by L. Todd Wood
Commander Zarin was not the only one silently leaving their harbor. Over three hundred small vessels, which were painstakingly hidden over the last twelve months, were making their way into the open ocean from their places of concealment. Soon the American radars would pick them up, but it would be too late. At the appropriate prearranged time, under radio silence, all of the small vessels gunned their engines and made their way towards the American force. They swarmed like bees as they rushed the much larger ships.
It was asymmetric warfare at its finest.
Lieutenant Vince Armstrong was in the Officers’ Mess having coffee with two other off-duty naval officers when the call to battle stations startled him and the others. He gulped the half-full mug down and slammed it on the table, racing to the flight deck of the USS Nashville, which was his post. The ship was an amphibious assault vessel full of U.S. marines, their vehicles, and gear. Their assigned mission was to deploy U.S. marines anywhere in the world to project American power. There was a helipad on the rear of the ship for rotary wing landings.
He arrived on the flight deck a minute later and donned his battle gear. The flight control area was submerged beneath the deck with only a glass encasement rising from the ship to allow the controllers to put their heads above the deck to direct flight operations.
Once inside, he asked the on-duty officer for a status report to get up to speed on the situation at hand.
“We have a CH-53 inbound,” said the duty officer. “He’s bringing supplies. Thirty seconds out.”
“We’ll he’d better hurry,” said Lt. Armstrong.
He grabbed the microphone for the air control frequency.
“Specter Two-six, this is Alpha One. Proceed with haste. Situation on board,” he ordered.
Below decks, the company of U.S. marines on board were also stowing their gear and preparing for the worst. It was like being a passenger on an airplane. There was absolutely nothing they could do during a naval engagement but wait there in the hull like the sitting ducks they were. They waited for the day when they could be deployed in-country or storm a beach as they had been trained. Here they were useless.
They donned battle gear, checked and tightened the tie downs on their vehicles, and waited.
Commander Zarin raced into the open water. He was thrilled and consumed with passion for his God. Soon he would go to him. His emotions were overwhelming.
He could not see or hear them, but he knew that hundreds of other boats were massing on the same targets, the elements of the U.S. Fifth Fleet currently steaming through the strait.
He barked commands to his crew.
“Turn on the radar and prepare to fire!” he said loudly but calmly.
He was at peace and ready to meet his maker.
In the electronic control room of the USS San Jacinto, the radar emissions of Commander Zarin’s craft was noted by the electronic warfare officer, who relayed countermeasures and notified his commander. But it was one of many signatures painted on the scope. There were hundreds of targets, and they were busy trying to prioritize and engage each one. The San Jacinto was the Aegis class ship responsible for defending the fleet against attack. Its advanced radar tracking system could engage over a hundred targets at once.
But tonight even this system was not up to the task at hand.
The commander of the task force had already given the order to fire in order to defend his force. The electronic warfare officer passed this target to a U.S. Air Force asset circling above. This was obviously the real thing, the lieutenant junior grade thought to himself. The adrenaline rushed through his veins.
Commander Zarin fired the Silkworm missile at the nearest target that displayed on his radar. The missile roared from the catamaran and screamed towards the ship. Simultaneously he saw fireballs emerge up and down the strait to his left and right as other Iranian ships fired as well. He felt a joy he had never experienced before. He was doing God’s will. He closed his eyes and prepared to meet his maker.
The Marine CH-53 was hovering over the helipad at the stern of the ship. Lt. Armstrong was in communication with the pilot, talking him down in the darkness. This was a delicate operation.
The pilot of the aircraft had no visible horizon as he stared out into the blackness of the night ocean sky. It was literally like looking into a black hole. He could not tell if he was moving up, down, left, or right. The only information he had was that provided by his instruments and his crew.
The ship bobbed up and down beneath him. As he tried to maintain a level hover over the moving ship, his crew talked him down.
“Left one, right two, down one,” the flight engineer said as he looked down at the helipad through his night vision goggles. The tubes magnified tiny amounts of ambient light and provided a greenish, fuzzy picture to those wearing them. Even so, the crewman could barely see the deck below him on this dark night. Finally with only a few feet separating the helicopter from the ship, the pilot pushed down the collective and slammed the aircraft onto the deck. The crewmen raced in to tie her down as the cargo was unloaded. It was more of a controlled crash than a landing.
As the wheels connected with the ship, the copilot looked out the left side of his windscreen into the blackness over the ocean. He saw a bright spot of light heading directly for the ship at supersonic speed. He yanked up on the collective to get the helicopter airborne and screamed into the mic at the same time.
“Missile inbound!” he shouted.
It was too late.
The warhead struck the rear doors of the LPD, obliterating the stern of the vessel. The fireball engulfed the helicopter. Water rushed into the hold of the ship, where the marines were waiting.
Lt. Armstrong had one final look at the sky before Marine armaments below exploded and blew the ship in half.
Chapter Fifteen
Kate read the lab report that was displayed on her computer screen but wasn’t surprised. She expected as much.
The shell casing she had picked up off the floor that night in Oliver’s home was from a Chinese-made QSZ-92 pistol, the most recent product of Chinese arms factories. It was either a very good plant to lead her in the wrong direction or another piece of circumstantial evidence that lead her down the road to Beijing. The shooter himself she would have called definitely oriental and most likely Chinese. She had a good look at him while they were in the bar at the old sugar mill.
This was one piece of evidence.
She had more, much more.
Kate had a Top Secret security clearance. However, she was cleared several layers higher than that on a need-to-know basis for her current position. This was an SCI authorization, or Sensitive Compartmental Information. Per this access, she had available to her the most sensitive data the National Security Agency, or NSA, could collect via their sophisticated electronic eavesdropping capabilities.
As she scanned the data on her secure connection in her hotel room in Nassau, more strands of the conspiracy began to come to light.
Before and after the initiation of hostilities in the Persian Gulf, there was a marked increase in intelligence chatter between the Iranian, Chinese, and Russian diplomatic apparatus. They had caught them red-handed.
Why hadn’t anyone else put this information together? The Chinese and the Russians had for years been making overt statements about removing the United States from its position of dominance on the world stage. The Chinese had manipulated their currency to swell their trade imbalance. By keeping their currency value artificially low, they created an artificially low price for Chinese goods in their export markets around the world. This in turn created massive currency reserves primarily in USD.
They also pushed a global mercantilist agenda and bought influence around the world. The recent cash disbursement to the Bahamas was just one example.
Billions of dollars had been loaned or granted to multiple Caribbean nations for infra
structure development. Jamaica, Bahamas, Dominican Republic, and Barbados were the main recipients. Sports facilities, refineries, roads, bridges, et cetera had all been funded. Economic growth was anemic in these regions, as they relied primarily on tourism to fund their economies. This was lacking since the long-term downturn began almost a decade before. The Chinese had stepped in to fill the void.
They also were pushing for access to commodities and raw materials globally. Africa was in the forefront here. In fact, many of the indigenous African people had become wary of Chinese bringing money. They complained of labor abuse and exploitation and strong-arm tactics in negotiations. Raw materials and energy were especially targeted for influence. Farm land, rare earth minerals, petroleum reserves, et cetera were bought and paid for.
The Bahamas was a large benefactor of Chinese largess. Hundreds of millions in loans were issued and forgiven. The Caribbean was a very strategic area with its plethora of ports near the United States. Now the Chinese were taking action in concert with other world players that wished the United States harm.
The United States was at war with the world. The president needed to know this. It was time. She picked up the secure phone and called the White House.
The Caribbean
The British Empire literally ruled the world. Or at least they used to. Connor was amazed at how much their presence was still felt throughout the globe. The economic reach they sustained for centuries was incredible. Australia, the Americas, Africa, India, Hong Kong, and of course the Caribbean all felt the English legacy.
Connor stood on the deck surrounding the pool overlooking Kingston, Jamaica. The hotel was located atop one of the nearby famous Blue Mountains. The view was breathtaking. The sun was setting over the harbor, and the lights of the sprawling city began to twinkle. It’s so beautiful, he thought to himself.
He had arrived that morning to meet with several clients in Kingston. That part of a trip to Jamaica was always unpleasant. The city was like a war zone. Gang warfare was common and the streets were very dangerous. Truckloads of armed soldiers were frequently seen driving from place to place. Many times they hit up the taxi drivers for bribes when they saw them with a foreign fare. Trash littered the streets in front of the decaying buildings.
There were pockets of modern living. A few nice hotels existed. The financial buildings were typically professional, as were the businessmen and women.
It was not a pleasant job to sit in the rear of the hired car and be driven swiftly from place to place. Going from meeting to meeting and being worried about being mugged was not his strong suit.
That was the emerging market business. It was the same in Venezuela, Trinidad, and other parts of Latin America. It came with the job.
Connor was always struck by the natural abundance of Jamaica. The bananas, coffee, and tourism were always big revenue producers for the country. In addition, the land itself was one huge piece of bauxite sticking out of the Caribbean Sea. Bauxite was one of the main ingredients of aluminum.
However, the left of center governments could never seem to create the right conditions to exploit this advantage. Their cost of production was thirty percent higher than the competition, so they were unprofitable in the international market.
A shame, thought Connor.
The English influence was unmistakable, however, during his travels. The language was an obvious giveaway. Jamaica, although ruled by the French as well for a time, was built on the English model. The population mainly descended from slaves imported to man the sugar plantations and from their English masters. Throughout the Caribbean, cricket was the national sport, as in the Bahamas. The passion for the game was just as high here.
Many islands in the Caribbean still had the Queen’s imprint on their currency. The main connection, however, which Connor saw on a daily basis, was financial. The primary financial centers of the world were English based: Cayman, London, New York, Hong Kong.
However, he also saw that this was changing. There was a new sheriff in town, the Chinese. Economic power was definitely moving East, where it was centuries before.
The Chinese, flush with their trillions in foreign currency reserves and holding the economic reigns of America with their trillions in U.S. Dollar debt, were now spreading their influence throughout the globe.
He was well aware that for years they were buying access to natural resources across the world. Oil in Latin America, strategic minerals in Africa, and access to ports in the Caribbean were acquired. This was done in full view of several U.S. administrations, who were too busy worried about making their banker angry than to deal with the obvious threats to national security.
Now their chief aim was to supplant the United States Dollar with the Chinese Yuan as the new global reserve currency. They no longer were so helplessly linked to the U.S. consumer market. Their middle class was growing exponentially. They were creating their own domestic market. The United States had lost its influence.
This was obvious to Connor and to most people in the financial business. There was more and more bond issuance in yuan than in dollars. The Russians and the Chinese were conducting most of their international trade in their own currencies rather than the historical USD standard for several years now.
The response of the United States to all of these issues was disheartening. The administration was pursuing a policy of devaluing the currency to deal with their external debt problem. No country had ever successfully followed this course and come out ahead economically.
Many a banana republic had tried─Zimbabwe, Argentina, and others─but the process didn’t work. It always led to inflation, loss of economic power, and a lower standard of living for its citizens. A nation can’t devalue its way to prosperity.
Connor mused on all of this as he smoked a nice Jamaican cigar. One of life’s small pleasures, he thought.
The recent hostilities in the Persian Gulf would add even more economic pressure to the United States. They could not afford to prosecute another very expensive war.
We can’t borrow the money, he pondered.
Interest rates had already risen dramatically, which greatly increased the cost of servicing all of this debt. The value of the United States currency was plummeting.
The financial crisis for America was entering a final stage.
After all, Connor thought, it’s what spelled the end for the British Empire. They just could not afford the fight with the Nazis. They could not afford to maintain their empire. It just crumbled. History repeats itself, he mused.
Kate got off the spanking brand new Aeroflot Boeing jet and walked into Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport. It was a sparkling new facility, built to ease the crowding of the city’s older airport, Domodedovo, located across town. The nouveau riche Russian money was very much on display. Packed duty-free shops lined the corridors. The locals were flush with cash. Beautiful girls dressed to the nines were everywhere.
Wow, how much has changed in the last decade, she said to herself as she remembered her time here years ago. Then, there was a palpable sense of doom in the air, no longer. The one thing the government had provided was economic success, at least in the cities. People did not have political freedom, but they very much had opportunity, to a certain degree. That is if you knew the right people.
She made her way to passport control. It was always a tense moment, she recalled. The harsh looks and the stare down were standard. It was an automatic Russian response to foreigners, especially Americans. She wondered if her cover was blown and she would be targeted for surveillance, or even if she would be let in the country.
She seemed to pass through immigration easy enough. Who knows? she thought.
She waited forever at baggage claim. I have traveled to many airports in many different countries, and the luggage always is late, she said to herself. She waited for an eternity.
I knew I shouldn�
��t have checked my bag.
Finally the baggage arrived and she poured herself into a taxi and barked in Russian for the driver to take her to the Moscow Hilton.
Kate was fluent. She had studied the language all through college and then immersed herself in the culture when she lived in Moscow. Although it had been a while, it came back naturally and easily. She rather enjoyed speaking it again.
The drive to the hotel was uneventful. What struck her was the continuity of Moscow. Yes, the signs on the shops were more vibrant. The cars on the road were nicer and much more expensive. But the buildings were for the most part the same Stalinist Soviet-designed housing blocks that had existed for decades. In spite of a new section of the city sporting new skyscrapers, it was as if the Russians could not escape the past. That thought was even more pungent as she thought of what was going on with the conflicts globally. The Russian Machiavellian instinct again showed itself.
She could not help but think that if there had been a more concerted effort at democracy after the fall of the Soviet Union, maybe things would have turned out differently. However, the complexes of the Russian leadership had prevented that. She hardly thought the Russian people were anti-American. “You are just like us!” many of them had told her. She could hear the surprise in their voices, once they had gotten to know her. They were, however, routinely whipped into an anti-American fervor by the frequent government television shows that demonized America. If one listened to this propaganda, one would think the United States was behind every sneaky plot ever imagined and then some.
Kate firmly believed in engaging people of different cultures. The more you get to know each other, the harder it is to hate each other, she thought.
She arrived at the hotel.
The Moscow Hilton was housed in one of seven towers that Stalin built in the early twentieth century to ostensibly highlight Soviet prowess in architecture. The real truth was that Stalin feared being ridiculed by Westerners upon their arrival in Moscow. “You have no skyscrapers!” he could hear them say. So Stalin demanded Moscow grow its skyline.
