by Brad Thor
“That wasn’t good enough for Reed, though. Not for the kind of operation he was planning. He needed actual eyes on. And to accomplish that, he would need help. Enter the Brits.
“MI6 had a solid operation in East Berlin, particularly that sector. If anyone could get him the confirmation he needed, it was the British.
“The important thing to keep in mind is that, for its day, this was like mounting the bin Laden raid, but with a lot less money and none of the time. We didn’t have the ability to mock up an identical structure we could practice on. And our surveillance capabilities back then were nothing compared to what we have today. The best and only thing we had going for us was that the Russians didn’t know we were coming.
“Among the team members, we thought that they might also be feeling so untouchable that their guard would be down. But Reed disabused us of that notion right away. ‘Always,’ he commanded us, ‘assume that your adversary is better equipped, better trained, and better prepared for the fight than you are.’ It was advice all of us took to heart and never forgot.
“He was completely correct, of course. To hope that we’d make entry and easily dispatch a bunch of half-drunk, sleepy Russians was not only arrogant on our part; it was also stupid and dangerous. He had put the fear of God into us and the operation was better for it.
“While the Brits worked to confirm, or get as close to confirmation as they could, that the diplomat and his family were inside, we got down to the even harder work—crafting a plan to get in and out. And not just of the safe house but of East Berlin itself.
“As was his fashion, Reed preferred to plan backward, starting with the extraction. While there would always be contingencies, he began with the assumption that the mission had been successful and the team had achieved its objective. That meant that we had secured the diplomat, his wife, and two teenage children. All that remained was to get them back safely into West Berlin. And Reed had been very clear about what his expectations were on that front. Because we’d be leaving with four extra people, our escape would have to be via a completely different method.
“Getting into East Berlin was going to be dangerous enough, but when I saw what our means of extraction would be, I’m sure my eyes were bugging out of my head. Nevertheless, it had been decided.
“While we waited to hear from the Brits, we worked up an equipment list and set to tracking down everything we needed and getting people in place. We were fortunate to have the budget we did. It would have been a real pain in the ass stealing some of that stuff.
“By the time the Brits got back to us, we had everything pretty much locked down. The only thing left was to decide if there was enough intel to go on. Based on the Brits’ assessment, there was a seventy percent probability that the diplomat and his family were in the safe house. We had reached the go/no go point.
“If we were right and the hostages were inside, then it was ‘Screw the Russians.’ They were the bad actors, and any blood would be on their hands. But if we were wrong, and they weren’t inside, then we were the ones who would be screwed. Reed made the decision that we would launch the next night.
“I remember that the moon was bright, which was not at all good for us. But we didn’t have a choice. It would be at least eight more days before we’d get a moonless night. There was no way we could let the diplomat and his family wait that long.
“Four ultralights were rolled out of a secure hangar at Tempelhof Airport just before midnight. Affixed to the wings of the two-seater aircraft were bright red stars meant to mimic planes from the Soviet air force. The look wasn’t perfect, but it didn’t necessarily have to be. All we wanted was to give GDR troops a reason not to shoot at us if we were spotted.
“Our assault force consisted of four Huracan members—me, Reed, a guy named Davis, and another named Thompson. Because of weight limitations, there was only so much gear we could take with us. Each man carried a pistol, a suppressed MP5 submachine gun, spare magazines, and a handful of other goodies.
“Four pilots with ultralight experience had been flown in from Ramstein Air Base. Like us, we kitted them out with night vision goggles. Their mission was to fly us over the wall to a makeshift airstrip the Brits had set up in the middle of Treptower Park.”
“Isn’t there a Soviet war memorial there too?” asked Harvath, who had operated in Berlin before as well.
“That’s correct. In fact, the best piece of grass for us to put down on was right in front of it, so that’s exactly where we landed,” Mercer explained. “Unfortunately, it was too risky for the ultralights to sit there in the middle of the park, and wait for us. Therefore, they had only one job—to get us in and then get themselves the hell out.
“It felt like we sat on the tarmac forever, waiting for the all clear to take off. But until the next phase of the operation had been completed, there was nothing we could do.
“A Special Forces team had been sent into the East German state of Saxony. There, they would create the diversion Reed had asked for.
“It had been important that the diversion be big. Massive, even. Anything localized to just the safe house would put the team inside on alert. If the diversion was felt across the city of East Berlin, it was less likely to cause suspicion. And in Reed’s estimation, the best way to fool a Russian was to wrap the deception in the cloak of something they were all too accustomed to—state ineptitude.
“At the appointed time, explosives were detonated at the power plants of Vockerode and Thierbach. Seconds later, East Berlin was plunged into a complete and total blackout.
“As soon as spotters confirmed that the lights had gone out, we were given permission to take off.”
CHAPTER 31
“The flight was quick. Less than five minutes. The pilots were able to pick out the infrared markers the Brits had laid down and brought the ultralights in for perfect landings. They stopped only long enough for each of us to grab our gear and hop out.
“By the time the third aircraft had touched down, the first one was already at the end of the grass, turning, and powering up to take off.
“Our British contact was keeping watch from the tree line. After we climbed out of the ultralights, he gave us a signal and we made our way over to him. I’ll never forget him. He had a ruddy complexion and perpetually bloodshot eyes. The man’s name was Ashford,” said Mercer.
“Robert Ashford?” Harvath asked.
“Yeah. That’s the guy. Do you know him?”
Harvath had known him all right. Ashford had been one of the Old Man’s most trusted contacts in British Intelligence. But late in his career Ashford had decided to cash in on his position and had succumbed to his lesser angels.
Ashford was working at MI5 at the time, looking to feather his nest and slip into a very luxurious retirement. He made the wrong choice of selling out both his country and his allies.
So egregious was his transgression that Reed Carlton could have had him killed. One word from Carlton and Harvath would have gladly done it. Instead, the Old Man had come up with a different plan for Ashford. In exchange for his cooperation, the Brit’s life had been spared, but he had been banished to a small fishing village in Alaska where he worked a backbreaking job on a trawler named Rawhide.
When Ashford died, Carlton had sent Harvath to ID the body and confirm it. He was buried in a small church graveyard under the new identity he had been given.
It was Ashford, long before Harvath knew that he was dirty, who had revealed the Old Man’s nickname.
“I knew him,” Harvath said matter-of-factly. “He died a couple of years ago. Heart attack.”
“That’s too bad. He and Reed were pals. They conducted a lot of assignments together.”
“Did you ever do any ops with him?” Harvath asked, probing for whether Mercer may have been compromised at any point.
“I only encountered him a handful of times. All of which were during my tenure with Huracan.”
Harvath was glad to hear that. “So what hap
pened after you were on the ground and had linked up with Ashford?”
“After making sure the ultralights had all safely gotten away, Ashford extinguished the IR beacons and we headed for the KGB safe house. A block away, we met up with a team of ex-SAS operatives who accompanied us for the takedown.
“We had all been through extensive hostage-rescue training. Davis and Thompson, ex–Delta Force, were especially experienced, as were several on the SAS side. According to the intel the Brits had developed, the diplomat and his family were being kept in different rooms on different floors of the house. This made the assault more difficult, but it also meant that the Russians were likely to be more spread out.
“The biggest question of all was whether the KGB officers would kill their captives once they realized an attack was under way.
“Our feeling was that, while normally a terrorist tactic, we couldn’t be absolutely sure. We had to operate as if each family member was guarded by an armed antagonist who had explicit orders to kill. That meant that it was of the utmost necessity that the assignment adhere to the maxim: speed, surprise, and overwhelming violence of action.
“In addition to the radios they had brought for us, the SAS guys were carrying ropes and harnesses. They would access the roof from an adjacent building and come down from above. The Huracan team would split in half and hit the front and back doors simultaneously.
“At best guess, there were four, possibly six Russians inside. They were believed to be armed but not heavily. Pistols, maybe shotguns. Not that it made a difference. In a close-quarters hostage situation, any firearm was bad. It was critical that we all excecuted our roles flawlessly.
“As Ashford was the only one among us without deep hostage-rescue training, he was to remain outside as a spotter. If any local military or law enforcement showed up, his job was to slow them down by any means possible—including the use of a pistol and a handful of grenades he had been armed with.
“Once the SAS team was in place on the roof, Davis and I crept up and placed a C-4 charge on the front door while Reed and Thompson did the same in back.
“When everyone was confirmed good to go, Reed gave the order to hit the safe house.
“The charges detonated, throwing open the front and rear doors, and showering the downstairs in wood, steel, and broken plaster. Upstairs, glass shattered as the SAS men exploded through the windows and an old skylight.
“As we made our entry, we tossed out flashbangs and swept from room to room, engaging the Russians.
“Many of the KGB operatives, as hoped, had been asleep—but not all of them. Those who could be shot immediately were. The others returned fire.
“It was a hell of a gunfight. And it wasn’t until it was all over that we realized the Brits had underestimated the number of Russians inside the safe house. It was more than double their worst-case scenario. By the time the smoke cleared, we counted thirteen in total, but that wasn’t the worst of it.
“The diplomat was found chained to a metal cot upstairs. He had been badly beaten and we would later learn that he had been psychologically tortured via an intensely bright lamp that had remained on, night and day, since his capture. The blackout was the first time the light had been extinguished.
“His son was found in the next room, handcuffed to a radiator. While he had also taken more than a few blows, he was in much better shape than his father. The true horror of the house, however, was what had been taking place downstairs.
“They found the diplomat’s wife in the living room and his teenage daughter in the kitchen. Both were bloodied, naked, and appeared to be under the influence of some sort of narcotic.
“On the kitchen floor, near the daughter, one of the Russians lay bleeding from his gunshot wounds but still alive. His trousers were undone. It didn’t take a lot of creativity to imagine what they had been doing to the women. That was the breaking point for Reed.
“He spat a question at the guy in Russian, but the man refused to answer. Grabbing the nearest object he could find, he slammed an enormous can of fruit right into the KGB officer’s nuts. I’m talking really hard. Then he posed the question again. Still the guy refused to answer. So Reed went to work on him even harder.
“He ended up rupturing both of the Russian’s testicles and mangling the hell out of the man’s magic wand. None of us had ever seen anything like it.
“We used to joke that Reed only had one soft spot—women, children, and animals. In fact, we used to tease him about it—me included, even though he was my superior. What those Russians had done, however, was absolutely beyond the pale. We all felt it. Reed was not only outraged by it; he was also offended.
“There was a code. Call it a sense of decency. As bad as the Russians were, he expected them to live by it. The Arab terrorists were animals. He expected this kind of savagery from them. But not from the Russians—and especially not KGB operatives.
“He expected a certain degree of Marquess of Queensbury out of them. In a word, he found them ungentlemanly. They had crossed a bright line. Out of a sense of honor, Reed needed to make things right.
“That guy with the busted-up wedding tackle was the only one left alive at the safe house—a message to Moscow.
“The diplomat and his son, as beaten up as they were, were strong enough to walk. The wife and daughter had a much more difficult time. We ended up having to carry them out.
“Ever the strategist, Reed had anticipated that we might be dealing with injuries and had come up with a plan.
“Ashford and his team got us to the extraction point and established a perimeter as we mounted the stairs to the roof of the building.
“We were literally within the shadow of the infamous wall, which was actually two walls. Looking down, we could see the area in between known as the death strip. Guard towers, fences capped with barbed wire, dog patrols, anti-vehicle trenches, floodlights, trip wire–activated machine guns, land mines… It was a nightmare.
“Reed had selected this spot along the death strip because it was the narrowest. From where we were crouched, we could actually hear people walking down the street and having conversations on the West Berlin side of the wall.
“As Davis, Thompson, and I prepped the diplomat and his family, Reed unpacked and assembled the meanest crossbow I had ever seen. Along with it he had a spool of high-test nylon filament that he slid onto what looked like an improvised reel jack made from a toilet paper stand.
“Affixing one end of the filament to a bolt, he cocked the bowstring and loaded the bolt into the barrel groove. Then, as he shouldered the weapon and activated his night vision scope, he had me burst a quick infrared signal to a car he had waiting on the other side. The driver of the car turned on his own infrared beacon, which was sitting atop a stack of sandbags on the street.
“After taking one last check of the wind, Reed flicked off his safety, exhaled, and let the bolt fly.”
“Let me guess,” said Harvath. “Nailed it. Dead center.”
“Not even close,” Mercer replied with a grin. “We didn’t know it until after, but not only had he overshot the sandbags but he had almost impaled our driver who had been standing what he thought was a safe distance away, next to his vehicle. The bolt hit the car, went straight through the left rear quarter panel, and came within an inch of puncturing the tire.”
Harvath laughed and the pain in his ribs reminded him to pop a couple more ibuprofen. As he reached for his water, Mercer continued.
“Now that the nylon line was all the way across, we attached a steel cable and had the driver pull it over. Once it had reached him, he attached it to the back of his vehicle while I wrapped our end of the cable around a chimney. Then we had him inch the car forward until the line was taut.
“We couldn’t send the diplomat or any of his family members out yet. One of us had to go first to make sure it was safe. Davis, Thompson, and I all volunteered. Reed chose Davis.
“Passing on wearing a harness, he clicked the trolley
onto the line, made sure it could support his weight, and, with his MP5 slung across his back, swung over the edge of the roof and zip-lined into West Berlin.
“Next, we tried to send the diplomat, but he insisted his family go first. So we explained to his son how the braking system worked, affixed his harness, and sent him across.
“The daughter was to follow, but there was no way that she would be able to sit upright. This is where Reed’s preplanning had paid off.
“He had brought along what resembled a canvas body bag. Once she was all set, we attached the bag to the cable, trailed a rope behind it, and slowly lowered her to the other side.
“It was an arduous process that left the daughter exposed for far too long, in my opinion, but it worked. As soon as she was extricated by the driver and her brother, we pulled the bag back and repeated the process for the diplomat’s wife.
“After she was safely on the other side, we sent the diplomat over. Then Thompson went. Finally, it was just me and Reed standing on the roof. I told him I’d take the last ride, but he would have nothing of it. I was to go, followed by him. I had my orders and so clicked in and took one of the most exhilarating rides I’ve ever taken in my life.
“I knew Reed had placed snipers on the West Berlin side, ready to take out any GDR soldiers who might have spotted and shot at us, but no roller coaster before or since has ever gotten my heart beating and my blood pumping like what we did that night. The operation had been a success.”
“That’s a real hall of fame story. One for the history books,” said Harvath.
“Absolutely.”
“So what about Reed’s nickname?”
“There’s always a team debrief,” said Mercer, smiling as he remembered it.
“Always,” Harvath agreed. “And it’s always made better in the presence of alcohol.”
“Too true. Which means it won’t surprise you to learn that once we got the diplomat and his family safely back to the embassy, we decided to have a drink in order to take the edge off.”
