Frontal Assault

10

Murdock and Don Stroh sat in the dirty shirt mess working over second cups of coffee.

Stroh pointed a twisted finger at Murdock. “I tell you, everyone at State is in a dither. They don’t know what to think. Half of them say that Saddam Hussein is staging the biggest coup of the century. They say look at the ‘incidents’ so far. Fifteen separate actions that they say almost certainly have gone down with the hand of Saddam behind them.”

“Fifteen?”

“Some you don’t know about yet. Count them this way. Three embassies attacked, four blasts in Cairo make seven, the hijack of the tanker most certainly by Saddam. Then the Qatar takeover, the Bahrain capture, ten tankers loaded with embargoed oil smuggled out of the Iraq port of Basra, the attack on Oman, the Lebanon insurrection by army units, then the assassination of the Syrian president, and the stabbing death of the Jordanian king.”

“I didn’t even know about the last two. What’s he trying to do, take over the whole Saudi peninsula?”

“Maybe, but he can’t do it without Saudi Arabia. No action there at all yet, and I think it’s because he’s afraid of them. He remembers Kuwait and the bloody nose he got there.”

“What about Iran? Nothing’s happened there yet.”

“True, and he might have them on tap as an ally. Who knows? The one big theory shooting around the Agency, State, and half of Washington is that he’s looking for leverage to raise oil prices, and get himself free of the embargo.”

“How does he do that, short of a break with the U.N. embargo and running armed tankers down the gulf?”

“Might be what he’s thinking. Who knows what the hell that madman has up his sleeve.”

“You said something about three places to send us next. What are they?”

“At the time, the boss was worried about Lebanon. Now it looks like they have that situation in hand. The rebels have been routed; a bunch of them killed. Three of their leaders executed by lopping off their heads in a public execution. So that one’s in hand.”

“So?”

“So the CNO and the Joint Chiefs are all over this. They say that Saddam tried outright aggression last time in Kuwait and got slaughtered militarily and economically. So, this time, he tries another way. He’s trying to take over these small countries from the inside. Not much we can do about that. We would be interfering with the internal affairs of the nations.

“This will work for him only on a limited scale. The brass says that once he has a toehold, he has to use his military to go in and prop up the puppets he’s put in power. Yeah, works in the small places without the army. But take Syria. He’d need to put a couple of hundred thousand men in there to take over the country, even if he did have a favorable political leader.”

“He’s got almost four hundred thousand men under arms,” Murdock said.

“But his equipment is getting old and worn out.”

“Tell that to the guys he’s killing.”

Stroh finished his coffee and waved at a steward for some more.

“Look at it this way. He wants to get control of the Persian Gulf so he can sell his oil at twice the going price and maybe charge everyone else for using the Strait of Hormuz. What does he need? First he needs a friendly Iran, since they control one bank of the strait. Then he needs that tip of Oman beyond the United Arab Emirates that controls the other side of the strait. If he has those two, he can finesse Saudi Arabia and be in business.”

“Sure, but Oman still has that separated chunk of land out there on the strait.”

“It was a theory.”

“Mr. Stroh?” A sailor touched his shoulder. “Sir, there’s a phone call for you. Seems to be important.”

“They’re all important, son. Where can I take it?”

Murdock finished his coffee and watched Stroh talking on the phone. He nodded, then hung up and marched back to the table.

“Just a theory, huh? That tip of the Strait of Hormuz has just been invaded by three hundred paratroopers and ten landing craft. In two hours, they captured the only city of any size in the area, Al Khasab. This carrier is about eighty miles from there. We’re speeding there as fast as we can. The President has ordered aircraft to fly over the area and report what’s going on. All communication with the city there was cut off an hour ago.”

Murdock stared into his coffee. “Now he needs the United Arab Emirates. It has a commanding view of the entrance to the strait. I’d say the UAE would be the next target. It has to be Saddam. How does he think he can get away with it?”

“With Saddam, that doesn’t seem to be a big factor.”

“How does he think he can control the strait with the Enterprise right in his face and all the firepower that the fleet down here has?”

“Logic has never been one of Saddam’s strong points. The question is what the hell are we going to do now?”

“Wait for somebody to yell for help. Did Qatar ask for help to recapture the point out there?”

“Not that I’ve heard.”

“Saddam only put three hundred men in there? That’s confidence. They could slip a thousand men across the strait from Iran. Even three hundred against sixteen is not good odds for the SEALs’ continuing health plan.”

Stroh stood. “I better go call my boss. He may have some new information.”

Murdock went back to his men. He had his three with wounds checked over again in sick bay. None of the wounds was serious, but Murdock wanted them to heal properly. All the men were fit for SEAL duty when needed.

The men worked over their equipment, cleaned and oiled weapons, put their gear in top shape, and made themselves ready for the next assignment.

“Got to be something else popping over here for us,” Jaybird said. Murdock had told them about the invasion of the enclave of Oman out on the point.

“Hey, we saved that old sultan’s ass once before. We gonna have to go back in and do it again?” Quinley asked.

Nobody had an answer for him.

Three hours later, the SEALs had a new assignment. Stroh talked to them all about it in their assembly room on the big carrier.

“Sultan Aziz of Oman has asked for help. The Navy will be putting five hundred men ashore from an amphibious ship tomorrow at sunup. Before then, they want to be sure the landing area is clear of mines and any other antiship construction. It’s a good old basic SEAL operation. Soon the carrier and its task force will be off the strait and waiting.

“The sultan didn’t want us to bomb the place into rubble just to get the Iraqis. There will be as little damage done to the land and buildings as possible. Our five hundred Marines will move in with complete air cover and do what they have to, to defeat the land force there.”

“We clear the beach and get out of the way?” Murdock asked.

“Right. There will be the fast boats for you to use to get in to shore and back to the carrier. You won’t be part of the invasion force.”

“Hot damn, that’s good,” Bill Bradford said. “No sense wasting our special talents pretending that we’re infantry.”

“But damn good infantry when we need to be,” Jaybird yelped.

“Will there be any sound-activated mines?” Murdock asked.

“Not that we know of. Saddam probably can’t afford those. We expect the usual old fashioned contact mines, maybe some angled steel, the regular antilanding devices.”

“When do we leave?” Murdock asked.

“You’ll be a mile offshore in two ten-meter RIBs that will then edge you into within a quarter mile of shore once it’s fully dark. Then you go over the side and tote your goods along in buoyancy packs and get to work.”

“Piece of cake,” Ron Holt said.

“You heard the man,” Murdock said. “All SEALs will make the trip. If your gear is ready, sack out for four. It’s now 1020. Early chow, then we’ll be out of here about 1700. Senior Chief and Jaybird, figure out what munitions we’ll need and draw them from ordnance. Lots of two-hour detonator-timers. We’ll want any explosions we generate to go off just before dawn so we don’t give them advance notice of the landing. Let’s move, people.”

Murdock had a talk with the commander of the landing forces by radiotelephone.

“Yes, sir, Major. I understand. You’ll give us the length of the landing zone. We’ll clear everything in that zone.”

“Could be mines and steel spike structures to ram our landing craft. We want a clear shot at the beach.”

“Understood sir. We’ll time our detonations for just before you land.”

“Good. You want any help? We have some Marine Recon guys who are raring to go.”

“How long a landing zone, Major?”

“Two hundred yards. We’ll be going in quickly and won’t need a half mile.”

“Good. Two hundred yards are easy. My men will do that with no problem. No help needed.”

“As you say, Commander. Good luck on the beach.”

“Same to you, Major.”

The SEALs left the carrier at 1750 in two ten-meter RIBs. There was no rush. The Enterprise was only five miles offshore, and they had an hour before full darkness. They crept along at five knots, much to the disgust of the coxswain, who liked to kick the craft up to thirty knots and make everyone seasick.

Murdock left a Motorola with the lead RIB driver and told him to keep it dry and be ready to pick them up on call. He would lay about a mile off the beach waiting for the call well before the landing started.

At last the sun set and the sky grew dark. Murdock motioned the coxswain to head for shore, still at five miles per hour so they wouldn’t create a wake for some sharp-eyed lookout to see.

At a quarter of a mile from shore, the two RIBs slowed to a stop. The SEALs in full wet suits, helmets, and face masks but no rebreathers, slid over the sides of the rubber boats and tugged their load of ordnance with them in four neutral buoyancy waterproof bags.

Murdock took the lead into shore with Alpha Platoon. They had checked the shore with NVGs while they waited. They saw no sign of a guard force or even any sentries. Murdock hoped that pattern held.

They stroked silently on the surface toward the shoreline. Just at the surfline, Murdock paused and made sure all of his eight men were with him. He counted, then waved them into their search pattern. He and his squad took the north half of the LZ from the small point of land to the shack that looked like it once might have been a lifeguard tower. The SEALs left their two floatation bags with one holder and dove into the restless water no more than eight feet deep here to check for floating mines or steel bars and other obstacles that would rip apart a landing craft.

On the first dive they found nothing. Murdock scowled. This was high tide, so they should be working farther from shore. Anything set in this area could be on a sandy beach when the tide was low. He waved the men out twenty yards, and they worked another dive. The seven men covered a thirty-yard area, then came up for air. Even in the murky nighttime water they could find anything large and threatening. So far they had found nothing.

Murdock came up and looked around. He saw three white markers bobbing on the surface. Some finds. He swam to the first and went down. A floating mine anchored to the bottom on a four-foot chain. Even at low tide, it would be two or three feet underwater. It was two feet long and as large around as a ten-gallon bucket. It was big enough to take out a small tanker. Joe Lampedusa attached a one-eighth-pound chunk of TNAZ to the mine and gave Murdock a thumbs-up sign. The timer/detonator would be put in just before the SEALs were ready to leave. Then they would set them for the right length of time.

Murdock checked the other floats. Soon there were twelve of them in a rough line along the two hundred yards of shore. They had found no spiked fixtures in the sand, no tank-trap devices to sink or upset the landing vehicles. Evidently Saddam’s troops had only time enough to lay out the mine defense on the most likely landing beaches.

They worked for three hours and found eighteen mines. Lampedusa had made a solo infiltration of the beach area. He came back and reported to Murdock that he found no troops, no personnel of any kind. There were houses about 300 yards in back of the beach, but they looked lived in by civilians.

The SEALs’ job was done, but it was too early to set the timers. Murdock waved the men onshore, and they faded into the sparse growth and hid themselves against the chance a roving patrol might come by.

Just after 0100, a patrol did swing past along the hard sand. Two men in the jeep were chatting and not paying much attention to their task. Murdock snorted. Not the way to run an invasion of a hostile land.

Dawn would come at 0530. Murdock decided to be well out of the way by then. He told the men to set the detonator timers for three hours. Then at 0230, they went back into the water, pushed the timer detonators into the chunks of TNAZ explosive, and started the timers.

Then they surfaced and swam straight out from the shore. Murdock got his Motorola out and activated without getting it wet as he floated on his back. He called the RIBs three times before they came in.

“Ready to motor,” Murdock said.

“Roger that, we’re on our way. Keep transmitting, and I’ll try to home in on your signal. We’ll be coming right off the small point of land where we left you.”

The SEALs swam a half mile into the gulf and waited. Five minutes later, the black RIBs came out of the night and idled up to them.

Once on board, the SEALs settled down for a wait. The coxswains wanted to get back to the safety of the five-mile zone, but Murdock said no.

“We need to know that our charges went off,” Murdock said. “Then we send a message to the carrier, and it will be relayed to the amphibious ship so they’ll know the way is clear on the beach.”

They waited. Most of the SEALs slept. Murdock watched the shore for any sign of activity. They were only a half mile off and in rifle range if anyone wanted to try to hit them. If anyone knew they were there.

Murdock had Holt crank up the SATCOM at 0500 and reported to the carrier that the charges had been set on eighteen mines in the 200-yard LZ. They would detonate at 0530.

At 0525, the SEALs were all awake and watching shoreward. Just before the appointed time, the first explosion shattered the morning calm. It went off three feet underwater, so the report was not loud, but they could hear it and see the geyser that shot into the air. Then, in quick sequence, the other mines exploded. Some of them came on top of others, so they couldn’t be sure of a count. One man said there had been seventeen explosions. Another one said he heard nineteen.

Murdock got back on the SATCOM:

“SEALs to Flatiron.”

“Go SEALs.”

“We report explosions on the beach. We set eighteen. Some counted seventeen, some two more than that. We assume they all detonated. Please relay.”

“That’s a roger, SEALs. Come home.”

Murdock nodded at the coxswain who gunned the little boat, and it slanted away from the tip of the shore. The other RIB followed them. A moment later, they saw two landing craft utility boats plowing through the gulf waters at eleven knots, heading for shore. The big landing craft could hold 350 combat troops, or 250 troops and an M-48 tank. A half mile behind them came two landing craft air cushion craft sending spray high into the air. They held 24 combat men, but could do 40 knots, and slide right up the beach, into the sand, over solid ground, and discharge 48 men to put down covering fire from shore for the troops in the slower LCUs.

It worked that way. Murdock could see the air cushion craft spray sand as they charged across the beach and spewed Marines out in all directions to lay down protective fire.

The LCUs hit the beach, the front ramp came down, and 250 Marines charged from each boat through a foot of surf, onto the dry sand, and into the brush. Behind them, from each LCU, rolled an M-48 tank, its big gun swiveling as the gunner checked out possible targets. Murdock heard one of the tank’s cannon fire before they were out of sight of the beach.

The coxswain grunted as they put more distance between them and the fighting. “Hey, I’m not used to getting shot at. I’m a blue water sailor.”

Murdock tried the Motorola. “DeWitt, any casualties over there?”

He made the transmission twice, then checked his own guys. Nobody had any new hurts.

“Lam, how’s that shoulder?” Murdock asked.

Lam had to shout over the sound of the RIB’s motor. “Yeah, I know it’s there. Think it busted open. No sweat.”

“Get to the medics as soon as we hit the carrier. I want them to check out Adams and Franklin, too. Not taking any chances you guys won’t be around for the big one.”

“What’s the big one?” Jaybird shouted.

Murdock shrugged. “Damned if I know, but we’ve had three or four little jobs on this vacation time. There must be a big assignment for us out there somewhere. I want everyone to be ready.”