Tom clancys ghost recon.., p.1
Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Choke Point, page 1
part #3 of Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Series
PRAISE FOR THE BESTSELLING NOVELS OF
TOM CLANCY
“Heart-stopping action . . . entertaining and eminently topical . . . Clancy still reigns.”
—The Washington Post
“Brilliant.”
—Newsweek
“Nobody can touch his gift for describing combat.”
—People
“Highly entertaining.”
—The Wall Street Journal
“[Clancy] excites, illuminates . . . a real page-turner.”
—Los Angeles Daily News
“Exhilarating . . . No other novelist is giving so full a picture of modern conflict.”
—The Sunday Times (London)
“Clancy is a master of detail—especially those having to do with military action and weapons. . . . And he builds strongly moral, attractive characters, ones we would like to emulate.”
—Houston Chronicle
“Clancy delivers. . . . The guts, the fun of these books, are the high-tech devices, the ingenious schemes, and the inside look at military tactics.”
—The Denver Post
“Megasuspense . . . thrilling.”
—The Indianapolis Star
“Not to be missed.”
—The Dallas Morning News
Novels by Tom Clancy
THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER
RED STORM RISING
PATRIOT GAMES
THE CARDINAL OF THE KREMLIN
CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER
THE SUM OF ALL FEARS
WITHOUT REMORSE
DEBT OF HONOR
EXECUTIVE ORDERS
RAINBOW SIX
THE BEAR AND THE DRAGON
RED RABBIT
THE TEETH OF THE TIGER
DEAD OR ALIVE
(written with Grant Blackwood)
AGAINST ALL ENEMIES
(written with Peter Telep)
LOCKED ON
(written with Mark Greaney)
THREAT VECTOR
(written with Mark Greaney)
SSN: STRATEGIES OF SUBMARINE WARFARE
Nonfiction
SUBMARINE: A GUIDED TOUR INSIDE A NUCLEAR WARSHIP
ARMORED CAV: A GUIDED TOUR OF AN ARMORED CAVALRY REGIMENT
FIGHTER WING: A GUIDED TOUR OF AN AIR FORCE COMBAT WING
MARINE: A GUIDED TOUR OF A MARINE EXPEDITIONARY UNIT
AIRBORNE: A GUIDED TOUR OF AN AIRBORNE TASK FORCE
CARRIER: A GUIDED TOUR OF AN AIRCRAFT CARRIER
SPECIAL FORCES: A GUIDED TOUR OF U.S. ARMY SPECIAL FORCES
INTO THE STORM: A STUDY IN COMMAND
(written with General Fred Franks, Jr., Ret., and Tony Koltz)
EVERY MAN A TIGER
(written with General Chuck Horner, Ret., and Tony Koltz)
SHADOW WARRIORS: INSIDE THE SPECIAL FORCES
(written with General Carl Stiner, Ret., and Tony Koltz)
BATTLE READY
(written with General Tony Zinni, Ret., and Tony Koltz)
TOM CLANCY’S HAWX
TOM CLANCY’S GHOST RECON
GHOST RECON
COMBAT OPS
CHOKE POINT
TOM CLANCY’S ENDWAR
ENDWAR
THE HUNTED
TOM CLANCY’S SPLINTER CELL
SPLINTER CELL
FALLOUT
OPERATION BARRACUDA
CONVICTION
CHECKMATE
ENDGAME
Created by Tom Clancy and Steve Pieczenik
TOM CLANCY’S OP-CENTER
OP-CENTER
MIRROR IMAGE
GAMES OF STATE
ACTS OF WAR
BALANCE OF POWER
STATE OF SIEGE
DIVIDE AND CONQUER
LINE OF CONTROL
MISSION OF HONOR
SEA OF FIRE
CALL TO TREASON
WAR OF EAGLES
TOM CLANCY’S NET FORCE
NET FORCE
HIDDEN AGENDAS
NIGHT MOVES
BREAKING POINT
POINT OF IMPACT
CYBERNATION
STATE OF WAR
CHANGING OF THE GUARD
SPRINGBOARD
THE ARCHIMEDES EFFECT
Created by Tom Clancy and Martin Greenberg
TOM CLANCY’S POWER PLAYS
POLITIKA
RUTHLESS.COM
SHADOW WATCH
BIO-STRIKE
COLD WAR
CUTTING EDGE
ZERO HOUR
WILD CARD
CHOKE POINT
WRITTEN BY
Peter Telep
THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
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Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) • Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England • Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.) • Penguin Group (Australia), 707 Collins Street, Melbourne, Victoria 3008, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.) • Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India • Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.) • Penguin Books (South Africa), Rosebank Office Park, 181 Jan Smuts Avenue, Parktown North 2193, South Africa • Penguin China, B7 Jiaming Center, 27 East Third Ring Road North, Chaoyang District, Beijing 100020, China
Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
TOM CLANCY’S GHOST RECON®: CHOKE POINT
A Berkley Book / published by arrangement with Ubisoft Entertainment SARL
PUBLISHING HISTORY
Berkley premium edition / January 2013
Copyright © 2012 by Ubisoft Entertainment S.A.
GHOST RECON, Ubisoft, and the Ubisoft logo are trademarks of Ubisoft in the U.S. and other countries. Tom Clancy’s GHOST RECON® © 2012 by Ubisoft Entertainment S.A. It is understood that “Tom Clancy’s GHOST RECON” is a registered trademark.
Cover art and design copyright © by Ubisoft Entertainment S.A.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.
For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.
ISBN: 978-0-425-26475-1
eBook ISBN: 978-1-101-60831-9
BERKLEY®
Berkley Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.
BERKLEY® is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
The “B” design is a trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Acknowledgements
Epigraph
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
TWENTY-TWO
TWENTY-THREE
TWENTY-FOUR
TWENTY-FIVE
TWENTY-SIX
TWENTY-SEVEN
TWENTY-EIGHT
TWENTY-NINE
THIRTY
THIRTY-ONE
THIRTY-TWO
THIRTY-THREE
THIRTY-FOUR
THIRTY-FIVE
THIRTY-SIX
THIRTY-SEVEN
THIRTY-EIGHT
THIRTY-NINE
FORTY
FORTY-ONE
FORTY-TWO
FORTY-THREE
FORTY-FOUR
FORTY-FIVE
FORTY-SIX
FORTY-SEVEN
FORTY-EIGHT
FORTY-NINE
FIFTY
FIFTY-ONE
FIFTY-TWO
FIFTY-THREE
FIFTY-FOUR
FIFTY-FIVE
FIFTY-SIX
FIFTY-SEVEN
FIFTY-EIGHT
FIFTY-NINE
SIXTY
SIXTY-ONE
SIXTY-TWO
SIXTY-THREE
SIXTY-FOUR
SIXTY-FIVE
SIXTY-SIX
SIXTY-SEVEN
SIXTY-EIGHT
SIXTY-N
SEVENTY
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I’m deeply indebted to the great number of people who contributed their expertise to this manuscript:
Mr. James Ide, chief warrant officer, U.S. Navy (Ret.), has continued his work as my first reader, researcher, and collaborator—from idea to polished manuscript. He is a great friend, fantastic writer, and it’s my honor to know him.
Mr. Sam Strachman of Ubisoft Paris has worked with me on several other book projects and offered his excellent advice, insights, and great sense of humor.
Mr. Jay Posey of Red Storm Entertainment fielded my many questions and provided me with an entire unit history of the Ghosts that was invaluable to the writing of this novel. He was an amazing resource, and I hope to work with him again.
Special thanks to Richard Dansky of Red Storm Entertainment, as well as Jean-Marc Geffroy, Michiel Verheijdt, and Julien Charpentier of Ubisoft Paris for their assistance and encouragement.
My agent, Mr. John Talbot, and editor, Mr. Tom Colgan, have supported and encouraged me for many years, and I’m truly grateful for the many projects we’ve shared together.
Finally, my wife, Nancy, and two lovely daughters, Lauren and Kendall, went above and beyond the call of duty on this one. If you only knew what I put them through . . .
He who conquers others is strong; he who conquers himself is mighty.
—Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
The bravest are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them, glory and danger alike, and yet notwithstanding, go out to meet it.
—Thucydides (460–395 B.C.)
ONE
You cannot apply to become a Ghost.
They find you …
And find him they had, recruited him right out of the Navy SEALs so he could wind up here, in South America, on a search and rescue mission for a CIA operations officer abducted only hours ago by Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, more concisely known as FARC.
During the past year, this revolutionary group had violated their cease-fire agreement with the government. They were back to drug smuggling, acts of terrorism, and kidnapping, which was why former Command Master Chief, now Captain, Andrew Ross was crouched beneath a thick canopy of palm fronds, about to order his Ghost team to attack –
When a gunshot cracked to the east. Remington MSR. Sniper rifle. Fired by one of the AFEUR guys.
The Agrupación de Fuerzas Especiales Antiterroristas Urbanas was the Colombian Army’s special forces group that had first responded to the abduction. They had twelve operators working with Ross’s four-man squad, and one of those boys had just blown their ambush.
‘Pepper, SITREP!’ Ross cried into the boom mike at his lips.
‘Hey, it wasn’t me,’ answered Master Sergeant Robert ‘Pepper’ Bonifacio.
‘He’s in your zone. You got eyes on him?’
‘Negative!’
The sniper rifle boomed once more, echoing across the valley and sending chills ripping up Ross’s spine.
‘Ghost Lead, this is Kozak. I got the drone on our sniper. He fired in reflex ’cause he’s dead. They cut his throat.’
Ross lifted his voice: ‘All right, Pepper? 30K? We’re moving in. Kozak, you hold back with the drone. Let’s go!’
As he sprang to his feet, Ross switched to the command net and spoke in Spanish to his counterpart, an AFEUR captain named Jiménez. ‘One of your snipers is dead. We need a squad in there to take out those troops on the west side.’
‘Roger, Captain. I’ll send them now.’
The FARC outpost where the CIA officer was being held lay on Colombia’s southwest coast, between the ramshackle villages of San Antonio, Las Juntas, and Aguaclara, all captured like insects within the web of Valle del Cauca’s mountainous jungle and the coca fields hidden within.
A storm system had just passed through, and the jungle’s hot breath rose and hissed from the damp earth as Ross sprinted toward the collection of tin-roofed shacks and lean-tos, partially obscured by enormous fronds. The stench of mold, rotting wood and gasoline grew thicker as he rounded the next knot of trees then hunkered down just twenty meters away from the clearing. Ahead lay five mud-covered jeeps, along with three flatbed trucks probably manufactured in the 1960s, an automotive graveyard if you didn’t know better.
Automatic weapons fire flashed and resounded from behind those trucks, drawing a string of short-circuiting wires in the late-afternoon gloom. Ross reached into his web gear, reared back and let fly a sensor grenade.
Once the grenade hit the ground behind the vehicles, the exact positions of the hostiles appeared in his Cross-Com’s heads-up display, targets marked by flashing red outlines of the figures, with data automatically sent to the other Ghosts, their own combination monocle-earpiece and microphones allowing them to mark the targets, hear his reports, and respond in kind. What’s more, the Cross-Coms weren’t the only technological trick up their sleeves. The team’s initial recon of the outpost had been conducted by Staff Sergeant John Dimitri Kozak, the youngest operator and self-professed technophile who loved commanding their Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). More sophisticated than its predecessor, the Cypher drone, this new UAV’s quad rotors rotated downward and turned into wheels so it could land and rumble along for an even quieter and stealthier approach on targets.
At the moment, though, Kozak had the drone in the air for overwatch, and his voice cut through the team net, burred with anxiety: ‘No movement from within the shacks. Something’s wrong. They’re not moving the package.’
Before Ross could comment on that, the AFEUR men, along with Pepper and 30K, returned fire on the rebels behind the vehicles, the barrage of rounds thumping and ricocheting off the jeeps, windows shattering and tires whooshing flat. The AFEUR troops were fielding TAR-21 Israeli bullpup rifles using standard 5.56mm NATO rounds. That distinctive thunder stood in sharp juxtaposition with the FARC rebels’ Chinese-made AK-47s that popped in reply.
Noting the hostiles IDed by the sensor grenade, Ross peered out from behind the trees, and the images of his teammates now shimmered in his HUD, green outlines superimposed over the surrounding jungle, along with blue outlines representing the Colombian SF squads.
Well, Major Scott Mitchell had been right. This sure as hell was an ‘interesting’ first mission for Ross, who’d just gone through the selection and qualification phases of becoming a Ghost, even after surviving the rigors of a career in the SEALs, beginning with preindoctrination and the infamous Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training (BUD/S).
Ross recalled the welcome letter from Mitchell, the explanation of how the D Company, First Battalion, Fifth Special Forces Group had been deactivated, with the Ghosts reassigned to the newly formed Group for Specialized Tactics (GST) and Mitchell promoted to serve as its commanding officer. There’d been some mention of a Joint Strike Force that would one day comprise all branches of the service, with test operations beginning at the unit level, mostly notably within the GST. In fact, Ross was one of the first non-Army operators to become a Ghost, and it was with some trepidation that he took on the role of a Ghost Lead to command three members from the US Army’s Special Forces. In the field it was all business, but during downtime, well, he feared their interservice rivalry would reach new heights. So far everyone had been cool, utterly professional, but he was waiting for the bomb to drop and for the team to give him a nickname that he would hate more than terrorists, reality TV, and Cupcake, his ex-wife’s ferocious white Chihuahua.
‘I’m moving up,’ he announced. ‘Cover me now!’ With that, he sprang from the mushy ground, weaving a serpentine path along the perimeter, elbowing past vines and ducking beneath low-hanging branches with raindrops threatening to fall from them like hot wax dripping from a candle. He was drenched in sweat now, his mouth salty, his eyes burning. He ignored his pulse ringing in his ears and was all about the course ahead, cutting, weaving again, sidestepping, and bounding over two fallen logs whose bark was flaking off like sunburn. His boots made sucking noises in the mud, and for a moment his vision blurred and returned as he blinked away more sweat and crossed beneath a stand of wax palms.
He broke from there to a small clearing and the nearest shack, where three of the FARC rebels had assumed defensive positions beside a wall that resembled a quilt of cannibalized sheet metal with fading soda company logos.
One of the rebels glanced back.
Ross lifted his HK416 assault rifle, the same one he carried as a member of the United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group, also known as DEVGRU. Like the AFEUR team’s rifles, his thirty-round magazine was loaded with 5.56mm NATO rounds, and he was about to express deliver some flaming hot lead to these rebels –
