Rogue Forces (12 page)

C
OMMAND AND
C
ONTROL
C
ENTER
, A
LLIED
A
IR
B
ASE
N
AHLA
, I
RAQ

T
HAT SAME TIME

“I’m impressed, Jon, really impressed,” Patrick McLanahan said. “The gear is working as advertised.”

“You expected anything less?” Jon Masters retorted smugly. He shrugged, then added, “Actually, I’m surprised myself. Networking the regimental stuff was a bigger hurdle than networking our own sensors, and that went pretty smoothly.”

“That could be a bad thing: it shouldn’t be so easy to link the regiment’s network,” Patrick observed.

“Ours isn’t nearly as easy to hack as the regiment’s,” Jon said confidently. “It’ll take an army of Sandra Bullocks to crack our encryption.” He pointed to one blank window on his laptop monitor. “Division’s Global Hawk is the only player not hooked up yet.”

“I may have been responsible for that,” Patrick admitted. “I told Dave that we’d be ready to start surveillance tonight, and he probably passed that along to President Martindale, who probably passed it along to Corps headquarters. Division might have retasked the Global Hawk.”

“That’s not your fault—that’s Wilhelm’s,” Jon said. “If he let us fly, we’d be on it like stink on shit. Well, they have lots of eyes up there without it.”

Patrick nodded, but he still looked uneasy. “I’m concerned about the northern portion of those tunnels,” he said. “If any AQI escapes we should get an eye on them so we can steer the Turks over to nab them, or use a Reaper to pick ’em off.” He brought a window from Jon’s laptop over to his display, studied it for a moment, entered some commands into his keyboard, and spoke. “Miss Harrison?”

“Harrison. Who is this?”

“General McLanahan.”

He could see the unmanned aerial vehicle contractor look around herself in confusion. “Where are you, General?”

“Up in the observation deck.”

She looked up and saw him through the large slanted window-panes. “Oh, hello, sir. I didn’t know you were on this net.”

“Officially I’m not, but Kris said it was okay. I have a request.”

“Yes, sir?”

“You have Kelly Two-Two on station in the southern part of the op, and Kelly Two-Six ready to go as a backup. Could you move Two-Two up north to cover the northern tunnel entrance and move Two-Six to cover the south?”

“Why, sir?”

“The Global Hawk isn’t on station, so we don’t have any coverage in the north.”

“I’d have to fly the Reaper to within maximum missile range of the Turkish border, and that requires permission from Corps and probably from the State Department. We could download weapons from Two-Six and send it up.”

“This thing will most likely be over by then, Lieutenant.”

“True, sir.”

“If we can get some eyes up there, I’d feel a little more relieved,” Patrick said. “How about we send Two-Two right up to the distance limit until I coordinate with Corps?”

“I’ll have to deconflict Two-Six so it can launch,” Harrison said. “Stand by.” Patrick flipped over to the approach radar picture of Nahla Air Base and found it relatively free of traffic, undoubtedly because the airspace had been closed down as a result of the operation to the north. A moment later: “Airspace says we can launch when ready, sir. Let me get permission from the battle major.”

“It was my idea, Lieutenant, so I’d be happy to give him a call and explain what I had in mind.”

“You’re not supposed to be on this net, sir,” Harrison said, glancing up at Patrick and giggling. “Besides, if you don’t mind, I’d like to take credit for your idea.”

“I’ll take the blame if there’s any snafu, Lieutenant.”

“No problem, sir. Stand by.” She clicked off the connection, but Patrick was able to eavesdrop on her conversation with Major Bruno and the conversation between Bruno and Lieutenant Colonel Weatherly about the launch. They all agreed it was a good idea to move the Reaper as long as it didn’t violate any international agreements, and soon Kelly Two-Six was airborne and Two-Two was moving north to take up a patrol orbit near the Turkish border.

“Whoever’s idea it was to move the Reaper up north…hoo-ah,” Wilhelm said over the Tank network.

“Harrison’s idea, sir,” Weatherly said.

“I wasted a perfectly good ‘hoo-ah’ on a contractor?” Wilhelm said, feigning disgust at himself. “Oh, well, I know we gotta toss the mercs a bone every once in a while. Good heads-up, Harrison.”

“Thank you, Colonel.”

“Is that his way of giving out praise?” Jon asked. “What a sweet guy.”

The picture of the operation looked considerably better once the Reaper had taken up a patrol orbit near the Turkish border, although it was still too far south to completely fill in the picture. “It was a good idea, sir,” Harrison said to Patrick, “but the ROE restrictions still can’t give us a look at where the tunnel supposedly exits. I’ll check on the Global Hawk.”

“We’d have that entire area covered seven ways to Sunday with the Loser,” Jon said. “Wait’ll these guys see us in action.”

“I really wish you’d change that name, Jon.”

“I will—but first I want to rub the Air Force’s face in it for a while,” Jon said happily. “I can’t wait.”

R
ECONNAISSANCE
O
BJECTIVE
P
ARROT

A
SHORT TIME LATER

“There they go, sir,” the gunner aboard Lieutenant Oakland’s Stryker said, studying the image of the tunnel entrance through his imaging infrared sights. Several bright flashes of light erupted on the screen, and seconds later the sounds of the explosion rippled over them. “Looks like the lead platoons are on the move.”

Oakland checked his watch. “Right on time, too. I’m impressed. We’d be hard-pressed to get an op this size going dead on time.” He flipped a switch on his monitor, checking the areas around each of his Strykers deployed around the area, then keyed his mike. “Weapons tight and stay sharp, guys,” he radioed to his platoon. “The IA is on the move.” Each section leader clicked an affirmative in response.

When all of them had checked in, Oakland sent an instant message to the Tank in Nahla, reporting friendly force movement. He briefly switched over to Maqbara Company’s command radio network and was met with an insane and completely incomprehensible cacophony of excited, shouted Arabic. He quickly switched it off. “Good radio discipline, guys,” he said under his breath.

“They’re going in, sir,” the Stryker gunner said. He and Oakland watched as a squad of eight Iraqi soldiers approached the building. Two soldiers used grenade launchers to blow the door open, showering themselves with wood and stone fragments because they had moved in far too close.

“Oh, c’mon, guys, where’s your entry team?” Oakland said aloud. “You should know that the guys who blew the door aren’t going to be able to do a smooth entry. One squad blows the door while another squad who’s shielded from the light and concussion do the entry. My seven-year-old knows this.” But soon he could see a sergeant reorganizing his entry team and getting the breaching team out of the way, so after a brief stutter step the operation appeared to be progressing.

Back at the Tank, Patrick and Jon were watching the action via feeds from the Strykers and unmanned aircraft…except Patrick was not looking at the raid on the suspected tunnel entrance, but farther north along the Iraq-Turkey border. The view from the MQ-9 Reaper’s imaging infrared scanner showed rolling hills punctuated by tall rocky crags and deep forested valleys.

“Sorry, sir, but you’re not going to get too much contrast or detail at this looking angle,” Margaret Harrison, the regiment’s Reaper liaison officer, said to him over the intercom. “Reapers are meant to look down at a fairly steep angle, not across to the horizon.”

“Copy,” Patrick responded. “Just a few more seconds.” He touched another key on his keyboard and spoke: “Mr. Bexar?”

“Bexar here,” the privately contracted intelligence officer replied.

“This is McLanahan.”

“How are you, General? Are you authorized to be on the net now?”

“Mr. Thompson said it was okay. I have a question.”

“I don’t personally know your security clearance, General,” Bexar said. “I assume you have a ‘top secret’ or else you couldn’t have sat in on the briefing, but until I verify, I’ll have to refrain from answering any questions that might compromise operational security.”

“Understood. You briefed that the Turks have five thousand troops in the area immediately adjacent to the regiment’s area of responsibility?”

“Yes, sir. The equivalent of two mechanized infantry brigades, one each in Sirnak and Hakkari provinces, plus three Jandarma battalions.”

“That’s a lot, isn’t it?”

“Considering recent events, I don’t think so,” Bexar said. “They’ve roughly tried to mirror American and Iraqi force levels over the past couple years. The Jandarma have maintained many more forces in southeast Turkey in the past depending on PKK activity levels. The problem is, we don’t always get regular updates on Jandarma unit movements.”

“Why is that?”

“The Turkish Ministry of the Interior is pretty tight-lipped—they’re not obligated by NATO treaty to share information like the Ministry of Defense is.”

“But the mechanized infantry movement in the area is a relatively new development?”

“Yes.”

“Interesting. But my question is, Mr. Bexar: Where
are
they?”

“Where are who?”

“Where are all these Turkish forces? A mechanized infantry brigade is pretty hard to hide.”

“Well, I suppose…” The question had obviously taken the intelligence man by surprise. “They…could be anywhere, General. My guess is they’re in garrisons in the provincial capitals. As for the Jandarma, they can evade our surveillance easily in this terrain.”

“Kelly Two-Two has been looking at the frontier for the past few minutes and I haven’t seen any indications of any vehicles whatsoever,” Patrick said. “And according to my charts, Two-Two is looking right at the town of Uludere, correct?”

“Stand by.” A moment later, after checking the telemetry readouts from the Reaper’s imaging infrared sensor: “Yes, General, you’re right.”

“We’re looking at the town, but I don’t see any lights or even any evidence of life out there. Am I missing something?”

There was a slight pause; then: “General, why are you asking about Turkey? The Turks aren’t involved in this operation.”

Yeah, Patrick thought, why
am
I looking at Turkey? “Just curious, I guess,” he finally responded. “I’ll let you get back to work. Sorry for the—”

“Harrison, what is Two-Two looking at?” Wilhelm asked over the intercom. “It’s looking fifteen miles in the wrong damned direction. Check your ground surveillance plan.”

Patrick knew he had to step in himself—it wasn’t Harrison’s idea to look across the border into Turkey. “I just wanted to have a look across the border, Colonel.”

“Who is this?”

“McLanahan.”

“What are you doing on my net, General?” Wilhelm thundered. “I said you could observe and listen in, not talk, and I sure as hell didn’t authorize you to direct my sensor operators!”

“I’m sorry, Colonel, but I had a funny feeling about something, and I had to check it out.”

“Better to ask forgiveness than ask permission, eh, General?” Wilhelm sneered. “I heard that about you. I don’t care about your ‘funny feelings,’ McLanahan. Harrison, move that Reaper to cover…”

“Aren’t you even going to ask what I wanted to look at, Colonel?”

“I’m not, because nothing in Turkey interests me at the moment. In case you forgot, General, I have a reconnaissance platoon on the ground in action in
Iraq
, not Turkey. But as long as you bring it up, what in hell were you—”

“
Rocket launch
!” somebody cut in. On the monitor showing images broadcast from Kelly Two-Two, dozens of bright streaks of fire arced across the night sky—from across the border in Turkey!

“What the hell is that?” Wilhelm snapped. “Where is that coming from?”

“
That’s a multiple rocket barrage from Turkey!
” Patrick shouted. “Pull your men out of there, Colonel!”

“Shut the hell up, McLanahan!” Wilhelm shouted. But he rose out of his seat in horror, studied the image for a few heartbeats, then hit the button for the regimental network and cried, “All Warhammer players, all Warhammer players, this is Warhammer, you have incoming artillery from the north, reverse direction, get away from Parrot
now
!”

“
Say again
?” one of the recon sections responded. “Say again, Warhammer!”

“I say again, all Warhammer players, this is Warhammer, you have twenty seconds to reverse direction of movement away from Objective Parrot, and then five seconds to take cover!” Wilhelm shouted. “Artillery inbound from the north!
Move! Move!”
On the
Tank’s intercom he shouted, “Someone get the fucking Turkish army on the line and tell them to cease fire, we’ve got troops on the ground! Get medevac choppers in the air and get reinforcements out there immediately!”

“Send the B-1 across the border to those launch points, Colonel!” Patrick said. “If there are any more launchers, it’ll be able to—”

“I said
shut up
and get off my net, McLanahan!” Wilhelm snapped.

The Stryker reconnaissance patrols moved quickly, but not as fast as the incoming rockets. It took only ten seconds for the two dozen rockets to fly thirty miles and shower the Zahuk tunnel complex area with thousands of high-explosive antipersonnel and antitruck mines. Some mines exploded a few yards overhead, spraying the area below them with white-hot tungsten pellets; other mines detonated on contact with the ground, buildings, or vehicles with a high-explosive fragmentary warhead; and still others sat on the ground, where they would explode when disturbed or automatically after a certain period of time.

The second barrage occurred just a few moments later, aimed a few hundred yards west, east, and south of the first target area, designed to catch any who might have escaped the first bombardment. This was the attack that caught most of the retreating members of the American recon platoon. The mines tore through the light top armor on the Strykers from above, ripping them apart and leaving them open for the other high-explosive munitions to follow. Many of the dismounts who escaped the carnage inside their vehicles were lost to submunitions exploding overhead or underfoot as they tried to run for their lives.

In thirty seconds it was over. The stunned staff members watched it all in absolute horror, broadcast live via the Reaper and Predator drones high above.