by Cuba (lit)
"Lab site Alpha is a dairy farm. The
recon team checking out Bravo reports
jackpot, but not many troopsno more than a dozen.
The Osprey will be there in less than ten minutes."
The admiral got up from his chair, stretched, rubbed
the back of his neck. So far it was going better than
he expected it would. So far. Nobody shot down
yet, only one recon team lost...
"Is someone monitoring Cuban radio and
television?"
"Yes, sir. The National Security Agency.
They will keep us advised."
"Ummm."
"What are we going to do about silo six,
Admiral"..."...Gil Pascal asked.
"Nothing we can do. The assault team will have to go into the
landing zone blind."
"The Cuban Army may be waiting."
"They mightea"...Jake Grafton agreed.
He put on his headset and switched between radio
channels. By simply flipping switches he could
monitor the aircraft tactical
channels. In addition, with the new tactical com
units, he and his staff could hear everything that was said
on the helmet radios worn by marine officers and
NCO'S.
Since the signals were rebroadcast and
ultimately picked up by the satellite, they were
also being monitored in the war room of the White
House. One of Jake's concerns was that the
politicians or senior officers would be tempted
to step into the middle of the operation. Although the Washington
kibitzers could not communicate on the nets, they could
quickly get in touch with someone who could, and an order was
an order, even if ill-considered.
He would worry about the politicians when the meddling
started, he decided, not before.
Doll Hanna was the recon team leader at dairy
Bravo. He was sitting on a biological
warhead assembly plant and he knew it. There
wasn't a cow hi sight, two clean, modern
dairy trucks sat near the entrance to the barn, and
Hanna could hear air conditioners running. And the
Cuban Army was guarding the place.
From where he lay he could see two soldiers in
cloth hats with rifles in their arms standing in front
of the main entrance. He knew that there were men
on the door in the rear of the building and in the old
thatch-roofed farmhouse nearby.
Doll Hanna touched the transmit button on his
radio. "Willie, you take the two guys on the
north side. Fred, you got the farmhouse.
Goose, these two on the main entrance."
All three men acknowledged.
Doll was wearing his night-vision goggles so he could
see Goose crawling behind the milk trucks, then
under them, working his way toward the entrance. It was eerie
watching Goose sneak along, knowing the guards
couldn't see him.
Taking out two men was a challenge. Either one could
raise the alarm.
Goose moved like he had all night.
He didn't, Doll Hanna well knew. The
Osprey was out there now circling, but it wouldn't come in
until he called the area clear. Still, the plane
only had so much fuel and the Cubans wouldn't stay
quiet forever.
In fact, a truckload of soldiers could come
rolling in here any minute. The troops in the
Osprey, when they arrived, would set up a
perimeter to keep the Cuban military
away.
"Doll, this is Fred. I'm going to make some
noise over here."
"Okay."
No doubt Goose and Willie heard that
transmission. Noise would cause the guards to do
something. If necessary, Goose and Willie could just
shoot them down.
Hanna heard the faint sound of a slamming door come
from the direction of the farmhouse.
The guards near the main door to the dairy got to their
feet, looked at each other, then started toward the
house. One stopped, told the other to stay, then went
on with his weapon at the ready. As he went around the
truck out of sight of the guard at the door, Goose
got him with a knife.
Then Goose waited.
The man at the door called out to his friend.
Nothing.
The guard looked worried. He called again, got
no answer, then walked forward twenty feet or so.
He stopped, cocked his head, stood looking into the
darkness and trying to hear over the hum of the big air
conditioners.
He was standing like that when Goose stepped out from
behind the truck and threw a knife. The guard
dropped his rifle and pitched forward on his face.
Hanna got up, trotted for the door of the barn.
He passed Goose, who was bending over the second
guard checking to make sure he was dead. Carefully
Doll eased the door open and looked inside.
There were people inside, all right, behind transparent
plastic curtains that formed biological seals.
They were wearing full body-and-head CBW suits,
so they looked like spacemen walking around in there between
trays of cultures and rows of worktables.
They had apparently heard nothing above the noise of the
air-ventilation system, which was a loud, steady hum.
Doll eased his head back. The people in there would have
to wait until the experts arrived.
Major Carlos Corrado walked onto the
runway of the Cienfuegos Air Base. The
runway lights were off and the night was fairly dark
considering that two hangars and at least five
aircraft were ablaze. He could hear people shouting, about
fire, about water, about missiles, about staying under
cover. Straining hard he could hear several cruise
missiles 'and airplanesup there in the
darksamerican airplanes, because in order to save
money, the Cuban Air Force, the
Fuerza Aerea Revolucionaria,
did not fly at night.
What was happening? Where was the war?
Carlos Corrado had no illusions about the
difficulties involved in engaging the American
military. His MiGo-29, a stripped Soviet
export version, had only the most rudimentary of
electronic detection equipment and lacked any
active countermeasures. And his GCI site was
probably in the same condition as the burning hangars
behind him.
If he left his radar off he would not beacon on the
Americans" detection equipment. And he would be
electronically blind.
Perhaps if he stayed low ...
Another cruise missile roared overhead and dove
into the last undamaged hangar. The 750-pound
warhead rocked
the base, then the hangar collapsed outward, its
walls silhouetted black against the yellowish white
fireball caused by the warhead.
Well, if the Americans were pounding Cienfuegos,
they must be pulverizing Jose Marti International in
Havana.
Havana. The war would be in Havana, so
that was where he would go.
The V-22 Osprey t
win-engine tiltrotor
assault transport was the ultimate flying
machine, or so Rita Moravia liked to tell her
husband, Toad Tarkington. It hovered like a
helicopter and flew like an airplane, operated from
the deck of an airborne assault ship, and was at
its best after the sun went down.
So here she was, in the pilot's seat of a V-22
on her way to a ballistic-missile silo in the
Matanzas Province of central Cuba with 24
combat-ready marines, loaded for bear. She had
made a vertical takeoff from
Kearsarge
and was now thundering along at two thousand feet over the
Cuban countryside at 250 knots, navigating
by GPS and monitoring the forward-looking infrared
display (Flir), which revealed the countryside
ahead as if the sun were shining down from a cloudless
sky.
Rita's copilot was Captain Crash Wade,
USMC, who earned his nickname in an unfortunate
series of ski adventures, not flying accidents.
Wade paid careful attention to the multi-function
displays (Mfd's), computer presentations
of everything the pilots needed to know, on the instrument
panel in front of him.
Rita was paying careful attention to the voice on the
radio, which was that of Asel Ty vek, NCO in
charge of the marine recon team at silo number
two. Rita didn't know his real name, just his call
sign, Blue One.
"Old Rover, this is Blue One. I want you
to hold four minutes out while we get some ordnance
on this LZ. It's sizzling hot."
"Old Rover, Roger."...Rita keyed the intercom.
"Okay, Crash, do a holding pattern."
"How come we got the hot LZ"..."...CRASH wanted
to know.
"Just lucky, I guessea"...Rita replied, and
selected an intercom button that would allow her
to talk to the lieutenant in the cargo bay with his
troops.
Asel Tyvek and Jamail Ali were side by side
in the ditch, just thirty yards or so from the barn. The
other two members of the team were also in the ditch, but
well left and right.
"We ought to get in the barnea"...Ali whispered, "in
case the Cubans want to get in there too."
"Man, those little boards ain't gonna
protect anybody from anything. You just be ready in
case the Cubans start diving into this damned ditch with
us."
"Listen, I can hear our guys coming."
Tyvek strained his ears. Yep, he could just detect
the distinctive beat of chopper rotors. "Snake
One, Blue Oneea"...he whispered into his radio.
"Cuban troops all around the barn. At least
two tanks, eight or nine trucks, a couple
hundred men. We're in a ditch near the barn."
"Got your head down?"
"Yeah."
Tyvek could hear the choppers distinctly now. He
eased his weapon up, put his finger on the safety.
The Cubans were going to be looking for cover very
shortly, and he didn't want to share the ditch.
The SuperCobras eased up over the tree line,
barely moving. Tyvek knew what was going to happen
next, and it did. He heard the roar as
Hellfire antiarmor missiles screamed toward
the tanks, and he heard the explosions as they hit.
He lifted his head above the ditch line for a quick
peek. The tanks were smoking hulks. Even as he
watched, more missiles tore into the trucks.
377
Not a standing figure could be seen. Everyone was on the
ground, crawling or lying still.
The two SuperCobras came closer. The noise
of their engines was quite plain now. The flex
three-barreled 20mm cannons opened up and
rockets shot forward from the pylons under the stubby
wings.
The men in the yard realized they couldn't stay where they
werethe area was a killing zone. Some jumped up and
ran for the ditch. Fortunately few of them seemed
to have weapons in their handsthe attack had caught them
by surprise.
"Here they comeea"...Tyvek shouted, and opened up on the
men closest to the ditch. He couldn't shoot them fast
enough. Men dashed for the cover of the ditch as he and
Ali and the other two poured fire into them and the
SuperCobras lashed the area with ordnance.
Tyvek spoke into the voice-activated mike on
his helmet-mounted radio. "We're gonna need
some help, Old Rover. Whenever you can get here."
Something heavy fell across Tyvek's legs. He
spun and fired at the same time, but the man was already
dead: Ali had shot him.
"They're going into the barnff"...Ali shouted. He fired
a whole magazine at three men trying
to get through the front door. One of the men disappeared
inside.
Jamail Ali scrambled over the edge of the ditch and
ran for the barn while Tyvek screamed at the
SuperCobra gunners not to shoot him.
"Snake One Four, this is Orange
One."...Richard Merriweather let go of the mike and
waited for an answer from the SuperCobra inbound
to silo six.
"Orange One, Snake One Four."
"Man, we're on the wrong side of this river or
creek five or six clicks south of the LZ.
How about seeing if you can find us."
"Are you standing up?"
"In plain sight."
Merriweather and his partner, Kirb Handy, stepped
away from the trees. With their night-vision goggles,
the SuperCobra crewmen should have no trouble seeing
two men standing in an open field, and they didn't.
Both the helicopters settled to earth and the marines
on the ground ran to them.
The pilot of the lead chopper opened his canopy as
Merriweather ran over. "Where are the other guys?"
"Haven't seen them or talked to them. Don't
know."
"Seen any bad guys?"
"Nope. How about a ride over toward the barn?"
"Sit on the skid and grab hold. We run
into trouble, you gotta get off if we drop down
low."
Merriweather gave the pilot a thumbs-up and
arranged himself on the skid. Handy was clinging to the
skid on the other side.
The chopper came slowly into a hover, then dipped
its nose and began moving forward. Merriweather held
on for dear life as the rotor downwash and
slipstream tore at his clothing, helmet, and gear,
and threatened to rip the night vision goggles from his
head.
What a stupid idea this was! How in hell had
they ended up four miles south of the goddamned landing
zone? If he ever again laid eyes on that son of a
bitch who flew the Here, he was going to stomp his
ass.
Bryne and McCormickthose two were missing.
If they were okay surely they would have checked in on
the radio. Maybe their parachutes didn't open.
Maybe they fell into that river. Maybe the
Cubans captured them as soon as they hit the
ground. Maybe, maybe,
maybe...
He could see the barn now. The chopper was just a few
feet above the trees, making an approach to the area
right in front of the damn thing. The other chopper was
flying over the trees, three or four hundred
yards awayclose, but not too close.
Nobody in sight around the barn. Not a soul.
Merriweather jumped when the chopper was three feet
off the ground, and fell on his face. He got up,
staggered out from under the rotor blast.
Handy appeared at his elbow.
The glow of a cigarette tip showed in the door.
Someone sitting there!
Merriweather froze, his M-16 at the ready.
A marine sat in the open door smoking d
cigarette. His face and neck were coated with green
and brown camo grease. His helmet and night-vision
goggles lay in the dirt beside him.
Merriweather walked over to the man, who said, "No
one around."
"Where's Bryne?"
McCormick nodded toward the east. "Over there about
a hundred yards. Parachute streamed, backup
didn't open."
"Your radio?"
"Broke. Bryne's got smashed."...McCormick
stood, took a last drag on the cigarette, and
tossed it away. "Been sitting here waiting for you.
The place is deserted, quiet as a graveyard."
"Too bad about Bryne."
"Left two little kids. Too fucking bad."
The interior of the barn was large, empty, and dark.
Merriweather used a flashlight, looked in eve
caret you corner, inspected the ceiling, the floor,
the nooks and crannys.
Then he spoke into his boom microphone.
"Let's get the Osprey into the LZ, set up a
perimeter."
Through her night-vision goggles, Rita Moravia
could see the silo two landing zone and the hovering
SuperCobras plain as day as she made her
approach in the Osprey. She saw bodies lying
everywhere, still-warm bodies radiating heat, and she
saw living men. She transitioned to hovering flight
and lowered the Osprey toward the ground between the
choppers. A cloud of dirt and dust rose up,
obscuring everything. She went on instruments.
On the intercom she told the lieutenant to get
ready.
As soon as the wheels hit, the marines in
back charged out the door of the Osprey and kept right
on going for fifty yards, when they went down on their
stomachs with their rifles at the ready.
Rita didn't wait to see what was going to happen
next. As soon as her crew chief said the last
marine was out, she lifted the Osprey into the air,
