Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 05 by Shadows of Steel (v1.1) Page B

the President, of course,”
Whiting said, “but we need to discuss the attack on the civilian Naval Reserve
Fleet vessel, the issue of thirteen persons still missing from that attack, our
rights to conduct salvage-and-rescue operations in the area, and Iran’s
intentions should the United States or any other nation choose to send any
vessel, including armed vessels, through the Strait of Hormuz and Persian
Gulf.”
                 “ Madame Vice President , Iran feels that the presence of any offensive
warships in the Persian
Gulf will only
increase tensions further,” Velayati said. “ Iran strongly objects especially to the United States or any other nation sending any warships
capable of land- attack operations into the Gulf. You desire negotiations, yes,
but Iran feels that such negotiations with Hornet bombers and Tomahawk cruise
missiles aimed at our cities and military bases is not true negotiating—it is
bargaining at gunpoint, and we shall not stand for such. If you truly desire
peace, madam, if America truly does not want this conflict to escalate further, you will agree
to remove your warships from the Gulf immediately. We shall do the same. Iran will not look favorably upon any nation
that decides to send a warship capable of land attack into the Persian Gulf .”
                 “Minister
Velayati, your terms are much too broad for diplomatic discussion,” Vice
President Whiting said in complete disbelief. “You simply cannot unilaterally
decide to close the Persian
Gulf to any
vessels you choose, any more than the United States can close off the Gulf of Mexico or the Gulf of Alaska ...”
                 “We
will not accept any interference from America !” Velayati emphasized. “If America attempts to sail an offensive land-attack
warship into the Persian
Gulf , Iran will consider it a hostile act. We do not
wish war, but we are prepared to defend our rights and our freedoms! America wants another Desert Storm with Iran ! No more Desert Storms! No more warships in
the Persian Gulf ! No more war! ” And the line went dead.
                 Whiting
dropped the phone back in its cradle, then sat back in the couch in the Oval
Office, where she had taken the call. “I’m too young and innocent for this, Mr.
President,” she quipped. That was an exaggeration, of course. As the former
Governor of Delaware and a former United Nations Deputy Ambassador, Whiting was
well equipped to take on anyone in an argument.
                 “Hell,
Ellen, Velayati was educated at Oxford —he’s supposed to respect women,” President Kevin Martindale said, trying to help his
Vice President unclench her jaw. “I thought he was a pussycat.” Whiting was not
going to relax that easily—her lips were tight, her eyes narrow and hard as she
made her way back to her seat around the coffee table in the Oval Office.
                 “Okay,
ladies and gents, what in hell is going wrong around here?” the President
asked. Recently elected and only forty-nine years old, divorced, with two grown
children, he was in tremendously good health and vitality although the stress
of forming a new government was bound to take its toll on his boyish good
looks. Today he was dressed in gray slacks, business shoes, and a conservative
white shirt under a thick cardigan sweater. His thick salt-and- pepper gray
hair was neady in place except for the famous “photographer’s dream,” a thick
lock of bright silver hair that curled defiantly down across his forehead over
his left eye when he got angry. The end of the lock was pointed, like the Grim
Reaper’s scythe. If a second one appeared over the right eye, heads would roll.
                With the President and the Vice
President was Secretary of State Jeffrey Hartman; Secretary of Defense Arthur
Chastain; Philip Freeman, the President’s National Security Advisor; and
Charles Ricardo, the White House