by Frank Perry
down the aisle and said something to the Minister. When the Minister’s voice cracked and he began sobbing, Peter moved. The soldiers were about twenty feet apart when he stood abruptly and pushed past the nearest soldier while screaming at the farther man, “Hey, give me back my papers!”
He continued to move quickly, closing the distance to the soldier in the front. As the other soldier regained his balance, he turned and began chasing Peter while pulling his gun from his holster. It took two bounding steps to grab Shields’ shirt by the shoulder. There was about seven feet separating both soldiers when Peter turned around, crushing the pursuer’s larynx and then attacking the soldier closer to the door. The man tried to bolt, but Peter grabbed his collar and threw him to the floor of the car, landing with his knee on his sternum while delivering a hard blow to his temple. The first man was gasping on the floor, trying to breathe through a crushed windpipe. Peter went to the back of the car pulling the Minister with him as they hurried off the train.
As they exited, Peter grabbed the back of the Minister’s shirt forcing him upright. They walked past other soldiers who assumed they had been released. The fat man got some inquisitive stares, but Peter was able to coax him forward, commenting on “bad food,” explaining the Minister’s stricken look. At the end of the ramp, the Minister was hyperventilating as Peter forced him down the stairs, onto the sidewalk, walking toward the beach. It was difficult to control the urge to run, but Sheik Abu Qatada would be dead in seconds if they tried. It would only be moments before the dying soldiers were discovered.
At the end of the street, there was a slight bend downhill toward the ocean. Hidden from direct view of the soldiers, Peter began pulling the Minister faster. As they reached the beach, the Iranian was stumbling from fatigue and the sand made it more difficult. He was too heavy to carry over the sand, so Peter moved under his shoulder to help. The Minister slumped, pulling Peter down. “Damn you, get up and carry yourself, I’ll leave you here if you don’t start walking.”
With that admonishment, the fat man stood almost erect and, with Peter’s support, started to move forward. It was like trying to run a sack race in soft sand. Peter kept them moving toward the sea, but they had to cover several hundred yards before the footing would improve on wet sand. Somewhere out in the darkened swells, the SEALS would be watching, expecting to time their arrival with Peter’s.
The sand hardened as they approached the surf line. Peter’s lungs felt like they would burst. He was carrying most of the weight of them both. He was about to collapse when two Navy SEALS broke from the surf and sprinted for them pulling the sled. Peter dropped to his knees in exhaustion. As the SEALS grabbed the Minister, one of them thrust his MP5 assault weapon into Peter’s hands. Peter had not been looking backward, but the SEALS had seen a line of Iranian soldiers heading onto the beach in pursuit.
They were working on the Minister to get him into a wetsuit and oxygen re-breather when the first shots struck sand near them. Peter had not started to prepare for the swim when he whirled. The MP5 was deadly at close range but could not match the range of military rifles shooting back. Fortunately, the Iranians were stumbling through the sand trying to get closer, firing on the move. Their aim was poor. One of the SEALS joined Peter in firing position, waiting for the enemy to get within range of their nine-millimeter weapons. The soldiers were getting closer and the Minister was taking too long to prepare, so Peter ordered the second SEAL to assist. He fired a volley toward the Iranians, freezing them in place momentarily.
As the soldiers took up firing positions and scurried for cover, the SEALS yelled at Peter to get his gear on, but he needed to keep firing back. He wheeled in his position and yelled to the SEALS. “Go. Go!”
“No sir. We will cover while you move.”
“Forget it, they’re too close. I’ll cover. Get the hell out of here!”
The SEALS each grabbed the Minister and ran, dragging him into the surf.
One yelled back, “We’ll wait outbound!”
Peter lifted his left fist in acknowledgment without turning and resumed firing at the soldiers, who now had steady firing positions. Bullets strafed all around him as he dove headfirst into the hard sand. There was no cover!
Looking back over his shoulder, the last flipper disappeared under a wave. It was still early dawn and the black water provided concealment.
He fired until his magazine was empty to suppress the enemy, then jumped to his feet and ran to the ocean, thrusting the weapon out to sea. Knee deep in the surf, he dove in, but the water was too shallow for cover. Bullets smashed into the sea near him and he could hear them streak past his head. He swam with all his strength until reaching the first line of breakers, when he felt a massive blow and searing pain between his shoulder blades. He kept clawing at the shallow water -- he imagined Rachael ahead of him.
In three feet, he jackknifed and started stroking underwater. Somewhere beyond the surf in the blackened ocean, his team was waiting. He was not sure how badly he was wounded. He was swimming for his life and needed to breathe!
He shot out of the water like a porpoise, gulping one gigantic lungful of air before submerging again. It wasn’t enough! Carbon dioxide was building in his bloodstream and he needed to take several breaths to clear it, but the soldiers were already rushing into the surf near him, firing into the water. As his lungs screamed, he pulled even harder to gain distance. He had no swim gear and the water was ice cold to his skin. The clothing was slowing him down. He was wounded and his vision dimmed; he could hear the bullets piercing the surface all around him. He gave one last mighty tug underwater before blacking out. His last thought was of her.
Minutes later, a dull consciousness returned. Peter, with his head cradled in someone’s arm, was being pulled under water. There was a mouthpiece in his teeth and a regulator was set to free-flow air. One of the SEALS had stayed behind watching his escape and rescued him. Peter could only see blackness all around and was freezing, but he was alive!
After about a minute of assisted underwater swimming, he tapped the swimmer’s elbow, signaling his ability to swim on his own. They were in ten feet of water with little sunlight above, but it was safe enough to stop, while he mounted a breathing device over his shoulders. As he strapped on the tank, the Navy man swam behind him, checking Peter’s wound. When he moved back in front of Peter, he signaled that the wound was okay. Peter still had no facemask, but he could discern the hand signal. Together, they swam another hundred yards while the two SEALS used clickers to navigate back together. Even in the darkness, they were able to rendezvous and continue out to sea toward the submarine. Peter was given a facemask to see better, but rejected the wet suit, fearing too much time would be lost. He could survive the cold now that they were hidden underwater.
As they swam together, Peter was amazed to see how agile the fat man looked underwater. As they neared the mini-submarine, surface propeller noise could be heard. The Iranian Navy kept a small fleet of fast patrol boats at the port of Bushehr for littoral (shallow water) warfare. Patrol boats passed overhead, back and forth, searching for an acoustic signal from the invaders. In the distance, the team aboard the mini-sub heard active sonar pinging from the surface ships. If the mini-sub were located, the water was too shallow to dive and they could not outrun an attack.
Reaching the mini-sub, the Navy men got Abu Qatada and Peter into the dive chamber first. It took about five minutes to get both sets of men aboard. During the chamber operation, noise from the high-pressure air and purging operations could disclose their location. As Peter and the Abu Qatada tumbled inside the hull, he told the minister to sit still and be silent. The Minister registered terror of the enclosed space and did exactly as told while whimpering silently. When the SEALS were aboard, everyone was silent for several seconds as the ships passed repeatedly overhead, trying to confirm their location. Some distance away, there was an underwater explosion, probably made by a depth charge. They remained frozen in place.
One o
f the SEALS gestured for Peter to lie flat on the deck, and applied a battle dressing to his wound without saying a work. Silence was their only defense. After several more minutes, the surface noise shifted. The senior NCO ordered the coxswain to maneuver to “mother” before they ran out of oxygen. The SEALS had been stationed offshore for almost twenty hours waiting for Peter’s return, so they blew water from the ballast tanks and began maneuvering out to sea. They moved at half speed to keep propeller noise low. All crewmen remained in swim gear with re-breathers, just in case the ship was hit.
They had to stop twice as surface ships approached. The progress to Connecticut was painfully slow. After hours of evasion, the crew fired a directional pinger to signal Connecticut of their position. One of the surface combatants detected the signal, and began using active sonar to locate them. Inside the ASDS, the men were rattled by the powerful underwater acoustic blasts.
The mini-sub stopped all propulsion, not wanting to draw the surface fleet to Connecticut. There was visible distress on the Minister’s face. They all knew the active sonar could “paint” a precise location of their boat for the attackers. The mini-sub was
