The Command

“Now, I have nothing against women. My parents taught me to respect and honor and care for them, as Cindy I think will attest. My daughters are smart and capable. That’s not why I’m uneasy with those who, for their own political gain, are thrusting females into places they don’t belong.

“Battle is a brutal business. It requires choices and actions no woman in any culture is prepared for. It also takes total concentration. Concentration that will be disrupted when young men and women are attracted to each other — or sidetracked from their jobs by the kinds of accusations and rumors that are inevitable in a mixed environment.

“Women personify creation and caring. In many ways, they’re better than we are. Kinder, more helpful, more willing to sacrifice for those around them. They alone are capable of perpetuating and nurturing the species. This is their great mission.”

Ross took a breath, flexed his fingers on the podium. He didn’t look at the commodore. “Men are fitted for another task. Defending the home; and by extension, the homeland. There is a hard edge in us. Even, at times, cruel. It must be tempered by a warrior code. But in combat that ferocity makes it possible to win. Without it, defeat is inevitable. And the loss of all we’ve labored to win. Freedom. Democracy. Maybe, our very survival. The world may be at peace now. But as Plato said, ‘Only the dead have seen the last of war.”

“My own career is ending. I have no desire to stay. I have only respect for Commander Lenson. He is a war fighter. Like Petty Officer First Class Thomas W. Horn, the ship’s namesake, he bears the highest decoration for courage our nation awards: the Congressional Medal of Honor. I wish him the best. But I don’t envy the task he faces, because it’s against Nature and God — to make warriors out of women, to ready a gender-mixed unit for battle.”

Ross paused for a moment, gazing off over their heads. “Maybe I’m a stick-in-the-mud,” he said, almost softly. “What they call a traditionalist. But what was our navy built on? The traditions of honor, of confidence in our brothers in arms, and, ultimately, of victory. That’s what I learned off Vietnam, and on deployments to Westpac and the Med. From the men, the men, who went before me. Stretching back in a chain to Steven Decatur and John Paul Jones.

“The navy’s downsizing. Well, we can build more ships the next time danger threatens. But without those core traditions, will we still have a force that can defend the land we love? Tradition unites us. It inspires us. It sustains us in the hour we face death. Without it, I fear for our future — and for our country.”

He paused again, as if about to say more; then his eyes fell on Aronie’s. Dan saw no signal passed, not so much as a blink. But the captain’s face closed, and he ducked his head. “I will now read my orders.”

While he read out the paragraph of terse navalese, Dan unfolded himself. He joined Ross and turned the page to his own orders. “Proceed to the port in which USS Thomas Horn may be and upon arrival, report to your immediate superior in command, if present, otherwise by message, for duty as commanding officer of USS Horn.” He faced Ross. Snapped his hand up in a swift and perfect salute. “I relieve you, sir.”

“I stand relieved.” Ross returned the salute and shook his hand. Quickly, perfunctorily, without meeting his eyes. They both faced Aronie. “Sir, I’ve been properly relieved by Commander Lenson.”

“I have relieved Commander Ross, sir.”

“Very well. Congratulations, Carter. My best wishes to you, Dan.”

When they sat, all eyes turned to Dan. Who stood shifting from foot to foot, presented with a dilemma.

The spotlight at the change of command belonged to the outgoing skipper. The incoming CO was expected to confine his remarks to wishing his predecessor well. Yet Ross’s words required an answer. He couldn’t let the crew go with them ringing in their ears.

Was Ross right? Were they trying to force something that in some deep way cross-grained how the universe was built? He absently pressed his ribbons above his heart, making sure they hadn’t come loose.

He didn’t deserve the medal. The glances it earned him, the startled salutes. By tradition — that word again — every man in uniform saluted the wearer of the Congressional. But since the navy had awarded few decorations of any kind in the Gulf War, compared to the other services, Dan wondered sometimes if he’d gotten it to fill some ambiguous and unutterable quota.

And the even more sobering story he’d had at third hand: that the U.S. Navy hadn’t put him in for the award at all, that he owed it to a personal nomination by General Norman Schwartzkopf, who’d ordered the Signal Mirror mission.