by Mark Greaney
This area was as safe as it could possibly be made, and, for the first time in a long time, Azzam finally felt comfortable in a location outside the capital other than the regime-held bastion of Latakia on the western coast.
Still, Azzam wore black body armor over his light blue button-down shirt, and his eight-man protection detail kept tight with him as he deplaned.
He wasn’t crazy. There was still a war going on, and this was still on the edge of contested territory.
But, Azzam thought, perhaps on his next trip out of Damascus he wouldn’t need the body armor. Russia had all but won this war for him, with help from the Iranians. A year from now the last pockets of resistance to his rule would be confined to somewhere out in the desert or up in the mountains, and the civil war would be over. His patrons in Russia and Iran would trade with him while other nations fretted over sanctions, and although his nation would not be as prosperous as it was before the war, Azzam himself would be even more prosperous from the under-the-table deals he fashioned with every Russian commercial opportunity that crossed his desk.
This Russian base would be the last nod to Russia’s power over him, because Azzam had worked out a secret agreement with the Iranians. In a few months, when the end of the war came, he would agree to allow the Iranians to create permanent bases in his country, just as he had done with the Russians. Moscow would be furious; they had forced him to agree to their patronage in a moment of weakness, but now that he had grown strong again—albeit in large part due to Russia’s help—he would dampen Russia’s hold over his nation by taking more support from the Shia regime in Tehran.
Azzam stepped down from the stairs, up to the welcoming committee of military men, and shook the hands of a Russian general and several colonels, who themselves had been ferried into this remote location for today’s photo op.
Within moments Azzam ducked his head and stepped into the back of a Kamaz Typhoon, a massive Russian armored transport vehicle, for the five-minute drive northeast to the Russian special forces base on the other side of the highway. This vehicle was followed by a second Typhoon, in case the first became disabled.
* * *
• • •
Almost two and a half miles away, two men lay on the cheap linoleum flooring of a bombed-out sixth-story apartment and looked through high-powered optics at the vehicle as it began rolling north.
The man on the right spoke English with both excitement and confusion in his voice. “That had to be him. That had to be Azzam.”
“It was him.” Court had confirmed through the higher-power optics of his rifle. He couldn’t make out the man’s face from this distance, even through the impressive scope, but the bearing of the figure, the treatment of the figure by those around him, and the fact that he was the one person who deplaned who earned the attention from the mass of Russian military officers arrayed at the bottom of the stairs told him he had acquired his target.
The Terp asked, “But . . . why didn’t you shoot?”
“Dude, it’s two and a half miles to the airfield. When he gets to the base, assuming he is somewhere around the main buildings, it will still be a one-point-seven-mile shot. A cold-bore shot from one point seven miles is not impossible, for the best snipers in the world, but long-range shooting is a perishable skill and . . . I’m a little out of practice.”
“You are telling me this now?”
“I can hit him, I just need him within one point five miles and a clean look at his entire head first. Don’t worry, kid. I’m patient.”
“But . . . shouldn’t we find out where Khadir and Yusuf are? What if they attack the base before you fire?”
“Why the fuck would they do that?”
The Syrian shrugged. “Maybe they think they can hit him.”
Court thought about this. “Break radio silence. Send a brief transmission telling them to stand fast. I will initiate any attack.”
* * *
• • •
Ahmed Azzam spent an hour touring the Russian camp, meeting with the Spetsnaz soldiers, getting photos and video of him asking questions, posing on weapons, and listening to stories of the men telling him about killing terrorists and rooting out resistance. They talked of Daesh, the SDF, and the FSA as if they were all the same unit, a group of foreign-led terrorists out to destroy the peaceful and prosperous way of life of the Syrian people.
Throughout the base he was shadowed by his eight-man security detail, his SAA translator, and a throng of officers from the Russian army and the SAA—more than two dozen men in all.
Azzam found himself enjoying his time out here with these men, but he’d already signaled to his entourage that he would be cutting his trip short. He wanted to get back on board the aircraft and back to the palace, where he could monitor the rescue of his mistress in Greece and the search for his son here in the capital.
Originally he’d planned to helicopter to a couple of Syrian bases to the west and then back to Damascus, but he’d already changed his mind. The aircraft would get him back to the capital faster, so he’d bypass the bases and return to the palace.
As soon as he shook hands with a dozen Russian soldiers at three 120-millimeter mortar emplacements, the general taking him on the tour spoke through his interpreter.
“Mr. President, we have prepared a meal in your honor. If you will follow me to the mess tent, I would like—”
Azzam smiled and held up a hand. “Thank you, General. I only wish I had time. But my duties force me to return to Damascus immediately.” He looked at the video crew following him on his trip. “Can we set up for my announcement here?”
The producer of the unit said, “Of course, Mr. President, but it would be good if we could get some more Russian equipment in the shot. Perhaps we could have them bring the armored transport carrier over here and park it behind you.”
The Russians obliged, and both big Typhoons lumbered across the small base and parked behind the mortar position. Azzam and the Russian general stood in front of the staged vehicles, and several Russian and SAA colonels were brought in close.
When the cameras were ready, Azzam’s bodyguards backed away a few feet.
* * *
• • •
In the wrecked sixth-floor apartment, 1.81 miles away from the mortar position, Court said, “I can see his head plainly now. But he’s still too damn far. Everywhere I’ve had a shot for the last hour has been on the far side of the compound, and every time he was on the near side, he was too wrapped up by the men around him.”
The Terp said, “But the armored vehicles are there. When he gets inside, you can’t hit him, and if he goes back to the airport, you can’t hit him. You might not get another chance.”
Court adjusted the scope for the distance, using a ballistic calculator and the range finder, and taking a wild-ass guess about the wind from the movement of the flags at the front gate of the base. But when he put his sights on the target, he saw that the point where the crosshairs met in his scope was wider in his field of view than Azzam’s head. He could approximate where he needed to position the rifle to fire, but it would take a miracle for the round to hit a head-sized target at such a distance.
Court closed his eyes and cussed. “I don’t have a shot,” he said.
* * *
• • •
When the camera was rolling, Azzam did not look at it. Instead he leaned an arm on the sand-colored Typhoon APC next to him and addressed the Russian and Syrian military forces standing around the armored vehicle. “I am very proud to reveal to my nation that this will not only be a small special forces base for our friends the Russians, but we are also constructing, with both Russian and Syrian input and assistance, a new, permanent airfield here in central Syria. In addition to our joint Syrian-Russian air base at Hmeymim, now Russia will have complete and total air superiority in the skies over the Syrian Arab Republic, bringing a n
ew dawn of security and prosperity to all here in our nation.”
Ahmed Azzam shook the hand of the Russian general, and then the two men held their hands in the air as those around clapped and cheered.
* * *
• • •
Court blinked away sweat and peered through the thirty-five-power scope. “What the hell are they doing?”
On his right, the young Syrian resistance fighter looked through his binoculars. “I don’t know. I also don’t know why you are not shooting.” The young man was obviously frustrated. “You told me back at our base that if you could see him, then you could shoot him.”
Court did not move from his prone position behind the Tac-50. “I lied. He’s still effectively out of range. We’ll only get one chance at this. I don’t want to—”
“Sir . . . this is your chance. What if he gets back inside one of those vehicles and leaves for the airport as soon as he finishes talking?”
Court shook his head and took his eye out of the scope. “I need you to contact the Carl Gustaf unit. Tell Khadir and Yusuf that wherever they are, they have to find a way to the airfield. Tell them to keep low, keep out of sight, but try to move to within six hundred meters.”
The Terp made the call, then listened to the reply. “They are nine hundred meters east, southeast of the airport, but an Mi-14 is almost directly overhead their position, so they are moving very slowly. They think they will be spotted in moments.”
Court scanned over with his scope. He saw the Russian helo hovering a thousand feet over the desert, and the gullies and low rises below it that were apparently hiding the FSA rocket crew.
“Shit,” Court said. “They can’t let themselves get compromised. They are going to have to try to take out the Typhoon when it returns to the plane. We can spot for them from here to see which vehicle he gets into. Tell them they have to get closer, but to hold their fire until we tell them, no matter what else happens.”
The Terp did this, then turned to Court. “You aren’t going to shoot at all?”
Azzam was still 1.81 miles away. Court recognized that he wasn’t going to get the shot he wanted today.
“No. Sorry. I can’t reach him.”
The Terp made the transmission, then turned to Court. “It will take them an hour to cover the open desert, and they will probably be spotted. You are still the best chance to kill Azzam. You must try.”
Court looked at the kid once more, then lowered back to his scope.
Court’s mentor at CIA, a man he only knew by his code name of Maurice, was the first of many instructors who turned Court into a world-class long-distance marksman. He taught the young CIA recruit the math and the craft; he gave Court the confidence he needed to use his scoped rifle in the field to hit targets out over a mile.
Court could remember months of lying prone in fields in West Virginia, East Tennessee, and North Carolina, wearing ghillie suits, with a man-sized target so far away it couldn’t be seen with the naked eye. Maurice would spot for him, sitting at his side just like the young Syrian interpreter did now.
Maurice was a Vietnam vet, and he always said the same thing on the final shot of the day, which was always the most difficult. As Court concentrated on his breath, his heartbeat, while he labored to exert as much control over his involuntary muscles in order to line his sights up on a mile-plus long shot, Maurice would lean into Court’s ear and say a phrase that never left him.
“Send it and end it, kid.”
Court would fire, sending a boat-tail round across fields and lakes, over cabins and farms, and, more often than not, much more often than not, he’d hit his target, thereby ending the “threat.”
He’d send it, and he’d end it.
He thought back to those days, the fundamentals of the craft, and he fought again to remain calm. He forced himself not to feel any emotion at all. Any increase in heart rate, fluctuation in breathing, new sweating on his skin that could cause reflex muscle contractions. Anything different with his body at the moment he fired would affect his shot. It could send the round out of the barrel one hundredth of an inch from where he wanted the muzzle positioned for firing, but translated out across 1.81 miles, the round would end up several feet off target.
He blinked hard.
No . . . this was insane. He couldn’t even put his crosshairs on the target’s head at this distance, much less hold them there.
But as he peered through the optics, an idea came to him, and again, it came to him in Maurice’s calm but intense voice.
“Got a problem you can’t solve? Change the question, son. Branch out.”
Maurice had taught Court all about “branching,” or the ability to change tactics and plans as the need arose. It kept him from panicking, kept him flexible and on track.
He couldn’t hit Azzam’s head, and he knew the man was likely wearing plated body armor. The only chance in hell he had of hitting him at all would be if everyone around him simply moved out of the way.
Court spoke aloud in the darkened apartment hallway now. “Sending.”
He moved the scope off the men in front of Azzam, and he instead shifted his aim fractionally to the left. The crosshairs met on a flat steel plate of the big Typhoon armored personnel carrier positioned directly behind the group.
Court cleared his mind of thoughts, blew out half his air, paused briefly, and pressed the trigger.
Boom.
He knew the flight path of the round would take seven and a half seconds, so Court racked the bolt quickly, resighted through the scope, and aimed again, this time back to the right. He fired again. He’d rushed his second shot somewhat, but he’d taken just enough time to put the crosshairs back in the group of Russians, approximating where Azzam was standing among them.
Both bullets were in the air at the same time, and Court had time to rack the bolt and line back up to prepare for a third shot before anyone on the Russian special forces base had any idea that death was screaming their way at 2,700 feet a second.
CHAPTER 75
Ahmed Azzam shook hands again with the general for the camera, then turned slightly to reach for the hand of a tall Russian colonel. Both men smiled and made eye contact, and then both men’s brains registered a sudden, jolting, whip crack of noise between them. Before either man could perceive any danger, there was an impossibly loud clang of metal on metal, a spray of sparks on Azzam’s right and on the colonel’s left, and then Azzam shut his eyes as an involuntary response.
An instant later he spun away from the flash and sound, and he crumpled down into a ball.
* * *
• • •
Court just had time to get his eye focused back in the glass as the first round struck the steel wall of the APC, inches from where Court had been aiming. As expected, the sound, sparks, and flying bits of metal caused an immediate reaction in the group.
The idea was that the Russian soldiers would be well trained at hitting the ground when under fire, whereas the Syrian president, who was no combat vet, would take longer to react.
Unlike his sniper craft, this was no science. This was just a guess about how individuals would respond in a heartbeat.
* * *
• • •
But the second round Court fired at the crowd didn’t come anywhere near the Syrian president, who was already dropping to the ground. It instead struck the Syrian Army captain serving as a translator on the outside of his left upper arm, traveled through his body lengthwise, and tumbled out and into the side armor of a Russian major. If the bullet had still been traveling ballistic it would have likely made it through this man’s Kevlar, but since it struck the armor sideways, it merely pitched the officer over the Syrian president, and he fell onto the ground alongside the armored personnel carrier.
Every one of Azzam’s eight bodyguards had reacted to the sound of incoming sniper fire the way
all humans react to such sounds; they recoiled automatically. But before anyone else on the scene had the presence of mind to act, the men recovered, turned for their protectee, and moved to cover him.
The eight men looked in the tight group for their president and panicked when they did not see him at first, but as the close-detail members realized he was on the ground, they worried even more.
Burly Syrians pushed their way through the Russians, some dead or injured; there was blood everywhere. Many of Azzam’s guards fell down in the process of getting to their president, but within six and a half seconds of the first shot hitting the Typhoon’s armor, two bodyguards had enveloped Azzam, and others began pushing Russians out of the way to get him clear of danger.
“He’s bleeding!” the lead protection agent shouted as soon as he saw the blood on Azzam’s collar. The president lay facedown in the dirt at first, but just as his two men shielded him, and others fought their way through the mass of Russians, both dead and alive, to get to their protectee, Azzam pushed himself up onto his knees. All the security men knew the bullets had come from the direction of Palmyra to the west, so they lifted him by the arms and began moving him around to the far side of the APC.
And it was in the execution of this move to safety that his lead bodyguard saw that Ahmed Azzam’s chin and right cheek were deeply cut, pouring dark rich blood.
It hadn’t been Court’s intended second shot that wounded Azzam, but rather the first shot. The big 647-grain bullet fired from the McMillan sniper rifle had exploded upon striking the steel APC, sending lead and brass fragments in all directions. Three men in the group were wounded with the shot, but none as much as Azzam. A hot, sharp, twisted fingernail of brass had ripped into his right cheek next to his lip at a speed of nearly six hundred feet per second, and it tore its way into his mouth, where it chipped two teeth and then exited out below his lip just above his chin.
