The attack on America began in March with another furious air assault designed to “terrify and intimidate” the Americans into a quick defeat. The thousands of American civilian casualties went officially uncounted. The Megastani Defense Minister, Dan al-Rumfalid (the same man who had supported Houston during the Mexican War), when asked about the American casualties, stated bluntly, “We don’t do body counts on other people.”(56)
No exact figures will ever be known, but about 10,000 American civilians and tens of thousands of American soldiers were killed in the first three weeks. Among other devastating weapons, 13,000 cluster munitions exploded into 2 million cluster bombs, wiping out city blocks and destroying entire divisions of
American soldiers.(57)
About 128 Megastani soldiers were killed during this time, mostly by “friendly fire.”
Yet Megastani forces were astounded, because despite their obvious and overwhelming military superiority, they still encountered pockets of fierce and desperate resistance, particularly in New York, San Francisco, Philadelphia, and Washington, DC. Even after Houston’s military lost all coherence, small groups fought on. Individual cases of American suicidal bravery were frequently reported—soldiers with rifles battling tanks and armored vehicles, trying to keep them from advancing into
public squares and neighborhoods.(58)
At that point they were not defending President Houston. They were defending their families, their honor, and America.
But they never stood a chance. As a “war,” the conflict was quickly over. By the middle of April, the US Army had ceased to exist.
In the process of deposing Houston, the Megastanis had bombed large areas of Manhattan, LA, and DC to rubble. They rained tons of depleted uranium weapons on Miami, putting thousands of children at risk for cancer. Schools and universities were hit, and education for millions was suspended. Some students lost all record of the degrees they had earned, and millions lost their health records. Lovely churches and cathedrals in cities and towns all over the States were carelessly hit, too.
Americans, scholars, and art lovers all over the world were particularly distraught by the fate of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the National Gallery and Smithsonian Museums in DC. Amid the chaos and lawlessness that followed the invasion, thieves pulled paintings off the walls, tearing and destroying some, cut statues apart with chain saws, and grabbed thousands of priceless gems and artifacts. The Library of Congress was senselessly torched by local thugs of one stripe or another. The Constitution was stolen and sold to a Bahraini billionaire on E-Bay. It was reported years later that he used it for spliff paper.
This desecration of our cultural heritage was entirely avoidable. Conscientious experts in Megastan had made a list of sites that needed to be surrounded and protected by Megastani troops. But the Neo-pros had simply ignored it and left every important cultural site in America
unguarded.(59)
Total Victory?
On April 16, Megastani Prime Minister Malik Henna declared America “liberated.” Megastani soldiers marched onto the National Mall in DC, tore down the absurd marble statue of Houston that had been erected there, and placed the Megastani flag over his head.
Not long afterward, Prime Minister Henna—who had never seen combat in his life—strutted around in a flight suit on a Megastani aircraft carrier on the Indian Ocean under a banner declaring “TOTAL VICTORY!”
But several months later, despite the horror of the Megastani bombing campaigns and the unquestionable superiority of Megastani forces, Megastan was nonetheless stunned when it found itself unable to declare victory. The war had taken on a new shape.
To understand how this happened, it is important to understand what had been happening in America for the past several years. Despite Houston’s brutal rule and the grinding desperation of living under the sanctions regime, one thing Houston had done for Americans was to ban firearms and suppress crime. It had been possible for Americans to walk anywhere day or night in complete safety. But a few months before the Megastani invasion, Houston had released scores of thousands of prisoners. Most were political, but thousands were common criminals convicted of
murder, rape and robbery.(60)
In the chaos of the invasion, as the American police and army collapsed, criminals as well as law-abiding citizens broke into arsenals to seize supplies and weapons. Weapons were sold or passed out to relatives and friends, and almost every American acquired an assault rifle. Many also acquired machine guns or even rocket launchers. A cache of 380 tons of powerful conventional explosives were looted in the first month of the war. It had been captured by Megastani forces and then carelessly left
unguarded.(61)
Interviews with Americans on the ground indicated that some would have been happy to give Megastan some form of payment if they would just get rid of Houston, lift the sanctions, and get out. The summer directly after the invasion was relatively quiet, and serious progress
could have been made.(62)
But such was not to be. The gross incompetence of the Megastani invasion and occupation shocked even the most cynical historians and
analysts.(63)
