Raid on afghanistan, p.14
Raid on Afghanistan, page 14
“And you, Colonel, don’t seem to understand the way the Navy Seals operate out in the field. Do you want to know what military courtesy we’re going to show you?”
“Why don’t you, Lieutenant Talley,” he replied in an icy tone.
“Looking at you, you’re obviously not trained in this kind of SpecOp, behind the lines fighting. I don’t know exactly why you’re here, but I’d guess it’s a last ditch attempt to get yourself a general’s star by hitching your coat tails to a Seal mission. As you are here, we’ll do our best to keep you alive, and that’s by no means certain. An officer like you, with little experience of this work, is going to slow us down, and the chances are you won’t make it back. All I can say is we’ll do our best to keep you alive. Even though the chances are you’ll die. Sir!”
He paused for effect, and the men tried even harder not to smile. Waverley had gone pale. Talley continued. “In the meantime, we need to know our orders because chances are you won’t be alive for long, and we don’t want you dying without telling us our new mission objective.”
Waverley was mute. It was clear that Talley had hit the nail on the head. He’d seized the opportunity to volunteer and come out here, hoping for a glorious opportunity to advance his career and gain his first star. It was a mistake. Seal missions sure earned a deal of admiration, at least, when they were successful. But it was admiration that was earned after years of hard work, sweat and blood; and always a number of casualties. The Colonel finally recovered.
“Alright, Talley, we’ll forget the bullshit. I may not be the fittest officer in the country, or the best shot, and I admit I’m angling for promotion. But I’m not such a dumbass, as you seem to think. I’ve seen my share of action in the past, so I won’t get in your way. I have a deal of intelligence for you, and this neck of the woods is my specialty. Maybe we got off on the wrong foot, so let’s start again.”
The men relaxed. The Colonel would be a passenger, no question. But if he cooperated, that may be something different. Talley held out his hand.
“That’s a deal, Colonel. What have you got for us?”
Waverley took his hand and gave him a brief smile. He took a map out of his pack, together with a sheaf of documents. The map covered the area of the Hindu Kush, the mountain range that loomed behind them to the south east.
“We believe that Gemal Rahimi has gone to ground in these mountains, so…”
He stopped, as Abraham Dur collapsed into fits of giggling. It was a peculiar sound, but enough to put the officer off his stride. He looked at Dur.
“Who is that man? What is he doing here?”
“He’s an Afghan local, Colonel. He’s been helping us out with local intel.”
“Would you ask him what his problem is?”
Talley nodded at Nolan. “Chief, have a word with him.”
Nolan took him to one side. “What’s up, Abraham?”
“That man, he said that Rahimi is in the Hindu Kush. That is very funny. For hundreds of years, those mountains have been the traditional hiding place of warlords and bandits operating between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Of course Rahimi is there, where else would he be? But it would take ten thousand men a lifetime to find him.”
Nolan stared at the clever old Afghan. There was something else. His expression was innocent, but something lay behind it.
“You know where he is, don’t you?”
He gave a small shrug and delivered a smile, screwing up his gnome-like face. “I am certain I know where my granddaughter will be. And yes, she will be with Rahimi, after she is given to him.”
Nolan pulled him over to where Waverley and Talley were talking. He ignored the Colonel.
“Boss, Abraham says he knows the whereabouts in the mountains Rahimi is likely holed up.”
Both officers looked at the old man.
“And where exactly would that be, Sir?” Waverley asked him.
Abraham smiled. “With my granddaughter.”
The Colonel sighed and raised his eyes upwards, as if he was dealing with a simple peasant.
“He wants her back, Colonel,” Nolan said before Waverley could sweep him aside. “What he wants from us in return for giving the location of Rahimi is a deal to get his granddaughter back.”
Waverley looked back at Dur. “Are you sure you can take us to his base?”
He nodded. “I am sure, but only in return for your promise to bring back Najela.”
Waverley nodded. “Well, yes, we can do that.”
“Colonel, I have not met you before, but know this. A blood promise is a blood promise.”
“Yeah, okay.”
But Dur wasn’t finished. “In Afghanistan, we take a blood promise seriously. A blood promise concerns the life of a family member. Failure to keep your word, unless it is impossible to prevent it, means that your own blood will be spilt.”
“Now look, Sir,” Waverley began to bluster. “I assure you that the US military always keeps its word.”
“I am not concerned with the US military, only with you.”
He stared at the Colonel, who turned away, muttering about impudent natives. Nolan took Dur to one side.
“I guess you’re sore about us not getting Najela out of that town.”
“I know it was not possible. The enemy was too strong, and they took her away before you had a chance to reach her. It is not always possible to keep a blood promise, American, but in this country, it is best to remember that we take these things seriously.”
“If she’s with Rahimi, we’ll get her back, Abraham. If it’s humanly possible, we’ll do it.”
“I know that you will. It is that new man I do not trust. But because I believe you, I will help you once more.”
“So where is he, my friend?”
“Bring me the map. I will point it out to you.”
They hovered over the map that was pinned on the ground with small rocks to keep it still. He couldn’t read maps in the conventional way, but they pointed out local towns, peaks and landmarks. Abraham pointed towards a small village up in the heights of the Hindu Kush.
“Here, this place is called Naveh. It is close to the frontier so that they can slip across to either side at will. His camp is just outside Naveh, about three miles away, so close that it is almost on the border.”
“How do you know this?” Talley asked him.
“I went up there once with a donkey train, carrying supplies to his camp. At the time I needed money to buy food, and they were looking for men to load and unload the donkeys. The place is very well hidden and well fortified. It will not be easy to get in there. Even Bin Laden and Mullah Omar stayed there for some time without being discovered. When we get near, I will show you the exact location.”
“We should assemble an Airborne Battle Group to go in there,” Waverley said thoughtfully. “If it’s as tricky a target as you say, we’ll need overwhelming strength to take it. I’d estimate a couple of thousand men should do it.”
“As soon as a force of that size starts to assemble, they will guess the target and disappear,” Dur said. “It will not work.”
“Is their intelligence that good?”
Dur grinned. “You use Afghans to do the menial work around your bases and airfields. Do you think that some of them do not report back to the Taliban?”
Waverley reddened. “I suppose so. Perhaps a drone strike,” he mused.
“If my granddaughter dies, you die. Besides, they are hidden in caves. A missile attack will not kill them.”
“Colonel,” Talley interrupted. “We’ll have to go in and do it the hard way. It’s just us. Otherwise, I suspect we will not even get the location out of this man. We have an assault team here. We can call in transport to an LZ close to the location and hit them before they even realize we’re there. It’s what we do.”
He stared at the map, seeing the markings that indicated the treacherous mountain they would need to assault.
“It won’t be easy getting there. I doubt a helicopter can land anywhere nearby.”
“Can you borrow that Osprey again, the V-22?”
Waverley nodded. “Yes, of course. I’ll ask them to take the woman back to Kabul too. I’m sure they’ll have some questions for her. But as for the mission, you know they can’t land the Osprey on a steep mountainside. It’s a clever concept, but not that clever.”
“We’ll use airborne rappelling, Sir. If the aircraft stays in the hover, we’ll descend to the ground on ropes. We’ve had a lot of experience and training in that technique. We’ll need a pilot who knows what he’s doing, of course. But it shouldn’t be a problem.”
“They’ll see the drop,” he objected.
“Not at night. And if there’s a wind, the sound will cover any aircraft noise from the enemy.”
Waverley looked paler than ever. “So let’s get this straight. You plan on a night rappel from a hovering Osprey, over a mountainside at night, and in high winds.”
“Exactly, Sir. We’ll manage.”
“And this man?”
He was looking at Dur, and he had a point. How the hell could they get an elderly man down a rope in such nightmarish conditions? It was Nolan who came up with an answer.
“We can winch him down, like the way we let down our supplies. It’s slow, but if it’s only one man, we can do it.”
Waverley coughed. “Ahem, well, I’ll be with you, of course.”
They gaped at him. “Sir,” Talley spoke firmly. “You haven’t trained for this. Just getting down onto the mountain will be tough, if not next to impossible, and the assault on Rahimi’s camp will be no picnic. I’d sit this one out if I were you.”
Waverley was ignoring him. “I’ve done rappelling before, naturally. I was younger then, but it shouldn’t be too difficult.”
“At night, onto a mountainside, in the middle of a gale?”
He shrugged. “It won’t be easy, no, but I have to do this.” He could see their eyes boring into him. “You think I’m just some chair-bound desk warrior, don’t you? All my life I’ve been good at the deskwork, it’s true, the behind the scenes stuff, and now it’s time to get my star. I’ve missed out on most of the combat experience that other officers had. Don’t you understand? I have to do this. It’s not just the promotion, I know the way you Special Forces see people like me. You should realize that you rely on the kind of information that we get to you men in the field. I need to get this mission under my belt, so there’s no argument. I’m going.”
“You could get yourself killed, Colonel.”
He smiled. “Then I’d be out of your way.”
“Or you could get the rest of us killed.”
He shook his head. “That won’t happen. And there’s one more thing, gentlemen. The reason why they asked me to come out here and talk to you, the reason that I have to go.”
“What’s that, Sir,” Talley asked.
“When you called in with that report of nuclear materials, it was quite by chance that I was the duty intelligence officer, and I answered the call. But my area of responsibility in Afghanistan is to assess any potential proliferation of nuclear threats. I have expertise in planning operations for tactical nuclear weapons, and I also possess detailed knowledge of their triggering systems. I have to go in with you and see what they have.”
They were silent as they digested the Colonel’s words.
“You’re serious?” Talley asked. “It really is your field?”
“It is. You know that the Brass have one big concern that overrides all others. Broken Arrow.”
Nolan looked up. “I thought Broken Arrow was when of our own nukes accidentally detonates.”
Waverley shook his head. “Not quite, not these days, Chief Petty Officer. It is a significant risk to the US if any nuclear weapon should accidentally detonate or go missing, for whatever reason. A weapon could be lost when the vessel carrying it crashes, for example. As you know, we call it a Broken Arrow scenario, and it’s the most serious military incident, short of all-out nuclear war. But things change, and the definition now broader. For example, if these insurgents got hold of fissionable materials, or indeed a complete ready-made weapon, the risk to us is similar. We don’t give a rat’s ass where the stuff came from. It’s preventing them from using it, and getting it back, that counts. They’ve tasked me to prevent it happening. So when this job came up, you could say that for me, it was the right thing at the right time, even though I was very skeptical at first. Our intel had not reported any kind of a nuclear program inside the country, and that’s why I wasn’t inclined to believe you at first with this Plan Salah ad-Din nonsense. Or rather, I thought it was nonsense at first. Listen, I’ll contact Bagram and ask them to make arrangements for the Osprey to be assigned to us. They’ll give us what we want, believe me. I’m classifying this as Broken Arrow, and a lot of people will be watching us very carefully when I report in.”
“There’s one more thing, Colonel,” Nolan stopped him. “You know they have a canary?”
“A what?”
Talley smiled. “It’s what we call a hostage, Sir.”
“Oh, I see. And?”
“The hostage is this lady’s father. Professor Benjamin Bergmann.”
“Bergmann? THE Benjamin Bergmann?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, my, God. Bergmann could give them everything.”
Agnetha had joined them. “My father will not give in easily to torture, I promise you.”
“But if he does? What then?” He stared at Talley. “Lieutenant, we have to get this man out of there. And if it can’t be done, you know what to do? The safety of the Western World could depend on it.”
Talley nodded reluctantly. “I know what to do, Sir.”
“You had your orders for the bombmaker, Lieutenant, and you failed to carry them out, as I recall.”
The young officer took out his Sig Sauer P226 and cocked the action. He handed it over to Waverley, who took it and held it loosely.
“If you’re that determined to carry out the order, she’s here right now.” He turned and pointed to Agnetha. “Kill her, Colonel. That’s what you wanted me to do, isn’t it?”
Waverley handed the pistol back. “Maybe you were right,” he muttered. “Perhaps because she was a hostage, I made the wrong call there, Lieutenant.”
“And because she’s a citizen of an Allied country?”
“No. Because she’s more use to us alive. In my world, the world of nuclear weapons, there are no enemies or allies. Only threats, to be neutralized if they become a clear and present danger.”
They had four hours to wait for the Osprey to return. Apparently, there was a problem with the interconnected prop shafts. The Bell Boeing V-22 was living up to its reputation as an unreliable aircraft, despite Pentagon attempts to prove otherwise. The V-22 squadron's former commander at Marine Corps Air Station, New River, had been relieved of duty after allegations that he instructed his unit that they needed to falsify maintenance records to make the plane appear more reliable. But it was an indication of the problems the Marine Corps had in getting the aircraft approved. Three officers were later implicated in the falsification scandal, but it was not the end of the troubled aircraft’s problems. It had also been discovered that the Osprey was incapable of autorotation to make a safe landing in helicopter mode if both engines failed. A Pentagon's testing source said that if the Osprey lost power while flying like a helicopter below 1,600 feet, emergency landings were not likely to be survivable. A nice way of saying that engine trouble at lower levels resulted in the aircraft becoming a death trap. The Marine Corps worked hard to keep the Osprey well maintained and flying, and they checked the working parts minutely after every mission.
While they were waiting, Agnetha Bergmann came and sat next to the men, who were busy checking and rechecking their weapons and equipment. She spoke to Nolan.
“I thought I saw you do all this earlier, checking your weapons.”
“Yeah, we did. This environment is pretty hard on weapons and gear. The only way to stay alive is to keep up the checks.”
She was silent for a moment. “I sense a sadness in you, Kyle. Have you lost someone recently?”
He was about to say no, but for some reason he decided he wanted to talk about it. The others had drifted away, attending to their own affairs, and he was alone with her.
“Yeah, my wife, a few weeks ago. She was killed while I was away on a mission, just like this one.”
“I’m so sorry, that’s awful. What about children?”
“Two kids, they’re with the grandparents.”
“They must miss her a lot. You must miss her a lot.”
“That’s right, I do. Every waking moment.”
They were silent for a few moments. Then she moved nearer to him, and when she spoke, it was a murmur.
“Would you do something for me? You know they’re taking me back to Kabul, presumably for debriefing.”
“That’s right, they’ll have a lot of questions for someone who was at the heart of the Taliban nuclear program.”
“I’ll be happy to tell them anything I know. But when you get to this camp, Rahimi’s camp, there’s a chance my husband may be there. After all, he works for Rahimi. That is why they tied me to him.”
“Anything’s possible, Agnetha. You want us to get him out?”
“No, I want you to kill him.”
Nolan was stuck for a response. “You’re asking me to assassinate your husband? Can’t you just get a divorce?”
She laughed bitterly. “Most Muslim women dare not ask for a divorce. Thousands of Muslim women and girls are stabbed, burned, or maimed every year by husbands who believe they have brought them shame by being unfaithful, or seeking a divorce which they see as the same thing. If such a wife is killed, the crime becomes an honor killing.”
“An honor killing?”
“Yes, it’s an irony. Islamic society purports to shelter women, yet often condones all kinds of savage violence against them in the name of male and family honor. If my husband, Seyid Hotaki, is still alive after your attack, I would spend the rest of my life worrying and wondering if he was coming after me for revenge. The only way I can be safe is to know that he is dead.”
