The Yeomen of England (Posleen in England)

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

15^th July 2005
The Prime Minister flipped off the TV with a look of distaste. “I confess, I have some sympathy with the protesters,” he said. “Do we really want the SS back on our planet?”
“The Posleen will eat most of them,” General Whitehouse said wryly. “Think of all the evil people in Africa who are being eaten right this moment.”
The Prime Minister glared at him. “Think of all the leaders off sunning themselves in the Caribbean while their people suffer,” he snapped. “I spare no love for the Taliban, bastards to a man, but did they really deserve to have the Posleen make mincemeat out of them?”
General Whitehouse shrugged. “They would have been a thorn in our flesh in the future,” he said. “I don’t have the luxury of wondering if people deserved it or not. If they’d developed a better military tradition, instead of charging madly shouting Allah Ackbar, they might have survived the Posleen.”
“India has our tradition and look what happened there,” the Prime Minister snapped. “What progress have you made in Ireland?”
“Quite a lot, once we got over the protests, both at expanding the military forces and at using British assistance,” General Whitehouse said. “They might have a chance after all.”
“Good,” the Prime Minister said. “Details?”
“Well, Ireland won’t be building any Sub-Urbs,” General Whitehouse said. “They have asked us to produce them some Sub-Urbs, but the machinery is needed in Scotland and Wales, although we could send some of the Wales machines to Ireland if the Posleen break through the defence lines there. That…does give us – them – some motivation to get it right, first time.”
“We’ll make plans to move the Wales construction machines if we have to,” the Prime Minister said. “We’ll have to use one of the carriers to do it; its not like the ship is good for anything else at the moment.”
Neither man commented on the irony of one of the most powerful naval units in the Royal Navy, such as it was with most of its personnel transferred to Fleet, being relegated to humble transport duties. The Invincible and her two consorts were both powerful and capable, even though they were dwarfed by the American super-carriers, but against the Posleen, their air complement was worse than useless. The Sea Harriers would be wiped from the sky – for nothing.
“I’ll mention it to General Anderson,” General Whitehouse agreed. “For the moment, the Irish have been building conventional shelters and stockpiling food, but if the Posleen get loose, it will be a disaster.”
“For everyone,” the Prime Minister said. “Seriously, what are the strengths and weaknesses of the new Irish Army?”
“They’re capable and – once we got rid of most of the terrorists – disciplined,” General Whitehouse said. “They still have a number of strange problems with religion, such as putting Catholics and Protestants together when we integrated the two parts of Ireland for military purposes; the problem is keeping them reminded that fighting it out will only give the Posleen a free lunch.”
“The BBC has been doing that for us here,” the Prime Minister said. “Horror stories about the Posleen in India and Africa, and the videos the Americans made for the Germans.”
General Whitehouse nodded. “Their real problem is that they’re short on many weapons,” he said. “They have hardly anything that can stand up to a Posleen lander and survive the experience…”
“We have hardly anything that can do that,” the Prime Minister pointed out.
“While killing the blasted lander,” General Whitehouse said. “They don’t have many tanks and an ordinary anti-tank round is just going to be shrugged off. Apart from that, they really need more artillery and heavy machine guns.”
“We’ve sent what we can,” the Prime Minister said. “Arms are at something of a premium right now.”
General Whitehouse grinned. “Don’t I know it,” he said. “Do you have any idea how many weapons turned up when the Irish started? Hundreds of weapons, each from different parts of the Warsaw Pact, stored away for a civil war.”
“I guess that the Posleen will put a stop to that, just as they are in the Sudan,” the Prime Minister sighed. He knew that the Posleen had succeeded in bringing peace to the Sudan, but it was the peace of the grave. “How are you providing ammunition for them all?”
“With difficulty,” General Whitehouse admitted. “We could fill an entire series of Turtledove’s books with descriptions of all of the compromises we’ve had to make. If we have a couple more years, then we might be able to get everything standardised. For the moment, one regiment has AK-47s – thanks for the ammunition, by the way – another has German weapons that date back all the way to the First World War, a third has some American weapons that must have been smuggled in…and on, and on.”
“Someday I want to read your memoirs,” the Prime Minister said. He smiled. “Now, what’s the good news?”
“We have nearly half of Ireland’s male population and a sizable percentage of the female population, roughly two million, under arms or in training now,” General Whitehouse said. “Convincing everyone to work together has been…difficult, nothing like as bad as we have had here. Of course, few of those are armed.”
The Prime Minister smiled grimly. “And if unarmed troops try to face the Posleen, they will be slaughtered,” he said.
“We’re working on getting more Irish weapons into production,” General Whitehouse said. “However, it will be a long time before they’re ready to face the Posleen. We might end up sending them to die by the thousands, just to prevent the Posleen from gaining a foothold in Ireland.”
“Smothering the fire with their bodies,” the Prime Minister said grimly. “It’s going to be unpleasant.”
“It could be worse,” General Whitehouse said. “Remember the guy who came up with the idea of wiring all of England with nukes?”
“Don’t even mention that man’s name,” the Prime Minister said. “If the Posleen didn’t get us, the survivors would, assuming there were any.”
General Whitehouse nodded. “Is there any chance of getting more officers I can borrow?” He asked. “That’s pretty much the other main weakness.”
The Prime Minister hesitated. “Take it up with General Mathews,” he said. “If he feels that we can spare a few officers for the period between now and the beginning of 2007, then we’ll allow it.” He frowned. “We could run more Irish officers through the expanded Officer Training School.”
“Good idea, sir,” General Whitehouse said. “Thank you.”
The Prime Minister snorted. “Thank me if you survive the battles on Ireland,” he said.