[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Astounding Science
Fiction June 1955. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
_A man acts on what he believes the facts are, not on the facts. He
lives or dies by what the facts are. Now sometimes you don't have
time to correct a man's beliefs, yet he must act correctly...._
The aging little psychologist looked down at the captain's insignia on
his sleeve and scowled.
"I know it's a lousy, fouled-up situation, commander," he said with
evident irony. "You speak of discipline. Well, it's bad enough here on
Mars, where a junior officer like you feels free to argue with a full
captain like me, but out there with the fleet, discipline is now
virtually nonexistent."
He looked up again and quickly added, "Oh, of course there is a
discipline of a sort, and in its own way it is quite effective. Strict,
too, as you will find. But it has few of the marks of the military
academy, of which the regular officers were so fond. Perhaps that was
the reason why they let the situation get away from them, and why we are
in charge of it now."
"I still think--" the commander started, but he was interrupted again.
"I know what you think, commander. You can forget it. It's wishful
thinking and we cannot permit such daydreaming in our precarious
condition. Face the facts as they exist in the present. After we kick
the aliens out of our solar system, maybe we can go back to the old
ideas again. Maybe. I'm not even very sure of that. But as for now, the
characteristic of despair is the lowest common denominator among the
combat patrols, and we therefore have mutinies, disobedience of orders,
defections of every variety. That is a real situation, and it will
persist until we can induce the men to accept tactical leadership that
can cope with the enemy.
"Actually, it is not very remarkable that this situation developed.
Strategy is still a rational computable quantity, but the actual tactics
of fighting is something else entirely. The aliens have an intellectual
response that is in full truth alien to us. It simply cannot be
comprehended rationally by a human being, although they manage to guess
pretty well the responses of our own fighters. Naturally, the result has
been that in the past our losses were almost ninety per cent whenever a
patrol actually engaged in a firefight with the enemy.
"Fortunately, the aliens are much too far from their home to possess
anything like the number of personnel and other resources that we have.
Otherwise, they would have beaten us long ago. Completely wiped us out.
And all because an ordinary, intelligent human being cannot learn any
patterns by which the aliens operate, and by which he can fight them
successfully."
"I know that," the commander muttered. "I spent plenty of time out there
before I got tapped for this new branch of service." He rubbed the moist
palms of his hands together nervously.
"Certainly you did," the captain acknowledged absently. Then he
continued his explanation. "Fortunately, there was a small body of
information on extra-rational mental faculties that had been developed
over the past century, and as soon as we expanded it sufficiently, we
were able to form this new branch of service you now belong to. But
unfortunately, some idiot in the Information Service released a
popularization of the data on the new branch. That was ill-advised. The
veterans who had survived so far had their own way of accounting for
their survival, and that did not include what that silly description
alluded to as 'blind guessing' by commanders of 'exceptional psychic
gifts.'
"Like most popularizations, the description was grossly inaccurate, and
was promptly withdrawn; but the damage had already been done. The damage
was completed by another idiot who named the new branch the Psi Corps,
merely because the basic capacity for extra-rational mental faculties is
technically signified by the Greek letter 'psi.' The name was slightly
mispronounced by the men, and that automatically produced that nasty
little nickname, which has stuck, and which expresses very well the
attitude of the men toward the new service.
"As I say, fleet discipline is very bad, and the men simply would not
accept orders from such officers. There are numerous cases on record
where they killed them when there was no other way out.
"Now, as far as discipline itself is concerned, the best procedure would
be to pull an entire fleet out of the defense perimeter and retrain
them, because the newly trained recruits can be made to accept Psi Corps
officers as commanders. But our situation is far too desperate to permit
anything like that. Therefore, we must use whatever devices we can think
of to do the job.
"The ship you are going to is staffed by veterans. They were incredibly
lucky. From the outset, they had a CO who was a man highly gifted in psi
without he or anyone else knowing about it until a few months ago when
we ran a quiet little survey. But he got killed in a recent encounter,
along with their executive officer, so we are now sending them a new
captain and a new exec as well. But those men simply will not accept
orders from a Psi Corps officer. Furthermore, they have heard the
rumors--soundly based--that the Psi Corps, as a result of its
opposition, has gone underground, so to speak. They know that its
personnel has been largely disguised by giving them special commissions
in the regular Space Combat Service. As a result, they will most
certainly suspect any new commanding officer no matter what insignia he
wears.
"Of course, now and then you will find one of the old hands who will
accept the Psi Corps, so long as it isn't jammed down his throat. Just
pray that you have somebody like that aboard your new ship, although I
must admit, it isn't very likely."
* * * * *
"All right, all right," the commander growled with irritation.
"But--with your permission, sir--I still think my particular method of
assignment is a lousy approach and I don't like it. I still think it
will make for very bad discipline."
"Whether you like it or not, commander, that is the way it will have to
be accomplished. We are simply recognizing a real situation for what it
is, and compromising with it."
"But couldn't this change in command personnel be postponed until--"
"If it could be postponed," the captain replied acidly, "you may rest
assured we would not be employing disagreeable--and somewhat
questionable--devices to speed it up. Unfortunately, our outlying
detectors have identified the approach of a fleet of starships. They can
only be reinforcements for the aliens, about equal to what they already
have here, and they will arrive in two years. If those two forces can
join each other, there will be no need to worry further about discipline
among the humans. There will shortly be no humans left. So we are
preparing a full-scale assault against those aliens now within our
system in the very near future. And we simply must have all tactical
combat devices commanded by men with extra-rational mental abilities in
order to deal with them effectively."
"Effectively?" the commander snorted. "Thirty-two per cent effective,
according to the figures they gave us in the Psi school."
"That is considerably better than twelve per cent, which is the
statistical likelihood of survival in combat without it," the captain
retorted.
Nervously, the commander scratched the back of his thin neck, grimmaced
and nodded.
"The first and most important problem for you is to gain the confidence
of your crew. They will be worse than useless to you without it, and it
will be a very difficult job, even with all the advice and help our men
can give you. And you will have to be careful--don't forget what I said
about assassinations. The way we are going about it, that you find so
disagreeable, should minimize that danger, but you can't ever tell what
will happen."
He held up his hand to forestall a comment from the other and continued
on. "There are conditions for everything, commander. Men react according
to certain patterns, given the proper circumstances. It is
characteristic of the sort of men you will encounter on your new ship
that they are unlikely to take the initiative in such matters, partly
from their early training and partly from their association with a CO
who pretty well dominated them. However, they will readily condone it if
somebody else does take the initiative in their behalf. Particularly, if
that man has some official authority over them, and there is always
somebody like that. They will not only condone the action, they will
positively be happy about it, because it will tend to bolster their
sense of security--such as it is. You know the sort of thing--father
hunger. Somebody to take care of them the way their old CO did."
The captain sighed. "So you see, commander, you are going into a
double-edged situation. Everything in it that can accrue to your
advantage, could also get you promptly killed."
"I see. First I fight with my men," the commander said bitterly. "And if
I win that battle, I will be permitted to fight the aliens with a
thirty-two per cent possibility of living through the first encounter of
that."
"It's always been that way to some extent," the captain replied
sympathetically, "in every command situation since the world began. Only
right now is a little worse than anyone can remember."
* * * * *
The commander departed. But about a month later, ensuing circumstances
brought one Lieutenant Maise to the same office building. He was not, of
course, ushered into the august presence of the captain, who was seeing
more important people than lieutenants that day.
Maise had been there for several hours every day for the previous three,
and he went immediately to the desk of the Special Reports Officer. The
SR Officer was a lieutenant also, a combination of psychologist and
writer, whose business it was to make sure that Special Reports on
morale matters were presented in the properly dramatic fashion so that
that indefinable aura of reality, customarily omitted from official
historical documents, could be included. The Evaluation Division, back
on Earth, was very fussy about that "aura."
"Ah, good afternoon sir," the SR Officer greeted him. "Glad to see you
again."
Maise nodded curtly and took a seat beside the desk.
"I think we are pretty well finished now--"
"We better be," Maise interrupted. "My ship is pulling out in four
hours."
"Right on the button, eh?" said the SR Officer. He fumbled in a desk
drawer and withdrew a bulky folder, from which he extracted a smaller
manuscript, and handed it to Maise. "I think you will find it complete
and suitably expressive, now, sir."
Maise scowled as he accepted the document. "It makes no difference to
me. I didn't want to get involved with the report in the first place."
"I know," the SR Officer nodded agreeably. "But don't worry. Nobody is
going to prefer any charges against anybody in any case. What they want
back on Earth is all the information they can get on morale problems, so
that they can more effectively implement their planning. You know how it
is."
"How would _I_ know?"
The SR Officer snapped, "I can understand your sentiments, but don't
blame me. Remember, I'm just a lieutenant, and I just work here in
Morale."
"Sure," Maise said, cracking a grin on his stiff lips. "Sorry. I know it
isn't your fault."
He opened the report, and commenced reading.
* * * * *