The Gambit

XXVII

“Colonel, Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero just changed course and altitude; she’s losing altitude fast,” exclaimed Sgt. Forrest.

“What’s the new course and altitude?”

“Ma’am, they were on a course of two-six-zero degrees at 28,000’; they are now located at 41.831168 x — 73.374939 on course two-one-eight and descending very rapidly, Ma’am. Let’s see, that new route puts them on course for…. Ma’am, where is Storm Two-Two?!?”

“Storm Two-Two; how soon before you can intercept Eight-Two-Zero?”

“Huntress, I’m about fifteen minutes out.”

“Yankee Five-Six, how soon can you intercept Eight-Two-Zero?”

“Huntress, ah, let’s see, at the last coordinates, I’m five minutes out.”

“Yankee flight, Storm flight, change of orders! Yankee Five-Six, take Eight-Two-Zero; Storm Two-Two, continue with Storm Two-Three on flight Fed Ex Six-Eight-Three. Yankee Five-Seven, continue with Fed Ex Ten-Oh-Three; we’ll keep an eye on Fed Ex Twelve-Sixteen.”

“Roger that, Yankee Five-Six taking Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero.”

“Yankee Five-Six, what is your load out?” Huntress inquired.

“Huntress, say again?”

“Yankee Five-Six, what is your load out?”

“Huntress, I’m carrying four Sidewinders, four AM-RAAMs, and a full load of 20mm.”

“Very good, Yankee Five-Six, your target is Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero, currently located at 41.831168 x — 73.374939 on course two-one-eight and descending very rapidly. Supersonic is authorized.”

“Huntress, say again.”

“Yankee Five-Six, this is Huntress Actual. Eight-Two-Zero is off course and appears to be on a direct path to the Indian Point Nuclear Power plant. Firewall it Five-Six! I don’t care how many windows you break. If Eight-Two-Zero is targeting Indian Point, they could crash into the place in approximately three minutes. Weapons are free. I repeat weapons are free. Give them two warnings; if they do not respond or change course, a shoot down is authorized.”

“Huntress, this is Yankee Five-Six. Going to full AB; will be within range in ninety seconds. Weapons hot. Repeat, weapons hot.”

“Roger, that Five-Six.”

“Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero, this is Yankee Five-Six. You are off course and descending very rapidly. Is everything all right?”

“Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero, please respond. You are off course and descending too rapidly.”

“Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero, respond. What are your intentions?”

“Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero, what are your intentions? If you do not return to your original course, you will be shot down.”

“Omar, we are about five miles out. Answer them; it might buy us the time to reach the target.”

“Yankee Five-Six, this is Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero, we are having major hydraulic problems and have lost steering.”

“Eight-Two-Zero, you must change course or you will be shot down.”

“Three miles, Omar. I see the target.”

“Yankee Five-Six. We are having problems with our hydraulics and have lost steering. There is a river directly ahead of us. I will try to make a water landing.”

“Two miles.”

“Negative, Eight-Two-Zero; turn or I will be forced to shoot. This is your last warning.”

“Fox three, Fox three,” exclaimed Yankee Five-Six as Thor fired two of his AMRAAMS.

Indian Point Energy Center is located directly on the east bank of the Hudson River, thirty eight miles north of New York City. Its two nuclear reactors generate more than two thousand megawatts of electricity that feeds thirty percent of the City’s electrical needs. More importantly, though, upwards of 17. 6 million people live within a fifty mile radius of its two reactors. If even one of these reactors suffered a meltdown, every one of these people would need to be evacuated. A plane the size of a 757 crashing into the right spot here could cause a disaster unimaginable in scale and unprecedented in the history of the United States. The 9/11 attacks on the Twin Towers, as horrific as that was, would pale in significance should a couple reactors on the Eastern Seaboard suffer a meltdown.

Captain Rouhani knew he was so close to achieving his mission. He knew his plane had been discovered. He could see the strobe light of the American fighter behind his plane. However, he still had three planes out there which the Americans did not know. He knew that in the wake of 9-11, the Americans had dramatically improved their response time to stray aircraft so he realized he would never make it — to Peach Bottom or anywhere else for that matter — the Americans were already calling for him to return to Logan. However, Limerick, Salem, and especially Indian Point, were still distinct possibilities for his men.

“Yankee Five-Six, this is Huntress. Do you copy?”

“Yankee Five-Six.”

“Yankee Five-Six, this is Huntress Actual. Our spotters on the ground indicate that a large aircraft crashed into a wooded area roughly a quarter mile north of the Indian Point Nuclear facility. Well done, Five-Six. Yankee Five-Six, reverse course and pick up Fed Ex Twelve-Sixteen, now located at 42.129548, -72.206268.”

“Roger that; Yankee Five-Six heading to 42.129548, -72.206268 to pick up Fed Ex Twelve-Sixteen.”

“Fed Ex Six-Eight-Three and Fed Ex Twelve-Sixteen, this is Huntress, you are directed to land at the nearest airport. Do you copy?”

“Fed Ex Six-Eight-Three, do you copy?”

“Fed Ex Twelve-Sixteen, do you copy?”

“Colonel, both Fed Ex Six-Eight-Three and Twelve-Sixteen just turned off their transponders. Looks like we have two more.”

“Storm Two-Two; this is Huntress. Fed Ex Six-Eight-Three is refusing to answer and has turned off its transponder. Be advised Yankee Five-Six shot down Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero as it intended to crash into the Indian Point Nuclear reactor.”

“Yankee Five-Six; Huntress. Fed Ex Twelve-Sixteen is not responding and has turned off their transponder. Looks like we have a second one for you tonight.”

“Roger that, Huntress.”

“Yankee Five-Seven, this is Huntress. Continue to stay with Fed Ex, Ten-Oh-Three. Be advised Yankee Five-Six shot down Fed Ex Eight-Two-Zero as it intended to crash into the Indian Point Nuclear reactor.”

“Jim, I just received a call from the FAA,” Secretary Axelsson said over the phone. “The Air Force just shot down a Fed Ex cargo plane that intended to crash into the Indian Point Nuclear facility; it actually impacted less than a quarter mile from the plant. They are tracking, with fighter escort, three other Fed Ex cargo planes — one of which the Air Traffic Controller said he heard four gunshots over the radio. All three have turned off their transponders and I’m guessing that they will try and hit three other nuclear plants — their route brings them very close to three more reactors; the Air Force won’t let them get near any reactor, even if it is along their route. They’ll most likely be shot down as well.”

“So, it looks like Miss Yaniv was right; they were trying to take out four of our nuclear power facilities. The intel the Israelis received from their source in Beirut had to have been intended for us to discover. I think the only real question, now, is how far will our retaliation go?”

“From what we have received from Tom in Marathon, this would appear to have been the last of their attacks. We’ll now focus on rounding up these guys out west. We’ve scrambled every available drone out of Creech. Fortunately, a few of these ranches are relatively close by so we’ve had them under aerial surveillance for the last few hours; there’s a few more in Oregon — we’re still working on getting the surveillance up for those. However, now that we know what we’re up against, it’s all hands on deck. We’ll start moving our forces to surround all of these ranches by tomorrow morning. We should have most of them rounded up by tomorrow afternoon at the latest.”

“Well, it would seem your sailing force has been hammering them pretty hard in the gulf. This last attack will most likely be the coup d’grace for the Iranian government. Our final pieces for doing just that should be getting into place right about now.”

“Thank you all for coming in this late at night; I know it’s been a long day,” Christine Thompson, the president’s press secretary announced. “I have just a brief statement and then I’ll answer a few questions for you as I’m sure you all have more than a few of them. Okay, you all know what happened this morning. As a direct result of that, elements of the US Navy have been conducting round the clock airstrikes throughout Iran. This evening, I’m sure you’ve all heard reports that several aircraft reportedly crashed tonight in the New York/New England area. I can confirm that four aircraft did, indeed, crash: one in New York, two in Connecticut, and one in Massachusetts. I can also report that no passengers were either killed or injured in any of these aircraft. We have yet to hear of any damage on the ground or whether any of these planes crashed in any populated areas. Are there any questions?”

“Chris, that’s it?” Several members of the press corps hollered out.

“Since no one was injured, do we know the types of aircraft involved?” Another reporter yelled out.

“Yes, I believe we do; all four were cargo planes.”

“What about the flight crews?”

“I’m sorry, but I have no information on them.”

“Does this have anything to do with the reports we’ve received of several sonic booms heard over Connecticut this evening?” One of the reporters yelled out.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Thompson replied.

“Chris, we’ve all heard the reports of sonic booms over the Northeast and now you are confirming that four planes have crashed — did the Air Force shoot these planes down? And if so, why?” Another reporter asked.

“No comment.”

“Did the downing of these planes have anything to do with what happened this morning?”

“I said nothing about ‘the downing’ of any planes. All I can confirm is that four planes did indeed crash tonight.”

“Chris, it’s very suspicious: the only planes in the region capable of generating a sonic boom are Air Force fighters and the sonic booms were heard in the same area where these planes supposedly crashed.”

“Good point, that is suspicious. No comment.”

Chris Thompson had no idea that her press conference served to initiate yet another round of violence; the only real question was who would pull the trigger first?

“Did you hear that?” Lieutenant Colonel Bukhari almost demanded of Muhammad Abu Abbas. “Major Zarin’s force completely failed; the US Air Force shot all of his planes down. Are your troops ready to launch their rockets?”

“Colonel, we can launch within minutes of the order.”

“Are all of the rockets positioned and targeted as I’ve indicated? We need to overwhelm their Iron Dome defenses and concentrate on specific targets rather than simply launching everything and hoping for the best.”

“Everything has been done as you have directed.”

“Very well; how long will it take for you to notify everyone to launch their rockets?”

“We can get the word out in fifteen minutes,” Abbas replied.

“Okay, it is now twenty minutes past the hour. I want everything to be launched at forty minutes past the hour — that gives you twenty minutes to spread the word, and make sure — no electronic communications, absolutely none — we do not want those Israeli pigs eavesdropping on this. We need the element of surprise.”

“Absolutely; we have swept this room for bugs and will be spreading the word person to person. We have a well-established network and we can get the word out to every launch site in a matter of minutes. We are ready.”

“Very well; get the word out immediately. At precisely 0640, we launch with everything we have.”

General Pardo knew the directorship of Mossad came with immense prestige; after all, there had only been eleven others in his position, and many of them had legendary reputations amongst the intelligence community. He also knew that its prestige often took a back seat to the real world of long hours and very little time with his family. This Iranian mess had really kept him busy: he usually arrived at the office well before six in the morning and didn’t leave the building until well past ten in the evening — on a good day. His latest routine — as he very often changed “routines”—had him starting the coffee first and turning on Fox News, second. He had a general disdain for all things media but he kept Fox News on whenever he was in the office. He didn’t trust the media but he tended to trust Fox a little more, especially as the current presidential administration seemingly did not. He had access to the network’s Israeli version but chose to listen to Fox’s broadcast real-time so he could remain up to date on all of the happenings in Washington — something extremely crucial over the past week. He could usually catch at least the last half of Sean Hannity before O’Reilly came on. This morning, though, proved a little different — no sooner than had O’Reilly started than Fox switched to a White House press conference — this got his attention. Who held a presser at eleven o’clock at night? — he thought to himself. About twenty minutes into the press conference, one of the correspondents asked Press Secretary Thompson if the four planes had been shot down. Alarm bells immediately went off in Tamir’s head as he grabbed his phone.

“General Malka, get your planes in the air NOW!!!” Pardo barked into his phone to the Air Force chief of staff. “Hezbollah will be launching an attack within the hour.”

“What’s going on?” Came the immediate reply.

“We received word…, yesterday, I believe, that Hezbollah would be launching an attack of their own as soon as the Iranians carried out their third attack in the US. The downing of the four planes in the New York area would seem to figure into that. Word is that this will be a massive missile attack coming from Lebanon, seeking to overwhelm Iron Dome; other than that, we don’t know too much. We know Iran has supplied tens of thousands of missiles to Hezbollah, many of them capable of hitting clear down to Ashqelon, maybe even Beer-sheba. The sooner we can get your planes in the air, the better off we’ll be, but we need to be able to hit clear up into the Beqaa Valley as this is where most of their longer range missiles are located.”

“Very good; we’ve known of their missile sites for some time. Scrambling the alert force now; the entire squadron will be airborne in twenty minutes.”

“Excellent. I’ll contact Bibi to let him know of the impending strike and see if he’ll authorize a preemptive strike.”

Israel’s Iron Dome missile shield is widely regarded as the preeminent missile defense system in the world — to date, intercept rates as high as eighty-five percent have been reported. A common misconception with Iron Dome, though, is that it is designed to take out every missile fired into Israel. Rather, Iron Dome uses a highly sophisticated radar to determine the estimated impact area of an incoming missile — a missile bearing towards a rural agricultural setting or heading out to sea will in all likelihood, simply be ignored; a missile heading towards downtown Tel Aviv will receive immediate action. The only limiting factor with Iron Dome is the number of missiles within its batteries: Iron Dome has five thousand missiles within its batteries; Hezbollah had literally over one hundred thousand missiles stockpiled, though the number of launchers remained a mystery.

Colonel Bukhari now experienced the same anxious frustration Rafsanjani experienced a couple days earlier: the order had been given, all he could do was wait. He had seven thousand medium range missiles scattered throughout the Beqaa Valley at over three thousand launch sites and vehicles, many of these with twin launchers. Of course, he had many other short range missiles and artillery pieces located along the heavily defended Israeli-Lebanese border. However, the primary focus of the initial volley would consist of the medium range Tishreen missiles, each capable of reaching clear into central Israel — and all targeted at Tel Aviv. However, he fully believed he had a golden opportunity to finally do some damage: He knew Iron Dome would intercept many, maybe even most, of these missiles but even if just ten percent of the Tishreen force got through — that would mean seven hundred missiles would be striking in and around Tel Aviv. Moreover the Tishreen missile carried a 450 Kg warhead — the punishment he, HE, could inflict on the Zionist pigs, he thought to himself, would surely bring retribution to his enemies and glory for himself!

The pilots of the Israeli First Fighter Squadron served General Malka well: All twenty four of the squadron’s F-16’s were airborne in eighteen minutes. General Pardo had forwarded Bibi’s authorization for a preemptive strike and every pilot raced to previously known missile sites in the Beqaa Valley. At precisely 0640 hours, each one of the pilots noticed the initial exhaust plumes of smoke coming from literally thousands of missiles as each pilot released all six of their own Maverick air-to-ground missiles. At 0641, the Iron Dome radar picked up the Tishreen missiles.

“General Malka, is David’s Sling ready to go?” Tamir asked over the phone, referencing Israel’s latest missile defense system.

“We’re tracking seven thousand incoming medium range missiles as we speak — and some are going to get through. Even if a third of these veer off target, our missile magazines simply aren’t large enough between both Iron Dome and David’s Sling — David’s Sling is still so new we don’t have a full complement of missiles yet. I can hear the air raid siren in the background where you’re at; they’re also going off in Haifa. You heading to a shelter?”

“No, there’s simply no time with these things. I know they’ve improved the guidance of these things but with only a two to three minute warning, we don’t have time to evacuate the building.”

“Understood. I’ve scrambled every attack squadron we have and put every Fighter squadron on alert. It’ll take us a few sorties but we’ll take out every static launch site we know about; the mobile ones will be tougher but we aren’t fooling around — we are going to take out everything they have. The Army is already unleashing a massive artillery barrage on known sites across the border; I expect they’ll be moving in very soon. We’ve had a plan on the books for cleaning up Southern Lebanon for several years: the army’s going all the way to Beirut and rooting everything out on the way up there. Once things settle down, we’ll pull back and occupy everything south of Tyre. With the US in the midst of completely destroying Iran — they won’t be a threat to the region for at least a decade — and Syria tied down with its own civil war — there’s no regional power to stop us so now is the time to clean this place up once and for all.”

“Muhammad,” Colonel Bukhari said into his phone, “did we get everything away? I’m hearing several fighters overhead.”

“The first volley’s away. No sooner than did we get the first volley off than we got hit by several airstrikes. We’re reloading now before we get hit again. It’s a race against time; it seems the Israeli’s know of many of our sites. We’re hearing of reports along the border where the Israeli army is hitting us hard but most of the longer range rockets are all up in Beqaa outside of the army’s range.”

“Have you been able to locate the frequency of Abbas or this Colonel Bukhari?” David Eitan asked his lieutenant.

“I just found it! Seems like the good colonel just called up Abbas.”

“Do we know his location?”

“Got ‘em! Sending to the Air Force… Now!”

“Colonel, I really think we should get off the phone. The Israelis routinely monitor our communications.”

“I’m sure they do, but I think they’re a little busy trying to take out all of your missiles right now,” Bukhari answered smartly.

“Do not underestimate them, Colonel. I’m in a pretty deep bunker but even I don’t think this might be deep enough.”

“Relax, Muhammad, I really don’t think there’s anything to worry about. We have missile sites to keep them….”

“Colonel?”

“Colonel…?”

“Colonel Bukhari, are you there?” Abbas asked, knowing the futility of the question even as he asked it as the line had gone dead.

“Tamir, how’d you make out?” Jim Carmichael called.

“The last missile came in about ten minutes ago. It’s bad; it’s too soon to determine how many got through but Tel Aviv looks like London during the ‘blitz. Our complex took a couple hits, I can see a couple skyscrapers that got hit… This is going to be bad. I would expect casualties to be in the hundreds, if not thousands.”

“Let us know of anything we can do to help. The Wasp is currently in the Med and had been headed your way — we could tell her to step on it and have her there in roughly twelve hours; she boasts a six hundred bed hospital on board, if that would help. We can get more over there, but she’s the closest.”

“That would probably be a good idea. I think we’re going to need that as I’m just now getting a report that both the Sourasky and the Edith Wolfson Medical Centers have been hit.”

“I’ll let Axe know to get them over there as soon as possible. I’m calling Stonewall next and I’ll let them of your situation. I know they don’t need the distraction but they’re going to find out anyway.”

“Go ahead and do that; I’m a little busy here.”

“Okay, then. Let me know of anything else we can do, my friend.”

“I’ll do that. Thanks, Jim.”