Chapter Two Thousand One Hundred Seventy-Six
7th September 1972
Mitte, Berlin
No one in this place seemed to be able to follow a straight line anywhere. That was Helene’s conclusion as she left the meeting that had just occurred that had involved herself as Minister of the Interior, the Minister of War, Minister of Finance, Minister of Transport, Minister of Agriculture, and finally, the newly appointed Minister of the Environment. The topic had been sectors of the economy, particularly State Industries, that lost money on paper but not really.
The Transportation Industry and the National Security implications were eternally of great concern. Roads, railroads, rivers, and canals all needed to be carefully managed so that every element was used in the most efficient manner possible. The trouble was that recently, certain newspapers had published articles about elements of the Transportation Industry that they deemed wasteful and archaic, but it was obvious that they were only looking at one or two parts without looking at the whole picture.
That had been the topic of discussion and Helene had listened to how the various bits fit together. One example had been how with the State control of the River and Canal system they were lucky to break even most years and typically lost money. What had gone unmentioned in the articles was that key industries were dependent upon that system and used it at reduced rates. The Steel Industry for example used coal and limestone, not to mention the ore itself. All materials that were heavy and took up a large amount of space. The most efficient mean of moving those materials were the canals followed by the railroads. Then the finished products needed to be shipped and even the waste products of the Steel Industry had their uses. The slag, mostly silica, was ground up and used as a component in road construction. Those were things needed to be transported cheaply. Then who was the customer who bought those things? Often it was the State who had given that very Industry reduced rates to ship materials.
There had been example after example of that. Farmers needed water for irrigation and the chemicals that made current crop yields possible, Builders need lumber, brick, and mortar, Bakers needed grain that had been ground into flour. It was an endless list of interlocking Government programs and private corporations. All because people wanted food on their plate, the roads not to have potholes, a roof over their head and didn’t want to pay out the nose for it. The result was the Government doing a careful balancing act involving subsidies and little things like charging below market rates for corporations to use the resources of State Industries. Helene had been reminded that a major part of her role was keeping anyone from disrupting any portion of the network.
Did that include well meaning, though ultimately foolish people, who would replace portions of that network with newer but less efficient means of transport in the name of saving relatively small amounts of money? Or removed the present redundancy within the system. Helene was under no illusions about what would happen if there were any disruptions to the supply chain, the cost of petrol went up, or any one of a thousand other things.
In today’s meeting all of that had been discussed at length. Then the conversation had turned to the latest plotting of the Chancellor, about whether or not he was going to call for an early election. Helene knew that he would do it if he thought that he could win an outright majority for his Party, removing the need for Coalition Partners such as Helene’s DEP. The press was already speculating about Red kicking Green to the curb. Which was all she needed at the moment. Sophie Scholl had told Helene that pre-election polling suggested they would finally breakthrough in Bavaria and Saxony was looking good, but she had heard that song before.
“We managed to clear your schedule for Friday, Ma’am” One of the Secretaries said, and Helene almost asked what exactly was happening. Then she remembered that Manfred was getting awarded an additional medal for his involvement in Argentina and that was when the official ceremony was scheduled. She would be attending with Hans. Missing that would be a political embarrassment even beyond how it would disappoint her son, especially with the role she had played in finally bringing that war to an end. Perhaps being outside the Government for a time would be good for her after all. On the inside, she was expected to play a major role as Minister of Interior and that was eating up all of her time.
Los Angeles, California
Lucia was still asleep when Ritchie got home while it was still dark outside. Stephen was wide awake, but in what was an extremely rare event, had not drawn attention to himself. Not yet anyway. So, carrying him into the kitchen and carrying on a one-sided conversation seemed like the best option at the moment.
“You will never guess how many bad guys your Dad busted last night” Ritchie said to Stevie who was busy blowing drool bubbles, not particularly interested in what was being said. But we all start somewhere, Ritchie thought to himself.
With that, the two slices of bread he had put in the toaster popped out. Ritchie could have made something better than toast with peanut butter, but that would make a lot of noise and create a mess. He was certain that Lucia would prefer to sleep.
It the wake of Manny and Suse having to practically sneak out of the country. Ritchie had expected some sort of blowback. All that had happened was that his Superiors wanted to know if he was preparing for the Police Officer 3 exam that was coming up soon. He had not realized that he had already been on the job that long. Word was that the LAPD Brass were almost gleeful that the Feds were currently tied up in knots, with the US Justice Department stepping in and Congress was going to be holding hearings. Who knew what was going to be happening next?