Love or Liberty, page 3
JoAnn sensed it, sobered up, and looked him straight in the eyes again. ‘Do you really think it’ll be okay?’
‘Yeah, I do,’ he reassured her. He really thought it would be, perhaps because he couldn’t imagine the horror of a nuclear war—not now, not ever. It seemed beyond imagination that mankind could do that to itself. ‘The Soviets must care about their children too. They wouldn’t be so stupid.’ He hugged her and prayed silently that he was right.
‘Well, anyway I thought we could go to this new place tonight. Mexican, since you’re home early,’ she said.
Jim didn’t nod. He had another idea.
‘And I was going to ask Fred and Wilma,’ she teased.
‘Who, Jack and Jill?’ Jim added.
They laugh for a moment, then Jim said, ‘Careful, or we’ll end up saying it out loud.’
‘Mike and Martha,’ JoAnn said, repeating the names, is if to etch them into her brain.
‘Actually, can we just keep it to ourselves today?’ Jim asked, ‘I don’t have the energy. And I haven’t seen you in weeks.’
‘Oh. Okay.’ JoAnn was surprised.
‘We could do tomorrow.’
JoAnn paused to think then said, ‘Sure, I’ll call them and let them know we’re busy.’
‘Why don’t we just sit out tonight and look at the sky? I have that book on the stars and it’s going to be a clear night. I should probably brush up for the NASA meeting on Monday. They might ask me something about the heavens I should have known in grade school.’
‘Oh, I see.’ JoAnn smiled at the idea. ‘That sounds like fun. I’ll warm up something for dinner if you’re okay with that?’
He kissed her again then said, ‘Maybe even sleep out, it’s so hot out there. In fact, we could go out beyond the city lights and make it a stargazing night.’
JoAnn laughed. ‘Sure. Sounds crazy.’
JoAnn warmed up dinner and straight after, they drove north east and stopped near the southern tip of Lake Houston, at a small hill with a wide-angle view of the heavens. Jim had come here as a youngster with an astrology club.
JoAnn laid out a picnic mat and spread a large blanket for cover, though it didn’t seem necessary with the heat of the night. The ice cream tub came too, she opened it and handed Jim a spoon while he searched the pages of his book under a flashlight.
Soon, they lay back and JoAnn began to feed him. He scanned the sky and pointed out what was what. At first, they both felt mildly speechless at the vast array of stars above them and the beauty of the moon which was low above the horizon. They wondered how incredible it must look from space, above the atmosphere, without dust or other lights in the way. Jim joked too, that the sky looked—to him at least—like a vast black bag that had been placed around the galaxy with pinholes for light to shine through. She pondered the mad idea and they mused that the big omnipresent light bulb on the outside was God himself.
With the aid of the book and a serial switching on and off of the flashlight, pausing for moments to let their eyes adjust, they quickly found the Little Dipper with Polaris at its tail. Jim said it was also known as the North Star. That, he knew. Next, they found Orion’s Belt, which JoAnn had already spotted, then Aries—Jim’s horoscope—which was a little more difficult. JoAnn put up a hand and drew an imaginary line from Polaris to Segin in Cassiopeia. She kept going double the distance, while Jim read and instructed her on what to do. Her finger ended at a cluster of stars which may or may not have been the ones they wanted, when they agreed they’d done a good enough job already. Sagittarius, JoAnn’s heavenly sign came next, though they were still at a complete loss at how to find it ten minutes later.
They lay still for a few moments and saw a plane’s flashing tail lights high above. JoAnn asked if the Soviet Sputnik satellite was still up there. Jim said he didn’t know, that things didn’t necessarily stay in orbit for long without power and that it had already been some years since it went up. He was sure it must have fallen from the sky.
‘I tell you what though. This is a good time of year for shooting stars up there.’
JoAnn snuggled up to him and after a moment of silent scanning, Jim said, ‘Let’s just make our own.’ He turned to her and they locked lips, just as a streak of starlight in the atmosphere flashed across the corner of his left eye.
CHAPTER 4 - SPECIALS
Some days later, Monday October 29th, 1962
Arriving at Ellington Field, Jim was a little surprised to be pointed towards a Gulfstream, which stood alone in front of an open hangar. Slender, with bulbous oversized engines, it was attached to a fuel bowser with grounds-men hurrying around it to make final preparations for flight.
He still had no idea what to expect when someone walked over from the other side and held out a hand. ‘Hi, I’m Tom Mitchell. You waiting on that plane?’ he asked.
Jim nodded. ‘Yeah.’
‘Cape Air Force Station?’
‘That’s right. I’m Jim Cobb.’ They shook hands. ‘Is it just us?’
‘I’m told a couple of other guys are onboard. I was just about to climb aboard too.’ Tom glanced down at his watch. ‘I think we should be on our way soon. Any idea what this is?’
Jim looked up at the sky and said, with a grin, ‘It just came out of the blue.’
Tom paused with a wry smile and Jim felt an immediate click between them, just like a pair of wings which had been bolted onto a new plane.
The fuel line was disconnected as they walked across the sunny tarmac and hopped up the small steps. They turned right inside the tube and saw two other men already seated inside the plush walnut and cream leather cabin.
The man on the left got up and shook Tom’s hand like they’d been friends for years. ‘What’s up buddy?’
‘Bean!’ Tom exclaimed. ‘I can’t believe it. You been following me around again?’
Tom introduced his buddy, Fred, with a wide grin. ‘He and I were up at Flight systems. Skunkworks.’
Tom turned to the other man. ‘And …’
‘…Chris James.’ He also stood up and shook with each of them. ‘Just the NASA guy.’
‘Navy—Enterprise,’ Jim added.
Tom Mitchell began to introduce himself as a Major from 4028th Strategic Reconnaissance Squadron, when the Captain interrupted from the cockpit door. ‘Gentlemen, please take your seats. We’re about to push off.’
They all sat quietly, faced forward and buckled in. The forward door was closed and the plane began to taxi to the runway. Before long, the big engines had pushed the plane eastward into the sky.
Chris looked like he was the youngest of the four, perhaps still in his late twenties, thought Jim. He was also the tallest by almost a foot. He wore a serious face with glasses, which gave him the analytical look of someone who read a lot. It was borderline money man to Jim. Buried in paperwork and having barely said a word at the outset, Chris came to life as they reached cruise altitude and the seat-belt sign was extinguished.
‘Gentlemen, I’d like to welcome you to NASA. You’re no doubt wondering why you’re here. Don’t worry, others are in the same boat … erh, plane, I should say.’
They turned their generous swivel seats towards him as he stowed papers and searched inside the pile of papers for something. ‘Before we go on, I’ll need you to sign something. Whatever we discuss here is restricted. I’m sure you understand that.’
Jim, Tom, and Fred looked intrigued as Chris handed out a paper to each of them. ‘It reminds you of your national secrecy obligations.’
They looked over their documents in silence and saw that they were being instructed on the Espionage Act. They scribbled their signatures and handed them back.
‘Tom, I was sorry to hear about Anderson. Do you know what happened?’ Chris asked.
Jim was aware that on Saturday, an American plane had been shot out of the sky over Cuba by the Soviets.
They all glanced at Tom for an answer. He said, ‘The plane’s still missing. It’s certain now that he didn’t make it. From what we know, the plane was caught by a surface-to-air missile launched from inside Cuba. There were no other planes in the air as far as we can tell.’
‘You knew the pilot?’ Jim asked, surprised.
Tom nodded. ‘Same squadron … running recon to check up on the build-up of Soviet missiles. He was caught out, just like Powers in sixty. The warheads are standing by out there, just as Kennedy spoke.’ He paused, then added, ‘I’ll be seeing Rudy’s family next week.’
Jim drew a sharp breath and frowned, then leaned forward and cupped his mouth without realizing it. It was the dreaded r word again. His father, Lieutenant Commander Cobb, had been shot down in reconnaissance when he’d discovered Soviet ICBM launch sites, SAM nests, bomber squadrons and nuclear submarine production lines, somewhere in Russia in forty-nine.
From what Tom hadn’t said, Jim now understood that he was probably a U2 jock, assigned to pilot twelve-mile high U2 spy planes for the CIA—which still didn’t officially exist. The Kremlin had tried to swat the little black midges from the sky in vain until they finally got one. Jim recalled the Russians looking as astounded at their success as the Americans looked wide-eyed and red handed, when American pilot Gary Powers was shot down in his U2, spying on the Soviet Union in sixty.
‘Jim, you okay?’ Do you …’
Jim realized that he had an audience. ‘No, no. I didn’t know him. We just … we can’t lose this war, that’s all.’ It felt to him, like it had done many times, that the Communists were closing in on all sides and getting ever closer to destroying the free world. He’d never say that to JoAnn.
‘Well, that brings me to why you’re here. Let’s first talk about the space program. Gentlemen, in late fifty-seven, the Soviets put their Sputnik satellite into orbit.’
Jim thought back to how the world had changed that day. The war against communism, to which he had pledged his existence after his father’s death, seemed to have spooled up again after Korea where it had never really ended. It meant the scourge was no longer confined to a distant alien country somewhere on the other side of the globe as people wanted to believe, but was now in their own skies. Sputnik was a new menace and people were shaken by the object circling out of sight above their heads.
‘That event alarmed the nation and galvanized Congress to set up NASA in fifty-eight. It inherited the Air Force’s Man In Space Soonest project,’ continued Chris. ‘You’ll know it as Project Mercury today. It put Al Shepard into earth orbit in May last year.’
Jim’s thoughts flicked back to the first spaceman. It was in April of sixty-one, that out of nowhere, the world was amazed to see Soviet Yuri Gagarin beat, by a mere three weeks, America’s Alan Shepard, to be the first man in space. The rumor was, at the time, that Werner Von Braun, maker of America’s rockets, was stubbornly opposed to a quicker launch of his own missile, which would have put America first.
‘Then NASA sent up John Glenn earlier this year, in February. Mercury now has further missions in the pipeline.’
Jim had followed those events. Glenn had been the first American to orbit the earth, but, by August just gone, the Soviets had usurped NASA again, with two record setting orbiting missions at the same time when just one would have done. It seemed to have turned into a numbers race when American astronauts also began to go up in twos.
‘You’ve seen the Soviets moving into space at breakneck speed.’ Chris said. ‘They are using six ICBM launch pads; two at a place called Baikonur and four at another called Plesetsk. Right now, they seem to be unstoppable and unbeatable.
‘But we have Project Gemini which will put our men in space for longer durations, to lay the groundwork for President Kennedy’s ambition to put a man on the moon by sixty-nine. You heard his declaration. About two years ago, the Marshall Spaceflight Center was opened in Huntsville Alabama and is already building the rocket which will take us to the moon. That’s kind of why you are here today. But more of that in a moment. We also have intelligence that the Soviets are close to sending a man outside into space, floating freely, to begin preparing for a landing on the moon. We, on the other hand, still have some way to go before Project Gemini will get to the same point. So, all indications are that they appear to have a big lead on us.’
Fred glanced at Tom to gauge a reaction, though he looked stern with concentration.
‘What do you make of it all? Do you think the American people will buy it?’ Jim asked.
‘I’d say so. They all think they’re going on a great big adventure across the galaxy,’ Tom said.
‘But, by the end of the decade?’ said Jim.
‘Sure, seems like plenty of time,’ Tom replied.
Fred jumped in. ‘Well, you know the Soviets are already building the N1 rocket. It’s a giant; have you seen it? I saw aerial shots and it’s an impressive beast. A real big fella.’
‘Yeah, so big, they say it’s visible fourteen miles up. It might just be a giant elevator to the moon.’
‘Some say we’re already out of time,’ Jim remarked, looking at Chris again.
‘I’d say someone needs to fire a rocket,’ joked Fred.
‘So, how do we stop them?’
‘Fire one of our own. Let them know we’re on it,’ said Jim.
‘Well, the moon’s been roped in. For freedom or tyranny?’ Tom added.
‘I sure hope the President knows how hard that’s gonna be, pointing at a dime in the sky, a zillion-miles away. I’ll bet he’s worried the Soviets will claim the moon as Communist soil. Probably wants to secure it at all costs. I reckon someone told him they’re planning to install nukes up there too. Imagine that, hey: nukes hanging over our heads. He’s right, we really do have to get there first.’ Jim said.
Fred grimaced and added, ‘But some people are saying the Soviets can’t even fund their program.’
‘Well, leaked memos show they’re actually planning to move out across the entire solar system,’ Chris interrupted. ‘And they do seem to be making progress. It’s been one thing after another since that Sputnik.’
‘The CIA has given us all a warning,’ said Tom. He recited: ‘An implacable totalitarian enemy with no rules of morality.’ He paused for the words to sink in, then added ‘They kill and incarcerate their own people. You can read all about it.’
Jim questioned, ‘The CIA said that on morality? Before or after the Bay of Pigs?’
Tom grinned at the irony. ‘We need to protect our freedom. There are no rules with such an enemy.’
‘You know, it looks like everyone’s trying to get in on the space action. Strategic Air Command doesn’t want the Air Force letting go of it. And DCI’s pulling in his direction too. Vandenberg’s in there somewhere,’ Fred added, glancing out the window. ‘Up here’s Air Force territory as far as they’re concerned. Can’t say I understand what NASA’s going to do if it all goes south and a war starts up there.’
They were all getting very excitable when Chris stepped in again to bring the discussion back. ‘We have reason to believe, too, that the Soviets have a lunar vehicle being prepared to survey the moon’s surface in anticipation for their manned missions. So, all in all, the truth is, that we are some way behind. But, we are accelerating. And, just as Jim said, we can’t let them win this race. So, the reason you are here is that each of you are invited to enter a NASA Special Operations program, to train to pilot vehicles into space and eventually, in larger numbers, go to the moon.’
The trio looked at each other for reactions during the ensuing pause, but they remained neutral and guarded.
‘Don’t you need test pilots? Or chimps?’ Jim asked.
‘They were requirements. But no longer,’ Chris replied.
‘Turtles?’ Fred asked.
‘Nope. The payload’s evolved.’
‘What about Apollo? Isn’t that what that’s for?’
‘Apollo’s going to get us there. But billions have been poured into NASA and the risk is high that it could be crippled in an escalating nuclear arms race, which would allow the Soviets to reach and dominate the moon first. That would be a catastrophic outcome and leave us years behind if the worst were to happen, even if it were then possible to catch up and regain an equal footing. You all recall how close we were to annihilation in Korea against the Communists from the north. And that wasn’t even against the might of the Soviet Union. The risks are too high and regaining a competitive position in space will not be easy in a space war. It may not be possible at all. We can’t be second, not against a totalitarian regime, gentlemen.
‘So, we have a Special Operations unit—a contingency—if things go south. As you can probably imagine, we are expecting to ship out to the moon and across the solar system in the next fifteen or twenty years and that’s going to require more than just a small handful of trained, experienced capable pilots, like those selected as the main NASA crew.
‘Another launch site is being built and you will be part of the backup plan. Some of you may even cross into the Apollo program at a later date, but that’s another matter and remains to be seen. You’ll have had all the preparation necessary by the time you’re called up for whatever eventuality we might face.’
CHAPTER 5 - RACE
A moment later
‘You’ll train alongside the NASA crew,’ Chris continued. ‘You’ll develop systems and missions and prepare to go to space. To get a feel for it, you’ll meet the others being invited into Specialist Ops too at the Cape Air Force Station later today. The second launch site is still on the drawing board. You’ll also meet a selection panel in around three weeks time.’
Jim had a query and ventured first. ‘But what do we do for questions? What can we say?’
Fred and Tom were clearly thinking the same and perked up for the answer.
‘Avoid questions and publicity. There’ll be no press. It’s strict secrecy. You will not be announced to the public; just like the Soviets, behind their iron curtain. NASA’s Gemini and Apollo may well become the show of the century, but you won’t be in the public eye.’
