Death Blow

9

Lieutenant Farooq Yuahya Khan stood behind a wooden frame building in this Nepalese town of twenty thousand and looked down the street two hundred yards at the police station. It was the last hold out of any organized opposition. He and his platoon of sixty Pakistan paratroopers had dropped in on the town at dawn the preceding day. They knew exactly where the town’s small military garrison was.

They caught most of the men in their bunks, killed half of them, and took forty prisoners. In rapid order they had captured the telephone center, the city administration building, and the town’s only hospital/medical center.

He and his men had flown in Chinese transport planes from Pakistan near the border and refueled in China. Then they flew in here two days ago, jumped, and lost only one man with a broken leg on the drop. They quickly quashed most of the opposition.

Now he gave hand signals and thirty Chinese-made rifles opened up on the police station from two sides. There was little return fire. He signaled again and his two best grenade men sprinted from cover to cover, then with increased support fire, they plunged across the wide street and slammed against the side of the police station. A red star shell broke high over the station. It was the signal to throw in grenades. Each man threw six grenades through three different windows and probably into six rooms.

Firing from inside the police station trailed off and then stopped. At once Lieutenant Khan ordered two squads to rush the station with a frontal charge using full-assault fire.

A few return rounds came from the station but not many. The soldiers kicked in the front door and threw in grenades; when the shrapnel stopped whizzing past them, soldiers jolted through the door and into the front and rear of the building.

In five minutes it was all over. The Pakistan lieutenant had no long-range radio, but a sergeant came out the front door and gave the move up signal, and an all-clear sign.

Lieutenant Khan worked down the street to the police station and hurried inside. There were more than a dozen dead Nepal police. He had them hauled out and put on the sidewalk for relatives to claim. He found two working radios. One a shortwave set was tuned to an Indian station in New Delhi, which was only two hundred miles to the southwest.

The broadcast was in English, and Khan could understand most of it. He sat quickly in a chair and he knew his face must be pale as he heard the news for the first time.

Lieutenant Khan turned off the radio. He would have it taken to his headquarters in the old army fort at the edge of town. The buildings had cooking facilities, quantities of food, and places for his men not on patrol to sleep. More men were promised, but none had parachuted in. He had no way to contact his superiors or those of the Chinese. He looked at his map again and frowned.

The town he now occupied was only fifty-five miles in a direct line from the nuclear-bombed city. He wondered which direction the winds blew. Was there a chance they would blow to the west and slightly north? If so, his town of Dhangadhi would be right in their path.

He had not questioned his orders to parachute into Nepal from the Chinese planes. He did not question the Pakistani Army leaders when the officers were told of the attack on Nepal. There was no reason given, no justification. He wondered about the alliance with China to go into Nepal. It was a small nation. Why did China need help to take it over? He knew that China had almost three million men under arms. They could take the small nation quickly by themselves. Why would they want an ally?

There were all sorts of rumors in the Pakistan Army, especially with the officers who knew more of the plans. The enlisted men were told nothing of the attack or the alliance. Some thought that China had its eyes on Afghanistan. The feeling was that while China had many resources, it was short on good oil reserves. Others said that Afghanistan was not a prize package for conquest. It had no oil reserves at all if that was China’s ploy. The nearest good oil nation was Iran, Pakistan’s neighbor to the south who had ninety million barrels of oil reserve, nearly four times the reserves that China itself had. Yes, Iran could be the eventual target. But why the thrust into Nepal? Was it only a ploy to show the world that China had the nuclear bomb and wasn’t afraid to use it? Sounded reasonable.

Lieutenant Khan sat wearily in a chair in the police station while his men organized the place and assigned men there. He thought of his family back in Pakistan. His wife would be worried into a state. His two small sons would wonder where their papa was. He had been a reserve in the Army and working daily at his job as a lawyer. Then the orders came and his unit was mobilized and sent to two weeks of special training and three jumps, then they were loaded into the Chinese transport planes and here they were. His unit had been lucky not to be shot up. He had lost two dead and three wounded. Lucky indeed.

Lieutenant Khan tried the small radio he had, but he knew it would not reach beyond the mountains. His only hope was that it would link up with some Pakistani units nearby.

He drove in a commandeered Nepalese Jeep to the telephone center. There he found most of the phone lines in operation. He called Dipalal, a larger town than his to the north about thirty miles well into the foothills of the mighty Himalayan Mountains. The lines were working.

Soon he was talking with his friend Captain Multan who led the attack on the larger town.

“Yes, almost no opposition. I lost only two dead, three wounded.”

“Why are we here, Captain? You heard about the nuclear bomb attack on that Nepal town?”

“Yes. We didn’t need such an outrageous blow. The Nepalese Army is small and spread out over the entire country. My friend, I don’t know why we are here. Either one of us could have captured Nepal in a week. Now it could be three or four days.”

Lieutenant Kahn talked to his classmate from the Military Academy for ten minutes, then they said good-bye and hung up. Kahn was trying to figure out how he could find out about the prevailing winds coming from Biratnagar. Would they bring deadly radiation with them? Or would it blow the other way into the mountains?

He had just hung up the phone when one of the Nepalese men who had been instructing the soldiers how to run the switchboards pulled a pistol from a desk drawer and shouted at Lieutenant Kahn. He bellowed a dozen words, then began firing from six feet away. He fired four shots. The first hit the lieutenant in the chest, driving him backward. The second hit his neck, bringing a spurting gush of blood. The third and fourth missed but Kahn slumped to the floor, his life’s fluid spurting to the ceiling from a ruptured carotid artery in his neck. Each spurt came lower, from six feet down to five in the air, then four and at last a bubbling at his throat as the soldiers around him tried to stop the flow.

The Nepalese man with the pistol threatened the rest of the soldiers, then fled out the door. Two guards at the front of the building had heard the shots. They saw the man rush out, his eyes wild, waving the pistol.

They shot him four times and he died in a screaming storm of angry words and the last two shots in the pistol all aimed at the invaders.

For the third day, the UN Security Council tried to hold a special session. Fewer then half of the thirteen delegates were at the emergency meeting. No business could be conducted, but some delegates there charged China, a permanent member, and Pakistan with butchery in their unwarranted invasion of Nepal.

Chinese delegate Chou Kao-Feng reached for his microphone and stared hard at the other members. “I am shocked that delegates to this august body would lower themselves to use such undiplomatic language. The People’s Republic of China has for many years claimed most of the area called Nepal. We are simply taking back what was stolen from China many, many years ago. We are a peaceful people, but when our rights and our borders are threatened, we will respond with devastating effect.

“Yes, we have used a nuclear bomb. Even as the Americans did twice in recent history. And we say as the Americans did at that time, that despite the loss of life at the target, the bomb itself has reduced the fighting and has saved thousands of lives on both sides.

“We have welcomed our ally Pakistan in this struggle. They too have territory in the area that is under dispute with India and Nepal and have cooperated with us to settle these disputes once and for all in a way that the world can understand.”

The session continued with each nation presenting its view on the use of the nuclear weapon against defenseless women and children.

The delegate from China sat back and turned down the volume on his translation ear phones until he could hear only a few whispers. Then he kept his eyes open and concentrated on his small garden in his home near Nanjing where he had a fountain, several plants, a small stream, and a bridge. He concentrated so hard that his face fused into a soft smile and he was totally oblivious to everything that was happening around him. His aid would gently bring him back to the present if there was any need for him to make a comment.

Captain Irving B. Robertson II glanced at the two envelopes that had come to his desk the day before. One was marked with a heavy blue line an inch wide. The other had a heavy red line just as wide. Both were inscribed: “Sealed Orders. To be opened only by order of the Chief Naval Officer by radio contact.”

Sealed orders. The last time he had seen those had been on training exercises, but outside of that he had seen sealed orders twice in the Gulf War. They usually meant action, but action of what type here, he had no idea. The only thing he could think of was a job for the SEALs onboard his ship. Yes, it could be for the SEALs.

He put the envelopes out of his mind and concentrated on the flight operations training drill they had in progress. They were launching F-18s, refueling them in air, and then recovering them. Drills were essential to keep every man involved sharp and sure. Every phase of the operation was important. In most of them, the smallest mistake or misjudgment, could lead to one or more instant deaths of his aviators and those on the deck. He wouldn’t allow any such mistakes to be made. Drill, drill, drill.

It was the third day of the Nepal invasion. CCN had flown a reporter in with Chinese permission and now the world had up-to-date details on the rapid takeover of the small nation. CCN was the only media news team allowed in the area. Reports told that by the end of the third day, 90 percent of the population centers of Nepal were under China — Pakistan control. Only a few mountainous areas had not been touched, and would not be until there was some administrative need.

The CCN feed was carried throughout the ship on TV sets and the men of the carrier were current on the war.

Lieutenant Commander Blake Murdock and Lieutenant (j.g.) Ed DeWitt sat in the wardroom watching some bulletins. The video showed a Chinese armored personnel carrier smashing into a small army garrison in some unnamed town. The six soldiers there had been routed quickly, three killed and three captured.

“And so it goes,” the reporter said. “China and Pakistan continue to mop up any last resistance to their invasion. One Chinese general, who I talked to this morning, said he would declare the fighting over sometime early in the evening.”

“That’s one we missed,” Murdock said. He finished his coffee and stretched. “We had all of our workouts today, or is there one more?”

“We’re wrapped for the day,” DeWitt said. “Eight miles this morning, then PT this afternoon followed by four more miles. The troops are sharp and ready to go anytime.”

“Good, I’m ready for a short nap before chow.”

“Go ahead. I have a half-finished chess game with Jefferson. He won the last one and I’m mad as hell. Well, almost. You have a good nap. I have to go play war on the chessboard.”

The call came at 2030. Murdock and DeWitt were both in quarters, a six-man officer’s bunking area. DeWitt had answered the phone.

“The Captain wants to see us right now,” DeWitt said. “He told me that Don Stroh would be there, too.”

“That means we’ve got some work to do,” Murdock said. “At least I hope that’s what’s afoot.”

Ten minutes later, the two SEALs and Don Stroh, dressed in officer’s khaki without any insignia, sat in front of the captain’s large desk. Two other officers Murdock didn’t know were present. The captain didn’t bother with introductions. Two files lay on top of it. He pointed to one.

“Orders just came through from the Chief of Naval Operations in Washington, D.C. I have been ordered to open sealed orders that have been on my desk for two days. I talked to the CNO a half hour ago. He said he has early advice that China will invade Bangladesh at dawn tomorrow, less than eight hours from now. The president has given orders that the Bangladesh Embassy will be evacuated at the first possible moment. He said he had no idea of our distances, but that he had been assured that there had been arrangements made for U.S. military planes to land in Calcutta, India, which is only a hundred and fifty miles from the embassy in Dhaka, Bangladesh.”

“But, Captain, if we’re still way up here by Hainan Island, we’re one hell of a long way from Calcutta,” Don Stroh said.

The captain smiled. “Yes, we were up there. So how would we get permission for an overflight of Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and Myanmar? That’s what we’d need if we were up there by Hainan so we could fly directly west to get to India.”

“So what do we do?” Murdock asked.

The captain grinned. “Didn’t tell you that ever since we hit the area around Hainan, the brass figured we would be of more value farther down south, so we’ve been sailing south along the coast of Vietnam. We’re now below Ho Chi Minh and about to turn west into the Gulf of Thailand.”

DeWitt looked at the map of the area. “So we’re down here near the Gulf. We’re mostly south of those four countries, but not much closer to Bangladesh.”

“Close enough,” the captain said. “The important part is we won’t get shot down trying to fly over Vietnam. They are still touchy about their airspace. We will have to overfly a small piece of Myanmar that used to be called Burma. It’s only fifty miles wide right there and we’ll be over it before they know we’re coming.”

“We’re talking about a COD?” Murdock said.

The man next to the captain spoke up. “Men, I’m Cresswell, the CAG. Yes, we have a COD onboard that can make the trip. It’ll be empty except for your team and should be able to do the run with no problem. Our navigator figured if we get within fifty miles of the shore on the Gulf, we should have an eight-hundred-mile run up to the tip of Bangladesh, then two hundred and eighty miles more to Calcutta. This bird will do a thousand seven hundred on ferry and we won’t be much heavier than that. So from the hardware standpoint it’s a go.”

“How long will it take us to get there, Captain?” Murdock asked the CAG.

“The COD cruises at three hundred, so that means we should have a nonstop of three and a half to four hours, depending on any headwinds we hit.”

“That’s a good-size town there in Bangladesh,” Don Stroh said. “We’ll need some directions how to find our embassy.”

“Yes, sir,” the third man with the captain said. “We have faxes from the State Department showing pictures of the embassy building and the surrounding area. Also faxes of a list of those personnel still incountry. They did a mini-evacuation a week ago when their intelligence people said something was going to happen with China.”

“How many left there to evacuate?” Ed DeWitt asked.

The same man looked at his notes. “Another fax shows that there are eight and a half million people in Dhaka. The last report from the embassy said there were nineteen people to evacuate.”

Murdock looked at the CAG. “Does the Navy have any helicopters in Calcutta? We’ll need two Sea Knights, the CH-forty-six, preferably both with door guns.”

“That could be a problem,” the CAG said. “we have no base there of any kind. Calcutta is well inland. We do have some elements in the general area. We had a four-ship group on a goodwill tour, a pair of guided-missile destroyers and two guided-missile cruisers. They were somewhere near the Bay of Bengal, which is just below Bangladesh.” He turned to the third man, the one with the figures.

“Johnson, check out their position and what choppers they have on board. Ask specifically about the CH-forty-sixes.”

The man nodded and left the Captain’s cabin.

“Would one CH-forty-six do it?” the CAG asked.

“Specs call for it to carry twenty-five troops,” Murdock said. “Assume that’s combat ready. We’ll have fifteen combat ready, but nineteen civilians in shirt sleeves, might squeeze in under the weight, and might not. We’d prefer to have two birds.”

“The range is no problem, a top of four hundred and twenty miles.”

“We’ll have to take the ordnance we need from here,” DeWitt said. “Who should I see, and when are we leaving?”

“The COD can leave anytime you’re ready,” the CAG said. “I’ll get it warmed up and the preflight done.”

“Should be a nighttime operation,” Murdock said. “Not a chance we can make connections and get to Calcutta and into our choppers and to that town while it’s still dark. No way. So, we make it tomorrow night. We’re too far away to do it any other way.”

“Give us more time to get some choppers flown in for you,” the captain said. “They probably won’t have door guns. You’ll have to use your own.”

“We’ll check our team and let you know what ordinance we need. This will be a hot mission, live ammo all the way. Oh, do you have any of the laser-aimed twenty-millimeter air-burst rounds?”

The CAG shook his head. “Read about them. You have that new rifle?”

“Four of them,” DeWitt said. “Great for shooting guys hiding behind buildings and around corners.”

“We’ll call you when we get the choppers tied down,” the CAG said. “We’ll try to fly three into Calcutta, so we can have two up and ready to go. We’ve got an amphib landing ship somewhere in that area. I’ll get back to you.”

“That will be all, gentlemen,” the captain said. The SEALs and Stroh stood, turned and left the cabin.

Outside, Murdock looked at Stroh. “Did you know about this Bangladesh caper?”

“Yeah, but it was sealed and on the captain’s desk. Knew it might happen, not that it would. It even came through channels. Your little admiral will be pleased about that.”

DeWitt looked to be in a hurry. “Come on, let’s get back to the men and find out what ammo we need. This could get hairy if we have to go up against those Chicoms.”

Murdock frowned. “Chicoms? I haven’t heard that term since the Korean War.”

“Like you were around then. That was fifty years ago.”

“I read about it. Chinese Communists, shortened into Chicom. I like it.”

Stroh frowned. “Let me know when you get ready to shove off. Probably around daylight sometime, I’d think. Give you more set-up time in Calcutta.”

“Remember, Stroh, this is the mission you guaranteed us that you would come along on. I’ve got a submachine gun with your name on it.”

Stroh started to respond, but DeWitt and Murdock turned and walked down the companionway toward the SEALs compartment. They both grinned, the look of astonishment and then fear on Stroh’s face had been reward enough. Now, they had to get a fast list of the ammo and other arms they might need.