Kim Jong-un swayed back on his heels and closed his eyes. He visualized the massed missile barrage raining down on the enemy’s capital, and it brought him a vindictive moment of pleasure.
“How many of the ‘Songun’ weapons have been armed with biological warheads?”
“The entire stockpile, Great Leader,” Hwung said. “All five missiles will be launched simultaneously.”
Kim nodded his approval. “And how many of them will get through the enemy’s umbrella?”
Hwung hesitated. A flush of hot, sweating fear washed over him. For a moment he was tempted to lie, but a lifetime of discipline and service to the Motherland choked the words in his throat. “This is something that cannot be determined, Great Leader,” he lowered his head, like a man surrendering himself for the headsman’s axe. “It will depend on which missiles from our massed barrage are targeted by the enemy.”
Kim’s smile froze on his lips. His eyes turned flat and black as a snake’s. “Then, for the sake of your worthless, miserable life, you must hope the American dogs are poor shots. Failure will mean your immediate execution.”
Hwung nodded obediently, showing no visible signs of fear. Failure would mean the fall of North Korea… and success would mean the end of the world.
Either way, his own death seemed inevitable.
THE OVAL OFFICE
THE WHITE HOUSE
It was dubbed the ‘Small Group’ – just four men including Patrick Austin, facing each other in a circle of chairs, with folders and notepads in their laps and no desk between them. To an outsider, the scene might have resembled an emotional therapy session at a community AA meeting.
Nothing could be further from the truth. This was a Council of War, comprising just the Secretary of Defense, the National Security Advisor, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs… and the President.
“Sir, the North Korean threat is real and imminent,” General Knight stared across the small space into Patrick Austin’s eyes. “The missiles that our drones located are being prepared for launch.”
“It could just be an exercise…” Walter Ford offered half-heartedly. Normally the moderating voice of reason and restraint, even the National Security Advisor’s tone was apathetic. His was restless. He twisted in his chair and crossed his legs.
“In the middle of a war?” Jim Poe arched his eyebrows incredulously and then shook his head. “A war the North Koreans are on the brink of losing? And why go through the delicate process of fitting biological warheads to the missiles if it’s just a training exercise? No. This is the real deal. Kim Jong-un has run out of options. He’s desperate. He’s been humiliated by the South Korean military and this is his last roll of the dice.”
“I agree,” the President said. His glossy urbane politician’s mask had been discarded. POTUS was a man with fear in his cool dark eyes, his tension betrayed by clenched jaws and hard lines around his mouth. “So what are our options? Is there anything we can do at a diplomatic level, or economically to pull this thing back from the brink?”
“Mr. President, with respect, there just isn’t time,” General Knight’s stern features were drawn tight with anxiety. “We’ve got hours, not days or weeks. Any economic measures would take months to come into effect. And diplomatically…?”
“Sir, the General is right,” Defense Secretary Poe agreed. “We don’t even have a reliable back-channel to Kim’s regime. Any message or warning we send would take too long.”
“That only leaves one choice…” Patrick Austin said. “Immediate military action.”
“Yes, sir,” General Knight said. “But within that choice are several options.”
“Such as?”
“We could target the site with missiles of our own, or we could get urgent word to the South Koreans and warn them. They might be able to launch an air attack with fighter-bombers…”
“China,” Walter Ford interrupted. “We cannot – under any circumstances – take military action that will compromise the stand-off we have with the Chinese at the moment. We’ve let the north and south fight this war and remained, at least publicly, on the sidelines. If we launch a missile strike, the Chinese will respond and this war could get out of hand.”
“Would the South Koreans be able to launch an effective air attack on their own?” Jim Poe sought the General’s opinion.
“Certainly,” General Knight said. “The ROKAF has plenty of F-15’s and F-16’s and their pilots are good… the question is whether they can spare them. The South Koreans have taken heavy losses over the three weeks this war has raged, and now they’ve committed everything left in the locker to this final push towards Pyongyang.”
“Could we send in a SEAL team?” Walter Ford asked.
“A special forces operation would be my recommendation,” the General nodded his head.
Patrick Austin winced and shifted slightly in his seat. “And risk letting the Chinese know we’re actively involved in the war? What if something goes wrong?”
“Sir, the 1st Special Forces Group is run by USINDOPACOM out of Hawaii. The Korean Peninsula is their part of the world. I know these men. They are some of the finest troops we have. They’re efficient, professional and experienced black-ops operators. On a mission like this they would be perfect – and completely deniable.”
Patrick Austin looked at the faces of the men sitting around him. Jim Poe nodded his head. After a moment of angst and hesitation, Walter Ford agreed.
POTUS drew a deep breath. “Make it happen, General,” he decided grimly. “Pass the word to USINDOPACOM to put together an operation. Tell them that it must be black. There can be no identification – nothing left behind that can connect the USA to the strike. And tell them that it’s urgent. The clock is counting down to a potential holocaust.”
39° 10’ NORTH, 126° 32’ EAST
NORTH KOREA
The Russians called it maskirovka – the deception, camouflage and disguise of military forces to evade enemy detection.
It was a cunning military doctrine first employed by the Soviet Army during the early years of the twentieth century, and perfected during the Second World War.
Kim Jong-un had studied the teachings of his Russian advisors and remembered, too, the lessons learned from the Persian Gulf War when mobile TEL launchers concealed in the Iraqi desert had taunted Allied coalition forces and been used by Saddam Hussein to terrorize Israel.
The launcher site in the South Pyongyang region was one of several concealed missile locations across the country, hidden in the deep crease of a wooded mountain range. During the day it was shrouded in deep shadow, the four TEL’s covered with camouflage netting and the support vehicles parked inside a tunnel that had been bored into the living rock of the cliffs, rendering the entire site undetectable to the prying digital eyes of western satellites.
For three weeks, while the Korean Peninsula conflict raged, the battery had remained dormant and hidden, the pensive crews listening to radio chatter with growing distress as the war turned against their comrades and the invasion force was thrown back across the border in chaos.
Now, suddenly, they were being called upon to join the great patriotic war in a glorious grand barrage against the enemy.
“Alert!” the captain in command barked the order. His eyes were alight with devoted fervor. Troops came scrambling from their tents and clambered over the launchers, tugging at the thick camouflage netting.
“Make ready! Make ready!” the captain said. “We will fire our missiles at dusk.”
Across North Korea, at eleven other secret sites, similar orders were issued as Kim Jong-un’s grand battery prepared for its final act of defiance.
USS IWO JIMA
SEA OF JAPAN
Thirty soldiers from the 1st Special Forces Group were assembled in a knot on the amphibious assault ship’s flight deck. The men were standing in the shade of the three UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters that had brought them from Okinawa. It was late afternoon and the darkening horizon bey
ond the USS Iwo Jima’s bow was hazed and blurred by a thin scar of cloud. The ship was making fifteen knots in the wake of two escorting frigates as she steamed off the North Korean coastline.
Group Operations Officer, Major Des Flood, was brisk and business-like as he addressed the three A teams, but tension infused his tone as he scanned the faces of the men gathered around him. Overhead, one of the Marine Corps’ UH-1 ‘Yankee’ utility helicopters hovered above the ship’s stern, forcing the Major to raise his voice above the clatter and downwash of the rotors.
The troops were dressed in black Czechoslovakian-made fatigues with no name tags, ranks or insignia, and no manufacturing labels. All their web gear and load-bearing equipment would be of Russian, Chinese or Eastern bloc design and manufacture. Even their underwear, socks and footwear was non-descript; knock-offs readily available on the open market in varying hues of black, brown or green. The headgear was just as eclectic, since no modern American-made helmets could be worn.
“Gentlemen, I’m Major Flood and we will be conducting this mission brief at 1600 hours along with our time hack.” Simultaneously every man’s head lowered to check their Russian military issue wristwatches. To an outsider on the Iwo Jima’s bridge, it might have looked like a moment of solemn group prayer. “It will be 1600 in ten seconds…”
The Major counted off the last few seconds, then declared, “Hack.” The troops synchronized their watches. Flood went on with barely a pause.
“Situation,” he said. “The North Koreans have concealed five armed TEL missile launchers near a village,” he gave the map coordinates. “They are making preparations to fire the weapons, most probably at Seoul…”
Tim Scott, the senior captain who would lead one of the A teams into battle, was a man with a dark brooding face. At a nod from the Major, he began passing around satellite enlargements that showed the long launcher vehicles parked line-abreast about a kilometer from a bedraggled village of huts.
“Our mission,” Major Flood continued through the standard briefing procedure, “is to render the missiles on the launchers inoperable, and to destroy the vehicles. This is a black operation. Repeat. This is a black operation. We go in hard, fast and quiet aboard three UH-60 Black Hawks and escorted by two AH-1 SuperCobra attack choppers. Apart from the crews manning each enemy vehicle, a squad of North Korean Special Operations Force troops has taken up position around the nearby village, guarding the road into the fields where the TEL’s have been positioned. The SOF are elite troops and will offer resistance.”
No one spoke. Flood gestured to his left where a clutch of helicopter pilots in flying kit stood. They were from 160 SOAR – the Special Operations Aviation Regiment. “Execution for the mission will be conducted by Flight Lead. Captain Kelso?”
Bob Kelso was one of America’s most experienced helicopter pilots; a tall, wiry man with a mop of brown hair and a face that had been made careworn by the stresses of countless covert combat missions across a long and distinguished career.
“Weapons status for the mission is strictly ‘hold’ en route, but once Chalk One and Chalk Two are over the Landing Zone, we are weapons free until extraction. Chalk Three will be dropped north of the LZ to cover our attack against enemy reinforcements coming from the village,” the pilot said. “Time on target will be just seven minutes… and we fly nap-of-the-earth all the way in trail formation with position and anti-collision lights on.”
Major Flood carried on with the rest of the briefing, handing out more satellite images, as well as three Defense Department photos of the North Korean TEL’s. “The launchers are ten-wheel converted old Russian Type C’s. For this operation we will be using Blue Spear Plan 5. Chalk One and Chalk Two are tasked with hitting the launchers and disabling the missiles. Chalk Three – with the assistance of the escorting SuperCobras – will prevent the launch site from being reinforced by enemy elements in the vicinity. Any questions?”
No one spoke. The men moved restlessly, as if impatient to be underway.
Most of the soldiers were armed with AKS-74M folding stock rifles and Czech CZ-75 pistols. The two Chalks that would hit the TEL targets would each carry a belt fed light machine gun and two RPG launchers. Chalk Three would go into battle carrying two Chinese heavy machine guns.
“Let me remind you to turn in your ID tags, wallets, jewelry and anything else that would identify you as an American to your team sergeants. There will be no photos of wives, kids or girlfriends. I will carry them, along with your wills and last letters, back to Oki to be placed with your other stored gear.”
Special Forces troops were experienced in black operations, regularly carrying out clandestine missions around the world, but Flood insisted issuing the warning before moving on.
“Sunset over North Korea today is at 1719 hours,” the Major glanced at his watch again. “We hit the target at exactly 1730 hours. Each team will carry five-pound semtek plastic explosive satchel charges. Remember, this is a priority op, and you’ll have just seven minutes on the ground before extraction, so don’t fuck around. People will die if we make mistakes.”
42° 24’ NORTH, 130° 27’ EAST
NORTH KOREA
“Two minutes to target,” the pilot keyed the mic on his headset and spoke to the Captain commanding Chalk One. The choppers had flown nap-of-the-earth since lifting off the Iwo Jima’s flight deck, and the Special Forces troops seated on the narrow steel benches in the belly of the beast were tense. No soldier enjoyed prolonged low-level flying; the men were anxious to be on the ground in their natural element, not suspended just a few feet in the air, an easy target for the enemy.
Captain Scott jerked his head in acknowledgement and turned to his men. Their faces were set and stony, smeared with streaks of camouflage paint. Scott held up two fingers. The soldiers began making final preparations. Some fidgeted absently with their weapons. Others checked their webbing. One man counted the grenades he carried for the twentieth time. For the twentieth time they were all there. Other men feigned nonchalant indifference, leaning their heads back with their eyes closed, breathing deeply and rhythmically as if they were asleep. Each man handled the fraught seconds before the mayhem of battle differently, and each agreed the waiting was the worst part of any mission.
The Black Hawks were flying in single file above dense forest, slogged by turbulence so they dipped and swayed. The canopy of treetops seemed close enough to reach out and touch, flickering past in a darkly dangerous blur. Night was settling over the surrounding countryside, the first stars of evening winking against the glow of the day’s last dying light.
“One minute!” the pilot’s voice sounded matter-of-fact in Scott’s headset – and then suddenly a bright searing flash of fire that flared like the sun lit up the sky directly ahead of the chopper’s canopy. “Jesus!” The pilot reacted instinctively. He hurled the helicopter over and at the same time changed pitch and altitude. The Black Hawk shuddered, then lurched, swooping a hundred feet into the air. A second blinding flash lit the dusk, followed by a third, a fourth and a fifth a few seconds later. Five white stars climbed high into the sky, trailing thick billowing tails of smoke.
“Fuck!” someone said in the sudden clamor of confusion.
“They’ve launched! They’ve launched!” the pilot’s voice was shaken and breathless. He fiddled with the helicopter’s controls as he spoke. The Black Hawk plunged back down to the treetops.
Captain Scott felt a tight fist of tension grip in his guts. The missiles were beginning to tip over onto a high parabolic trajectory towards the south. He got on the net to the group Tactical Operations Center.
“Mother Duck. Mother Duck. This is Bravo Three Zero. Sunrise! I say again, Sunrise!”
At TOC, the radio chatter went suddenly silent for long seconds. Captain Scott listened to the hiss and crackle of static with his heart in his mouth. The helicopters were just seconds away from their target.
The grim-faced TOC Ops Officer keyed his mic.
“Bravo T
hree Zero this is Mother Duck. Abort! I say again, abort!”
Scott pressed his lips into a bitter line of simmering frustration. “Roger. WILCO. Out.”
NORAD
PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE
COLORADO
“Holy shit!” the controller gasped, instinctively punching the alarm that would summon the duty officer to his station. “I’m seeing multiple launches across North Korea.” The display screen was lit with blooming glows, each dot a separate detected missile. “Thirty… forty plus missiles. These are valid launches! Repeat. These are valid launches!”
The senior watch officer swore. “Christ!” He was a major. He lunged for an internal phone and rang through to command.
CINC-NORAD answered the call. He was a four-star General with a buzz-cut of grey hair and a hard, flat face with deep craggy lines chiseled into the corners of his mouth and eyes.
“Sir, we have forty or more valid missile launches from locations right across North Korea,” the major spoke quickly. A series of longitude and latitude coordinates began water falling down the right side of the monitor’s display in bright green readouts. The computers had identified forty-two missile launches. “We’re still waiting to confirm their direction. We’ll know more after the boost phases end.”
“Is this real world, or an exercise?”
“This is real world, sir! These are valid launches.”
“Shit,” CINC-NORAD breathed. He snatched up the gold phone on his desk that connected him to the CJCS.
Dead Storm: The Global Zombie Apocalypse Page 6
