“You know the Master Chief,” said Murdock, joining the act. “He wouldn’t care how you did the job as long as it got done.”
“This is the thanks we get for sustained superior performance in an operational environment,” Magic complained.
Razor grunted as they handed Higgins up again. “Hey, Magic, you know what they say. One fuckup cancels out all those pats on the back. As a matter of fact, I’m starting to forget about those three helicopters already.”
“That really hurts my feelings, Chief,” Magic replied with a grin. “I’d hate to have it affect my aim the next time.”
Razor accepted Murdock’s hand up the rock. “That’s the problem with all of us sitting down at the same table, Magic. If we eat it, you eat it.”
Razor Roselli was not in the habit of relinquishing the last word. Magic and Doc grinned at each other and accepted that.
Higgins was out of it. Knowing the move wouldn’t do him any good, Doc Ellsworth made sure he was well medicated. Though his fellow SEALs were doing their damnedest, Higgins was still taking jolts.
The ground rose up toward a small peak. The stretcher-bearers found Jaybird waiting for them.
“This peak blocks the way down the range,” he said. “We can’t go over, we’ve got to go around. I checked both sides, there’s no ledge. The slope isn’t bad but the footing’s slick; only a few cracks for handholds. It’s got to be single file.”
“Okay,” said Murdock. He thought for a few seconds. Ed DeWitt had just come up behind them.
“Okay,” Murdock repeated. “Jaybird, you go first. Doc, you and Magic grab ahold of Mister DeWitt’s belt and help him across. Razor and I’ll watch how you go and then bring Higgins over.”
DeWitt, who had been privately steaming about his helplessness, seemed on the verge of protesting. But without a better idea to offer, he didn’t.
The SEALs approached the peak, which was in the shape of a dome. They were able to easily walk up to it. But then both sides of the dome extended out and down about a hundred feet. One side was sheer and the other sloped gently. Walking across the sloping side was the only way around. That in itself wouldn’t be a problem, even with the chance of ice. The problem was negotiating it with the stretcher.
Like all SEAL officers, Blake Murdock was a graduate of U.S. Army Ranger School. And there, during Mountain Phase in the Chattahoochee National Forest near Dahlonega, Georgia, they taught all the tricks of moving up, over, and down rock. Especially with casualties. Unfortunately, virtually all those tricks required climbing rope, which the SEALs did not have. Oh, well, Murdock thought.
Jaybird went first. He faced the rock with both hands and boot soles pressed flat against the slope. He moved without crossing his legs. He crabbed across by stretching his right leg out, making sure of his hold, and only then bringing the left leg over beside it.
Melting water had frozen into seams of ice in the channels and cracks in the rock. Jaybird occasionally paused to break up the patches of ice with his boot.
Magic, DeWitt, and Doc followed him, except they made the move together. Magic first, his left hand grasping DeWitt’s belt. Then DeWitt, his good hand on the rock for support. Then Doc, his right hand hanging onto the other side of DeWitt’s belt.
Doc slipped. As he felt his leg slip off the icy rock he instantly released DeWitt’s belt. As he dropped all he could do was splay his feet outward and hope the friction arrested him. He slid about twenty-five stomach-churning feet, and then stopped in a shower of ice and rock chips.
“You okay?” DeWitt called down.
“Yeah,” was all Doc managed to get out.
Now that he knew Doc was all right, DeWitt said, “You’re supposed to be helping me.”
Doc wasn’t receptive to SEAL humor just then. His face was ash gray. He slowly made his way across to one of the ice channels running down the rock. Doc took out his knife and chipped out the ice, exposing a crack in the rock about an inch and a half wide. He wedged his fingers into the crack and used it as a handhold.
Doc slowly climbed upward. Chipping with the knife, climbing, stopping, chipping some more. It wasn’t fun. His hands were already abraded and bleeding from the drop. He lost two fingernails on the way up, and had to keep tucking his hands in his armpits when they became numb from the cold.
When Doc reached the level he’d dropped from, he continued on across the dome. Jaybird and Magic were waiting on the other side to pull him over.
Doc collapsed onto the ground. “If you guys don’t mind, I’m going to take a little break here.”
“No problem, Doc,” said Jaybird. “We had a nice rest ourselves waiting for you.” Then he reached around for the medical pack and got to work wrapping up Doc’s hands.
On the other side of the dome Murdock and Razor were looking at each other.
“I don’t know about you,” said Razor. “But I didn’t pick up a lot of pointers watching that.”
“Well,” Murdock said laconically. “We can pause here for a short moment of prayer, and then we can head across the rocks before I get any more hypothermic.”
“Skip the prayer,” said Razor. “God’s already made up his mind what he’s going to do with my ass. Besides, he’s a SEAL God, he doesn’t like to listen to any sniveling.”
Razor Roselli was the Old Testament type, Murdock thought. “Let’s go then. But if I fall you let us go. There’s no way you can hold Higgins by yourself and no sense in going down with us, you understand? That’s an order.”
“You’ve been doing just fine, Boss,” Razor said calmly. “Let’s not ruin everything by giving orders at this stage of the game.”
Murdock just shook his head and gave up. He grabbed the handles on both sides of the head of the stretcher in his left hand. He stepped off first, facing the rock with the entire weight of the front of the stretcher in that one hand.
Razor followed, holding the rear of the stretcher with his right hand.
They eased across an inch at a time. With half of Higgins’s deadweight hanging on it, Murdock’s arm felt like it was coming out of its socket. A bitter cold wind was whipping across the face of the rock. Murdock felt himself tensing up; his knees began to wobble. He couldn’t stop to sort himself out; he and Razor had to keep moving in unison. Be cool, he kept telling himself. Take it easy.
Razor Roselli’s right foot slipped. He threw his entire body flat against the rock. That and his left leg held him up; he didn’t go down. To Murdock’s enormous relief.
Razor regained purchase with his right foot. He pushed himself back off the rock and nodded to Murdock. They resumed their inch-at-a-time rhythm.
As Murdock came around the dome, Magic and Jaybird reached out to grab the stretcher. When Razor got closer, they worked their way down the line of carrying straps on the stretcher, trying to take as much of the weight onto themselves as possible.
Razor got off the rock and joined Murdock slumped on the ground. Doc checked Higgins out.
Jaybird clapped his hands together with exaggerated enthusiasm. “Okay, Chief, we’re ready to go.”
Razor treated him to a single arched eyebrow. “Then get out there and do some scouting. And work a little goddamned harder on the route selection this time.”
Jaybird nodded happily, as if he would have been disappointed with any other response. “You got it, Chief.”
Murdock and Razor rested until they felt themselves cooling down, the body’s signal to get moving again.
The going was easier now. They went a few hundred meters further, and Jaybird came bounding back.
“I found a position with a good view of the road,” he announced.
When they reached the spot Jaybird had picked, Murdock used his GPS set to find out exactly where they were. They’d traveled a whisker over two kilometers.
Jaybird had been right. They had a perfect view of the road, just short of the dogleg where Jaybird had made that very careful turn in the BMP.
When Murdock announced
the halt, Doc Ellsworth issued orders. “Everyone drink your IV bag and put your space blankets on.”
All the SEALs carried a bag of intravenous fluids as part of their belt survival kit. It was just as effective swallowed as injected into the veins. They also carried a vacuum-packed foil space blanket. It folded down to the size of a pack of cigarettes and weighed only ounces. The SEALs broke out the blankets and wrapped themselves up.
Murdock already had the vise-grip headache that was one of the warning signs of dehydration. He cut the top off his IV bag and sipped steadily until it was gone. The survival credo said to ration your sweat, not your water. You drank whatever you had; your body would handle the storage and use it as needed.
Murdock immediately had to urinate, which was a good sign. The urine was dark and therefore concentrated, which wasn’t a good sign.
Jaybird, who knew he’d had it the easiest, came around and collected everyone’s canteens. He’d discovered a frozen pool of collected water. He chopped up the ice with his knife and filled the canteens with the ice and slush. The SEALs would keep the canteens under their space blankets. When the ice eventually melted they’d have at least a little water. Murdock joined Razor in the rocks overlooking the road.
A column of BMPs was stacked up at the base of the mountain, but none had started up the road. “I can’t wait to see what happens next,” said Razor.
He said it with a definite lack of enthusiasm, which Murdock shared.
38
Saturday, November 11
1745 hours North central Lebanese mountains
“The bastards are waiting on something,” Murdock said of the BMPs down below.
“What’s your call?” Razor asked.
“Infantry in helicopters,” said Murdock. “Land ‘em further up and down the range and have ‘em sweep together. Couple of rifle companies ought to do it.”
“Nope,” Razor said confidently. “That would be the smart thing, which is why they won’t do it. They don’t want to lose any more expensive helicopters. They’re going to come up that road. They’re just waiting for the tanks to lead the way.”
“That’s your call?” Murdock asked.
“Yup.”
“For ten bucks?”
“You got it, Boss.”
“Wait a minute,” said Murdock. “I might have gotten carried away there. I think betting with subordinates is one of those things they told us not to do at Annapolis.”
“Does that mean you’re pussying out on the bet, sir?”
“No, fuck it.” He paused. “It would be sweet if they came up that road.”
“What about the tanks?”
“Tanks would just clank around on the road. They could shoot their guns all they wanted; they don’t know where we are. They’d run out of ammo before they found our position. I’m worried about infantry, though. Either in helicopters or BMPs.”
The answer didn’t take long in coming. The falling sun illuminated two small dots in the eastern sky. Razor Roselli spotted them right away.
The dots grew larger, and noisier, and turned into two swept-wing Russian MiG-23BN Flogger ground-attack aircraft.
Razor looked at his watch. “It takes two hours to scare up some air support?” he said with professional disgust. He and Murdock stuffed their space blankets under the rocks. They were invisible among the brown boulders in their brown camouflage, completely motionless. The other SEALs were out of sight.
The two MiGs went across the range at very high altitude. It seemed like they were trying to get their bearings while staying out of range of ground fire. Then they came back across the valley, wings fully swept forward and popping flares to confuse shoulder-launched infrared guided missiles.
Murdock thought they were still pretty high up for effective bombing. As it turned out he was right.
Two small dark objects dropped from the belly of the lead MiG. The bombs landed just above the hulk of the burned-out BMP on the road. One hit the side of the mountain. One blew a crater in the road. The ground shook beneath the SEALS.
Razor Roselli shook with silent laughter. “That’s good,” he chortled. “That’s really good. Nothing like creating a fucking antitank obstacle for us. We ought to put these dumb bastards on the payroll.”
“No balls at all,” said Murdock. “Son of a bitch was flying so high it was a wonder he could see the ground.”
The MiG’s wingman screamed in and dropped two bombs of his own. One landed where the road cut across the top of the mountain range. The other just barely missed and sailed over the other side.
“With any luck some Syrians were coming up the other side of that road and it landed in their laps,” said Razor. He wiped his eyes with his sleeve. “Oh, this is too much. We could have saved ourselves all that trouble and stayed right where we were. These fuckheads would never hit anything they were aiming at. Shit, we’re probably in more danger here out of the line of fire.”
“I think you’re missing the point,” Murdock said dryly. “We don’t want them to be any good.”
Razor’s sharp eyes spotted two more planes in the distance. “Here comes the second team. Let’s see if they can do any better.”
“We don’t want them to do any better,” Murdock insisted.
There were two more MiG-23BN’s. These two didn’t make an orientation pass over the target to advertise their presence. They came in very low across the valley, their camouflage blending well with the ground.
The MiGs made hard banking turns and streaked up the long axis of the mountain range. When the lead MiG was almost over the SEALs’ heads, strings of black smoke belched from its wing roots and underside, and sixty-four 57mm rockets rippled into the rocks where the SEALs had last been.
The second MiG waited just long enough to let the smoke clear away, and then fired its four pods of rockets right onto the target also. The two MiGs made high-G turns and streaked back toward Syria just over the treetops.
Murdock allowed enough time for a good dramatic pause. “You were saying, Chief?”
“All right,” Razor conceded. “So someone threatened to shoot them if they didn’t do better. And maybe it wasn’t too safe staying where we were.”
“They did pretty damn good,” said Murdock. “We would’ve been in a world of hurt.”
“I guess the Syrians are going to decide that we’re either dead or pretty well suppressed,” said Razor. He took a look over the rocks. “Better get your wallet out, Boss. Guess what’s coming up the road.”
39
Saturday, November 11
1785 hours North central Lebanese mountains
“I don’t see any tanks,” said Murdock.
“So they’re even stupider than I thought,” Razor replied.
A Syrian mechanized infantry company was heading up the road. A platoon of three BMPs, in column, was in the lead.
Then a gap, and the second platoon of three BMPs. Then the company commander’s BMP, and the third platoon bringing up the rear. Ten BMPs in all.
“Oh, Magic?” Razor called sweetly.
I see them,” came Magic’s voice from the rocks.
“Let me tell you what I want to do,” said Murdock.
The Syrians weren’t in any hurry to drive up the hill. They must have thought they were just going to clean up what the rockets had left. Another mistake, Murdock thought. He would have rushed the vehicles up while the MiGs were still firing, arriving at the position while the enemy was sucking dirt and bleeding from the ears. But that was him.
Murdock pulled his MSG-90 from the drag bag. It was a substantial weapon, except when compared to Magic’s McMillan M88. Unlike most sniper rifles, which were bolt-action weapons, the MSG-90 was a gas-operated semiautomatic. It was less accurate than a bolt-action, but faster at engaging multiple targets. The caliber was 7.62-X-51mm NATO. By way of comparison, the.50-caliber round was close to five and a half inches long. The 7.62mm NATO was two and three-quarter inches long.
The MSG-90 weighed
fourteen pounds unloaded, and was forty-six inches long with an adjustable bipod, stock, and cheek rest.
Murdock stacked the eight twenty-round magazines filled with Lake City match ammo beside him. There was an opening in the rocks just large enough to accommodate the rifle barrel. Murdock dropped the bipod legs and adjusted them to the correct height. He took a square of camouflage cloth from the drag bag and placed it beneath the muzzle, so when he fired the gas wouldn’t kick up the dirt and dust and give his position away. At any range beyond six hundred yards it was almost impossible for anyone to tell where the bullet had come from. He grabbed the cocking handle mounted on the left hand side of the stock, pulled it all the way back, and released it, chambering a round. Then he stuck a set of foam earplugs in his ears. No sense in going deaf.
The lead BMP was approaching the still-smoldering hulk of the SEALs’ hijacked vehicle. It had to ease around very slowly and carefully; there wasn’t much room left on the road.
When the BMP came even with the hulk Murdock heard a boom from Magic’s McMillan.
Designers of armored vehicles have to make trade-offs in where they allocate the protection. Any vehicle equally armored all around, on top, and on the bottom would end up either under-protected, or so heavy it would be immovable under the highest-power engine able to fit inside.
The BMP was designed to be able to defeat up to.50-caliber rounds over its frontal arc. The rear was proof only against small arms. As in any armored vehicle, the armor was thinnest on the roof and belly.
In the mountains of Afghanistan the Russians quickly discovered how vulnerable the BMP was to fire from above. But these Syrian BMPs did not carry any of the add-on armor panels the Russians had developed.
Magic put his first round right through the roof of the BMP’s engine compartment. It was easily identified by the ventilation and exhaust grills at the right front of the vehicle.
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