The Devil's Footprint (33 page)

Lonsdale got up to throw a log on the fire.
 
He turned around and spoke.
 
"You fly low and fast and, most likely,
you'll get through the outer screen.
 
That's a big perimeter they have to watch.
 
If you are contour flying they'll lose you in
the ground clutter.
 
As to the targets
themselves, if you stay low, they probably won't pick you up either."

"Helicopters might work," Fitzduane admitted.
 
"But what we are talking about is what
is likely to work best.
 
And there are a
few more objections to choppers.

"First, even when the noise is suppressed, they remain noisy bloody
things.
 
Second, they are vulnerable to
ground fire.
 
A rifle can take out a
helicopter.
 
Third, they are complex
mechanically and require one hell of a logistics tail.
 
Fourth, whether or not we get in undetected,
no one is going to miss the actual arrival of two or more helicopters, so when
we would try and leave, we would be sitting ducks.
 
Remember, Quintana is expecting helicopters,
so that is what he has geared up for.
 
The place is stiff with SAMs."

Lonsdale grinned ruefully.
 
"And finally, this is not an officially sanctioned
U.S.
government
operation whereby we can have whatever supporting firepower we need.
 
There will be no close-air support on call up
there.
 
Okay.
 
I get the picture."

"The essence of what I am proposing is stealth," said
Fitzduane.
 
"We fly in real low in
two C130s equipped with contour-following radar and ECM equipment.
 
As you've said, there is a good chance we
won't get picked up, but even if we are, the electronic countermeasures will
scramble the radar screens for the necessary few seconds.
 
Then the Guntracks get pulled out by LAPES at
twenty feet or less.
 
Next, the aircraft
pop up to two-fifty feet and we jump.
 
Then down they go again and head for home."

"Two hundred and fifty feet is goddamn low, Hugo," said
Lonsdale.
 
"Where I come from, five
hundred feet scarcely gives you enough time to scratch your crotch.
 
Any lower and you start digging holes in the
ground."

Fitzduane laughed.
 
"You're
not keeping up to date, Al," he said.
 
"Irwin has a new fast-opening combat ‘chute.
 
It will open in time and you will land as
lightly as a ballerina."

Lonsdale looked dubious.
 
"I'd
hate to try this thing only to find out that the minimum jump height spec was
just a copywriter getting carried away.
 
Parachuting is like sleeping with a few snakes.
 
Most people don't fancy it, but dangerous as
it looks, it's actually quite safe until something goes wrong.
 
Then you rarely get a second chance."

Fitzduane spoke quietly.
 
"I
jumped with the Irwin a week ago.
 
Seven
jumps in all with seven different ‘chutes, each time at two-fifty.
 
I was curious too."

"I guess the first time was the hardest, Colonel," said
Lonsdale slowly.
 
"Well, you don't
look as if you bounced, so let's move on."

"We've got satellite and other
intel
on
what happens where on the plateau," said Fitzduane.
 
"You have got to remember it consists of
hundreds of thousands of square miles of decidedly inhospitable terrain.
 
Theoretically it is patrolled, but in
practice that means that the main oil facilities and pipelines get regular
attention and the balance is just ignored except for random helicopter
overflights.
 
Frankly, what else can they
do?
 
What else do they need to do?"

Lonsdale was lying back with his eyes closed.

He was trying to build up a mental model of Fitzduane's plan.
 
The fact that helicopters were not being used
had thrown him a little initially, but now he was getting into the swing of
things.
 
It helped that he had trained
with Guntracks and the Rangers in
Ireland
.
 
He had participated in low-altitude parachute
extraction exercises before.

LAPES was an extraordinary technique if you were not used to it, but it
worked.
 
A cargo aircraft like the C130
throttled back to 120 miles an hour and flew as little as six feet above the
ground, almost as if landing.
 
Then, at
the designated spot, a parachute was opened and as it filled it pulled a
palletized Guntrack — or other equipment — out of the rear door of the aircraft.

The parachute acted as a brake to kill the forward momentum.
 
The effects of the short vertical drop were
countered by special compressible pallets and careful packing.

It was not a barrel of laughs for humans, but for supplies and equipment
it was remarkably successful.

"So," said Lonsdale, "we land inside the plateau rim far
away from the outer defenses but also some distance from the terrorist
bases.
 
Better yet, we pick some
godforsaken spot which is off any regularly patrolled route and has cover.
 
We are all alone with the scorpions.
 
We have gotten in undetected during the
night.
 
Now we lie up well camouflaged
and hope some wandering peasant does not stumble on us."

"The plateau is clear of wandering peasants," said
Fitzduane.
 
"For a start, since
there is neither arable land nor grazing there is no reason to be there.
 
Second, Quintana obligingly rounded up the
few remaining Indians and either killed them or trucked them down to a
settlement on the coast.
 
Whatever he is
up to, he is serious about not being seen.
 
But it will help us."

"How many people and vehicles are we using?" said Lonsdale.

"The strike team, including myself," said Fitzduane, "will
consist of fifteen personnel — five three-person teams in five Guntracks."

"Why those numbers?" said Lonsdale.

"As you will remember," said Fitzduane, "a Guntrack needs
a crew of three for optimum effectiveness.
 
Driver, front gunner/navigator, and rear gunner.
 
Regarding the number of vehicles, five is the
minimum number required to allow successful completion of the mission plus some
redundancy.
 
The capacity of the C130s
comes into play.
 
It's a judgment
call."

*
         
*
         
*
         
*
         
*

Fitzduane woke up at dawn the following day as the morning light streamed
into his bedroom.
 
Without thinking, he
reached out for Kathleen and then sat up with a start as he remembered.
 
He lay back and closed his eyes and focused
on the mission.
 
He blotted Kathleen from
his mind.

"The team," said Lonsdale over breakfast.
 
The sun was well up, and they were eating
outside.
 
"The
fighting fifteen.
 
As of now,
there
is
you and there is me, which is nice but it
makes only two."

Fitzduane was looking over the deck at the yard below.
 
He turned back to Lonsdale.
 
"Al," he said.
 
"I can count eight snakes down
there.
 
And they are not babies."

"They beat hell out of a guard dog," said Lonsdale equably.

He refilled their coffee.
 
"The team?" he repeated.

"There is substantial backing for the operation within the
system," said Fitzduane, "but the number-one rule is that I can't use
any serving member of the
U.S.
armed forces for the ground team."

"Deniability," said Lonsdale scathingly.
 
"Shit, you would think we would have
learned by now.
 
This smacks of politics
and
President
Georgie
Falls
and his abiding love of playing both ends against the middle.
 
It's this kind of indecisiveness that makes
outfits like Delta all training and no action.
 
It's why terrorists supported by countries like
Iran
piss on us and get away with
it."

Fitzduane was beginning to see why Master Sergeant Al Lonsdale had quit
Delta.

"Think positive, Al," he said.
 
"The positive aspect of all this is that we have near-total
flexibility.
 
We don't have a chain of
command stretching through endless second-guessers to a situation room in the
White House.
 
We aren't being micromanaged.
 
We can do what has to be done, how we want
it, and when we want it."

Lonsdale shrugged.
 
He could blow
hot, but he cooled off as quickly.
 
He
smiled.
 
"Put that way, you've got a
point, but there are still a few Delta people I would give a lot for.
 
You've got to
understand,
Colonel, the U.S. Army of today is the most powerful, best equipped, and best
trained in the world.
 
Sure we fuck up
sometimes and use too much force or too much firepower, but most of those
problems are political.

"The best of our people are not just good.
 
They're
real
good.
 
Too good to pass
up.
 
There's gotta be a way!
 
And you can't mount an operation like this
with amateurs."

Fitzduane drank some coffee.
 
"I like to run in
Arlington
Cemetery
," he
said.
 
"A man whose premises we are
using at present to operate from, Grant Lamar, suggested I might like to run a
bit further — to
Fort
Myer
.
 
There, I met a man called General
Frampton."

"The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs?" said Lonsdale
incredulously.

"Something like that," said Fitzduane mildly.
 
"He said his discussion with me was
entirely unofficial but he would like to introduce some men who had suddenly
resigned from the U.S. Army and were in need of employment in civilian
life.
 
He said they would consider
anything, even a short assignment.
 
He
added that he hoped that he could entice them to reenlist in the future."

"Who are they?" said Lonsdale.
 
"I may know a couple of them."

Fitzduane told him.

"Fucking A!" said Lonsdale.
 
"These are my people."
 
He stood up and shouted "Ya-hoo!"
 
The sound echoed back from the walls of the
valley.

"I don't think that is entirely a coincidence," said Fitzduane
gently.
 
"And please do not disturb
the snakes."

Lonsdale grinned.
 
"They don't
mind the odd yell," he said.
 
"These snakes are Arizonans.
 
They have been listening to Indians and cowboys sounding off for the
last hundred years."

Fitzduane looked along the deserted valley.
 
Someday, snakes or not, it was going to be
built upon from end to end.
 
He had
already noticed some Realtor's signs hammered into the brush as they drove to
Al's house.
 
It was quite a paradox.
 
It was just too beautiful to escape
unspoiled.

Lonsdale saw where he was looking and read his expression.
 
"Yeah," he said with feeling.

He turned back to the subject.
 
"You and I and six
Delta
.
 
We're up to eight."

"Chifune Tanabu and Oga," said Fitzduane.
 
"They've been tracking Reiko Oshima and
Yaibo for quite some time, and they'd like to finish it.
 
You remember Chifune from
Japan
, Al, and
you also met Oga.
 
He's ex-Japanese
airborne.
 
Both are good shooters."

Lonsdale remembered how taken aback he had been when he discovered that
the security agent he was to work with was not just a woman but someone
so
slight and feminine and beautiful as Chifune.
 
She looked too gentle to hurt a fly.
 
Appearances in her case were totally
misleading.
 
She was a crack shot and
cool as ice under fire.
 
Quite a woman, quite a person.

"Chifune is good," he said.
 
"Better than good.
 
As to Oga—"

"I
know
Oga," said
Fitzduane.

"Five to go," said Lonsdale.

"The British are contributing three," said Fitzduane.
 
"SAS have a score to settle with
Yaibo.
 
Then there is a man called
Shanley I ran into who I think you'd approve of.
 
Which leaves one to go.
 
A civilian but ex-Airborne captain, Dana
Felton, wants that slot and I think maybe she's entitled.
 
She lost a friend to these people.
 
She's good.
 
Then there are a couple of Irish Rangers, Grady and Harty, who know the
Guntrack particularly well.
 
We have, as
they say in
Ireland
,
an elegant sufficiency.
 
It'll be tough
to make the final selection."