David Weber - The Short Victorious War

"Let me be certain I understand this correctly, Sir Thomas." The Duke of Cromarty's voice was very quiet. "You're suggesting that we deliberately entice the PRH into attacking Yeltsin's Star?"

"Yes, Sir." Caparelli met the Prime Minister's gaze levelly.

"And your reasoning for this is?" Cromarty prompted.

"In essence, Sir, we hope to set a trap for the Peeps." Caparelli cleared his throat and activated a small-scale holo display of the Yeltsin System in the high-security conference room just off Cromarty's office.

"At present, Yeltsin's Star represents our most powerful concentration short of Home Fleet itself, Your Grace," he explained. "We've taken pains to keep our exact strength in the system a secret. Given the intelligence the Peeps seem to have on our routine movements elsewhere, it's quite possible they know much more about Yeltsin than we'd like, but Admiral Givens' plan offers us at least the possibility of turning that around on them."

He manipulated controls, and the tiny star system above the table was suddenly lit by tinier flecks of bright green light.

The Graysons have spent the last year fortifying their system with our assistance, Your Grace. We're still a long, long way from completing our plans, but as you can see, we've made considerable progress and Grayson itself is well covered by orbital forts. They're small, by our standards, because they're left over from the Grayson-Masada cold war, but there are a lot of them, and they've been heavily refitted and rearmed. In addition, the Grayson Navy itself must now be considered equivalent to at least a heavy task group of our own Navy—a truly enormous accomplishment for a seventeen-month effort from their beginning tech base—and Admiral D'Orville's Second Fleet is an extremely powerful formation. All in all, Sir, this system has turned into an excellent place for an attacker to break his teeth."

"But it also happens to belong to a sovereign ally of the Star Kingdom, Admiral." Concern and more than a hint of disapproval tinged Cromarty's voice. "You're suggesting that we deliberately draw the enemy into attacking one of our friends—without consulting them."

"I fully realize the implications of my suggestion, Your Grace, but I'm afraid we've reached a point at which we don't have time for consultations. If Admiral Givens is correct—and I think she is—the Peeps are counting down against a timetable they may have spent years perfecting. We have our own defensive plans, but allowing them to begin a war on their terms, at a time of their choice, against a target of their choice, is extremely dangerous. If at all possible, we need to draw them into a false start or, at least, into attacking a target of our choice. But to do that, Your Grace, we have to get the information we want them to have into their hands in time for them to rethink their operations and send out new orders from their central command node before their scheduled 'X' hour.

"The key to the plan is one of Admiral Givens' communication officers at BuPlan. The Havenite ambassador's gone to great pains to suborn him. He's been working for them for almost two T-years now, but what they don't know—we hope—is that he's actually working for Admiral Givens. To date, his reports have been one hundred percent accurate, but he's reported only information which couldn't hurt us or which we were reasonably certain the Peeps could obtain by other means.

"What we propose is to use him to inform the Peeps, through Ambassador Gowan, that the activity around Talbot Station has concerned us so deeply that we're transferring several of D'Orville's battle squadrons there as reinforcements. We'll be sending replacements to Yeltsin, of course, but not for two or three weeks. At the same time as he passes the information off to Gowan, we'll send the same instructions to Admiral D'Orville through regular channels. As far as anyone will know, it will be an absolutely genuine order... but the same courier boat will carry separate orders under a diplomatic cover instructing Admiral D'Orville to disregard the redeployment instructions. If the Peeps have sources in our communications sections that we don't know about, they may pick up the 'official' orders as confirmation of our double agents report.

"If our present analysis of Peep operations is accurate, they're probably coordinating from their base in the Barnett System. If we can get this false information to Barnett quickly enough, whoever's in command there will have a window to hit Yeltsin before our 'replacements' arrive. Only when he does, he'll find out none of D'Orville's ships ever left."

"I understand that, Sir Thomas, but what if he hits Yeltsin hard enough to take the system despite Admiral D'Orville's strength? Bad enough that we're asking our allies to take the brunt of the first blow, but what if that blow is heavy enough to conquer them despite all we can do?"

Caparelli leaned back in his chair, his face like stone. He was silent for several seconds. When he spoke again, his voice was heavy.

"Your Grace, they're going to attack us. Neither I nor any member of my staff doubts that, and when they do, Yeltsin will be a primary target. It has to be, given the shallowness of our frontier at that point. I realize the risk I'm suggesting we expose the Graysons to, but it's my opinion that drawing the Peeps into attacking us there on our terms is our most effective option. In a best-case scenario, they'll underestimate D'Orville's strength and attack in insufficient force, in which case officers like D'Orville and High Admiral Matthews will hand them their heads. And even if we lose D'Orville's entire fleet and Yeltsin, we'll hurt them very, very badly, and a prompt counterattack from Manticore should retake the system with an overall loss rate which will be heavily in our favor."

"I see." Cromarty rubbed his chin, eyes dark, then drew a deep breath. "How quickly do you need a decision, Sir Thomas?"

"Frankly, Your Grace, the sooner the better. We don't know that we still have enough time to bring this off— assuming it works at all—before they launch an attack elsewhere. If we do have time, we don't have a lot of it."

"I see," the duke repeated. "Very well, Admiral. I'll give you my decision, one way or the other, as quickly as possible."

"Thank you, Your Grace."

Caparelli withdrew from the conference room, and the Prime Minister leaned his elbows on the table and propped his chin in his cupped palms while he stared at the holo for long, silent moments. His was a politician's well-trained face, yet his expression mirrored his internal struggle, and, at last, he reached for his com terminal and pressed a key.

"Yes, Your Grace?" a voice asked.

"I need a high-security scrambled link to Admiral White Havens flagship, Janet," he said quietly.

Hamish Alexander paced back and forth across his briefing room aboard HMS Sphinx, hands folded behind him, and scowled as he listened to the Prime Minister's voice from the com.

"... and that's about the size of it, Hamish. What do you think?"

"I think, Allen, that you shouldn't be asking me that," the Earl of White Haven said testily. "You're undercutting Caparelli's authority by asking me to second-guess him. Especially by ignoring official channels to go behind his back this way!"

"I realize that. Unfortunately—or fortunately, depending on one's viewpoint—you're my best source for a second opinion. I've known you and Willie for years. If I can't ask you, who can I ask?"

"You're putting me in a hell of a spot," White Haven muttered. "And if Caparelli finds out about it, I wouldn't blame him for resigning."

"A risk I'm willing to take." Cromarty's voice hardened. "What he's proposing comes very close to betraying an ally, Hamish, and you happen to be not only a respected strategist but the officer who conquered Endicott and finalized our alliance with Grayson. You know the people involved, not just the military situation. So give me an opinion, one way or the other."