do not make the United States a participant in unlawful aggression (see Section 9B) or provide intelligence which is designed to protect the lives and property of United States citizens, so long as said action does not bring it into conflict with United States law (see Section 9A, Subsection 3) and the laws of the host country.
Subsection 2:
Undeclared War in Combat Zone
A. If the ROC is present in a zone and is caught in a situation of armed conflict, the ROC