The Reluctant Assassin Box Set

by Lee Jackson

  Startled, the co-pilot looked up at him. “We’re ready as soon as the cargo door is closed. I was just double-checking these tires. They’re new.” He peered at Klaus and gestured toward the rear of the plane. “They’re pulling the conveyor away now. I’ll let the captain know.”

  Klaus watched him climb into the plane and then turned back toward the parking area. At first, he saw nothing out of the ordinary. Then he spied a shadowy figure slip between airplanes.

  Klaus mounted the stairs and stood in the door while keeping an eye along the line of aircraft. Suddenly, a man leaped into the light, heading directly toward Klaus’ plane in a dead run.

  “We’re ready, sir,” a voice behind him said. A flight attendant stood there. “If you’ll take your seat, I’ll close this up.”

  After rolling out of the taxi, Atcho moved in a crouch to the front of the line of planes, obscured by shadows. By the time he had a clear view, the conveyor belt had been backed away from the plane. Klaus stood near the front landing gear with another man in a pilot’s uniform. The two conversed briefly, then they both moved to the stairway.

  Atcho watched Klaus scrutinize the parking area while the co-pilot climbed into the jet. Then Klaus followed, but he paused at the top of the stairs and once again stared into the shadows cast by the row of planes where Atcho hid.

  Atcho leaped from the darkness into the brilliant airfield lights. He ran hard, arms pumping, legs extended in long, powerful strides. He had closed only a quarter of the distance when Klaus entered the aircraft and the door closed. Nevertheless, with no weapon and no plan, Atcho pushed his body to extremes.

  Too late. The jet lurched into motion coming straight toward him, gaining speed.

  Atcho called on all his reserves, his lungs heaving, sweat streaming from his face.

  The plane turned right, and suddenly sirens blared and cars raced across the tarmac toward him. The plane continued on as a bevy of security cars surrounded Atcho. He tried to dodge past them, but six security guards jumped from their seats and tackled him, bringing him to the ground on his stomach.

  In despair, Atcho craned his neck to look up at the jet as it glided by.

  Klaus could not hear the sirens of the police cars, but he saw them as the plane made its turn. He watched them surround the man running across the tarmac. Then a host of security guards tackled the man. Fascinated, Klaus stared, seeing the man lift his head to watch the plane roll past him. He recognized the face. Atcho!

  19

  Atcho walked disconsolately with Sofia toward the conference room at Berlin Brigade headquarters. He had arrived early that morning, having started his return trip immediately after his close encounter with Klaus.

  “If I’d had just one more minute,” he said. “Or a gun.”

  Sofia stopped dead in her tracks. “You didn’t have your gun?”

  “There was no time to arrange a permit or to smuggle one in. I had to go with what I had.”

  “What if he’d had a gun?”

  “I figured he had the same problem.”

  Sofia shook her head. “So, he can smuggle five nuclear bombs in and out of the country, but he can’t get in a peashooter?”

  Atcho looked sheepish. He shook off the comment.

  They entered the conference room and took their seats. “I blew that one,” Atcho said as he sat down. “Do we at least know where they went?”

  “Libya,” Burly’s intoned over the speaker. “The pilot filed his flight plan after takeoff. That plane is fast. Klaus was in-country before we could activate any operatives there. Besides, the pilot called an in-flight emergency and diverted to an airfield outside of Tripoli. Being in Libya, he had no problem establishing a legitimate purpose. Klaus is now among friends.”

  “Libya,” Atcho groaned. “From there, he could go anywhere, and he transferred all his money to Tripoli.” He scooched his chair back and stood abruptly. “What next? Where do we go from here?”

  Sofia glanced at him. She recognized his extreme frustration. “A better question is, where does he go from there?”

  20

  “It’s been a month since you got back from Crete, Atcho,” Burly said over the speaker from DC, “and not a peep from Klaus.”

  Atcho looked around at the big conference room the group had used since they combined the team of US and German intel analysts. It looked desolate. The analysts were gone, and so was the clatter of busy people at work over keyboards, monitors, and electronic communications devices.

  “The chatter on Klaus has gone to zero,” Sofia interjected. “Berger’s back to his regular activities, and the BND pulled Gerhardt and his team out yesterday. Right now, it’s just me, Atcho, and Joe.”

  “My boss cut my involvement way down,” Horton interjected. “I’m free to go whole hog again when we got something. Meanwhile, he wants me back doing my regular job.” He snickered. “Maybe one day he’ll clue me in on what that is.” He looked around furtively. “Don’t tell him I said that. I need the paycheck.”

  “How’s the war going?” Atcho asked. “What’s the news reporting stateside?”

  “Saddam keeps igniting more oil-well fires,” Burly replied. “General Schwarzkopf must be planning to launch ground combat soon. Saddam’s battle formations and infrastructure have been decimated but I’m sure the Iraqi Republican Guard still has plenty of fight left. I thought Klaus might take sides to influence the outcome of the war, but his opportunities are running out. And still no sign of him. Maybe he’s waiting for ground combat.”

  “Well he’s startin’ to annoy me,” Horton said. The corners of his eyes crinkled with a grin. “There’s a war on, and I’m not in it? That’s just not natural.”

  “He is going to Kuwait,” Atcho announced flatly, “and he’s not after military formations.” Sofia and Horton turned questioning eyes to him.

  “When I watched the news this morning,” Atcho said, “the channel re-ran an interview with Carl Sagan. In one segment, Sagan said that for the fires in Kuwait to have a significant effect on world climate, hundreds of oil wells would have to be ignited.

  “When Sagan first made that statement, Saddam had lit maybe ten oil wells and storage facilities. That started on January 22, right after Desert Shield kicked off and when Saddam knew he had lost his battle against the Saudis in Khafji.

  “At last count, Iraq has ignited over seven hundred oil wells.” He paused, reflecting. “Can you imagine the effect of dropping a nuclear bomb, or multiple bombs in the middle of those fires? Think nuclear winter. There’s no action Klaus could take to equal that.” Sofia and Horton stared at him. Burly’s speaker remained silent. Before anyone could speak, Atcho added, “That’s where Klaus is going. Kuwait.” He paused. “That’s where I’m going.”

  Sofia gasped, her eyes wide with uncharacteristic fear. Then, Horton slowly stood. He advanced toward Atcho and stopped when their faces were only inches away. They looked at each other, eyeball to eyeball. “Now you listen to me, sir,” he said, his voice full of indignation. “You ain’t going nowhere.” His eyes bulged, and he crossed his arms. “Without me.” A grin spread across his face.

  “Hold your horses,” Burly called over the speaker. “Neither of you is cleared into the war zone. Atcho, we let you play lone ranger on your foray into Crete, but going into Kuwait or even Saudi Arabia is different. The military owns that ground right now, and Stormin’ Norman wouldn’t appreciate a freelance agent rummaging around in his backyard while he’s running a war.”

  Atcho pushed his chair back and stood, his arms folded, staring at the speaker. “We can’t sit around in Berlin doing nothing.”

  “I agree,” Burly said, “and you might be right about what Klaus’ aims to do. But if you’re going to be effective, you’ll need Schwarzkopf’s cooperation. If he’s even heard of this situation, it’s no more than a blip on his horizon, and you’ll need to be cleared to get into the war zone. That’ll take a few days. Sit tight. I’ll work things on this end.”


  The room was quiet after Burly hung up. Atcho leaned on tightly curled fists over the table. Sofia kept her eyes on his face, reading his agitation.

  Horton broke the silence. “You know what my momma used to say during situations like this?”

  Atcho lifted his head with hooded eyes and a slight smirk.

  Horton laughed. “Hell, my momma never saw a situation even close to this. But somewheres along the way, I did learn the best way to keep things in perspective.” He paused for dramatic effect. “It’s time for cognac. That’s co-nee-yak!” Then he glanced at Sofia. “Oh, sorry, ma’am. You cain’t partake. We’ll get you some warm milk.” He laughed at his own joke. Sofia ignored him, her eyes still glaring at Atcho.

  21

  Saudi Arabia, February 24, 1991

  The rotary blades of a Blackhawk helicopter whirred over Tony Collins’ head. He sat in the middle seat behind the cockpit. From that vantage, he watched the pilot and co-pilot prepare for liftoff. Through the windscreen he had a panoramic view of what lay ahead. For the moment, that included only more Blackhawks waiting on the tarmac, rotors spinning. The doors were slid back and locked open. The deafening roar of their engines permeated the ground. The vibration traveled through the frame of the helicopter and coursed through Collins’ body. He reached up to check his helmet.

  Two gunners perched over their machine guns on each side of the aircraft. They checked and rechecked the functionality of their equipment. Their combat gear, including Nomex gloves and huge helmets with room for earphones, covered them completely. Dark sun visors obscured their eyes. They had painted the lower parts of their face masks to look like the jaws of human skulls, giving them an otherworldly appearance.

  A large man climbed into the seat on Collins’ right, and three soldiers on each side perched in the door, their legs dangling over the edge. They sat grim-faced, their weapons pointed at the ground. The large man put on a set of earphones, checked his commo, and nudged Collins. “Can you hear me?”

  Collins nodded. Despite the intercom, yelling was required over the clamor of competing noises.

  “Good. I’m Major General Alsip. I run this outfit. I know who you are. Glad to have you aboard. You can ask me anything. I’ll answer what I can. Same with my staff and soldiers. But stay out of my way, stay out of their way, and if you so much as breathe information that compromises our mission or could get my soldiers killed, you’ll be out of here so fast you’ll think you never left stateside. Is that understood? I don’t want to see any maps drawn in the sand for TV cameras.”

  “Got it,” Collins yelled back. By “this outfit,” he knew the general referred to the 101st Airborne (Air Assault) Division, the storied military unit that fought to so many victories in both World Wars and in Vietnam.

  “Good.” The general whirled one hand over his head, his index finger pointing up. The co-pilot, who had been watching diagonally across from the front, nodded to the pilot. Collins heard voices over the intercom. Moments later, the pitch in the engine gained deep-throated intensity, and the Blackhawk vibrated more stridently. Then it lifted to hover in the cold February air, made wet by smoke from oil-well fires.

  On his left and right, against a black sky, other helicopters floated upwards as if choreographed, and then held steady in formation three feet off the ground. He took a deep breath. Desert Sabre has begun.

  He found the names of operations confusing. Only this morning he had come to realize that Desert Sabre referred to the direct attack on Iraq’s forces in Kuwait. It was a subset of the larger operation, Desert Storm, which encompassed the entire combat operations against Saddam Hussein’s army in Kuwait, and inside Iraq.

  Atcho and Sofia entered the conference room in the embassy where, once again, Horton sat absorbed by the television. The view focused on the wheels and tracks of an armored personnel carrier and then panned out to show that it was one among a vast number of military vehicles spread out and speeding over a desert panorama. Black smoke marred the sky.

  “We started our counterattack against Saddam in Kuwait,” Horton announced.

  The three stood mesmerized by the unfolding scene. “That Stormin’ Norman Schwarzkopf, he’s a tricky fella,” Horton continued, beaming. “His air war destroyed Saddam’s air force, so the Iraqis couldn’t see what we was doin’. He kept an amphibious force offshore to make them think we was goin’ to do an assault from the sea. Meanwhile, he got the Marines set to charge straight up toward Kuwait City.”

  Horton warmed to his narrative. “While the Marines and the amphibious force were sitting there to the east, ol’ Stormin’ moved the Brits, the French, and a major US Army unit to the west. This morning, he called the signal to snap the football. The Marines charged up the center while those units on the left swept wide to come in deep on the flank. Saddam had his army concentrated in front of our amphibious force, and it’s still just settin’ in place.” He relished the telling. “Just like a Hail Mary.”

  Watching the news from his lodgings in Libya, Klaus fumed. Large numbers of men, some in military uniform, others in civilian clothes, walked toward the news camera, their arms raised in the air, to join a larger group already sitting cross-legged on the ground.

  To the left and right in the field of view, American soldiers with rifles guarded them while others patted down newcomers for hidden weapons. The journalist broadcasting the report identified the location as being inside Iraq and the men on the ground as surrendered Iraqi soldiers. The prisoners looked meek, beaten, even obsequious before their captors.

  “These men say they don’t know why Saddam invaded Kuwait,” the journalist reported, “or why they were sent here. They tell us they are glad that for them, the war is over.”

  More reports showed footage of demolished Iraqi tanks with live ammunition still stored in their burned-out hulls. News video showed highways with mile upon mile of destroyed vehicles of every description piled together on both sides of a desert road. Smiling American soldiers posed for the camera. They waved US flags as their troop carriers drove by one fire after another shooting flames from blasted-out rubble.

  Klaus grabbed the phone and dialed a number. While he waited for it to be answered, he glanced outside his window. The crystal blue of the Mediterranean Sea sparkled at the bottom of steep cliffs. At their base, the salt water sprayed as massive waves crashed against boulders.

  Defensive walls outlined the compound that housed him. Men with machine guns protected the front gate and manned spaced-apart positions. The room that Klaus occupied was comfortable, but sparsely furnished.

  A man’s voice answered the third ring. “Hello?’

  “Hassan, this is Klaus. It’s time for me to go.”

  “How is your shoulder?”

  “It’s sometimes painful, but I have most of my strength and can move it almost normally.” He laughed. “I can shoot with it. What else is important?”

  “I’ll send a car to bring you to my house.”

  Hassan was the hawaladar in Tripoli Kadir had recommended. He had secreted Klaus in an ancient fortress outside of Tripoli and sworn the security team to silence.

  “The war is moving fast, and Saddam will lose,” Klaus told Hassan on arrival at the hawaladar’s house. “That should embarrass every Muslim. Our Saudi and Kuwait brothers betrayed us to the infidels. They win against Saddam only with the help of the Great Satan. Get me there.”

  Hassan was a tall thin man in a straight, plain robe. He wore no beard. His hair, although unkempt, was cut short, and he spoke little. When Klaus had finished speaking, he nodded. “I made a few phone calls. We should have you on your way soon, if Allah wills it.”

  Klaus felt an immediate lessening of tensions. Being in a faithful Islamic country with Muslims who understood jihad was truly a blessing. He rested in Hassan’s house for a few hours that afternoon, and then the two met in the early evening.

  “It’s set up,” the hawaladar said. “There is a chartered jet flying to Riyadh in Saudi Arabia the da
y after tomorrow. You won’t be the only passenger, but no one knows your mission. The pilot is taking you because I asked, and the flight will cost you nothing. It was already scheduled. Arrangements to get your luggage through customs is done. When you arrive, you’ll be met by a man with a car. The driver will drop you at the home of the hawaladar in Riyadh. That’s the best way to get there undetected, and you should arrive, if Allah is willing, by noon the next day.” He gave Klaus written details.

  When Klaus finally settled into his seat on the flight two days later, he felt contentment he had not known in years. He was among Muslims. His shoulder gained strength and mobility every day. His remaining funds amounted to three and a half million dollars, and the way was paved for him into Saudi Arabia. Most importantly, he had his bombs secured in the aircraft’s cargo hold. Allah truly chose me as his instrument for jihad. He slept, aware that when he arrived in Riyadh, the war would be in its fourth day.

  22

  Collins had never experienced such highs and lows or been as exhausted as he was during his four days covering Desert Storm. General Schwarzkopf’s strategy at first seemed to him extravagant. The 101st Airborne (Air Assault) Division swung wide and north to strike Iraqi forces from the left flank. The 82nd Airborne Division maneuvered at the left in a parallel trajectory. The French did the same to the north, and the Brits to the south. Marines on the right flank cut straight up into Kuwait City.

  From Collins’ perspective, the strategy initially appeared to him simple on paper but unnecessarily complex in action. The enemy was to the front, and Schwarzkopf’s main force swept past it on the left side in a wide, risky maneuver through the desert. The chance of major units bogging down in the sand seemed high.