[Rogue Warrior 18] Curse of the Infidel (50 page)
ROGUE WARRIOR
®
: CURSE OF THE INFIDEL
Copyright © 2013 by Richard Marcinko and Jim DeFelice
All rights reserved.
Cover photographs by Getty Images
A Forge Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010
Forge
®
is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Marcinko, Richard.
Rogue warrior: curse of the infidel / Richard Marcinko and Jim DeFelice.—First Edition.
p. cm.
“A Tom Doherty Associates Book.”
ISBN 978-0-7653-3294-3 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4299-6547-7 (e-book)
1. Rogue Warrior (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Special forces (Military science)—Fiction. 3. Terrorism—Prevention—Fiction. I. DeFelice, Jim, 1956– II. Title. III. Title: Curse of the infidel.
PS3563.A6362R63 2014
813'.54—dc23
2013025794
e-ISBN 9781429965477
First Edition: January 2014
1
The glass is specially treated and cut to block light waves that are larger than a certain wavelength. By placing it over the entire detector, it ensures that there are no hot spots on the sides that can be seen. The latter is why using a huge pane of glass to walk across a room won’t work, as a quality sensor will note the temperature emanating from your body at the edges.
2
“Zeus” is a famous, or infamous, piece of malicious programming that steals information from online transactions. Trojan horses are programs that may look benign or be presented within another program, but are actually designed to do something bad. They don’t generally spread to other machines like viruses do.
3
Perl and HLASM are programming languages. Or soft drinks; I’m not sure which.
4
Taking drugs is forbidden under Islam. Because of that, there are varying opinions on whether devout Muslims are allowed to traffic in them, even to fund jihad. Osama bin Laden wrote a very long letter to one of his minions saying they were not. Obviously, not everyone agreed with the old goat.
5
In case you’re interested, no direct link to al Qaeda has ever been proven. Most experts believe that bin Laden’s network inspired the Madrid bombers, but didn’t guide them.
6
Yet another member of the Saudi family who owed me a favor.
7
My editor suggests some of you may never have heard of Mr. Magoo, the nearsighted cartoon character who first appeared in 1949, and has been a perennial kids’ favorite ever since. I think he overestimates my audience.
8
This was changing during my time there, with the government slowly taking over territory.
9
Also known as the State Department.
10
The copy editor is asking for a definition of a “snake dive.” It’s what you do when bullets are flying and you try to make your body as narrow and lithe as possible so you somehow slink between them. You’ll find the full definition in
Webster’s
between “Get the Hell out of There!” and “Kiss Your Ass Good-bye.”
11
“No-load people”—The heavily redacted version of the
RW Dictionary
defines them as people loaded with “no’s.” The unredacted and not-safe-for-work version uses more colorful language.
12
Technically, wailing aloud is not considered proper at an Islamic funeral, but either the local custom permitted it or no one was worrying too much about proper form. As Taban’s was the only funeral in Mogadishu I’ve ever attended, I’m not sure which of those is correct.
13
Trace read the manuscript and asked, “Why is it always ‘son’? Women deserve equal billing.” I told her “bitch of a bitch” would just be piling on.
14
It has to do with goats.
15
See
Domino Theory,
available at fine bookstores, online, and from the neighborhood pawnbroker at a substantial discount.
16
Damned if I can pronounce her actual name, let alone spell it. A Rose is a Rose by any other name, anyway.
17
DIA
=
Defense Intelligence Agency, also known as Daft, Insolent, and Angry
18
A corollary of the little-known Newton Law, the Desperately in Motion.
19
Check out
Domino Theory.
20
Can’t Cunt. You’ve been reading Rogue Warrior books for how long and you didn’t know what that meant?
21
The situation is somewhat more complicated than I’m detailing here, but that only means it’s worse, not better. If you want to delve into it a bit, Google “Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr” and “Abu Omarcheck” and read about the CIA agents and the operation in Italy that resulted in murder charges. Admittedly, this involved the Italian justice system, an oxymoron to be sure, but still …
22
We should also credit the afore-not-mentioned intelligence service, whose “borrowed” dossier included the information that helped Shunt make the proper connections.
23
The boys’ lovingly applied nickname for Hoshang.
24
I have no idea. I’m not an expert on art.
25
French colonial officer and hero of World War I. By the way, the name was spelled wrong on Google Earth the last time I checked.
26
I always thought bin Laden deserved to be decapitated, castrated, and covered in pig blood, then wrapped in pigskin in keeping with the tenets of his preaching.
27
Commander Seigel’s résumé is too long to reprint here, but one of the big bullet points is SEAL Team Six, where he distinguished himself as a man among men. Check out
The Real Team
for a list of achievements—and know that even those thirty pages barely scratch the surface.
28
Since this all happened in real time, there was a bit of a lag with the first transmission and the interception, and we always lost a bit of the conversation the first time a different frequency was used. And because it used commercial sat frequencies, our system was relatively easy to detect, unlike the much more expensive bugs the Christians in Action and folks at No Such Agency routinely employ. Our method was cheaper, though.
29
A U.S. court ruled that the attack could not have been carried out without the help of Sudan, and awarded a judgment against the government there. Personally, I would have added the Yemen government to the docket, and the award I would have awarded would have been paid in blood.
Yemen eventually arrested some possible plotters, but all were soon released. Rumor has it that a few have since met other fates.
30
In case you’re wondering, the battle we refer to as
Black Hawk Down
takes place the following year, and was part of a different operation, or “mission shift” in militarese.
31
No, of course that’s not his name. He came to us via an associate who works in Virginia, who also can’t be named. He knows who he is.
32
Given that he has somehow swindled the navy into thinking that he is ultra important and remains on active duty, I’m not going to use his real name. You can call him Chief Asshole if you want. Just duck when you say it. Better yet, run.
33
I’m not supposed to mention the name of the submarine, or even the fact that it was a member of the Ohio class—oops—which was modified partly to facilitate SEAL missions. The submarine now carries Tomahawk missiles rather than Tridents, so it retains one hell of a punch.
34
A late addendum: apparently the two have made up. I’m not sure what sort of ritual was involved, but Trace assures me they are now “friends.” Look for young Mr. Garrett to make an appearance in future episodes.
35
Sean Mako, one of our best team leaders. The mission in Iran proceeded; maybe I’ll write about it someday. Then again, maybe not.
36
More on Cuba can be seen in
Seize the Day
;
Domino Theory
details (some of) the India action he’s referring to. He had a point, but only to a degree.
37
Legal counsel advises that the CIA absolutely does NOT do this, nor does any branch of the U.S. government engage in illegal fraud. (Legal fraud, of course, is a different matter.) You should treat these scurrilous allegations as COMPLETE and TOTAL fiction.
38
DEA
=
Dickheads, Eunuchs, and Assholes. Otherwise known as the Drug Enforcement Administration.
39
No offense intended, of course. At least not more than necessary.
40
The British had already destroyed the most advanced French warships, but the remaining force was still potent.
41
There were actually thirty-five apartments in the building. Add in the lobby, which had its own system, and you see that Junior screwed up two thermostats
not
in that building. We apologize for the inconvenience.
42
I’m calling it a ladder only because it was on a ship. Even in the crew areas, the
Bon Voyage
’s interior looked more like a hotel than a garbage scow, and the ladder would have served well as the main staircase in a four-star establishment.
43
If you don’t know who they are, I’m not going to be the one to corrupt you. But if you’re thinking
Playboy
for the Goth set, you’re not too far off.
44
Abstract Geometry, judging from the assignment.
45
You can read about Larry and some of his real-life exploits in
The Real Team.
Besides “Bullet Head,” he’s known as one of the “gold dust twins,” the other being Frank Phillips, another associate to whom I’m deeply indebted.
46
The device is also useful for getting in and out of hotel rooms without leaving a record—maybe a few Secret Service agents are in the market for one.
47
Youngsters: Kirk Douglas was an American movie star and former navy man, injured during combat in WWII. His real name was Issur Danielovitch. He played a badass and he was a badass.
48
You can get his full background and details on his stint with Six in
The Real Team.
Denny spends a lot of time in Eastern Europe on business these days, and luckily for me happened to be on his way home from a sojourn there when I called him for help.
49
Officially known as the Transportation Safety Administration, some know it best as the Tortured Sanity Administration. That’s the clean version.
50
Six hijackers were among the injured; the rest were dead, or so well hidden on the ship that we never found them.
51
Chechen exiles in need of cash. Rumor has it they’re turning state’s evidence in exchange for leniency.