The following conversation was (not) heard in the White House in late May:
General Jes Dooit:
Mr. President, I have been asked to brief you on a recommended strategy for the coronavirus war with which we are engaged. First, I want to give you some military history to update you on our recommendations moving forward.
In WWII we were confronted with war with Germany and Japan. With respect to Germany, we were facing an extended conflict resulting in the continued loss of American and Allied lives. In order to bring the war to a quick end we deployed an invasion strategy on D-Day. Knowing that we were going to lose tens of thousands of American lives during the invasion, we also knew that we needed to accept those losses in order to achieve the longer-term goal. A similar strategy was employed by Russia near Stalingrad, sacrificing large numbers of soldiers’ lives in exchange for a long-term victory.
With respect to Japan, we dropped 2 bombs on their large industrial cities resulting in hundreds of thousands of deaths and even more injuries. But those lives lost resulted in a long-term victory.
In neither case did we go to the Congress or the American people to ask for permission. We ACTED. THEY LOST. WE WON.
On the other hand, in Vietnam we employed a strategy of incremental warfare. This resulted in thousands and thousands of American deaths with no victory achieved. We could have invaded North Vietnam, captured Hanoi and imposed victory, but we went to Congress and the American people and asked permission, which was never granted.
The same failed strategy has been used in Afghanistan where we refuse to do the necessay action to conquer even if it means losing lives.
Now we are facing a new war, COVID-19. It is time to use the correct strategy to beat this viral enemy. We cannot use the failed strategy of incremental battles resulting in 1,000 deaths every day. We have already lost the first phase of the war. The enemy has now invaded every county, every borough, every city and every neighborhood in this country. Our defenses have been breached. We have no armaments that we can deploy to fight the virus. No defenses will be available to us for at least another year. We have tried to mobilize our industrial base to make new weapons, but they have not provided us with what we need yet, and probably won’t be able to over the next 6 months.
We cannot keep losing 1,000 people a day with no end in sight.
Even if we get the ultimate protective defense shield, a vaccine in the next 9 months, it will not be distributed and deployed for at least an additional month or two and the protection from it won’t be achieved for at least 2 additional months. If it works, and if the public embraces it (both of which are very debatable), we are looking at a minimum of 12 months of new deaths.
Mr. President, we can absorb those additional 350,000 deaths over those 12 months, with the potential of even more after that period as we did in Vietnam or Afghanistan, or we can move strongly and powerfully forward with a bold strategy like we did in WWII. That strategy is to deploy an immediate, aggressive, nationwide strategy to get as many people infected as quickly as possible with the specific winning strategy of achieving herd immunity as quickly as possible.
Here is how we intend to employ that strategy:
- Force the states to “open” their economies immediately. Get as many people out into the marketplace as possible, as quickly as possible. Any officials that resist this must be immediately called out. We suggest you frame this as a question of freedom. “Liberate” those states that try to resist opening.
- Make sure that any recommendations from the healthcare professionals including the CDC and the NIAID are considered to be “suggestions”. Do not allow states to use those recommendations as a shield to prevent reopening.
- Encourage citizens to assume that if the states create reopening strategies, that that means that everything is back to normal and they can do anything they did last year at the same time.
- Discourage anyone from protecting other people from viral infections that they may carry. Make the use of masks a political issue so that your supporters refuse to wear them. Make this an issue of personal freedom, free speech and choice. In those cases that are possible, create legislative acts or executive actions that prohibit any officials in those states from making masks mandated.
- Capture the intelligence of the enemy. Provide alternative interpretations of the infection rates, hospitalization rates, death rates and long-term health effects. We have learned from previous wars that the PR value of data interpretation can be very effective. Focus on the areas of improvement, focus on what we are achieving, not on what where we are falling short. Even though those interpretations will be challenged, and even though they will historically be found to be false, it is like the inflatable tanks and planes we used on D-Day. The short-term value of the obfuscation will allow us to achieve rapid national infections.
- Control the information. Do not allow the press or the public to see the data. Shift the data access, accumulation, analysis and reporting from any source that might be available to the public such as the CDC and move it to locations that can be controlled by the Central Command. If the CDC will not cooperate, move the data to another location controlled by a supportive officer.
- Expand the virus transmission pool. Force schools to open, without masks and without social distancing. Argue that staying home is worse. If we can get the schools to open and the children to bring viruses from their families into the classroom, share the virus with their classmates and then spread those back into the community, we can dramatically accelerate the national infection rate. This strategy is amplified by the fact that even though the school children will spread disease, they are likely to remain reasonably symptom free. This will allow a true covert expansion of infections.
Mr. President, we believe that if you follow the strategies enumerated above, that we can get 50-60% of the population infected by the end of September. We estimate that there will be an additional 300,000 deaths resulting from this strategy, but those deaths will be the cost of this strong counterattack and allow us to win the war.
By October we will then begin to see a dramatic decrease in infections, hospitalizations and deaths. The economy will roar back, and your chances of reelection will be dramatically improved.
Mr. President, this is the only strategy that makes sense. A brave and resolute commander in chief will follow this strategy. We will win the war against the virus and we will preserve your administration and your name in history.