How I Got US Aid in South America

A week had passed since the civil war ended. In that time, events had torn through the country like a storm.

First, we ran a full investigation of every officer and enlisted man in the 1st Infantry Division and the Artillery Regiment, sifted out the ones who had actively taken part, and handed down summary punishment for insurrection and treason.

Why punish them without a trial, you ask?

Because the great nation of San Marcos has no law school, and therefore no professional judges, prosecutors, or lawyers. The legal profession is staffed by sitting a judicial exam for anyone who has worked in the courts for five years or more. How is a proper jurist supposed to come out of that? The whole apparatus has been a nest of corruption for a long time, but the judiciary is a story for another ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠day. For now, the sentences themselves were simple.

The two ringleaders, Garcia and Dani, each received forty years. The nineteen officers who had actively joined them were given a blanket ten years apiece. As for the officers whose families had been taken hostage and who had been forced to participate, and the enlisted men who had had no choice but to follow their superiors' orders — every last one of them was acquitted.

"The sentences seem far too light, Your Excellency. This is treason, after all. I would suggest that the two ringleaders, at the very least, be executed by public firing squad."

"......"

Isabella offered her opinion that the punishment was too lenient, and that a public firing squad might be in order. I shut it down at once.

"That is no way to achieve national unity. Only forgiveness and reconciliation can bring San Marcos together."

A nonviolent humanitarian, a latter-day Gandhi in the making, I rejected the idea without hesitation.

Executing them wouldn't even help the country. What's the point?

Of course, a sentence was a sentence and money was money, so the damages for losses the state had suffered were assessed down to the last dollar. The war, drones included, had cost us a little over two hundred million. On that basis, I seized every last asset the Motinho brothers owned.

We tore through their accounts with a fine-toothed comb and found about seven million in liquid assets between the two of them.

Their salary is a thousand dollars a month. How the hell did they accumulate that kind of money?

On top of that, the safe in the division commander's office held five million dollars' worth of diamonds of completely unknown origin. Even so, that still left one hundred and eighty-three million outstanding — but there was no need to worry. In the open nation of San Marcos, a man can work off what he owes. Labor in the coal mines knocks twelve dollars a day off the debt, so if the two of them put their backs into it, they will pay it all back eventually.

The repayment period is unlimited, and I'm not even charging interest.

What country on earth offers criminals a deal like this? You could call San Marcos a human-rights state on par with Scandinavia and you wouldn't be stretching it.

"Damn right."

I was nodding to myself in warm satisfaction when Isabella spoke up.

"Your Excellency, Major General Bruno Alves, commander of the 2nd Infantry Division, is waiting outside."

"Ah, is it that time already? Send him in."

The 2nd Infantry Division. They had not joined the rebellion — but they had not come to put it down, either. Of all the units in the civil war, theirs had been the most thoroughly ambiguous position. I couldn't punish them, and leaving them alone left a bad taste in my mouth. Still, I had decided to settle the matter while I had the chance.

There's no law that says something like this can't happen again.

A moment later the office door opened and Major General Bruno stepped inside.

"Glory to San Marcos!"

A man with salt-and-pepper hair and the face of somebody's next-door neighbor snapped off a salute the instant he crossed the threshold.

"Y-you summoned me, Your Excellency!"

He had every reason to be nervous. Garcia, a man in the same position as himself, had raised a rebellion; he was not so stupid as to miss that he was under suspicion too. I deliberately said nothing and stared at him. The longer the silence stretched, the more visibly his legs began to shake.

"Sit down."

"N-no, sir! I'm more comfortable standing!"

"I'm the one who's uncomfortable. Sit."

"Yes, sir!"

He perched on the sofa's armrest, barely letting his backside make contact.

Why is he sitting THERE? Is his ass itchy?

"Major General Bruno."

"Sir!"

"During the civil war, the 2nd Division was remarkably quiet."

"Th-that's...!"

His face went ashen.

"W-we simply couldn't move rashly, Your Excellency — for fear ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the border defenses would be left exposed! It's the truth! Please believe me!"

"No."

Borders? On an island nation surrounded by ocean on all sides?

I let out a breath. It was absurd, but I decided not to press him. In the San Marcos of this moment, with a civil war only just over, what the country needed was stability.

"I know. You're a cautious man, Major General."

"Y-Your Excellency..."

"Which is why I wanted to talk to you. I'm ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠looking to change the structure of the army."

I slid the reorganization plan across the desk toward him.

"The dissolution of the 1st Infantry Division has left a considerable gap in the army. The armored division will cover it for the time being, but that can't go on forever."

"That's true, sir."

"So I intend to take this opportunity to reorganize the 1st and 2nd Infantry Divisions into eastern and western defense divisions, respectively. The 1st becomes the East Defense Division. The 2nd becomes the West Defense Division."

"Sir? Then it's the same as now..."

"It is not the same at all. The names are different, for one thing."

"I-I suppose they are."

"In any case, since we're reorganizing, I'll be sending in new commanders, and..."

"......"

I looked at him as he fidgeted on the armrest.

"How would you feel about taking off the uniform and trying a government post?"

"A g-government post, sir?"

"As it happens, the First Vice Minister of National Defense seat is vacant. I think a man of your caliber would do very well in it."

"Th-that's very sudden, I..."

"What? Not interested?"

"N-no, sir! How could I not be! I, Bruno Alves, am prepared to leap into a pit of fire or a pit of water if Your Excellency so commands! Just give me the assignment! I'll do it better than anyone!"

"I knew I had the right man."

I walked over to where he was perched on the armrest and held out my hand.

"Then I'll be counting on you. I'm going to need a lot of help."

"It would be an honor, Your Excellency!"

"Commander Pedro will be waiting. The two of you will need to work closely together, so go pay your respects before you leave. The Senior Presidential Secretary for Defense will fill you in on the discharge and the appointment."

"Yes, sir!"

Bruno fled the office as if the floor were on fire. The moment the door closed, Isabella came over.

"Your Excellency's schemes are truly formidable."

"What do you mean?"

"You assigned the First Vice Minister post to that untrustworthy creature, did you not?"

"Well... they say keep your friends close and your enemies closer. I'd rather have him where I can watch him than sit around worrying about what he's getting up to out of sight."

"And he will fail the next civil service competency examination of his own accord."

"Ah..."

Right. He was going to flunk it and get dragged off anyway. Major General Bruno had gone from high school straight into the military academy and spent his entire life as a soldier. A man whose mind had set like concrete had a probability of passing that exam that converged on zero.

Isabella nodded, deeply impressed.

"Your Excellency always has a plan."

"I-it's nothing, really."

In any event, with Bruno's reassignment, the armed forces of San Marcos had come fully under central control. There was no longer any need to fear the warlord-ization of the regional commands, and no longer any reason to lose sleep over another rebellion. The civil war had let us cut out a festering wound and, in its place, lay down a far more solid foundation.

Now the only thing left is...

I picked up the paper lying to one side of the desk.

"This needs to be dealt with."

It was the secret contract Garcia had signed with Chevron.

Reduced to its essentials, the contract between Chevron and Garcia read as follows.

It was an asinine contract. For one thing, they had sold the country for pocket change.

The Northern Oil Fields were a mid-sized reserve holding anywhere from four hundred million to nine hundred million barrels. At the current price of about sixty-five dollars a barrel, even seven hundred million barrels in the ground meant forty-five billion dollars in revenue. You still had to subtract drilling costs, of course, but if oil prices held anywhere near their present levels, the profit would be staggering. And they had signed the whole thing away for a billion dollars — on an installment plan, no less.

You'd have to be an idiot...

This is why a man needs to play in the big leagues. Grow up in a country with a GDP per capita of twenty-eight hundred dollars and you don't even notice when you're being taken for a ride.

And why is he pocketing the money from selling off the oil fields himself?

Those resources belonged to the state. They were supposed to go back to the people. This bastard would have made Yi Wan-yong weep with envy.

The terms alone were more than enough to put the screws to Chevron. There was just one problem.

We don't have any real evidence.

Nowhere in the document did a single word appear that could identify Chevron. Even the name Douglas & Hoffman was absent. On its face, the contract was nothing more than an agreement between Garcia and an investment firm called Tate Investment. Which, to be fair, was only to be expected. A major oil company was not going to be sloppy enough to leave a paper trail. They had covered their tracks so thoroughly that we shook down every location connected to the Motinho brothers and still turned up not a single trace of Chevron.

There was, however, one thing they had failed to anticipate.

"Your Excellency. We have brought in the attorney who led the negotiations with Garcia in the United States."

"...I'm sorry?"

Our intelligence director, Lucio, was considerably more competent than I had imagined.

"Wh-where from?"

"He was staying at a hotel in Florida."

"How did you bring him here?"

"I explained the situation carefully and persuaded him with the utmost courtesy."

"And he just... came along?"

"Yes."

"Lucio, what happened to your face?"

"I fell down."

"...I see."

"Yes."

I had no idea what kind of persuasion that had involved, and even less idea how he had ended up with those injuries on his face, but I let it go. What mattered right now was finding evidence.

"If you leave the interrogation to me as well, I will not disappoint you."

"You brought him in. Go ahead."

The next day, Lucio — every inch the capable intelligence director — arrived with evidence of devastating force.

"Being a lawyer, he had a great deal stored in the cloud."

There were two pieces. The first was the contract under which Chevron had commissioned Garcia's negotiations. Unlike the copy Garcia had been holding, this one named the parties and laid out the substance of the deal in unmistakable language. It would be powerful evidence, no question.

The second was a call recording.

It was ironclad. There was no room left for excuses.

All that remained was how to use it. Isabella and I sat down to work out the approach.

"What if we lodged an official protest with the American government? We present this evidence, establish that Chevron was behind the civil war, and make it known that they may also have been responsible for the bombing that killed President Juan and the members of the State Council."

"And you think the American government would actually investigate Chevron? I suspect they'd turn around and accuse us of smearing one of their own companies."

"Then what about going to the press first? If the public has already seen it, the American government would have no choice but to act."

"I'm not so sure. We might be better off filing a lawsuit."

"A lawsuit... in the United States?"

"Yes. We take this evidence to the best law firm we can find and we sue — for astronomical damages. The press will pick it up on its own, and the American government will have to start looking into whether it's true."

"A method worthy of the land of lawsuits... That's actually a good idea. Shall we move on it immediately?"

"Let's identify a firm first. One with a track record of beating Chevron."

"Yes, Your Excellency."

In the end, however, none of this discussion proved necessary.

"I'm sorry — ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠who did you say you were?"

"Ellen Evans. Director of the Bureau of Intelligence and Research at the United States Department of State."

"John Brown. FBI International Operations Division."

Because America came to us first.