The Glory by Herman Wouk

up in uniform. How we worried during the war, and were so glad when it was over. And for a laugh, about his capturing a fortress
     with nobody in it. How does that sound? Too personal?”
    Rapid estimate before answering her: the tea should be over by five, the hatted ladies heading home for dinner. Even if the
     Egyptians claimed the sinking in the next hour or two, it would not make the network news right away. “Well, the question
     is, are you nervous?”
    Nakhama threw back her head and laughed, and the hat fell off. “L’Azazel, how I hate hats!” she said, retrieving it. “Nervous?
     Why? It’ll be fun. What have I got to lose? Don’t worry, I won’t disgrace you. Where is there a mirror?” She plopped the hat
     on her head, tilted it, and it looked very chic. “How’s that?”
    For answer, impelled by a pulse of love for her, he came and kissed his wife. Why panic her? Noah might well be in a helicopter
     right now, soaking wet but safe. That she was prettier than Emily Cunningham was an old story, but she was rarely this animated
     nowadays. Twenty-three years ago the sort of sweet faintly mischievous charm with which she now glowed had bewitched him into
     marrying a Moroccan waitress after knowing her for a week, over his parents’ anguished objections. “Well, it sounds like a
     first-class speech. Good luck.”
    “Thanks. Poor Zev, off to Chicago tonight, aren’t you? Will you have time to eat at home first? Galia and Ruti volunteered
     to cook dinner.”
    “That’s a novelty I won’t miss.”
    When she left it lacked a few minutes of three. He turned on his desk radio, and listened tensely to the bulletins. Not a
     word about the Middle East. Fine. The letter regarding the countermeasures still lay before him, and tearing it up, he realized,
     would be foolish. The
Jaffa
still sailed, and missiles could hit torpedo boats and patrol craft as well.
    Awareness bore in on Barak that not only had the war with the Arabs entered a new phase; so had warfare at sea. No vessel
     had ever been sunk by a ship-to-ship missile until now, nor had any western country even tested such a weapon. Russia, the
     arsenal of the Arabs, had leaped at a stroke into the world lead in waterborne missile combat. Hard times ahead for Noah’s
     navy, and a major shock on the global scene. The Soviet Union’s massive edge in land armies was balanced off by superior American
     air and sea forces; but the Styx was suddenly a proven threat to the Sixth Fleet, and for that matter to all of NATO’s surface
     warships.
    Meantime, the wait for news. Zev’s father had told him more than once that his hair had begun to turn white during the long
     silences of Zev’s service in the British army, fighting Rommel in North Africa. At the time Zev, in the flush of soldierly
     youth, had shrugged off the old man’s anxiety with some amusement; and now he was the old man worrying about his son. It had
     all happened fast. Who could have predicted that Noah would be hit at sea, by the first Arab blow after the Six-Day War? Nobody
     would be mothballing uniforms soon, that was now clear.
    And what to say tomorrow in Chicago? By then the Egyptian coup would certainly be in the news. His standard act required drastic
     revision, and
“Messianic times”
was out for sure. On the other hand, it occurred to him that in this changed picture the forty-eight Skyhawks might be forthcoming.
    He began scrawling rapidly in his clear Hebrew script on the green pad.
    Sinking of the
Eilat —
Implications and Options
    Egypt is militarily prostrate. In reprisal for this attack on the
Eilat
, our air force can sink every single Egyptian naval vessel afloat. It can level any targets in Egypt, from military bases
     to whole cities. Our armor forces can roll unchecked to Cairo. How then could Colonel Nasser have dared to violate the cease-fire
     with such a major act of war? Is it suicidal lunacy?
    Not in the least. To begin with, the sinking is a feeble