The Shield: a novel (6 page)

The Defense Minister relaxed for the first time since they met today.  “I have another project for you. It’s not as urgent but the sooner we do it the better. I know that you have an
AMOS communications satellite ready to be shipped to Baikonur in Kazakhstan for launch. How about launching it ourselves?”

The Director of the Aircraft Industries was so surprised he was speechless for a moment
.
“Nitzan, you were the one who killed that project five years ago.”

The
AMOS is a geosynchronous communications satellite weighing in at about 1400 kilograms and needing much more rocket power than either of the other spy satellites to get it into its high orbit. The smaller satellites weighed about one fifth of the AMOS and orbited much lower. They were light satellites, one providing high resolution imaging for commercial purposes and the other a military version with additional sensors.

“
That was in a different time and universe. We don’t have Baikonur and cheap launchers anymore. The only things on that site in Kazakhstan are sheep, and they will not help us much. So, what do you say?”

Nitzan Liebler was smiling. His old friend It
amar was obviously still in the process of adjusting to the new reality, but he was resilient and would be on top of the situation soon.

“
This is a serious undertaking, as you undoubtedly remember from the proposal we submitted to you when you were the Communications Minister.” Itamar smiled
,
“By the way, the new job fits you better. Anyway, it will be more complicated now. We don’t have access to parts that would have been purchased in the U.S. and E.U. Of these, I would assume the most time-consuming to manufacture ourselves will be computer chips for the navigation module. The rockets will not be as efficient as I would like them to be but won’t be the bottleneck either.” He stopped to think. “If we get the necessary resources, by which I mean money and priority access to one of the microprocessor fabricators, I believe that we can have the first AMOS in Geo-stationary orbit within six to nine months - if we are lucky, more than a year if we are not.”  He paused. “May I ask why we would need it?”

Nitzan’s smile was not
amused: “You may, but I will not answer, at least not today. Start the project and let my office know what you need – You’ll get it. Oh, and don’t be too greedy. I know you. Try not to feed too many side projects from this trough.”

***

It was early afternoon and the Prime Minister was longing for his customary nap. Working on Saturday was unusual in itself, but skipping his midday nap was most inconvenient. He looked at his watch again. It was almost one in the afternoon. He dialed his secretary.

“
Moshe, please invite the delegation in and ask them what they would like for lunch. Get me the usual.”

A group of Knesset members filed into his office. These were the members of the Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee. They needed to be updated on the situation and had agreed to come to the Prime Minister’s office instead of having him testify at the committee ch
ambers at the Knesset. The P.M. had asked for this dispensation since his schedule was too busy to accommodate a trip to the parliament building.  Amos Nir waited for everyone to get comfortable around the big conference table and for his secretary to finish taking lunch orders.

“
I appreciate you coming to see me,” he said. “It is a break with tradition and hopefully will not happen again. I have about an hour and a half – It should be enough to answer most of your questions.”

“
Amos, we know how busy you are at the moment and will take only as much time as we need to clarify a couple of issues,” the chairman of the committee and a rival of Amos’ for control of their party said. “I have an issue with a foreign policy decision that was made yesterday by the Defense Cabinet,” he stated.  “Why did you decide to open communications with the British Army in Syria? The Brits are not our friends and never have been. I, and others, think that we do not need them and need not maintain any contacts with them.”

“
There were a number of reasons,” Amos responded patiently. “The cabinet assumed the British command would realize something had happened as soon as they tried to contact their headquarters in Jerusalem, which our historians told us would happen about four hours after the Event. Getting no response, they would investigate. This put a limit on how long we could wait to make contact if we wanted control of the situation, which obviously we prefer. We saw no reason to lie to them or invent anything more bizarre than what really happened. Any lie would come out later and harm our credibility with no real gain for us.

“
We also had to take into consideration that the disappearance of British Palestine would deprive the forces fighting in Syria of their reserves and logistic support. This could lead to their defeat, or at best a standoff with the Vichy forces - not something we wanted.

“
There were also broader strategic considerations. As you so astutely mentioned, the British aren’t our friends. All they needed to do to save lots of Jews was to let them escape from the Nazis into Palestine. Not only didn’t they bother, but they actively hunted down any refugees who tried to run their naval cordon. Then in 1948 - of our time-line - they did their best to support the Arabs attacking the Jewish community in Palestine and to prevent the birth of the State of Israel.

“
But the situation is different now. We are the superpower here, at least in some respects, and do not need their favors since we can take anything we need by force.  We also do not need them as enemies – God knows we have enough of those in this world. Israel can greatly benefit from an agreement of cooperation on a number of issues with the British Empire. The Brits are not stupid, especially Churchill, who has a keen sense of history and knows that the Empire is in danger.  Additionally, General Wilson’s reports should make them understand that we can cause them serious grief but also be of great assistance. They will not know at this point that we can break them, or the Nazis for that matter, if we choose to, but they will see the advantages of cooperation. We need them to supply us with oil and, maybe, give us access to some of the oil fields they control but at this point in time don’t even know exist. We also need them to keep the Royal Navy out of the way as we will start work on our Mediterranean gas fields. Our limited military help should convince them to deal. If they don’t see their way to cooperating with us within the next couple of days, they will definitely see the advantages after operation Moses begins.

“
Speaking of this operation, we will need the Allies’, mostly the Brit’s, cooperation to have it go smoothly or we will have to damage them, which may influence the course of the war.”

The members of the committee looked at each other. No one could argue against
Amos’ position, so the chairman went on to their next question: “I have doubts about Operation Moses,” he said. “My misgivings are shared by some of the other committee members.” He looked around for support from the other eight members of the committee, who nodded encouragement, before continuing. “This whole operation will upset history as we know it, with unpredictable results. I am not sure that we should do it. Possibly when we go back to our own time we will not recognize the world and the changes may not be for the better.”

A Knesset member from a left opposition party added: “The basic premise for this operation strikes me as possibly racist and unfair. The other thing I
am questioning is your intent to contact the Nazis.  I don’t know how you can morally justify negotiating with those animals.”

The speaker finished and the room was quiet. Apparently the issues he raised troubled others as well.

Am
os was surprised by this reaction to something he considered self-evident. The only explanation for this seeming opposition to a good plan was political maneuvering. Everybody was aware of the new coalition negotiations taking place and it was likely that all this posturing was just to ensure a better position in the upcoming national unity government. He relaxed. This was familiar territory and he knew how to deal with politicos, though it was shocking that at this time of emergency some people would continue with their petty political games.

“
I will not comment on how racist or unfair operation Moses may be. My personal opinion is that the question is political correctness drivel. The world never treated the Jews fairly.  I’d rather leave this to future, or is it past, historians. The more important question is about changing the future. As of now, our scientists are not optimistic about our chances of going back to our own time.  But even if we could, we need to ask ourselves if we should.

“
History has already been changed by our presence here. We had to shoot down several British planes. How soon do you think they will have their own jets flying, now that they know it’s possible?
We used missiles to shoot down the Luftwaffe planes we encountered, so they will have no information – the pilots saw nothing and died in the encounters. We did not want to kill the British pilots and so used our jet’s cannon to shoot off their tails and give them a chance to escape. These pilots have probably seen something that, we have to assume, will be correctly interpreted by their experts. In our timeline the Germans had operational jets in 1944 and the Brits and Americans were not far behind. Even the least significant aspect of our technology will have unforeseen effects. If we go back now, it is likely that the world we return to will be generations ahead of us in technology and our edge over our enemies will not only be gone but we could be extremely vulnerable. It’s my humble opinion - and the consensus of the cabinet - that we should stay here as a superpower rather than go back and risk being destroyed. Here and now we have an advantage which we plan on maintaining. In any case, this is an issue for the Knesset to debate, or even for a referendum.”

“
Why the squeamishness about killing British pilots?” the chairman asked.

“
Since we hope to cooperate with them, sparing their pilots will make it easier. It was a show of both good will and air superiority, just like our help to them in Syria against Vichy. If they don’t understand this, we will make it clear soon.  We’ve also assumed that it will be impossible to keep the existence of obvious technologies, such as jets, a secret from our allies, and they are, or will be, our allies. This shouldn’t be a problem in the short term – they won’t have the technological base to build a jet that will be anything close to even our old ones for many years. We do need to be diligent about keeping the less obvious stuff secret. The Brits, and everybody else, will try to insert spies, which will not be difficult with Operation Moses going. We have some ideas of how to lessen the dangers, but we can’t eliminate them entirely.”

“
How about negotiating with the Nazis?” reminded the chairman.

“
As to negotiating with the Nazis: They are disgusting, but in this time-line the bulk of the Holocaust hasn’t happened yet and, as crazy as they are, we hope we can bend them to our will.  And if they don’t bend, we have the power to break them and we will not hesitate using it. As to our planned method of contacting them, we will do it in the most direct and forceful way. We don’t plan on negotiating with them in the usual sense of the word. It will be more of a ‘do what we tell you or die’ kind of negotiation.”

There were more questions, mostly clarifications of issues that were presented to the full Knesset earlier in the day. The meeting closed with all the committee members if not explicitly agreeing with the government’s policies, at least not opposing them actively.

Amos Nir was satisfied.

***

Thomas Harvey was both flattered and offended. He was the only ambassador to have a private meeting with the Foreign Minister.  This put him ahead of everybody else, and he was sure that the U.S. ambassador in particular was annoyed. On the other hand, he was pulled into the meeting somewhat unceremoniously by a Foreign Ministry guard. He decided he was more flattered than offended.  These were hectic times for the Israelis; he’ll give them some leeway.

“
Ambassador, I am glad you could see me on such short notice,” the Foreign Minister said when Harvey was led into his office. “We have things to discuss which I hope will benefit both our countries greatly. Of course your country, the British Empire, is not the same as the U.K. you represented, but I hope that you are loyal to the crown that exists in the here and now.”

Harvey was perplexed. “Minister, you announced just a couple of minutes ago that all the
ambassadorial credentials are null and void. Did I misunderstand you?”

“
You did not. I assume that your loyalty does not depend on your credentials?”

“
Sir, I am a loyal subject of the Queen, er… King.” Harvey said uncertainly.

“
In that case, let’s get to business. Let me update you on what has been happening in the last day or so.” Harvey appreciated this personal briefing.  After all, this country was under British rule now, in 1941.  He didn’t think the Israelis had realized that. The Minister told the ambassador about the events in Syria and the contact that was made with General Wilson.

“
Now we come to the interesting part,” he continued. “We would like to invite the general for a visit and it would be appropriate for the British embassy to host him for dinner. If you don’t wish to host him, we will skip that part, but I think it will be an advantage to everybody if you do so.”