Free The Generals by W.E.B. Griffin Page B

position to correct one’s dress.
    Brigadier General Paul T. Hanrahan was meditating on that point as he marched into the office of the JAF CG. The fur-collared zippered nylon jacket General James G. Boone was wearing was intended by Army Regulations for wear by aviation personnel when engaged in flight activities. It was, in fact, specifically prohibited to nonaviation personnel, as well as to aviation personnel when not engaged in, or en route to, flight activities.
    But there were four silver stars on each of the jacket’s epaulets, which meant that there was virtually no chance of anyone suggesting to General Boone that he was out of uniform. There were only two generals in the Zone of the Interior (the Continental United States) senior to General Boone: the Chief of Staff and the Commanding General of CONARC (Continental Army Command) and Hanrahan thought it very unlikely that either would say anything to him.
    General Boone was also under arms. He was wearing a “Pistol, General Officer’s, w/accoutrements.” The pistol was a Colt automatic, caliber .32 ACP. The .32 ACP cartridge was, in General Hanrahan’s judgment, only marginally more effective than a .22 long rifle cartridge. That is to say, hardly useful for anything more serious than shooting squirrels or holes in beer cans. The general officer’s .32 Colt was carried in a soft brown leather holster suspended on a soft brown leather belt. The belt carried three lines of stitching lengthwise and was clasped by a gold-plated buckle, which, when closed, formed a circle stamped (engraved?) with the National Seal. These were the general’s accoutrements.
    Hanrahan thought the “General Officer’s Pistol w/accoutrements” was something of a joke, something that would appeal to a recently appointed brigadier general of the Quartermaster Corps, or maybe the brigadier who served as Chief of the Medical Service Corps, who commanded the non-M.D. administrators and technicians who ran the Army’s hospitals. At the time of his own promotion to brigadier general, when he had been presented with his “Pistol, General Officer’s, with accoutrements,” Hanrahan had looked at it, cleaned it, and then put it in a drawer. He had never worn it, never intended to wear it, and was genuinely surprised to see General James G. Boone wearing his. General Boone, in Hanrahan’s judgment, was one hell of a soldier, and not given to affectations.
    Boone, a tall, heavy man with a pockmarked face and short gray hair, had been a major of Engineers when the Philippines fell in World War II. Refusing to give up when Wainwright gave the order to surrender, he took to the hills of Mindanao, where he proclaimed himself “Commander, U.S. Irregular Forces in the Philippines” and promoted himself to colonel—in the correct belief that only a colonel had sufficient prestige to successfully enlist Filipinos to his cause. When MacArthur was finally able to send troops back to Mindanao, they landed to the strains of “The Washington Post March” played by the band of the thirty-thousand-man-strong U.S. Irregular Forces in the Philippines, Colonel J. G. Boone (his promotion by then having been confirmed and made a matter of record by General of the Army Douglas MacArthur) commanding. There was no doubt in General MacArthur’s mind (he, in fact, would have done the same thing himself) that Boone was one hell of a commander and a soldier, even if he had refused a legitimate order to surrender and had the unspeakable arrogance to proclaim himself a colonel.
    Boone had gone into Korea as an Infantry colonel, and came out eighteen months later as a major general, in command of a division. He was now deputy commander of CONARC (Continental Army Command) and Hanrahan had not been at all surprised when Boone had been named commander of the forces that were going to invade Cuba.
    Hanrahan was deeply ashamed to come before General Boone in the present circumstances.
    “General Hanrahan reporting