Thirteen Days Page #17

MCNAMARA:

-- you sonofabitch, goddamn it, I didn't

drop --

KENNY:

You were in the room. It was your

purview. It was your job to make sure

Bissel wasn't f***ing us over and you

didn't do it. You've got the most

important job in the world right now.

You're the smartest guy the President

has.

(beat)

Besides me.

That gets an amused snort from McNamara, breaking the

tension.

MCNAMARA:

Anybody ever tell you you're an

egomaniac and a prick, O'Donnell?

Kenny stares him in the eye, serious, hushed. A friend.

KENNY:

You need to be the best you've ever

been.

McNamara enters the elevator. He turns, stands there facing

Kenny for a dramatic beat. Then the doors close.

INT. KENNY'S OFFICE - DAY

WALTER CRONKITE, on the B&W T.V. screen, sits in front of a

map showing Cuba and the blockade line.

WALTER CRONKITE (V.O.)

-- well, it appears the world has just

received a reprieve. Defense Secretary

Robert McNamara has announced that the

quarantine zone has been moved from 800

to 500 miles.

PULL BACK, REVEALING:

Kenny watching the T.V., is yelling at the phone.

KENNY:

Find out how close our exercises are

coming to their cruise missiles. I'm

calling you back in five, and you will

have an answer for me or I will come

down there and beat the sh*t out of you.

(beat)

Then you can press charges, and I'll get

a Presidential pardon.

He hangs up, hears SHOUTING from the Oval Office. He goes to

the door, enters --

INT. OVAL OFFICE - CONTINUOUS

-- and sees the President leaning over his desk, jabbing his

finger at General Taylor.

THE PRESIDENT:

-- how the goddamn hell did this happen?

I'm going to have Power's head on a

platter next to LeMay's!

(noticing Kenny)

Hey, Kenny, did you hear me give the

order to go to DEFCON 2? I remember

giving the order to go to DEFCON 3, but

I must be suffering from amnesia because

I've just been informed our nuclear

forces are DEFCON 2!

Kenny realizes he's not joking as he spots Bobby sitting on

the couch behind Taylor, pale as a ghost. Taylor, embattled,

wants to die, but stands there like a man.

SMASH CUT TO:

INT. MISSILE SILO - DAY

CLOSE ON:

The nose cone of a TITAN MISSILE, its 20 megaton nuclear

warhead wrapped in the steel re-entry shell. Cold, silent,

fearsome.

GENERAL TAYLOR (V.O.)

Mr. President, the orders were limited

to our strategic forces in the

continental U.S.

INT. OVAL OFFICE - CONTINUOUS

Taylor continues on.

GENERAL TAYLOR:

Technically, General LeMay is correct

that SAC has the statutory authority --

The President punches his desk.

THE PRESIDENT:

-- I have the authority. I am the

commander-in-chief of the United States,

and I say when we go to war!

GENERAL TAYLOR:

We are not at war, sir, not until we're

at DEFCON 1.

THE PRESIDENT:

General, the Joint Chiefs have just

signalled our intent to escalate to the

Soviets. You have signalled an

escalation which I had no wish to

signal, and which I did not approve.

But Taylor knows this very well. And the way he's suffering,

it's clear he's taking the heat for his underlings. From

over on the couch Bobby chimes in:

BOBBY:

LeMay... he's history.

The President glances at Kenny who stands there, speechless.

THE PRESIDENT:

Get out of here, Max.

The General leaves. Kenny closes the door, wanders deeper

into the office. He looks from the President to Bobby.

There's a long, long beat of shocked silence.

KENNY:

Jesus...

BOBBY:

Rescind the order. Can all the Chiefs.

Put Nitze, Gilpatric and the

Undersecretaries in charge.

KENNY:

We can't do that, Bobby.

THE PRESIDENT:

He's right, we can't rescind DEFCON 2.

The Soviets will think we've gotten

sweet on them.

KENNY:

And we can't purge the Chiefs. Our

invasion talk will look like a bluff.

Or even that there's been an attempted

coup.

Bobby is disgusted, but knows they're right.

BOBBY:

McNamara won't be able to handle them.

It's too much for one man...

(knowing look to Kenny)

...with all due respect to our heroic

fifth column.

The President collapses in his rocking chair. Kenny leans

over the back of the sofa next to Bobby.

KENNY:

We've got Khruschev's attention with the

blockade. If we want a political

solution. I think it's time to turn up

the diplomatic heat. Cause if we let

this go on too long, we're going to find

ourselves in a war.

Bobby looks at the President, meaningful. The President

turns to Kenny.

THE PRESIDENT:

I've been considering a variation on one

of Stevenson's ideas. We're going to

send up a trial balloon through Lippman.

The Jupiter missiles.

EXT. WEST WING DRIVEWAY - DAY

SUPER:
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 25TH. DAY 10.

The West Wing looms behind Kenny and Bundy. Kenny, poker

faced, takes a drag on his cigarette. Bundy nervously flicks

his, looks away from Kenny a beat.

BUNDY:

What did you think of Lippman's column

this morning?

KENNY:

I think it's a bad idea.

Bundy turns back to him.

BUNDY:

Thank God. Look, everyone is furious

about it. We trade away our missiles in

Turkey and we're f***ed politically.

Kenny grinds his jaw, but doesn't say anything. He agrees.

Bundy steps up to him, confiding.

BUNDY (CONT'D)

You gotta stop 'em. We know it's Jack

and Bobby's idea - they leaked it to

Lippman. The military guys are going

ape, and they're not alone.

KENNY:

Then they should speak up.

BUNDY:

Christ, Ken, you know it's not that

easy.

KENNY:

Yes it is.

BUNDY:

No it isn't. They don't trust the

people that feel this way. But these

people are right. And the Kennedys are

wrong.

(beat)

We need you to tell 'em, Kenny. They'll

listen to you.

Kenny prickles, intense, but Bundy presses on, too wrapped up

in his own thinking to notice.

BUNDY (CONT'D)

Jack and Bobby are good men. But it

takes a certain character, moral

toughness to stand up to --

KENNY:

-- You listen to me. Nobody, nobody,

talks about my friends that way. You're

f***ing here right now because of the

Kennedys. They may be wrong. They make

mistakes. But they're not weak.

The weak ones are these 'people' who

can't speak their own minds.

BUNDY:

You know I don't mean they're weak.

Kenny gets in his face, intimidating.

KENNY:

No, they just lack 'moral toughness.'

And you think I'll play your Judas. You

WASPS and blue-bloods never understood

us, thinking we want into your club.

Well we got our own club now.

(beat)

And you guys don't realize fighting with

each other is our way. Nobody plays us

off each other. And nobody ever gets

between us...

INT. PRESIDENT'S BEDROOM - DAY

Kenny throws himself on a chair in the bedroom's sitting

area, newspaper in hand. The President, buttoning his shirt

in a full-length mirror, sees him. There's a TV on. The

President selects a tie from a nearby rack, eyes the paper.

THE PRESIDENT:

What's that?

KENNY:

Oh, just a bunch of crap about

withdrawing our Jupiter missiles in

Turkey if the Soviets'll do the same in

Cuba.

The President's eyes flick over to him in the mirror.

THE PRESIDENT:

I don't want to listen to this again.

KENNY:

If we made a trade, we'd be giving in to

extortion, and NATO would never trust us

again. We'll get clobbered in world

opinion.

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