Martin Variety in American Comics.

Chapter 381 The Tradition of Secret Negotiations (Please subscribe, read, and comment on the monthly ticket)

Metropolis, Daily Planet Building.

Before dawn, General Sam and his daughter Louise were already standing on the roof. The city lights were brilliant, no different from daytime, but the cold wind blew mercilessly on the general's face.

In order to look dignified, General Sam only wore a military uniform with rows of ribbons on his left chest symbolizing his resume, which was more exaggerated than a rainbow and very majestic, but he was not cold-resistant.

In comparison, Louise, who often goes out on field missions, is more experienced and doesn't have to keep up appearances. She wraps herself in her coat and watches her father suffer in peace.

Like all families, the relationship between Louise and General Sam cannot be said to be bad, but they have great differences in their choices of life directions.

As an officer, General Sam has a conservative mindset. Many times he doesn't think about why something happens and just wants to maintain the status quo.

Louise, on the contrary, was an excellent journalist. She looked down on the military atmosphere and was dissatisfied with her father's indiscriminate compliance with orders from his superiors.

Every time they met, the father and daughter would hug each other, talk about recent situations and then talk about their careers. The two different values began to collide, and after a big quarrel they parted ways.

After years of quarreling, Louise's patience with her father the general had reached its limit, and conversations between father and daughter became less and less frequent.

Clark was supposed to act as a middleman in this meeting, acting as Superman, to connect Martin and General Sam.

After Louise learned the news, she decisively replaced her boyfriend.

She knew her father's character too well and knew that the other party would never just have a simple meeting, and Clark could not handle it.

As the most successful creation in the history of Krypton, Clark does have a very high IQ and his super brain is comparable to a computer.

Lois loved her boyfriend very much, but she had to admit that Clark was an idiot in this regard.

Because he doesn't believe in these political things at all. No matter how powerful the super brain is, it is no different from not having it if it is not used.

More importantly, Lois realized after listening to Clark repeat his conversation with Martin.

Martin's initiative to meet is more than just a conversation, perhaps it is the beginning of a bigger plan.

Clark was completely unaware of this, or maybe he was aware of it but didn't care.

Of course, Clark doesn't care about this political reality, and this reality doesn't care what he thinks.

Maybe Kryptonians have the power to destroy the earth, but sixty to seventy percent of the world's population is already in the midst of war. For them, death is the easiest thing, and survival is the most difficult thing.

Things like zombie wars and meteorites hitting the earth can frighten the American middle class, but they don't make people in South America or Africa feel anything.

Because their living environment is even more horrible than those movies.

It follows that Superman's moral sympathies are not as broad as he thinks.

"Mr. Martin is too arrogant. It's already ten minutes past the agreed time."

General Sam looked at his watch and forced himself to express his dissatisfaction to his daughter.

He was not angry because the other party was late, but the wind on the rooftop was too strong. Although the thin military uniform looked good, it could not withstand the cold wind!

"Who can you blame? I've been telling you to wear an extra coat, but you refused. You deserve it!"

As the saying goes, children are the enemies of their parents in their previous lives, and the more outstanding the children are, the more so.

If Superman were here, General Sam would definitely scold the other party and force them to make some promises.

But faced with his extremely outstanding biological daughter, the determined old general was speechless. He didn't want to spend the rest of his life living in a military nursing home with a bunch of soldiers until he died.

"You are right, and I won't argue with you. But this situation only applies this time. I won't fall for it next time."

General Sam looked at his daughter with a headache and had already thought of the first thing he would say to Martin.

This is the problem with parents like him. They raise their children so well that they will definitely not follow the path set by their parents, but try to make a name for themselves.

Sometimes General Sam didn't know whether he wanted Louise to achieve such an achievement.

"Sorry, sorry!"

When the father and daughter were having a quarrel, Martin fell from the sky and slowly landed on the rooftop, breaking the atmosphere.

"I live in a remote place, so it takes some time to rush here. Please forgive me."

Diana and Arthur were still sitting in the invisible plane and did not show up.

Although the Justice League is now at the forefront, most people have not yet realized the power of the Amazons and Atlanteans.

Martin also doesn't want the Americans to get involved in this matter too early.

Although Amanda Waller is dead, the Sky Eye Society has not disappeared.

Steve Trevor may be a man with ideals, but as a secret agent organization, the attributes of the A.O.R. are difficult to change, and it will be difficult for it to survive without causing trouble.

In a peaceful world, spy organizations will gradually be marginalized and eventually disappear within the government's power structure.

Steve himself may not care about this kind of thing, but what about the agents in the Sky Eye? If they leave this organization, they will have nowhere to go.

The skills honed in various covert operations are almost worthless in the ordinary person's market.

The U.S. government has no precedent for arranging a retreat for department employees. In order to maintain their current special status, they will definitely stir up trouble secretly to demonstrate their value to higher powers.

Can Steve withstand the pressure from both sides and persist in pursuing his ideals?

Martin doesn't think so. According to Bruce's intelligence, this veteran who has been active in American politics since World War II is not in a good situation even though he has returned to the SkyEye Society.

Because he advocates cooperating with the Justice League to deal with the superhuman situation in the United States first.

But such remarks do not have the support of either party at all, as they simply cannot accept the emergence of such an uncontrolled group in the United States.

The current American system cannot afford the emergence of a third party.

Steve didn't actually see these things, or he didn't want to see these things, which disappointed those who had bet on him, and they all distanced themselves from him.

As a result, Steve, who was originally in a desperate situation, instantly became a withered flower that no one cared about.

Amanda Waller's former subordinates also took the opportunity to start a rebellion, trying to regain control of the Sky Eye Society.

In contrast, General Sam was much smarter. Although his status rose due to superhuman affairs, he did not seek any political channels to express his opinions and maintain his military position.

This seemingly conservative behavior actually makes it impossible for people to do anything to him.

Because this is exactly what the two major parties in the United States require of the military: to obey the government's arrangements completely and not have to have their own political propositions.

If some politicians use this as an excuse to attack General Sam, it will break the current neutrality of the army and force those officers to take sides.

Moreover, it is completely impractical to seize power from General Sam through general administrative means.

No one in the government was as familiar with the situation of superhumans as he was, and this so-called new department had not actually established anything completely new.

Intervening too early can bring great rewards, but also great risks.

The White House politicians who are used to being the banker and the winner takes all are not willing to take such responsibility, so they are prepared to wait and see.

This is one of the important reasons why Martin wants to meet with General Sam, who is now standing on the edge of the cliff.

Whether to fly into the sky on the wind or fall into the bottomless abyss is actually a matter of taking a step.

General Sam was observing Martin in front of him. His team had been working non-stop all night and found out that the other party was just an ordinary employee of Wayne Group.

Although he did not believe this identity, there was really nothing to dig up, so he could only meet with such doubts.

"I have to admit that your intelligence work is pretty good. My people worked all night and didn't find any flaws in the way you hid your identity."

General Sam took the lead in launching an attack, trying to test Martin's identity.

There was no disguising this probing, Martin smiled and said, "I thought that as a father you would complain to me first about Louise's coming here, although I am also surprised. Superman should have been in charge of this matter."

He was also surprised that Lois would appear in this place alone. It was obvious that she was replacing Superman.

"If I had known that the two of them would do this, I would never have agreed to it."

In fact, even if a real fight broke out, the little power General Sam had would be like a fortress on the beach to the Justice League, which would collapse at the first blow.

As a result, Louise intervened and made it seem like Martin was threatening General Sam, and the situation suddenly changed.

"Last night, Superman asked me an interesting question, is there any plan to militarize the Justice League?"

Martin went straight to the point and said to General Sam: "To Superman, I reiterated the principles of the Justice League. To you, General Sam, I want to say that your worries are really unnecessary. Even if we don't recruit more people, with only the current number, do some ambitious people think he can use war to solve us?"

Even without counting Martin, the five current leaders of the Justice League, combined, are capable of defeating the army of any country on Earth.

But Martin and his team knew that violence was only the foundation, and it was something that should only be used as a last resort, so they expanded the Justice League through innovative ways.

General Sam's face suddenly turned cold: "Can I understand this as some kind of threat?"

"No, no, no, I don't think there's any point in threatening a general like you. These are all true."

Martin stared into General Sam's eyes and said, "Maybe many people in the government think that the Justice League is aggressive, but in fact we have been very restrained.

After the Battle of Los Angeles, a large number of superhumans awakened their abilities. If the Alliance hadn't provided manpower and money to guide these newly awakened people, do you think Los Angeles, an international metropolis, can continue to wait?"

"Alarmist!"

General Sam certainly would not accept such remarks. He snorted coldly and said, "Maintaining order is the power of the government. You are stepping into other people's business. Do you think we should thank you? Besides, these things can be solved by the government."

Martin shook his head in disappointment: "After the war broke out, the National Guard was slow to respond and had no ability to deal with this kind of occult incident.

After the demon was expelled, the first order of the Los Angeles City Council was to blockade the affected communities, and the federal government prepared to mobilize troops into Los Angeles without even attempting to calm the market.

The media controlled by certain political parties began to hype up the threat of superhumans, completely ignoring the extent of the disaster.

With Bruce around, Martin knew the situation inside Congress better than General Sam, and even knew it earlier than him.

General Sam was speechless. If he were Superman, he could use the authority of the government to justify these actions.

But the young man in front of him obviously didn't care about these things. No matter what his true identity was, he must have a good relationship with Batman, otherwise he wouldn't know so many things.

Of course he can suppress the other party in the name of the government or the army, but if the other party clearly states that they don't care, does he have to completely break off relations with the Justice League?
Not to mention that he has no such power to represent anyone, and even if he did, he would not do so.

He is also dissatisfied with many of the government's measures, such as the sale of public services, which seems to raise the upper limit but also raises the lower limit.

In the Battle of Los Angeles, perhaps only the public sector, such as the police and firefighters, played too little role because they were short of personnel and resources.

So in the end, it was many non-governmental organizations that came into play and stabilized the situation.

The Justice League is what brings these non-governmental organizations together.

If the Justice League had not taken the lead, even if these non-governmental organizations had abundant resources and manpower, it would have been difficult for them to perform due to lack of discipline.

This is also the reason why General Sam is willing to meet Martin, because the other party does have something besides violence.

"Mr. Martin, you are wasting the goodwill of the friendly people in the government by speaking like this."

General Sam's original intention was to make the Justice League compromise, but Martin's attitude forced him to state his own opinion first.

"Who would reject a well-intentioned friend? But General, what kind of friends do you want to be with us?"

Martin went straight to the point. Although he had explored so much in the beginning, the main point was actually in the latter part.

Only by defining clear boundaries of interests can we ensure that the other party is truly sincere.

The United States has inherited the British tradition of throwing away various treaties it signed at will. Even the words written in black and white cannot be trusted, let alone verbal guarantees.

Moreover, judging from General Sam's attitude, he was obviously unwilling to sign even a written agreement and only wanted to reach a secret verbal agreement with Martin.

It was very American, but Martin was not that stupid.

Even if General Sam himself could be believed to be willing to maintain a verbal agreement, he could not go against the will of the army or the government.

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(End of this chapter)