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Forged in Iron and Ambition (Web Novel) - Chapter 815: Dead in the Water
Chapter 815: Dead in the Water
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The endless chatter of radio traffic echoed throughout the command center at Guantanamo Bay. Radio operators and telegraph agents desperately attempted to get in touch with someone, anyone, of higher authority back on the American mainland.But no matter how many minutes passed, the result was the same. One-way calls, pleading for a response that never came.
All the while, photographs taken from reconnaissance planes sat squarely on the table in front of the assembled officers. Each one was as silent and still as the dead.
It was a scene the likes they had never witnessed before. A naval force from a future age, that threatened to drown them all.
Carriers the size of cities with escorts that seemed almost too sharp in silhouette. No large bore guns could be witnessed mounted across their bows. And yet that did not fill the officers with any form of confidence.
Behind them were amphibious assault ships, and logistics vessels carrying men, armor, and munitions needed to stage a full scale invasion. It was a force designed to carry a million men to the shores of the new world.
Perhaps in the entire history of mankind, such a vast naval force had never been gathered... until now....
Now... Nobody present dared confront what was coming for them, at least not until someone gave them the order to do something, anything.
The silence between the command staff was drowned beneath the constant radio chatter until the man seated at the head of the table finally broke and sighed.
"Is this intelligence confirmed without a shadow of a doubt?"
An attache representing the Department of Naval Intelligence sat nearby, smoking profusely. More than two packs’ worth of spent cigarettes littered his ashtray, which by now was nearing critical mass. And yet still he managed to find room.
He stamped out the last butt regardless, his hands jittery as he reached for another, only to find the pack empty. With a frustrated breath, he reached instead for the hidden flask in his coat pocket.
Only after the whiskey hit his bloodstream did he visibly steady.
"I’m not exactly sure how a fleet that large, traveling directly toward our exact position, could be considered anything but a hostile landing force," he said. "But yes. The intelligence is confirmed through official channels, what remains of them, anyway."
Under normal circumstances, the attache’s tone and choice of words would have earned him an immediate reprimand.
But these were not normal circumstances.
No one present could find the strength to challenge him over decorum. In truth, his words did little more than briefly dull the dread that clung to the room, as radios, telegraphs, and telephones continued to offer nothing but silence from their supposed superiors.
Just as the commanding officer was about to speak, the intelligence attache interrupted him, anticipating the question before it was ever asked.
"Does it sound like we’ve reached anyone with the authority to authorize our next move?"
Even after the outburst, no one condemned him. As the commanding officer looked around the table, into the eyes of his officers, and then down at his own reflection in a now-cold mug of black coffee, he realized they all shared the same fear.
They simply lacked the courage to voice it.
He remained silent for several long moments as the radio chatter pressed in on him from all sides.
Then, finally, he snapped.
"Fuck it. Fuck everything," he said. "With the way things are back home, and with no one willing, or able, to answer our calls, I see four options available to us."
He exhaled sharply.
"And none of them are good."
Every eye in the room turned toward him. The commander looked exactly as they felt, haggard, exhausted, yet still standing before the weight of potential annihilation.
"As I see it," he continued, "our first option is to obey the last confirmed orders we received and defend this base at all costs."
He paused.
"The result would be our total extermination. For a nation we can no longer even confirm exists."
The words pressed down on the room like an increase in gravity. Several men slumped forward, heads lowered, shoulders heavy.
Before despair could fully take hold, the commander forced himself onward.
"Our second option is to surrender to the Germans without firing a single shot."
A bitter smile crossed his face.
"That would almost certainly brand us traitors in the eyes of whatever government survives back home, assuming there’s still a home to return to, and families still alive to greet us."
That last qualification hung in the air, unspoken until now, yet impossible to ignore.
Desperate to keep momentum, and hope, the commander pressed on.
"I won’t lie to you," he said. "Those first two options are likely the most honest. The remaining two only delay the inevitable."
He gestured toward the table.
"If we cannot fight, and we cannot surrender, then we must either abandon this position and attempt to regroup with whoever remains willing to resist the German advance... or approach Batista and voluntarily surrender Guantanamo Bay to the Cuban government, hoping our combined forces might stall the invasion long enough to make them reconsider the occupation."
Everyone in the room understood why the commander had called the first two options preferable.
The third option meant unauthorized abandonment of one of the most strategically critical positions in the Caribbean. Even if they managed to regroup elsewhere, arrest and court-martial upon return were near certainties.
As for the final option, Cuba alone had been unable to deter Spanish naval pressure, let alone stand against a multinational expeditionary force that now represented the full naval might of the Central Powers.
Silence returned to the room.
Even the radio operators had stopped calling for help.
The enemy was coming. Defeat was inevitable.
Now, the men gathered at Guantanamo Bay could only choose how they wished to face it, what banner to die beneath, or whether to accept the disgrace of surrender without ever firing a shot in their own defense.
