“Exactly!” Poulengy exclaimed. “Perhaps the vision of your juggernaut barreling down on them will give the moderates in Idaho an excuse to break ranks with the radicals and settle this before you need to come to blows with their Guard.”

“And if they don’t?”

The senior general didn’t answer at first. Instead, he concentrated on his driving. When he did respond, it was in a mournful tone. “Scott, that’s why I picked you. I trust your judgment and discretion. I know without having to tell you that you’ll apply just the right amount of force, at just the right time, to get the job done.”

Scott wanted to thank his superior for the vote of confidence but didn’t. Instead, another image interrupted. This one was of a ten-year-old-boy, turning to face his father after hitting a baseball for the first time in a real game. Instead of running for first base, the boy flashed his father a smile. Scott remembered that he had yelled at Nathan that day for being so stupid and not taking off for first at a dead run. God, Scott thought to himself, why had I done that? Nathan had been so proud of what he had just done and he had wanted to share that pride with his father. With eyes welling up with tears, Scott couldn’t keep himself from muttering, “How, dear God, could I have been so stupid?”

To a man the staff of the 4th Armored Division was blurry eyed and a bit slow on the uptake. For many, it had been a grueling all nighter with scarcely enough time for those fortunate enough to live close by to run home, shower, shave, and throw on a fresh set of BDUs. Those who lived off post made do with a shower at the post gym. Since they were professional soldiers, they took this all in their stride. Every one of them understood that on a scale of sacrifices that soldiers were obliged to accept, loss of sleep was way down near the bottom.

Even if the division hadn’t been responding to a crisis, a goodly number of people in the 4th AD would have spent the night preparing. A visit by the Chief of Staff of the Army anywhere outside the Beltway is, to put it mildly, an occasion. Normally weeks of planning and preparation crammed with briefings, dress rehearsals, and walk throughs preceded the Chief’s visit. Often whole units were stood down from normal training activities in order to keep anything like training for combat from interfering with the visit. And while it is true that the United States Army didn’t invent the term “dog and pony,” over the years generation after generation of Army staff officers have honed that ritual until it has become something of a fine art.