by Larry Bond
Corrine had given Dolov the story he needed, but she now had to give him a reason to let her go.
“What prisoner did you lose?” she asked. “And where was he lost?”
She saw the inspector’s face flicker with fear for a brief second as he connected the two events. It went from that to a blank officiousness. He was worried that she really was from Greenpeace and that he had told her too much.
And then he smiled.
“Let me make a phone call. Perhaps our misunderstanding can disappear.”
13
CHECHNYA — SEVERAL HOURS LATER
Unobstructed runway. Two large buildings, hangar-type, at the north end. I don’t see any people, though.”
Ferguson shifted around as he spoke. He couldn’t see the top of the peak opposite him, so he had no idea what defenses might be hidden there. The mountain also shadowed whatever was directly below him on the western side of the base, and some of the road to the northeast.
“Here’s something,” he said, as a vehicle emerged from one of the two buildings; it looked like an old-fashioned bread van. Another followed, and another and another. They drove out to three different points surrounding the airfield.
“Maybe they’re radar trucks,” suggested Van Buren, who was listening along with his intelligence staff to Ferguson’s briefing. “The satellites have cleared overhead, so it’s possible that they drive out there once they’re gone.”
“I don’t see any antennas or radar dishes,” reported Ferguson. “I don’t see any missiles either.”
Van Buren’s G-2 captain began explaining that the vans might contain a short-range, low-power radar, which would give them some early warning of approaching helicopters. Another officer said that it was possible that the rebels were using the mountain itself as the base for tropo-scatter antennas, with the transmission portions relatively short and camouflaged. Such a system would be difficult to see, though it was likely to leave gaps in the coverage.
“I don’t know,” said Ferguson. “Maybe have somebody look at the satellite photos again. Can you get a U-2 in?”
“Russians’ll shoot it down in a heartbeat,” said Van Buren.
“Could they hide missiles in the vans?” asked Ferguson.
“Shoulder-launched missiles, sure.”
“Hang tight,” said Ferguson, as a new set of vehicles appeared from the building. These were tracked ZSU-23-4 Shilka antiair guns, sometimes called “Zoos,” old but reliable flak cannons that could fill the air with shells. Their altitude was limited, but they were deadly against helicopters and low-flying planes. Parachuters would be massacred.
The southeastern end of the base dropped off sharply about twenty yards after the end of the runway. The eastern side of the complex south of the buildings was relatively flat, with a dirt road but no aircraft access ramp. Trenches flanked the runway for about three-quarters of its length. The runway itself was rather narrow and pockmarked with small craters at the sides. The Air Force people had already looked at the sat photos and decided they could get a Herky Bird in there and out.
“I have four F-117As,” Van Buren said. “We can take out four targets — the vans and one of the antiair emplacements. But every shot has to count.”
“Better to take out the guns and jam any radar on the way in,” suggested one of his captains. “Then we target the missiles when we’re on the ground.”
“What if they have heat-seekers in them?”
“We go in with flares and a decoy.”
“Still risky.”
“Why don’t you have the Stealth fighters take out the guns and two of the vans,” said Ferg. “Conners and I hit the last van ourselves. We link up near the buildings. We can work it into deck, like we’re the real attack. We have a grenade launcher. We have to get down there anyway to confirm this is the place. So we call in, attack starts, we get the van and move on.”
“That might work,” said Van Buren. “You have readings?”
“Not yet,” said Ferguson.
“We’re doing a lot of work here, Ferg. It’s going nowhere without real data. Even then, we have to get Alston’s OK.”
“It’s got to be the place, Van.”
“Fergie?”
“It’s all right, Van. You guys just get ready to hit it. I’ll get the numbers.”
“Don’t get so close they induct you into their army.”
“I hear they have a hell of a retirement plan,” said Ferguson, snapping off the phone.
14
AKTAU, RUSSIA
Dolov did not reappear. Instead, a short, frumpy-looking woman in her midthirties came into the room dragging Corrine’s bag. The woman said absolutely nothing, staring at Corrine as she checked her things. Apparently she was free to go.
The terminal was by then full of people. Food vendors were hawking wares from boxes and small pushcarts; she bought a bottle of mineral water and a sandwich, which she gulped down while walking back toward the Specials door. As she approached the office, a short man in a leather coat pushed away from the wall and came toward her. Corrine eyed him warily, not sure now who or what to trust. “Ms. Alston?” “Yes.”
“A friend sent me to get you,” said the man. “My name’s Tru. I’ve been waiting.”
He was an American, or at least his accent was; it had the brassy tone of the New York area in it.
“What friend?” she asked.
“Jack?” he said, more a question than an answer.
“What’s the weather like?” she said, starting the authentication sequence.
“Warm. Visibility at five miles.”
“And getting better?”
“Probably not.”
“That’s good enough.”
“I hope so.”
She swallowed the last of her water, then threw the bottle in a garbage can as she followed him toward a hall at the side of the airline counters. She hesitated, then tossed her bag, including her sat phone and wallet, in there as well.
Tru continued down the hallway, past a baggage-screening area to a large empty room. Various machinery sat at the far side of the room, piled and bunched up near the wall. To the left was a set of metal garage-style doors. Tru went to one, bent and opened it, waiting for her so he could close it behind them.
Corrine shivered as the outside air hit her. Tru walked to the left, steering around a large yellow tractor used to move aircraft. Jets were lined up along the rear of the terminal building, crews zipping back and forth as they were prepped and loaded. Tru’s shoulders rolled back and forth as he ducked past them; the short man strolled past the lineup of aircraft as if he were lord of the place.
Corrine followed as he turned to the left at the end of the building, walking out beyond a large Russian airliner toward a two-engine Airbus, which sat alone in the sea of concrete. The Airbus — an A310, capable of holding over two hundred passengers — had the red livery and insignia of the Turkish National Airline, THY. Corrine expected to find a smaller plane beyond it, but when Tru crossed around to the left side of the aircraft she realized this was the only plane there. A rickety-looking push ramp was at the door directly behind the cockpit; two men in coveralls were standing nearby.
Her contact bounded up the steps to the open cabin door. Corrine hesitated at the bottom of the steps, then clambered up. As she reached the cabin, the men below grabbed the boarding ladder and pulled it away.
“Think you can button up?” Tru asked from the flight deck. “There’s a diagram on how to shut it.”
Corrine struggled at first, the movement slightly awkward, but once the door was moving toward the side it slapped in easily. She pushed through the curtain to her left, only to find that the rest of the airliner was completely empty.
“No movie today,” said Tru behind her. “Come sit up here with me.”
“Don’t you need a copilot or a navigator or something?”
“Nah. I know where I’m going. But I do get lonely.”
Corrine slid into
the seat normally reserved for the first officer. The A310 had a glass cockpit, with the latest flight controls and data systems. While normal flight protocol would call for a two-member flight crew, an experienced pilot could fly the aircraft by himself. Tru was already talking in Russian with a member of the ground crew assigned to him, and in a few minutes the airplane’s engines spun to life. The pilot turned to her, gave her a smile, then released the brakes and began trundling down the access ramp, taking a place in the lineup to the runway.
“I don’t think we’re bugged, but you never know,” he told her. “I did do a check.”
“Thanks,” she said, as he turned the plane to the flight line.
15
SOUTHERN CHECHNYA
While Ferguson had been talking with Van Buren, Conners had studied the sat photos and the 3-D simulation, trying to correlate it with what he had seen. The easiest way—”easiest” being a relative term — was up what seemed to be a secondary road through a canyon at the southern end of the base, but the approach was bound to be mined. Conners thought they might be able to get down a ravine on the northeast side of the mountain, since they were already beyond the lookouts who would guard it. The satellite data showed an old dumping ground at the base of the slope; a double fence ran a few yards away from it.
“That’s a steep slide,” said Ferguson.
“I can make it,” said Conners.
“What about Daruyev?”
Their prisoner was sitting a few yards away, hands manacled and a hood covering his face.
Conners didn’t say anything. It would be easiest, he thought, to kill him.
“Can’t do that,” said Ferguson.
“Just leave him here,” said Conners.
“Nah.” Ferguson looked at the satellite photos again. If they could see where they were going, it might be possible to go down the slope with the prisoner. Even so, they’d also have to worry about at least one and probably two lookout positions that had a view near the bottom.
“There’s a Russian satellite that moves overhead just about 1600 hours,” said Ferg. “If we figure these lookouts and everybody on the base will make themselves scarce then, maybe we can get through then.”
“That gets us at the fence while it’s still light,” said Conners.
“Yeah?”
“Safer in the dark.”
“Not going down the hill. That spot there can be seen from both the base and this lookout here.”
“If that’s a lookout. Still safer in the dark, Ferg. Even if these guys have night gear, which we haven’t seen at all. To get there by 1600 we have to leave now.”
“You feeling tired?”
“Why don’t we just wait another night?”
“Longer we wait, Dad, the more chance we have of getting nailed. Besides, if we get down there and check out the place as soon as it’s dark, we’ll have more time to get away if the place is clean.”
“You really think it is?”
“No way, or I wouldn’t be going down. But it’s a possibility.”
“What do we do then?”
Ferguson shrugged. “We go back, get the truck, and look behind door number three.” He reached into his rucksack for the bread the old woman had given them. “Hungry?”
Conners took the bread. “What I could really use is some coffee.”
“What I could really use stands about five-five, and has handles right here,” said Ferg.
16
BUILDING 24-442, SUBURBAN VIRGINIA
Thomas stared at the tube, watching as it filled with a list of green letters denoting files of intercepted, deciphered, and translated intercepts tangentially related to Verko. He chose one at random and opened it; it was a Russian interior ministry estimate of how long it would take to clear land mines in the region. Thomas chose another, which referred to the need for firefighting apparatus. A third was filled with gibberish, though whether that was a glitch on the American side wasn’t clear.
Thomas got up from his desk. He’d piled up his papers and reports so he could pace from wall to wall; it helped him think.
Why set up a base at an old airport, he thought to himself, unless you have an airplane? And yet there were none there, at least not according to the sat photos or anything else he’d seen.
If it were big enough, Thomas realized, an airplane would be the perfect delivery system. Packed full of explosives and waste, you could crash it into a city, or maybe explode it above — death would rain everywhere.
So where was the plane?
He sat back at the computer and did a search of Interpol and the FBI looking for stolen planes. Nada. Then he realized that it wasn’t absolutely necessary to steal an entire plane. It might make more sense to take different parts, ship them in by truck, and put the airplane together. He found different sites where plane parts could be purchased. Then he made a few calls for background information and data. A rather cranky FBI intelligence expert told him that it would be next to impossible to put a plane together from parts; not only would it cost much more than the aircraft itself, but finding people with the expertise to assemble everything would be a nightmare.
Besides, there would be records of the purchases anyway, and you’d need a ton of shell companies to obscure what you were doing.
Stubbornly, Thomas clung to the theory. The agent’s objections led him to a file listing parts purchases that had been blocked because of Customs concerns, and it was on that list that he found a company whose name matched the gibberish in the NSA intercept he had opened.
Thomas hand-copied the symbols, then went back to the intercept, holding the paper up to the screen. Then he went back to the Customs database and did a general search. There were no hits. But a similar try in one of the Interpol networks led to an Algerian airline company, which Thomas already knew was on a list of possible fronts for Islamic militant groups. The gibberish was actually an acronym for an airline company name in Arabic.
He stood up from his desk, cracked all of his knuckles, then sat back down and began running requests for information on the airline and any company it did business with.
17
INCIRLIK, TURKEY
By the time Corrine Alston’s plane arrived, the mission and its various contingencies had been fairly well mapped out. Colonel Van Buren met her at the foot of the plane, holding out his arm as she stepped somewhat wobbly onto the tarmac. Corrine smiled but didn’t take his hand, walking toward the Hummer with a crisp step that belied her fatigue.
The Special Forces command unit was sequestered in a distant hangar at a far corner of the base. A pair of Hummers containing advanced communications gear was parked at one side of the space. Another vehicle — a modified civilian Ford Expedition — sat outside, data from its satellite dishes snaking through the long cable on the floor. A quartet of communications specialists sat in front of flat panels and keyboards at a station behind the Humvees. Besides being able to communicate with troops in the field and the Pentagon at the same time, the specialists could tap a few keys and get realtime information from sources that ranged from the NSA wiretaps to specially launched Predator aircraft.
It was also rumored that they could order McDonald’s-to-go around the globe, though the com specialists cited the fifth amendment on the topic.
Near the communications section, a large topographical map of the target area sat in the center of two large folding tables, along with a number of satellite photos and hand-drawn diagrams depicting various phases of the operation. Van Buren’s G-2 captain gave the briefing, laying out what they knew and working through the overall game plan. To circumvent detection by the Russian air defenses in the region, radar-evading Stealth fighters and special C-130s equipped to fly below radar level would be used. The attack would begin with four Stealth fighters firing on the air defenses. With the defenses secured, a company of SF troops would jump from an MC-130E, aiming to land along the southeastern end of the airstrip. A second company of SF troopers, along with technica
l experts and a company of men trained in handling hazardous waste, would be aboard an MC-130E, prepared either to land once the strip was secured or to jump in if necessary. Van Buren would be aboard this aircraft so that he could personally supervise the operation on the ground.
Support would be provided by an AC-13 OH gunship, which would train its howitzer on any pockets of resistance. Once the base was secured, the dirty-bomb facilities would be examined and secured. Depending on the exact situation — one of the reasons Van Buren wanted to be on the scene himself — it would either be blown up or merely prepared for Russian occupation. Guerrillas considered of value would be ex-filtrated along with the assault troops.
The operation would be coordinated with help from the unit’s specially equipped MC-17X, a jet-powered aircraft based on the C-17 and outfitted with comprehensive communications gear and a scaled-down side-looking radar adapted from the Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System (JSTARS) used by the regular Army to coordinate large-scale ground battles. Dubbed “Command Transport 3” in typical SF disinformation style, the one-of-a-kind MC-17X would remain beyond the border until the Stealth fighters launched their attack. At that point it could move forward and use its sensors to help the attackers.
Once the attack was under way, the Russians would undoubtedly see it. While their reaction was difficult to predict, it was likely they wouldn’t be pleased. A flight of F-15 Eagles would accompany the command plane and be prepared to intervene.
The Air Force had also provided two tankers with escorts to cover any contingencies. Two long-range, Special Operations Chinooks would stand by near the border as SAR aircraft; each would have a contingent of paratroopers aboard in addition to Air Force pararescue personnel who were being temporarily plucked from another section for the night.
