Retribution (Soldier Up - Book Five 5) by Steven Linde Read Free Book Online Page A

everyone from officer to enlisted adored him. 
                  General Portson and his staff loaded onto the aircraft and prepared for departure, headed to Washington D.C. to meet with the President and the Joint Chief of Staff.  General Clayton headed off with General Moon and his staff to JFK Center. General Clayton’s mission was to examine what they were doing on Bragg and find what they were missing.  It was going to be a long day for General Clayton; he was given the nickel tour of Fort Bragg even though he used to live there many years ago.  It had changed after the event. It seemed that the soldiers had lost their spirit-de-corps because he could see it in how they carried themselves.  Where were the marching troops? Where were the formations? This was Fort Bragg, the home of the elite, but the elite looked to be gone. It was understandable to an extent that airborne soldiers were no longer airborne. 
                  Generals Moon and Clayton arrived at JFK Center, the home of Special Forces once there they headed into the building to General Moon’s office.  There were several senior NCOs that were there to great General Clayton and a few retired Green Berets.  All of them had served with John at one point or another during his or their careers. John was much respected among all of them.  General Moon sat down with General Clayton to talk with him at length about the operations on the West Coast.
                  “Alright John what aren’t you telling us?” General Moon said.
                  “I’m sorry General, I don’t understand the question,” replied General Clayton.
                  “You had help; you couldn’t have done it all on your own, right?” General Moon asked.
                  “Ah, I see …” General Clayton said.  “Of course I had help. The bottom line was that I had people in place that I trusted and trusted me.  A lot of it had to do with Dognillo and his powers of persuasion. I’ve never hidden anyone’s contribution to the effort.  In fact, I’ve done everything I possibly could to redirect all of the accolades being thrust on me.  You know we ran drill-after-drill on EMP scenarios and that’s why the underground facilities were built. “
                  “True, but it takes a Presidential order to open them John; you know that,” General Moon stated.
                  “I do, so court martial me. I did what needed to be done and got the job done.  Have you forgotten that’s our job, that’s the very definition of our job?  We take charge and accomplish the mission in the absence of orders,” General Clayton responded testily.
                  “Ok John, Ok don’t get your panties in a bunch. I meant nothing by it.  I’m just asking questions; to tell you the truth, we’ve been running our own operations in and around the various communities without General Portson’s knowledge.  My predecessor felt it necessary to keep the facilities a secret from the rest of the post.  However, we’ve been in and out of the facilities ourselves and taken out what we needed when we needed it.  He felt it was necessary to keep it a secret until it was necessary to open them,” General Moon said.
                  “Why is that?” General Clayton was a bit skeptical.
                  “He felt that the other commanders on post would want to strip it of everything and take it for themselves.”
                  “Why now then?”
                  “Well that’s a long story and not really my place to say but what I can say is that someone in the know let the cat out of the bag.”

Chapter Eight
     
    SFC Harris hadn’t returned to West Virginia as of yet. He was still waiting for the plan on how they were going to deal with Colonel Magnus and his bunch.  The plan was sidelined when one Colonel Lambert arrived