The Sum of All Fears.pdf - Delta Force

the subject of considerable joshing during his confirmation hearings, and there
was light-hearted speculation that Fowler liked Bunker mainly for his SecDef's
love of football. Bunker was a rarity in the Fowler administration, as close to
a hawk as anyone here, a knowledgeable player in the defense area whose lectures
to men in uniform were listened to. Though he'd left the Air Force as a captain,
he'd left with three Distinguished Flying Crosses earned driving his F-105
fighter-bomber 'downtown' into the environs of Hanoi. Dennis Bunker had seen the
elephant. He could talk tactics with captains and strategy with generals. Both
the uniforms and the politicians respected the SecDef, and that was rare.
Next to Bunker was Brent Talbot, Secretary of State.
A former professor of political science at Northwestern University, Talbot was a
long-time friend and ally of the President. Seventy years old, with regal white
hair over a pale, intelligent face, Talbot was less an academic than an
old-fashioned gentleman, albeit one with a killer instinct. After years of
sitting on PFIAB the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board and
countless other commissions, he was in a place where he could make his impact
felt. The archetypical outside-insider, he'd finally picked a winning horse in
Fowler. He was also a man with genuine vision. The changes in the East–West
relationship signalled to the SecState a historic opportunity to change the face
of the world, and he wanted his name on the changes.
On the President's right was his Chief of Staff, Arnold van Damm. This was,
after all, a political assembly, and political advice was of paramount import.
Next to van Damm was Elizabeth Elliot, the new National Security Advisor. She
looked rather severe today, Ryan noted, dressed in an expensive suit with a
wispy cravat knotted around her pretty, thin neck. Beside her was Marcus Cabot,
Director of Central Intelligence, and Ryan's immediate boss.
The second-rank people were farther away from the seat of power, of course. Ryan
and Adler were at the far end of the table, both to separate them from the
President and to allow their fuller visibility to the senior members of the
conference when they began speaking.
'This your year, Dennis?' the President asked the SecDef.
'You bet it is!' Bunker said. 'I've waited long enough, but with those two new
linebackers, this year we're going to Denver.'
'Then you'll meet the Vikings there,' Talbot observed. 'Dennis, you had the
first draft pick, why didn't you take Tony Wills?'
'I have three good running backs. I needed linebackers, and that kid from
Alabama is the best I've ever seen.'
'You'll regret it,' the Secretary of State pronounced. Tony Wills had been
drafted from Northwestern. An academic All-American, Rhodes Scholar, winner of
the Heisman Trophy, and the kid who had almost single-handedly resurrected
Northwestern as a football school, Wills had been Talbot's prize student. By all
accounts an exceptional young man, people were already talking about his future
in politics. Ryan thought that premature, even in America's changing political
landscape. 'He'll kick your butt, third game of the season. And then again in
the Superbowl, if your team makes it that far, which I doubt, Dennis.'
'We'll see,' Bunker snorted.
The President laughed as he arranged his papers. Liz Elliot tried and failed to