The Fourth War (8 page)

“From where I am here, on the roof of the Ambassador Hotel in central Islamabad…” the camera broke away from the reporter and panned to the side, showing a wide darkness with only occasional pinpricks of light, “…you can see that electrical power has been cut to the entire city. The roads are dark, though masses are gathering in the streets and there is more than occasional gunfire below. We have been advised to stay in our rooms, and security forces have cordoned off our hotel. Though the Ambassador has private security, we are not at all confident that things may not turn ugly for us. As you can see”—the camera panned at an awkward angle to show the streets below—“crowds are gathering below us and on almost every street corner. The Ambassador, unfortunately, is well-known to house Western guests, and gunshots have already been fired through the lobby windows.”

The reporter fell silent and a slight pause followed because of the satellite delay. The anchor in New York, his face taking up half of the split screen, looked grim. “We've heard most of the Pakistani cabinet and many of the military leaders have been assassinated,” he said. “Are you hearing anything—has anyone claimed responsibility for the attacks against the Pakistani president and his cabinet?”

The reporter stared into the camera while she waited through the pause, then nodded. “Yes, we've heard the same rumors about the cabinet, but right now I can't confirm anything. All I can tell you is that there were almost simultaneous explosions at both the Interior and Defense ministry buildings, as well as central police headquarters.”

“What about outside of the capital?”

“Outside of Islamabad we have no idea what's going on, though there are reports of military units on the road leading down to Faisalabad and Karachi. And remember Peter, there are many parts of Pakistan that have hardly developed past the fifteenth century. The south is fairly stable, but the northern and western provinces are run almost entirely by local tribal chiefs and warlords. Remnants of the Taliban control several strongholds in the mountains, and the local tribes in the west have always been some of their greatest supporters. I would guess that, even now—”

The New York anchor cut in, “Jane, Jane, let me interrupt you. We've just been informed…” He hesitated, then continued, “Jane, we're being told that the Indian government has just placed their military forces on the highest alert. The BBC is reporting there have been military incursions across the borders in the mountains around Kashmir. Of course we know that both Pakistan and India, sworn enemies for many generations, have an unknown number of nuclear weapons, but in light of what appears to be a quickly deteriorating situation, do you know if—”

Bradley reached over and snapped the monitor off.

No, they didn't know! No one had any idea. It was a sickening mess! No one knew what was going on!

Sukkur Military Facility
Sind Province (Eastern Pakistan)

The main bunker sat near the center of the compound, behind the electrified fence and small guard tower. It was a semiburied cement structure, forty feet wide and one hundred feet long. The walls were six feet of reinforced concrete, the roof multiple layers of concrete and steel plate. There was only one entrance, a narrow circular stairway that led to a steel door, fifteen feet below ground level. A small elevator shaft had been built beside the stairs, but it could only be controlled from inside the facility. There were no visible airshafts or vents. The structure was completely sealed.

The main contingent of special forces moved to the central bunker, taking up protective positions behind the firing walls. A single team moved toward a small outbuilding, the power generation plant. An explosion was heard, then the smell of black smoke filled the air. Four soldiers entered the building, moving quietly and quickly, knowing exactly where to go. The information from the architects proved to be exact. The power relay was shorted and the electrified fence lost its power. The soldiers hunkered near the firing bunkers and listened carefully, waiting for the hum of electricity to dissipate as the power went down. Moving quickly, a soldier tested the fence with an insolated wire, then quickly cut the wires, letting them fall on the ground. The main team of twelve men moved through the downed fence toward the central bunker, crouched at the waist, providing each other with cover, then spread out in a line on both sides of the stairs.

“Four minutes, team!” the helicopter pilot counted down.

Peter ran, crouching, across the brown dust and dropped down beside the colonel. The colonel waited until his men were in position, then lifted his finger and held out his hand. A captain moved forward with a satchel charge, pulled the pin, and dropped it down the winding stairway. The explosion was enormous. Dust and acid smoke filled the air.

The combat soldiers listened, not moving. There was no sound from the stairs, no movement, no sign of resistance at all.

Peter nearly screamed with frustration, his eyes squinting in anger. All the planning and sacrifice. The stakes were enormous, and he was sure they had failed.

But they had to be certain. So, someone had to go down.

He turned his eyes to the eastern sky. “Bird, say ETA of hostiles?” he demanded.

“Three minutes,” came the reply.

Peter could see the column of dust rising above the dry plain from the riverside. The enemy convoy was so near, he could feel the ground rumble. The colonel followed his eyes, and Peter saw the look of defeat in his eye. “Colonel, if we're going to send someone down there, we better do it now,” he said.

The young colonel nodded brusquely. “You going down with them?” he asked.

“If that's alright with you.”

The colonel nodded, then turned to his executive officer, his second in command. The exec, a lieutenant colonel, wiped his hands across his face, which was camouflaged gray. “Booby traps?” the colonel asked.

The exec shook his head. “Doubt it, sir. They didn't have enough time. I'd say chances are three or less on a scale of ten.”

The colonel nodded, then eyed his XO. “Send Talbott's men in,” he commanded. “Tell them they have ninety seconds and not one second more.” The commander motioned to his exec, who began crawling toward the six-man team to his right, then nodded to Peter, who followed the exec, crawling on his elbows and knees.

The commander hit his radio mike. “Birds, be ready to get us out of here!”

“Ready there, boss,” the lead chopper pilot replied.

The XO and his soldiers moved toward the top of the stairs, pressing themselves against the side of the half-buried bunker. They waited, then moved forward and down the smoky stairwell, disappearing quickly into the gloom and smoke, Peter moving comfortably in their midst. As the men disappeared down the dark stairwell, the commander listened on the tiny earpiece in his ear. It was less than a minute before he heard Peter's voice. “Strike a couple dozen warheads. There's nothing here, sir.”

The commander sat back against the mud and brick wall.

“Hostiles, one minute!” the chopper pilot said over the net radio. “Choppers moving in.”

A long and swollen pause followed. “What do we do?” Peter demanded over the radio.

“You got pictures and readings?” the colonel replied.

“Best as we can.”

“Then let's get out of here!” The colonel heard two clicks in reply. He wiped the dust from his face as Peter and the soldiers emerged at the top of the stairs. “Let's go! Let's go!” he cried to his men.

The helicopters were already setting down in the compound, blowing dust out before them, filling the sky with brown sand. As the last chopper set down, a T-72 tank crashed through the main wall, sending more smoke and choking dust in the air. The U.S. soldiers ran for the choppers and in seconds were on board. Peter scrambled onto the lead chopper, the last man inside. He was barely on board, holding onto a seat brace, when the helicopter lurched violently into the air, just clearing the compound's outer wall. Peter pulled himself into his seat, the cabin door open, the dusty wind in his face, as the chopper dipped and rolled onto her side. He stared down at the desert while reaching for his lap belt to strap himself in, then glanced back to the compound, which he could now barely see.

The military vehicles had moved through the breach in the wall. Armored personnel carriers were disgorging their Pakistani combat teams.

But if they had come for the warheads, they were also too late. Peter watched them, then cursed and sat back in his seat.

The chopper pilot set a course, moving back over the desert.

It was a long and quiet flight all the way back to Camp Thor.

Aboard Air Force One
Over Southern New York

Word that the interdiction operation had failed came a little after ten in the evening. Within minutes, the president was on his way from New York back to D.C.

Meanwhile, the story of the assassinations in Pakistan had completely taken over the news. Cable news showed a nearly continual loop of the Pakistani 727 wreckage and the bombed-out Defense building, which was on fire still, flames reaching high in the early morning air. A short time later the power went out in Islamabad, cutting off most transmissions to the outside world. The U.S. embassy hunkered down, fortifying its outer walls. India announced it was placing its military forces on the highest state of alert, and shortly thereafter, the White House issued a terse and obviously incomplete statement.
The president is aware of the situation in Pakistan. He urges all parties to remain patient and calm. The United States government is working to stabilize the situation. The president will make a public statement once he has consulted with his staff and other world leaders.

Other than that, neither the White House nor the Pentagon would have further comment.

As his caravan pulled away from the Waldorf Towers amid a sea of press, the president commanded the White House tactical communications director to have the national security team available to brief him by the time he boarded Air Force One. There were only two members of the national security group on board the aircraft with him, the secretary of state and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, an air force four-star with a ridiculous number of ribbons on his chest. The others were scattered around the world, but would be tied in through secure telephone.

Seconds after the president boarded Air Force One it took to the air. The president moved to the main conference room near the front of the highly modified Boeing 747-400 where he sat, grim-faced, at the head of a wooden table surrounded by computers, communications gear, television screens, coffee makers, and anxious staff. Only the chairman of the joint chiefs and secretary of state sat with him at the table. The lower staff members, both military and civilian aids, occupied small swivel chairs lining the four walls. POTUS was fuming, literally seething inside. His lips pressed together and his eyes were intense. They narrowed as he spoke, but his voice remained calm. “So the mission was a failure,” he said to his staff. It was a statement, not a question, and everyone remained still. The president glanced at his chairman. “We did not recover the weapons?” he said to confirm.

“No, Mr. President.” Gen. Lowe H. Abram, the chairman of the joint chiefs, answered the president.

“Just like that.
Poof,
they're gone.” The president grasped his hands together then quickly spread them apart. It was a visceral reaction, but the sarcasm of his gesture was not lost on this team.

General Abram nodded reluctantly.

“General,” the president asked, leaning forward in his chair. “How much effort, how much time, how much money and manpower have gone into this operation to ensure that exactly this didn't happen?”

General Abram answered slowly. “Sir, apparently not enough.” The president snorted and the chairman went on. “They were very well prepared, Mr. President. It was a brilliantly executed plan.”

The president nodded brusquely. That was obvious enough. “How many weapons do they have?” he asked in a tense voice. He tightened his gut as he waited for the reply.

The general paused. “As best we know, the Pakistani government has completed development and construction of twenty-four warheads, sir. All of the warheads were kept at Sukkur, the only secure nuclear facility they had.”

The air went out of the president and he visibly deflated. His face grew pale and his hands shook in his lap. “Two dozen warheads,” he repeated, his voice trailing off. A chill ran down his spine. There was nothing in the world he feared more than this. Twenty-four nuclear warheads in the enemy's hands—an enemy who had sworn to destroy the United States, an enemy who believed there were glory and waiting virgins in death, an enemy as bloodthirsty and hate-filled as any his nation had ever faced.

They could reach any place, from the ports in L.A. to downtown D.C. Overnight, the world had been turned on its head. He thought of an image, somewhere from deep in his mind, a wild-eyed Sunday morning preacher he had seen on TV. The preacher had conjured up an image from some obscure scripture and used it to coax a few more dollars from his flock. He could hear the minister's voice as he described the coming horror, a picture of death and destruction that was hanging over the world.
“And there came forth a great dragon with seven heads and fire.”

The president shook his head. The dragon didn't have seven heads. It had twenty-four.

He felt physically sick. He rubbed at his temples, then fixed his eyes on the general. “How powerful are the warheads?” he asked.

“It varies, Mr. President,” the general replied. “From the information that has been provided to us, it appears that a majority of the weapons are in the five-to-twenty-five-kiloton range. A few are larger, perhaps by a factor of two.”

The president felt the ball tighten up in his chest. “And the delivery systems?” he asked.

The general shook his head. “That sir, is where the news gets really bad. You see, Mr. President, the Pakistanis designed all of their weapons for tactical delivery; mortars, small rockets, some of their more advanced missile systems. All they were looking for was to lob them over the border into India. In addition, mobility and secrecy were their primary means of protecting the warheads from a counterattack, so all were designed to be very small. We considered this a weakness, for it degraded their reliability, but it did allow the Pakistanis an enormous range of attack options.

“And that, Mr. President, is what scares me so. The Pakistani warheads are small enough to be dropped from a Cessna flying over the border or put in the trunk of a car and driven downtown. Indeed, most of the warheads are so small they could easily be smuggled across the border from Mexico. The options are enormous. And that is the heart of our fear.”

“And the codes? The command and control procedures and precautions?”

“Sir, the Pakistanis have never been able to develop sophisticated security systems into the weapons themselves. They are what we call “raw.” There are safeguards, yes, but cracking the weapons won't be much harder than cracking a common bank safe. And anyway, Mr. President, we have to assume that whoever has the weapons also has the arming codes. Yes, the facility at Sukkur was taken by force, but the warhead storage bunker itself showed no signs of forced entry. Whoever stole the nuclear warheads knew the access codes and procedures to the bunker's only door. So we have to assume that the person or party also has access to the individual weapon codes.”

The president swallowed, his mouth dry, as an uncomfortable silence filled the room. He lifted his eyes and stared at the communications box on the center of the table. “Who did this?” he demanded in a determined growl. Everyone understood the question was directed at the CIA chief.

Richard Braun, the CIA director, didn't answer as he thought. He was in his office back at Langley, surrounded by his senior staff. The director, a former cowboy and Wyoming senator, was one of the few men in D.C. who was willing to tell the president the truth. Hard-nosed, though soft-spoken, he and the president went back. Way back. They knew each other's secrets.

Normally arrogant and outspoken, the director was quiet now. He cleared his throat deeply, the secure telephone humming softly.

“Who has the warheads!?” the president demanded again.

The director's voice came over the phone. “Sir, the truth is we really don't know.”

The president scowled. “Nothing? You have no idea at all!?”

“No sir, we don't.”

It was the worst possible answer. Yet it was truth.

But the president knew who had taken the weapons. And he knew in his heart where they would appear. New York City, D.C., Jerusalem, or Tel Aviv. Chicago or L.A. Where they hit hardly mattered, he knew they would come. “Okay,” he struggled to keep his anger in check. “What
do
we know, Richard? What is going on over there? Is there someone we can work with to find where the warheads have gone?”

“Sir, no one has stepped forward to claim responsibility for the assassinations. And the situation in Pakistan has gone from indescribable to worse. Over the last few hours, anyone tied to Massarif's government has either been killed or gone into hiding. Even now they are being hunted. Radical groups, tribal leaders and their local militias, clans and their families, these are the elements that control the reins of power inside Pakistan now. And while it looks like the army has maintained control of the major cities, it is also fractioned and likely to break into tribes. And it appears there is no central government or means of transferring authority. We don't know who to contact in order to establish a relationship. No one has stepped forward. Only our CIA agents and a few military forces are providing us any information right now, and there are very real concerns about the security of our assets in-country.

“There is no government in Pakistan, Mr. President, no military leadership, no pro-Western forces. We have no one there we can deal with, at least not at this time. Someone will emerge, of that I have little doubt, but for now we have no indication of who that might be.”

The president leaned back in his leather chair and stared into space, feeling the aircraft bumping gently under his seat. “Who stole the weapons?” he demanded again as he cast a cold glare around the table.

No one moved. Many eyes stared at the floor. The president shook his head. “I know who took them,” he said in answer to his own question. “And all of you know who stole them too. This has been their entire focus since the towers went down. And now it has happened. We knew this would come.”

General Abram cleared his throat. He was a lean and no-nonsense man with Indian blood in his veins, his mother a full-blooded Apache, his father a street kid from St. Louis. He was a product of their fighting spirit, and his blood boiled now. “Mr. President,” he growled, “I do not believe that al Qaeda acted alone. This was far too broad an operation to have been carried out without some kind of assistance.”

The president frowned in agreement, then suddenly stood from his chair. “I want them located and I want them destroyed. We don't negotiate and we don't screw around.”

The staff stood and faced the president as he began to walk from the room. “We meet again in the morning,” he said to his staff. “Brief at seven o' clock. By then I want to know who has the weapons and how you intend to take them down.” The president paused a quick moment as he passed through the door. “Who is this—this Donner—this operative who called out the DARKHORSE? Is he a legitimate asset? Why didn't he give us more time!”

The CIA director's voice answered through the speaker phone. “Ah, Mr. President, Donner is a HUMINT priority code.”

The president nodded. Human Intelligence priority code. Access to this information was limited to perhaps three or four men. It wasn't a subject that could be spoken of here, not even among his most senior staff. The president took a small step toward the telephone speaker in the middle of the table. “Okay then, who is handling the asset?” he asked.

“A man named Colonel Bradley, sir. He's an air force officer on loan to the agency.”

“A military officer? Why not one of your men?”

The director paused a moment. “Sir, as I mentioned, Donner operations are a priority code.”

“Alright, fine! When can I be briefed?”

“Sir, Bradley is on his way back from Israel right now. He'll RTB early morning.”

“Fine. I want to see him immediately upon his return.”

“Yes, Mr. President. We'll be there, sir.”