"Is it a rescue?" Coleridge asked.
"Not yet," the SEAL replied. "We've got a team in place outside the camp. I'm just here to make sure you're you. How many guys are in there?"
In quick, terse exchanges, Wilkinson answered the SEAL's rapid-fire questions, giving him the numbers he needed: 170 prisoners, including 18 badly wounded men who would need stretchers and special care if they were to be moved.
"You mean all of you are being held in one place?" the SEAL asked.
"Yeah," Wilkinson replied. "I think they're still trying to decide what to do with us… and it's easier to guard all of us together."
"Well, that's good, anyway," Huerta said. "Makes it easier to get you all out."
"When?" Wilkinson asked. "When's the rescue?"
"Can't say yet, sir," the SEAL replied. Evidently, there was light enough at his back for him to recognize Wilkinson's uniform and rank bars. "First thing is to let people know you're okay." There was a pause. "You got a place in there to hide some weapons?"
Coyote thought about a corner tucked away among the rafters he'd noticed earlier, a spot someone could reach by getting on someone's shoulders. "Yeah!" he said. "There's a place!"
Huerta hesitated, as though thinking it over. "Okay. Somebody reach through the window."
The windows were too narrow for a man to squeeze through ― the reason, perhaps, why they weren't barred or screened over ― but Chief Bronkowicz helped Coyote up so he could stretch his arm over the sill. It was a long reach. The eaves of the roof extended well beyond the wall, but Coyote felt something cold and heavy placed in his open palm. He pulled it back inside. Light gleamed from the parkerized finish of a.22-caliber pistol, the barrel swallowed by the heavy cylinder of a long suppressor.
Two times more, Coyote reached into the night, retrieving a Marine Kabar combat knife and two fully loaded magazines for the pistol.
"Listen up now," the voice at the window said. "It's vital that those weapons not be seen by the gooks, get me? They see those, they'll know we're in the area."
"You can count on us, Chief," Wilkinson said.
"I'll try to slip back in here tomorrow night, same time, and let you know what the word is. No promises. If I don't show, just hunker down and sit it out. Those weapons are in case things get too tight and I can't make it."
"Wait a minute," Coyote said. "Won't you need these?"
"Not to worry, pal. I won't have time to stop and play with our NK friends, and those things'd just slow me up anyway. I don't care what the bastards do to you, you keep them hidden until you hear a rescue op going down, get me?"
"Right, Chief."
"When you hear the fun and games begin ― explosions, helicopters, American voices, anything like that ― that'll be the time. Use them to protect yourselves until the cavalry arrives." Huerta paused. When he spoke again, his voice carried the whip crack of command, even at a whisper. "Until then, keep 'em out of sight. You guys start playing cowboy and you'll get all of us killed, get me? Don't even load the damned thing until it's time to use it! I don't want an accidental shot giving the whole damn thing away!"
"Count on it, Chief," Wilkinson said.
Coyote felt the heavy authority of the pistol in his hand. The SEAL was taking a terrible chance by leaving the gun and knife with the prisoners, but it might be their one chance of survival if their captors started slaughtering them during a rescue attempt.
"Okay," Huerta said. "I trust you. Don't do nothing crazy. I'll try to make contact again tomorrow night, let you know what's happening."
Abruptly, the head pulled away. There was a whisper of noise from the ceiling as the SEAL climbed back toward the roof ridge, then silence.
For the first time since his capture, Coyote allowed himself the luxury of hope.
0630 hours
In the hills east of Nyongch'on-kiji
"Those poor bastards don't have a chance," Huerta said. "Not unless we go in fast and pull them out. I mean like tonight!"
It was two hours since he'd made contact with the prisoners inside the compound. Unwilling to approach the building's wall on the ground and in the open, he'd used his line and grapnel to get up on the roof, then secured himself by the waist so he wouldn't fall and crept spiderwise to the overhang so he could reach the window.
The prisoners' description of the North Korean questioning had convinced him that they were in serious danger. Their captors might be expecting an American attack, and it was unlikely that they would keep the prisoners together or in one place for very long. The likeliest move would be to transport them to P'yongyang. When that happened, rescue would be out of the question.
Sikes looked at the map Huerta had drawn, then compared it with the actual camp, spread out below them in the golden light of the dawn. The SEAL team had created a hide for itself, an OP sheltered behind a blind of brush and loose rock overlooking the base and well away from the nearest roads. The lieutenant pointed to something that looked like apartment buildings beyond a motor pool garage and a cluster of supply sheds. "Barracks?"
"Yes, sir. Two sentries there." Huerta pointed out notations on his map. On his way out, he'd scouted the compound. "Also here, and here. Roving patrols here…"
"Too big a job for fourteen men," Sikes said. His mouth quirked in a passable imitation of a smile. "Too big even for fourteen SEALS."
"No such thing, Lieutenant," Larry Gordon said, crouched behind the OP's blind nearby. He patted his M-60 machine gun affectionately. "We can take 'em!"
"What do you think?" Sikes asked. "A battalion inside the compound?"
"About that." Huerta thought about what he'd seen. Security inside the camp was not all that good. "Securing the prisoners won't be the problem," he said. "We can handle the bad guys inside the camp. But we're going to have to bring in helos to get us out, and holding out against NK reinforcements from outside is gonna be a bitch."
Sikes studied the map a moment longer. "Agreed," he said at last. He pointed toward the airfield, sprawled across the ridge-top spine of the peninsula to the north. The valley between that ridge and this one was filled with the regular outlines of fenced-in compounds, military-looking buildings, massed trucks, and military vehicles. "We've got hostile air based there… and a major Army base of some kind down there in the valley." He dropped his arm. "Shit. Ten minutes after it goes down, we could have half the North Korean Army on our asses."
"We could bring in some cavalry," Huerta pointed out. "Just enough to hold on until we could evac the hostages." Already, he was thinking of the op like a hostage rescue, something he'd trained for intensively during a tour with SEAL Team Six.
They discussed the situation for another fifteen minutes, suggesting alternatives, planning, revising. Finally, Sikes looked across the hide to where Tom Halliday was unfolding the compact satellite dish and aligning it with a nondescript piece of the southern sky. The unit could assemble a burst transmission and hurl it to a Navy comsat hanging in a stationary orbit 22,000 miles above the equator, then on to Washington and to the Navy ships waiting beyond the eastern horizon.
"Well, the decision won't be ours," Sikes said at last. "Thank God. But if we can get some help, we'll go in."
The SEALs crouched lower over the map as they went over their options, composing the message they would transmit.
0740 hours
Flag Plot, U.S.S. Thomas Jefferson
Admiral Magruder let his finger slide across the stretch of blue labeled Yonghung Man on the map. Hundreds of close-spaced numbers gave depth readings. The finger came to rest on the out-thrust slash of the Kolmo Peninsula. Symbols on the map marked the airfield at the peninsula's base, the tangled maze of Wonsan's streets across the narrow gut between peninsula and mainland, the red-flagged triangles of known SAM and radar sites along the coast. "This stretch of beach looks clear," he said.
The man in camouflage fatigues opposite the plot table from the Admiral was Colonel John Caruso, commander of the MEU's Marines. Next to him wa
s Admiral William E. Simpson, CO of the four ships of the amphibious squadron. They'd heloed in from the Chosin only an hour earlier and stood now in Flag Plot with Magruder, studying the map of the North Korean coast.
Admiral Simpson traced narrow corridors on the map, between the islands which interrupted the approaches to Wonsan. The islands bore exotic names: Yo-do, Sin-do, Su-do. Do, Magruder remembered, was Korean for island. "These stretches could be mined," Simpson said thoughtfully. "Gun emplacements on these islands."
"We have plenty of Mark 106 sleds to take care of the mines," Magruder said.
"Air strikes can take out the gun emplacements," Caruso added. "And any NK air out of this airstrip will have to be neutralized before my boys go ashore."
"We can handle that," Magruder said. "This'll be Winged Talon all over again, except this time we'll carry it out!"
The brief message from Bushmaster had electrified the staff and senior officers of TF-18. Here was a real chance to rescue the men of Chimera's crew ― all of them ― from a single compound four miles from the coast. There would not be a better chance than this. Bushmaster had warned that the prisoners might be moved soon. When that happened, they would be beyond the carrier group's reach forever. A rescue, if it was to be attempted at all, would have to be mounted within the next day or two, and that meant getting a start on the planning now.
"Do you think your people can pull it off?" Magruder asked Caruso at last. "Two thousand men against… God knows. Ten thousand? Twenty?"
"More'n that if we're not in and out, chop-chop." The colonel frowned. "I gave you my recommendations the other day, sir. I thought we could do it then. I think we can do it now. But the show's gonna be yours."
"I know."
Caruso's plan, submitted as one of the options the task force had been examining two days before, had been for a Marine landing to secure a base on the mainland, with recon teams ranging inland to secure the American prisoners… assuming that preliminary reconnaissance could locate them. At the time, no one knew where Chimera's crew was being held, and the plan had been shelved in favor of Winged Talon.
But now…
The real question was what Washington would think. Winged Talon had been aborted minutes before the Navy aircraft had hit Korean air space, and since that time there had been no explanation, no word at all save that the SEALs should be sent in and that TF-18 should hold station at Point November. It seemed unlikely that they would approve a full-fledged Marine landing one day after calling off a far simpler, far cheaper air strike.
Magruder was still angry about that call, angry with a simmering, barely restrained resentment which needed little to boost it to white-hot fury.
"Recap it, then," Magruder said at last. "Air strikes to take out KorCom radar, SAM sites, and guns. A heliborne Marine assault on Nyongch'on to support the SEALs and secure the prisoners. Marine assault at Kolmo to give us a secure base from which to support the Nyongch'on op. Why not just go straight in from the task force with helos? Why have the Marines go ashore at all?"
"Too many things could go wrong, with nothing in reserve," the Marine colonel said. "We only have two large flight decks, Jefferson's and Chosin's… and Jefferson is going to be busy with CAP and ground strikes. We have no guarantee that all of our helos will arrive at Nyongch'on intact, and we might have to reinforce before we evacuate. It'll help to have a shore-based helo pad, and the airfield will provide us with just that. Any helos that are damaged on the ground at Nyongch'on will have a friendly place to set down and off-load only a few miles from the DZ and won't have to make it all the way back to Chosin, eight, ten miles out at sea."
Magruder nodded. "Makes sense."
"Besides, the beachhead will help divert enemy attention away from Nyongch'on. Our boys are gonna have their hands full in there, no matter what, but we can help 'em take some of the heat off."
"Okay. Bill? How long before you have a detailed working plan?"
Simpson pulled at his lower lip. "My staff's already working on it. I can have a preliminary on your desk in three hours. Your boys'll have to work out the air ops and fire control."
"A preliminary's all I'll need for right now… to sell Washington on the idea."
Simpson grinned. "I'm glad that's your department, Tom, and not mine. I'd get mad and want to kick bureaucratic ass."
"Who says I won't?" He looked at the map again, at the small forest of red triangles, SAM sites and hardpoints. This was going to be lots more expensive than Winged Talon, in men, money, and aircraft. But then, from the look of things, Washington was going to ignore the military option in favor of the diplomatic one.
And how long, he wondered, before those boys at Nyongch'on came home? How many wouldn't come home at all? He wondered if Washington would even let them take the first, necessary steps. He felt a stab of fire in his gut, an old ulcer burning anew. Sometimes it was hard to know who the real enemy was.
CHAPTER 19
0750 hours
Dirty shirt wardroom, U.S.S. Thomas Jefferson
Batman queued up with other officers to buy a meal ticket from the cashier, picked up a tray, and started down the cafeteria-style line. It wasn't that he was hungry ― quite the contrary, in fact ― but the mechanical actions of moving through the chow line were a piece of mindless routine that allowed him to put off the thoughts that had been troubling him since the party the night before. Finding an unoccupied table in the corner of the wardroom, he slumped at the seat and began picking at his food without interest. His thoughts kept returning with a kind of morbid fascination to the subject of death.
Kill or be killed. There was no other way to look at aerial combat. All of his training, all of his preparation, all of the lectures and classes and maneuvers he'd gone through during his Naval career had been directed to one end and one end only: to place Lieutenant Edward Everett Wayne on the six of an enemy combat aircraft so that he could destroy it. During the actual dogfight, he'd not thought of the MiGs as anything other than targets in a kind of video game in the sky where machines exploded in flame and debris, jacking up the victor's score.
The sudden shift in his mind, from thinking of them as targets to thinking of them as men with families, wives, children…
Through much of the previous night, he'd wrestled with those thoughts, wondering if he should go talk to one of Jefferson's three chaplains. There was an inner reserve which made him hold that idea at arm's length. He respected the chaplains, respected their experience and the Navy traditions which stood behind them but what could they tell him that he didn't already know? None of the carrier's sky pilots were aviators themselves, none had been in combat.
How could they address what he was feeling now?
Besides, Batman had heard stories of chaplains who'd gone to the ship's captain with what otherwise would have been considered confidential information… if that information was potentially dangerous to the man, the ship, or the crew. He suspected that CAG would ground him so fast it would make his head spin. Navy combat aviators had to have their heads screwed on straight at all times.
So maybe he should ground himself… or turn in his wings. Every part of Batman's background, his whole being rebelled against that idea. It would be an admission of weakness, of failure. An admission that he no longer had the right stuff.
But Batman felt that if he didn't talk to someone he'd blow his stack. The only people with whom he had enough in common were other aviators, the very men for whom he had to maintain the facade, the band-of-brothers act that all was well.
There was no one, not even Malibu…
Across the wardroom, an officer in khakis rose from his table and carried his tray toward the galley window. Batman recognized the lanky gait, the pale, pale blond hair of Tombstone's RIO.
Tombstone! There was a man who had never made a point of maintaining the machismo of the aviator brotherhood. The guy's got problems of his own, Batman thought… but possibly it was the fact that Tombstone was having problems that
made him seem like the right man to see.
Batman picked up his unfinished breakfast and hurried from the wardroom.
1120 hours
Flag Plot, U.S.S. Thomas Jefferson
A lieutenant informed him that CINCPAC was on the line. "I'll take it here," Admiral Magruder said. He picked up the handset and stabbed a button. The hollow-sounding hiss of a satellite-relayed signal sounded in his ear. "Task Force Eighteen," he said, using the time-honored Navy tradition of identifying himself by the name of his command.
"Tom?" the voice at the other end said. It had the faintly artificial quality of a security-scrambled transmission. "This is CINCPAC. I'm afraid the answer is… sit tight. Washington wants you to take no action at all until further notice."
Magruder had expected as much, but the disappointment was keen nonetheless. "Understood, Admiral," he said.
"We appreciate your situation, Tom," the voice continued. Magruder had spoken with CINCPAC several times during the past few days and knew Admiral Bainbridge shared his own feelings of helplessness… and anger. What did Washington think it would accomplish, screwing around this way?
But to voice those feelings would be unprofessional and would change nothing.
"A diplomatic initiative is under way," Bainbridge continued. Even through the scrambling it sounded as though the words had a bad taste in his mouth. "The White House crisis team has high expectations for a successful resolution."
"Very well, sir."
"Your plan has been code-named 'Righteous Thunder." It is to be held in reserve, pending a breakdown in negotiations… or the decision by the Command Authority to proceed with a full military option."
CINCPAC's stress of the word "full" meant an all-out invasion, Magruder knew. They could all well be standing at the verge of a new Korean War… and with 1990's weapons, this one would make 1950 look like kindergarten.
Hell. Washington couldn't want that.
But the alternative didn't sound promising either. For P'yongyang, negotiation was simply another form of warfare. The North Koreans might hold Chimera's crew for months, for years, with nothing being settled. They would hold show trials, parade "confessions" extorted from their captives, promise a release and then change their minds in response to some imagined or contrived slight by American authorities. The anguish would go on and on.
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