Shadow Knight's Mate by Jay Brandon Page A

many casualties, but we do not expect any more. The danger is being contained.
    â€œThe best thing all of you can do for your country today is to go about your normal lives. The attacks were very confined. Most American cities were not affected at all. Let us show the world the strength of Americans. We will live through this. We will prosper and grow.
    â€œOur intelligence services have been working through the night and will continue to work to find the source of these attacks. In the first analysis, we believe this threat to our national security is not from a … not from a terrorist nation or even a terrorist group. No group has claimed responsibility.”
    Now the President looked his gravest as he stared into the camera lens. Jefferson Witt had gotten elected partly because of his mature, thoughtful appearance. Exhausted by a cowboy presidency, a majority of Americans wanted someone stable and gray, even slow. Tonight Witt looked much grayer than when he’d been elected a year ago. His first visible response to the crisis was to look tired.
    But there was resolve in his voice. In his next sentences he would take the first major steps of his presidency, the ones that would define him for history. And he believed deeply in what he was about to say. His eyes grew livelier and his voice stronger.
    â€œBut these attacks will not be ended by reprisals, no matter how rapidly and forcefully we respond. That kind of reaction isfrom another age. That page of history has been turned.
    â€œEvery nation, no matter how powerful, is vulnerable to attacks such as we have seen overnight. They will not end by our destroying some terrorist bases or even toppling regimes and occupying whole countries. We have seen the failures of such policies in recent years.
    â€œNo. We are going to do what my advisors and I had planned to do already, what I campaigned saying America should do. A large majority agreed with me. Well, now is the time.
    â€œWe are going to begin withdrawing American forces from around the globe. We are calling our men and women home. They have been stretched too thin for too long. We will not demand more of them.”
    The President raised one finger and shook it as if reprimanding a class. “No more will America be the world’s policeman
or
the world’s whipping boy. We are going to stand down. We will be an equal at the world’s table. Other nations will have to solve their own problems.”
    The President knew the danger he faced. It was difficult to put a good face on this retreat, with dead Americans, many of them children, lying in hospitals and morgues across the country. But he and his speechwriters thought they knew how America would respond, and they counted on the fact that a large majority of Americans were exhausted from years of war and intervention. Jefferson Witt was a picture of strength, not of cowardice, as he continued to stare forcefully into the camera.
    â€œAmerica has never run from a fight. We have plunged into so many conflicts in order to save someone else. We are not running from this. But this is not a fight, not in any sense we have ever known. There is no other country to attack. We will continue to work to bring these attackers to justice, but that doesn’t mean we have to continue to support a huge military establishment in order to protect the world. That is not our job, if it ever was. This is not a retreat, it is a consolidation. A protection of our own vital interests.
    â€œI have ordered the immediate withdrawal of the first units of American troops from the Middle East, from Asia, from Europe.This will not be done in haste, but in a timely way we will bring all our forces home.”
    The President smiled. It was a slight smile, but on his craggy face, at the end of that terrible night, it was dazzling. The President’s smile reassured. His voice was hearty as he concluded, “This is the end of the age of American domination. But