08:14 (New York Time)
Monday, January 12, 1976 ‘C’
NBC Television studios, 30 Rockefeller Plaza
New York City, U.S.A.
‘’TWO MINUTES FOR COMMERCIAL!’’
Using the break in their morning television news show, the two show’s anchors, a man in his mid-thirties and a blonde woman in her mid-forties, drank some water and had makeup artists quickly redo their facial makeup. The female anchor then looked at the producer, standing behind one of the cameras.
‘’Is our next guest ready to walk in?’’
‘’Yes, Barbara! She arrived at the studio a good twenty minutes ago and got her makeup worked on.’’
‘’Good! Is she in uniform or in civilian clothes?’’
‘’She came in uniform and she looks impressive.’’
‘’Excellent!’’ said Barbara Walters before looking at her co-host, Jim Hartz. ‘’I must say that I have rarely been this nervous before interviewing someone, Jim. There is so much to say about her.’’
‘’True! If you get stuck, I could always jump in and ask her technical questions about her Space Corps: that’s kind of my specialty after all.’’
‘’Thanks!’’
Minutes later, at the producer’s signal, Barbara Walters spoke at the television camera facing her.
‘’And now, following the previous viewing of the latest pictures from Mars, here is our next distinguished guest: General Ingrid Dows, Commander of the United States Space Corps.’’
On cue, Ingrid walked in on the set, wearing her futuristic-looking Space Corps going-out uniform, with an impressive collection of medal ribbons on her left breast. She shook hands with both Barbara Walter and Jim Hartz before taking the chair offered by Walters, who warmly smiled to her.
‘’General Dows, let me say first that you must be about the most remarkable person to appear on this show. Your achievements are legendary and so is your devotion to duty and to our country. Welcome on our show!’’
‘’Thank you, Barbara.’’ replied Ingrid, who had been told to call Walters by her first name during her interview.
‘’May I add as well that I am a bit jealous of your youthful appearance, General. Could I ask what is your actual age, if that is not too impolite?’’
‘’You may, Barbara. I am actually fifty years old.’’
‘’Fifty years old…’’ said slowly Barbara as she eyed Ingrid’s nearly juvenile face and her fit, trim body. ‘’Now, it is widely said that your apparent youth is due to a miracle which happened to you in Palestine some 22 years ago. Can you tell us more about that?’’
‘’I can, but I must warn that I have no wish to see that occurrence affect what other people will think of me. I simply wish to be known for what I do, rather than for what I am. Basically, while commanding our Interposition Force in Palestine in 1953, I and my driver were attacked by a group of Jewish extremists while inspecting the ruins of Haifa. We defended ourselves but my driver was killed and I was gravely wounded before one of my military police patrols came to my rescue and killed my remaining attackers. I was then rushed to our field hospital in Ramat David Airbase, near Haifa, for emergency medical treatment. While on the operating table, a powerful spiritual entity that I call ‘The One’ and which had already affected me in the past manifested itself again, healing me completely in seconds and also rejuvenating me back to my teenage years. At the same time, The One resurrected my dead driver, returning her to life and full health. Now, before you ask questions about ‘The One’, let me emphasize a few things: first, it is not ‘God’ as followers of the Bible or of the Koran would understand it. It did not create the whole Universe and it didn’t even create Humanity. Rather, it is an extraordinarily powerful spiritual being who has been shepherding Humanity for millions of years, hoping for us to gradually improve along the millenniums. Every one of us holds inside a tiny part of The One. That part is what we commonly call our soul. We get our soul as our fetus is forming and it leaves us at our death. That soul is however not lost forever after our death. Instead, after returning to the main mass of The One for a period of cleansing, it joins with another fetus, to give it a soul. That process is what the Hindus would call ‘reincarnation’. However, contrary to Hindu beliefs, souls reincarnate only in human beings: they never go inside animals or objects. As for the previous lives that our souls have gone through, we normally can’t remember those lives. Some people have claimed in the past that they can remember their incarnations, but they are generally impostors and liars trying to profit from the sensation created by their claims.’’
‘’But you do yourself claim to remember your past incarnations, General.’’
‘’Yes, I do and I have proven my claims in the past with my military superiors, notably by demonstrating my ability to speak and read dozens of long-dead languages, on top of being able to speak nearly twenty still existing languages. Now, you must understand that the souvenirs from my past incarnations only add to my life experience and wisdom. Those souvenirs don’t control me. I am an officer of the United States and am completely loyal to my country. Some tried in the past to discredit me by claiming that my past souvenirs made my loyalty as an American questionable, but I will only say this: I served and fought for the United States in six conflicts by now and was wounded in combat twice.’’
‘’Do those six conflicts include the recent retaliatory strikes against Korea, General?’’
‘’Yes! I personally flew three combat missions against Korea in that recent conflict.’’
Barbara nodded her head while eyeing the impressive collection of medal ribbons on Ingrid’s chest.
‘’You certainly have the medals to prove your valor in combat, General. Now, to return to the subject of the entity you call ‘The One’, what more can you tell about it to our listeners?’’
‘’The main point I will say is that ‘The One’, contrary to the God of the Bible and the Koran, does not ask to be worshipped or revered. It simply exists in our background and only wishes for us to become more kind, more tolerant and less violent. I honor him, or I should say ‘it’ since it has no sex or gender, by working to bring peace and promote justice, tolerance and compassion by my actions and words. Don’t take me wrong, though. I do not pretend to be some kind of prophet or spiritual leader. Rather, I hope to give the example by my own actions. Ending the war in Indochina by a peace treaty was one of my proudest achievements.’’
‘’Promoting peace and justice is certainly a laudable goal, General Dows. Now, to jump at your achievements in space, culminating with the present mission to Mars, to what do you attribute your technological successes?’’
‘’Mostly to the technological and historical files left to us by Nancy Laplante, the time traveler from the year 2012 who died in 1941 and who was my adoptive mother. Those files allowed us to avoid following many technological dead-ends which could have cost us decades of wasted research and trials, on top of warning us about geo-political conflicts to come. I am also a qualified engineer, with a PhD in aerospace engineering, and I have personally directed the design of most of our modern combat aircraft and aerospace systems and spacecraft, including that of our CONSTITUTION-Class interplanetary spaceship.’’
Barbara nodded her head slowly, truly impressed, before looking at Jim Hartz. Her co-host took her clue and asked his first question of the interview.
‘’General Dows, the United States has by now gone to the Moon, where we have had a permanently occupied base for over a decade now, and is now conducting its second manned exploration mission to Mars. What are your future goals and challenges in space for you and for the United Space, General?’’
‘’The more immediate goals of my Space Corps are threefold, Jim. First, I want to drastically cut the costs of sending payloads to Earth orbit, in order to lower the financial burden on the American taxpayers. I am hoping to do that soon with the inauguration in the next couple of months of a new space launch system that should cut by at least fifty percent the cost per pound put in orbit. Second, I am planning to start building a large permanent orbital space station which will greatly augment the capacity of our scientists to study the Universe from orbit, by providing more space telescopes available for daily use. That orbital space station will also serve as an orbital refueling station for our interplanetary spaceships returning from planetary missions, like our present mission to Mars. I am also hoping to attract the interest of a few commercial consortium to help finance a possible touristic capability to our future orbital station.’’
Jim Hartz nearly sucked air in then, positively fired up by that mentioned possibility.
‘’And what kind of touristic capability are you looking at, General?’’
‘’Basically, to add to our future orbital station a space hotel offering short sojourns in space to travelers able to both pay for the high ticket cost of such space hotel rooms and transportation to orbit and to accept the risks inherent in space travel. The feasibility of such a commercial project will depend a lot on the success of my planned low-cost launch system and on how expensive it will be to build our orbital space station. However, the tragedy that struck our state of Hawaii has delayed most of these projects by a year or two, since part of my previously authorized budget for my Space Corps was transferred by me to the emergency aid funds destined to help our poor citizens from Hawaii.’’
‘’Uh, did you just say that you were the one who decided to transfer part of your own budget to the Hawaii relief fund, General?’’
‘’That’s correct, Jim. While our space projects are important, the welfare and needs of our citizens must come first.’’
‘’I can only admire the generosity and compassion you showed by doing this, General. You said that you had three future main goals and spoke about your low-cost launch system and your future orbital space station. What is your third future main goal, General?’’
‘’Something that will still take some years to develop, but which I think will be our ultimate goal for the decades to come: the sending of a manned exploration mission to the Jupiter and Saturn systems. However, before we can launch such ambitious deep space missions, we will have to drastically improve the efficiency of our space propulsion engines. That means studying and developing new types of space engines. Preliminary studies on such engines are already ongoing, but they will take years to bear fruit, so we will have to be patient.’’
‘’If I may now jump to a bit of a contentious subject concerning our space program, General, many Congressmen have criticized your propensity to invite foreign scientists and astronauts to participate in our various manned space missions. Notably, they object to the fact that you allowed quite a few Soviets to be part of our space missions. I believe that there are a number of Soviets participating in our present Mars mission, correct?’’
‘’That is indeed correct, Jim, and I feel no reasons to have to apologize for that. Making a cooperative effort in space with the Soviet Union can only help appease tensions between our two countries, thus helping to prevent wars while building up international goodwill. Right now, a total of fifteen Soviet scientists and cosmonauts are part of our present Mars mission, six of which are presently on the surface of Mars. We also have a total of 42 non-Americans, including the fifteen Soviets I earlier mentioned, who are part of the crew of the U.S.S. LIBERTY. They come from such diverse countries as France, Sweden, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Chile, New Zealand, Italy and Japan and they are all eminently qualified to participate in our Mars mission. To those who may complain that they are freeloaders traveling to Mars at the expense of the American taxpayers, be reassured: their respective countries are covering the cost of their participation in a more than fair way.’’
‘’Many American taxpayers will indeed be happy to hear that. Finally, I have a more personal question for you, General. You have now been serving in the United States military since 1942, which means that you will have a 34-year-long service record this year. Are you planning to retire in the coming years, even though you still have a young body?’’
This time, Ingrid took a time to reflect mentally before answering in a measured tone.
‘’I hope to be able to serve further as long as I will be allowed to. I also hope that I will have the chance of leading our first manned mission to the Jupiter System before I retire from the military.’’
‘’And after that, General?’’
‘’After that, I fully expect our biggest aerospace companies to fight each other in order to obtain my services as an aerospace engineer and designer. So, as you can see, I am not worried about my future employment. Neither am I going to simply sit on my ass and do nothing after retiring from the Space Corps.’’
‘’Some would suggest that you could make a top-notch political leader, General.’’
That made Ingrid do a grimace.
‘’No way! I am too honest and frank to be a good politician.’’
Both Barbara and Jim laughed briefly at that before Barbara looked quickly at her watch, then back at Ingrid.
‘’Well, I am afraid that we are about at the end of our air time, General. You were certainly a fascinating person to interview and I am sure that our viewers appreciated learning more about you.’’
‘’It was my pleasure, Barbara. If I may make a public promise right now, I want to say that Jim here will be invited by my Space Corps to spend some time on our future space station as soon as it will be built and operational. Then, he will be able to show to your viewers what it is like to be in Space.’’
Hartz’ smile immediately turned to a grin and he vigorously shook Ingrid’s hand on camera.
‘’General, that is the best gift you could ever make to me and our viewers. Good luck in your future space projects.’’
‘’Thank you, Jim. Thank you, Barbara, for giving me the opportunity to present my projects to the American public.’’
Ingrid then got up and walked off the set as Barbara faced again the camera.
‘’And here you have it, ladies and gentlemen: an interview with the famous General Ingrid Dows, military hero, space pioneer and patriot.’’