by Tom Clancy
“Air activity picking up over Germany,” a colonel said. “We show some American fighters coming out from Ramstein and Bitburg, heading east. Total of eight aircraft.”
“What do we have on the American Stealth fighters?”
“There is a squadron—eighteen of them—at Ramstein. Supposedly the Americans are demonstrating them for possible sale to their NATO allies.”
“They could all be in the air right now,” Kuropatkin noted, “carrying nuclear weapons, for that matter.”
“Correct, they can easily carry two B-61-type weapons each. With high-altitude cruise, they could be over Moscow before we knew it....”
“And with their bombsights ... they could lay their weapons exactly on any target they wish ... two and a half hours from the time they lift off ... my God.” In the weapon’s earth-penetration mode, it could be placed close enough to eliminate the President’s shelter. Kuropatkin lifted his phone. “I need to talk to the President.”
“Yes, General, what is it?” Narmonov asked.
“We have indications of American air activity over Germany.”
“There’s more than that. A Guards regiment in Berlin reports being under attack by American troops.”
“That’s mad.”
And the report came in not five minutes after my friend Fowler promised not to do anything provocative. “Speak quickly, I have enough business here already.”
“President Narmonov. Two weeks ago a squadron of American F-117A Stealth fighters arrived at their Ramstein air base, ostensibly for demonstration to their NATO allies. The Americans said they want to sell them. Each of those aircraft can carry two half-megaton weapons.”
“Yes?”
“I cannot detect them. They are virtually invisible to everything we have.”
“What are you telling me?”
“From the time they leave their bases, then refuel, they can be over Moscow in less than three hours. We would have no more warning than Iraq had.”
“Are they truly that effective?”
“One reason we left so many people in Iraq was to observe closely what the Americans are capable of. Our people never saw that American plane on a radarscope, neither ours nor the French scopes Saddam had. Yes, they are that good.”
“But why would they wish to do such a thing?” Narmonov demanded.
“Why would they attack our regiment in Berlin?” the Defense Minister asked in reply.
“I thought this place was proof against anything in their arsenal.”
“Not against a nuclear gravity bomb delivered with high accuracy. We are only one hundred meters down here,” Defense said. In the old battle between warhead and armor, warhead always wins....
“Back to Berlin,” Narmonov said. “Do we know what’s happening there?”
“No, what we have has come from junior officers only.”
“Get someone in there to find out. Tell our people to fall back if they can do so safely—and take defensive action only. Do you object to that?”
“No, that is prudent.”
The National Photographic Intelligence Center, NPIC, is located at the Washington Navy Yard, in one of several windowless buildings housing highly sensitive government activities. At the moment they had a total of three KH-11 photographic and two KH-12 “Lacrosse” radar-imaging satellites in orbit. At 00:26:46 Zulu Time, one of the -11s came within optical range of Denver. All of its cameras zoomed in on the city, especially its southern suburbs. The images were downlinked in real-time to Fort Belvoir, Virginia, and sent from there to NPIC by fiber-optic cable. At NPIC, they were recorded in two-inch videotape. Analysis started immediately.
This aircraft was a DC-10. Qati and Ghosn again availed themselves of first-class seating, pleased and amazed at their good luck. The word had gotten out only minutes before the flight was called. As soon as the report had gone out on the Reuters wire, it had been inevitable. AP and UPI had instantly picked it up, and all television stations subscribed to the wire services. Surprised that the networks had not yet put out their own special bulletins, the local affiliates ran with it anyway. The one thing about it that had surprised Qati was the silence. As the word spread like a wave through the terminal building, what lay behind it was not shouting and panic, but an eerie silence that allowed one to hear the flight calls and other background noises normally submerged by the cacophony of voices in such public areas. So the Americans faced tragedy and death, the Commander thought. The lack of passion surprised him.
It was soon behind him in any case. The DC-10 accelerated down the runway and lifted off. A few minutes later it was over international waters, heading toward a neutral country and safety. One more connection, both men thought in a silence of their own. One more connection, and they would disappear completely. Who would have expected such luck?
“The infrared emissions are remarkable,” the photoanalyst thought aloud. It was his first nuclear detonation. “I have damage and secondary fires up to a mile from the stadium. Not much of the stadium itself. Too much smoke and IR interference. Next pass, if we’re lucky, we ought to have some visible-light imagery.”
“What can you tell us about casualty count?” Ryan asked.
“What I have is inconclusive. Mainly the visible-light shots show smoke that’s obscuring everything. Infrared levels are very impressive. Lots of fires immediately around the stadium itself. Cars, I guess, gas tanks cooking off.”
Jack turned to the senior Science and Technology officer. “Who do we have up in the photo section?”
“Nobody,” S&T replied. “Weekend, remember? We let NPIC handle weekend work unless we expect something hot.”
“Who’s the best guy?”
“Andy Davis, but he lives in Manassas. He’ll never make it in.”
“Goddamn it.” Ryan picked up the phone again. “Send us the best ten photos you have,” he told NPIC.
“You’ll have them in two or three minutes.”
“How about someone to evaluate the bomb effects?”
“I can do that,” S&T said. “Ex-Air Force. I used to work intel for SAC.”
“Run with it.”
The nine Abrams tanks had by now accounted for nearly thirty of the Russian T-80s. The Soviets had pulled south to find cover of their own. Their return fire had killed three more of the M1A1s, but now the odds were a lot more even. The Captain commanding the tank detachment sent his Bradleys east to conduct reconnaissance. As with their first dash, there were people watching them, but for the most part they did this from windows now unlit. The streetlights worried one Bradley commander, who took a rifle and began shooting them out, to the horror of Berliners who had the courage to watch.
“Was nun?” Keitel asked. What now?
“Now we get the devil away from here and disappear. Our work is done,” Bock replied, turning the wheel to the left. A northerly escape route seemed best. They’d dump the car and truck, change their clothes, and vanish. They might even survive all this, Bock thought. Wouldn’t that be something? But his main thought was that he’d avenged his Petra. It had been the Americans and Russians who’d brought her death about. Germans had only been the pawns of the great players, and the great players were paying now, Bock told himself, were paying now and would pay more. Revenge wasn’t so cold a dish after all, was it?
“Russian staff car,” the gunner said, “and a GAZ truck.”
“Chain gun.” The track commander took his time identifying the inbound targets. “Wait.”
“I love killin’ officers....” The gunner centered the sight for his 25mm cannon. “On target, Sarge.”
For all his experience as a terrorist, Bock was not a soldier. He took the dark, square shape two blocks away for a large truck. His plan had worked. The American alert, so perfectly timed, could only mean that Qati and Ghosn had done their job exactly as he’d envisioned five months earlier. His eyes shifted as he saw what looked like a flash bulb and a streak of light that went over his head.
“Fire�
�hose ’em!”
The gunner had his selector switch on rapid fire. The 25-millimeter chain gun was wonderfully accurate, and the tracers allowed you to walk fire right into the target. The first long burst hit the truck. There might, he reasoned, be armed soldiers in the truck. The initial rounds went into the engine block, shattering it into fragments, then, as the vehicle surged forward, the next burst swept through the cab and cargo area. The truck collapsed on two flattened front tires and ground to a halt, the wheel rims digging grooves in the asphalt. By that time the gunner had shifted fire and put a short burst through the staff car. This target merely lost control and slammed into a parked BMW. Just to make sure, the gunner hit the car again, and then the truck. Someone actually got out of the truck, probably wounded already from the way he moved. Two more 25mm rounds fixed that.
The track commander moved immediately. One does not linger where one has killed. Two minutes later they found another surveillance spot. Police cars were racing down the streets, their blue lights flashing. One of them stopped a few hundred meters from the Bradley, backed up and raced off, the track commander saw. Well, he’d always known German cops were smart.
Five minutes after the Bradley departed for another block, the first Berliner, an exceedingly courageous physician, came out his front door and went to the staff car. Both men were dead, each torso ripped to shreds by the cannon shells, though both faces were intact except for the splashed blood. The truck was an even greater mess. One of the men there might have survived for a few minutes, but by the time the doctor got there, it was far too late. He found it odd that they all wore Russian officers’ uniforms. Not knowing what else to do, he called the police. Only later did he realize how disproportionate his understanding of the events outside his home had been.
“They weren’t kidding about the infrared signature. This must have been some bomb,” the S&T guy observed. “Damage is a little funny, though ... hmph.”
“What do you mean, Ted?” Ryan asked.
“I mean the ground damage ought to be worse than this ... must be shadows and reflections.” He looked up. “Sorry. Shockwaves don’t go through things—like a hill, I mean. There must have been reflections and shadows here, that’s all. These houses here ought not to be there anymore.”
“I still don’t know what you mean,” Ryan said.
“There are always anomalies in cases like this. I’ll get back to you when I have this figured out, okay?” Ted Ayres asked.
Walter Hoskins sat in his office because he didn’t know what else to do, and as most senior man present, he had to answer the phones. All he needed to do was turn to see what the stadium was. The pall of smoke was only five miles away through his windows, one of which was cracked. Part of him wondered if he should send a team down there, but he had no such orders. He turned his chair to look that way again, amazed that the window was almost intact. After all, it was supposed to have been a nuclear bomb, and it was only five miles. The remains of the cloud were now over the front range of the Rockies, still intact enough that you could tell what it had been, and behind it like a wake was another black plume of fires from the bomb area, The destruction must be ... ... not enough. Not enough? What a crazy thought. With nothing else to do, Hoskins lifted the phone and dialed up Washington. “Give me Murray.”
“Yeah, Walt.”
“How busy are you?”
“Not very, as a matter of fact. How is it at your end?”
“We have the TV stations and phones shut down. I hope the President will be there when I have to explain that one to the judge.”
“Walt, this isn’t the time—”
“Not why I called.”
“Well, then you want to tell me?”
“I can see it from here, Dan,” Hoskins said in a voice that was almost dreamy.
“How bad is it?”
“All I see is the smoke, really. The mushroom cloud is over the mountains now, all orange, like. Sunset, it’s high enough to catch the sunset, I guess. I can see lots of little fires. They’re lighting up the smoke from the stadium area. Dan?”
“Yeah, Walt?” Dan responded. The man seemed to be in shock, Murray thought.
“Something odd.”
“What’s that?”
“My windows aren’t broken. I’m only like five miles from there, and only one of my windows is cracked, even. Odd, isn’t it?” Hoskins paused. “I have some stuff here that you said you wanted, pictures and stuff.” Hoskins leafed through the documents that had been set in his In basket. “Marvin Russell sure picked a busy day to die. Anyway, I have the passport stuff you wanted. Important?”
“It can wait.”
“Okay.” Hoskins hung up.
“Walt’s losing it, Pat,” Murray observed.
“You blame him?” O’Day asked.
Dan shook his head. “No.”
“If this gets worse ...” Pat observed.
“How far out is your family?”
“Not far enough.”
“Five miles,” Murray said quietly.
“What?”
“Walt said that his office is just five miles away, he can see it from there. His windows aren’t broken, even.”
“Bullshit,” O’Day replied. “He must really be out of it. Five miles, that’s less than nine thousand yards.”
“What do you mean?”
“NORAD said the bomb was a hundred-kiloton range. That’ll break windows over a hell of a long distance. Only takes half a pound or so of overpressure to do a window.”
“How do you know?”
“Used to be in the Navy—intelligence, remember? I had to evaluate the damage distances for Russian tactical nukes once. A hundred-kiloton bomb at nine thousand yards won’t sink you, but it’ll wreck everything topside, scorch paint, start small fires. Bad news, man.”
“Curtains, like?”
“Ought to,” O’Day thought aloud. “Yeah, regular curtains would light up, especially if they’re dark ones.”
“Walt’s not so far out of it that he’d miss a fire in his office. ...” Murray lifted his phone to Langley.
“Yeah, what is it, Dan?” Jack said into the speaker.
“What number do you have on the size of the explosion?”
“According to NORAD, one-fifty, maybe two hundred kilotons, size of a big tactical weapon or a small strategic one,” Ryan said. “Why?” On the other side of the table, the S&T officer looked up from the photos.
“I just talked to my ASAC Denver. He can see the stadium area from his office—five miles, Jack. He’s only got one cracked window.”
“Bull,” S&T noted.
“What do you mean?” Ryan asked.
“Five miles, that’s eight thousand meters,” Ted Ayres pointed out. “The thermal pulse alone should fry the place, and the shock wave would sure as hell blow a plate-glass window out.”
Murray heard that. “Yeah, that’s what a guy here just said. Hey, my guy might be a little out of it—shock, I mean—but he’d notice a fire next to his desk, don’t you think?”
“Do we have anything from people on the scene yet?” Jack asked Ayres.
“No, the NEST team is on the way, but the imagery tells us a lot, Jack.”
“Dan, how quick can you get somebody to the scene?” Ryan asked.
“I’ll find out.”
“Hoskins.”
“Dan Murray, Walt. Get some people down there fast as you can. You stay put to coordinate.”
“Okay.”
Hoskins gave the proper orders, wondering just how badly he might be endangering his people. Then, with nothing else to do, he looked over the file on his desk. Marvin Russell, he thought, yet another criminal who died of dumb. Drug dealers. Didn’t they ever learn?
Roger Durling was grateful when the Kneecap aircraft disengaged from the tanker. The converted 747 had the usual pussycat ride, but not when in close proximity to a KC-10 tanker. It was something only his son enjoyed. Aboard in the conference room were an Air Forc
e brigadier, a Navy captain, a Marine major, and four other field- and staff-grade officers. All the data the President got came to Kneecap automatically, including the Hot Line transcripts.
“You know, what they’re saying is okay, but it sure as hell would be nice to know what everyone’s thinking.”
“What if this really is a Russian attack?” the General asked.
“Why would they do it?”
“You’ve heard the chatter between the President and CIA, sir.”
“Yeah, but that Ryan guy’s right,” Durling said. “None of this makes any sense.”
“So who ever said the world had to make sense? What about the contact in the Med and Berlin?”
“Forward-deployed forces. We go on alert, and they go on alert, and they’re close to each other, and someone goofs. You know, like Gavrilo Prinzip shooting the Archduke. An accident happens and then things just slide down the chute.”
“That’s why we have the Hot Line, Mr. Vice President.”
“True,” Durling conceded. “And so far it seems to be working.”
They made the first fifty yards easily, but then it got harder, and soon it went from hard to impossible. Callaghan had a total of fifty firefighters trying to fight their way on, with a hundred more in support. On reflection, he had a continuous water spray over every man and woman. If nothing else, he reasoned, it would wash whatever fallout or dust or whatever the hell was out here off his people and into the sewer drains—that which didn’t freeze first, that is. The men in front were coated with ice that made a translucent layer on their turn-out coats.
