IX
On July 25, the White House held a press conference. The reporters present clapped sporadically as President Vanderbilt took the podium. Lack of the usual enthusiasm was a gauge of their concern, and Vanderbilt noted it.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the press,” he said, surveying the quiet, serious faces that regarded him, “and my fellow Americans, I’m glad of this opportunity to lay your fears to rest, and to cast some light on this situation. I will make a statement, then take a limited number of questions from the press.”
Vanderbilt glanced at his notes for a brief instant, his jaw working in a way that had become a noted characteristic, an unconscious manifestation of his thought processes when he was weighing which approach to take. He decided on his “comforting father” demeanor, rather than the “shaking his fist in the face of his antagonists” routine. Both were becoming the trademarks of his persona, and both were still fresh enough to garner a satisfactory response from the public when appropriately applied. Throughout his election campaign and his subsequent months in office, he had almost always used the comforting approach when he addressed concerns of policy that would affect jobs and similar domestic issues, such as economic matters of general interest to the nation. His damn the torpedoes approach was generally reserved for those small, sovereign nations, who for one reason or another, resisted U.S.-enforced United Nations edicts that dictated policy to them. Conflicts of those sort were generally only an immediate threat to the small nation and its neighbors, posed no real problem to the safety of American citizens, and so were not of great concern to the voting public, but his courageous image would be imprinted on the public psyche.
In the present situation, Vanderbilt had still debated, up until this moment, which tack to take. He decided that should his advice prove wrong, it would be safer not to be remembered as having dared the terrorists to “shoot and be damned.” He could further shift potential public ire toward the military, by laying his advice before the people as the collective wisdom of his military advisors.
He looked up and addressed the unseen audience of millions, focusing past the camera lens into the imagined living rooms of the nation. “I realize that many of you are concerned about the televised warnings, and the hysterics-inducing rhetoric that certain irresponsible media people have used to improve their audience share.” His disdainful eye drifted briefly over the assembled press contingent.
“Experts in the United States military, and the best scientific minds in our nation, do not believe that these terrorist threats have any real merit. This kind of communications-age goad is the greatest weapon in the arsenal of a modern terrorist, and he could not use it without the use of an information media that has instant access to millions of people. His actual power over people is magnified a million-fold by his ability to amplify the public’s perception of it.
“His principal method is to engender fear into the minds of the timid so that they become disorganized and at odds with the authorities, and behave in a way that disrupts organized efforts to combat him. That is where the term terrorism comes from. He seeks to create panic and distrust of the government. I ask you all to understand this, and to regain your sense of perspective.
“Ask yourselves, how could a nation, let alone a single man, destroy such a vast area as the Eastern Seaboard? Such a feat would require dozens of nuclear missiles, and the greatest nuclear powers on earth could not hope to do it with impunity. Let’s defeat this barbarous act of terrorism in the only way that it can be defeated . . . by ignoring it.
“If you will do this, these impotent threats will subside. The damage reported at Eidermann Air Force Base was greatly exaggerated by the sensation seekers. This was an old, almost abandoned, World War II airfield, in the middle of nowhere, which for the past thirty or forty years has been used only for the storage of obsolete equipment and war materiel. It was easily possible for some sensation-seeking whackos to plant explosives all over the place, and set them off with an ordinary timing device. Senator Bill Harford, Chairman of the Armed Services Committee, has conducted an in-depth investigation of the Eidermann incident, and he believes that it was accomplished in just that way.
“The United States Air Force Space Command and the United States Army Strategic Defense Command cannot confirm the initial idea that this was some kind of threat from space—an orbital weapon system of some sort. I don’t know who proposed such a thing, but experts assure me that such a weapon would be of considerable size, if it were possible at all, and that they can find no such weapon anywhere in the vicinity of Earth.
“Let me assure you that the Space Command keeps very close tabs on all objects in orbit about the Earth, and knows the position of every last fragment that might interfere with planned satellite launches. They can find no unlisted objects there.
“The authorities conclude that this is an empty threat by some demented faction that wants to have some sick fun at your expense. Let’s not give credence to these people, or even dignify such perversions by worrying about them. The authorities have things well in hand, and are seeking the perpetrators as we speak. I have no doubt that we will eventually find and arrest these people.”
Vanderbilt turned to his live audience: “Ladies and gentlemen, I’ll take a few questions at this time. I’m due at a Commerce briefing in thirty minutes, but I can grant a moment or two if you will keep your questions brief and to the point. Yes, Martha . . .”