（外文电子版资料）Bester, Alfred - Disappearing Act.pdfVIP

file:///G|/rah/Alfred%20Bester%20-%20Disappearing%20Act.txt Disappearing Act This one wasn’t the last war or a war to end war. They called it the War for the American Dream. General Carpenter struck that note and sounded it constantly. There are fighting generals (vital to an army), political generals (vital to an administration), and public relations generals (vital to a war). General Carpenter was a master of public relations. Forthright and FourSquare, he had ideals as high and as understandable as the mottoes on money. In the mind of America he was the army, the administration, the nation’s shield and sword and stout right arm. His ideal was the American Dream. “We are not fighting for money, for power, or for world domination,” General Carpenter announced at the Press Association dinner. “We are fighting solely for the American Dream,” he said to the 137th Congress. “Our aim is not aggression or the reduction of nations to slavery,” he said at the West Point Annual Officer’s Dinner. “We are fighting for the meaning of civilization,” he told the San Francisco Pioneers’ Club. “We are struggling for the ideal of civilization; for culture, for poetry, for the Only Things Worth Preserving,” he said at the Chicago Wheat Pit Festival. “This is a war for survival,” he said. “We are not fighting for ourselves, but for our dreams; for the Better Things in Life which must not disappear from the face of the earth.” America fought. General Carpenter asked for one hundred million men. The army was given one hundred million men. General Carpenter asked for ten thousand H-Bombs. Ten thousand H-Bombs were delivered and dropped. The enemy also dropped ten thousand HBombs and destroyed most of America’s cities. “We must dig in against the hordes of barbarism,” General Carpenter said. “Give me a thousand engineers.” One thousand engineers were forthcoming, and a hundréd cit