Specter

8

"Get in here."

Murdock opened the door and stepped through into the briefing room. Part of Nassau's Operations suite, it was a typically stark shipboard compartment, gray-walled and with a tile deck. PLAT monitors — television monitors showing activity on the flight deck looking both forward and aft — hung from several strategic points on the cable- and conduit-cluttered overhead, and the center of the room was dominated by a large table.

There were maps on the table, but they were covered by a sheet. Murdock, who'd been anticipating worse and worse personal outcomes for himself in regard to this meeting, wondered what that meant.

Were they going to kick him out of the Teams?

A number of naval officers were in the compartment, gathered around the table or sitting in chairs or sofas near the bulkheads. Most were members of Nassau's Operations staff, including Commander George Presley, from CIC, and Commander Randolph R. Garrett, the red-bearded head of Nassau's Intelligence Center.

There were some surprises waiting for Murdock there as well. Captain Phillip Coburn was the commanding officer of SEAL Seven, an old-time SEAL who'd begun with Team Two in Vietnam, back in 1969. Commander George Monroe was Coburn's executive officer, while Senior Chief Ed Hawkins was on Coburn's administrative staff.

Two of the men Murdock did not know… the only two enlisted men in the compartment. One was a tall, athletic-looking electronics technician first class, square-jawed, blond, and blue-eyed. The other was a machinist's mate second, a head shorter than the other petty officer, with black hair and an intense, dark gaze. Both wore the SEAL Budweiser on their dress blue uniform jumpers.

Murdock zeroed in on Coburn, however. "Captain Coburn," Murdock said, trying to control his surprise. "I, ah, I thought you were at Little Creek. Sir."

"I was, until Blue Arrow got hot. I've read the report, and Commander Presley filled me in when I came aboard this morning. Tell me something, son. Was there any way on God's green earth you could have avoided that fight at the monastery?"

"Certainly there was, sir. I gave the order to fire. I could have ordered my men to hold their fire. The decision was mine."

"And?"

"Sir?"

"Why did you do it? Open fire, I mean."

"Two soldiers had detained Gypsy, our contact, our whole reason for going in. Judging from the nature of what was going on at the time, I thought it likely that they would shoot him. At the very least they would have arrested him on some pretext."

"Yes, and searched his vehicle."

"They would have found the briefcase, sir, yes."

"I don't know if anyone bothered to tell you, Lieutenant," Monroe said, "but the Agency has its package. Fletcher flew back to Langley with it soon as you brought it aboard. By all accounts, they're happy about this mess at least."

"I take it you've seen some of the late-breaking news stories, Lieutenant," Coburn said.

"Yes, sir. It sounds like the Serbs are playing up our presence there in a pretty big way."

"You got that straight," Coburn said. He leaned back against the table, his arms folded. "That general… what's his name?"

"Mihajlovic."

"Mihajlovic, right. He's telling the whole world, live on ACN TV, that — pick one — the Marines, the Green Berets, the SEALS, the CIA, or all four are out to overthrow the legitimate government of the Yugoslav Republic. He's been showing off that CRRC you left on the beach, by the way."

"We had no choice on that, sir. They were parked practically on top of it."

"Was there any way for you to have avoided contact with the enemy at the beach?"

"Well, I could have holed up in the woods for a day or two. Or chosen a different extraction point. But there seemed to be no reason for either until we were already committed. I… I'm really not sure what else I could have done, sir."

Coburn held up a hand, shaking his head. "Don't sweat it, son. I just wanted to hear it from you. Missions of this type never go as smoothly as they do in the movies, do they?"

Murdock quirked an eyebrow. Where was this leading? "No, sir. Never."

"Mihajlovic can't prove anything," Senior Chief Hawkins put in. "All the gear was sterile. You didn't leave anyone behind."

"By the way," Coburn said. "Speaking of that, I saw Garcia at Bethesda before flying out here. Doctors say he's going to make it."

They'd medevaced Garcia off the Nassau that same day, first to Naples, then back to the National Naval Medical Center at Bethesda, just inside the Washington Beltway. "That's good news, sir," Murdock said.

"Yes. Yes, it is. Good work bringing him off the beach like that."

"SEALs take care of their own, sir."

"Yes, they do." Coburn unfolded his arms and exchanged looks with several of the other officers. "Gentlemen? Any further questions for this young man?"

"Not on the last mission," Garrett said, scratching his beard. "But I can't wait to hear how he's going to manage this next one."

Coburn looked at the expression on Murdock's face and laughed. "What did you think, son? That we were going to court-martial you? Maybe keelhaul your ass out of the Navy?"

"Something like that, sir. We were supposed to go in quiet. In and out, no hear-um, no see-um. We screwed up. I screwed up."

"Bullshit. The gods of war screwed up this time, if anybody did. You did everything right, Lieutenant. Sometimes even right just ain't good enough."

"That's not to say there won't be some administrative fallout over this," Monroe put in. "Like they say, shit runs downhill, and there are some very unhappy people at some very high levels in this affair. Right now, there is some very high-level ass-covering underway in Washington. I'm afraid you haven't heard the last of it."

"But to get to you they have to go through me," Coburn said quietly. "So don't worry about it too much. How have you and your men been getting on since your picnic on the beach?"

The abrupt change of tack in the discussion caught Murdock by surprise. "Eh? Fine, sir. We've been keeping them busy, cleaning weapons and gear, calisthenics, and so on."

"Ready for a new assignment?"

"Absolutely."

"Good." He glanced across the compartment at the two enlisted men. "Pardon my manners. I should introduce these two. Lieutenant Murdock, this is Petty Officer Stepano, Petty Officer Papagos. They've volunteered for this operation, and if you agree to help us out here, they'll be assigned to your unit. Stepano speaks Serbo-Croatian, Bulgarian, and Macedonian. Papagos speaks Greek. You'll likely need both of them where you're going."

"Welcome aboard," Murdock told them. "A pleasure, Lieutenant," Stepano said.

"Yeah, Lieutenant," Papagos added. "We heard a lot about your outfit."

Coburn turned to the table and lifted the sheet off the maps. Murdock had expected them to be charts of the Adriatic coast and inland, where Blue Squad had been operating a few nights ago, but these maps covered an area farther south. He immediately recognized the convoluted coastline of northern Greece, the indentation of Thermaic Bay at Salonika, the rugged mountains inland that formed the natural border between the Greek and Slavic Macedonias. A red line had been drawn on one of the charts, from the airport south of Salonika northwest. It ended with a roughly circled region in the mountains just south of the border, not far from the Greek towns of Orme and Edessa.

"Yesterday morning," Coburn said softly, "a Greek passenger aircraft was hijacked. Olympic Lines domestic flight, a twin-engine turboprop. There were no radioed demands, no negotiations. Shortly after takeoff, the aircraft simply left its flight path and started flying toward the border with Yugoslav Macedonia. It was intercepted by a flight of Greek Mirage F-1s about here." He pointed to the map halfway along the line, near the town of Arabyssos.

"My God. They didn't shoot it down, did they?"

"No. But the hijacked aircraft ignored all radio calls and all threats to shoot it down. It began flying very low, following the mountain valleys toward the border. They lost it somewhere north of Edessa."

"Radar?"

"We were tracking the aircraft from a Hawkeye on radar picket duty off the Jefferson, but they weren't able to hang onto it. That terrain-" He brushed his forefinger along the border. "The mountains aren't necessarily all that high. This one on the border is twenty-five hundred meters. But it's rugged. There was also some pretty heavy-duty jamming in the area by Macedonian forces."

"Macedonians, sir? Or Serbians?"

Coburn gave a hard smile. "Good question, and one we don't really know the answer to yet. Former Yugoslav Macedonia is technically independent. We still have a small peacekeeper force there. But the Serbs still think of the place as theirs. The Macedonians themselves aren't Greeks, like most people think. They're Slavs, like the Serbs. It's entirely possible that Serbia is mixed up in this."

Murdock studied the map for a moment. "If you never had radio contact with the aircraft, how do you know it was a hijacking?"

"We know." Coburn paused, staring at the largest topo map, one that showed the entire stretch of Macedonia, from the Kosovo-Serbian border to Salonika. "Lieutenant, what I am about to divulge is classified top secret. My orders were to keep you in the dark about certain aspects of this mission until you had already accepted the assignment. That's why the nonsense with the sheets when you came in.

"I'm going to stick my neck out a bit on this one, though, and tell you something that must remain within these four bulkheads. God knows, it'll come out soon enough anyway. ACN is probably drawing up its special news bulletin logo right now."

"Yes, sir?"

"One of the passengers on that aircraft was Congresswoman Ellen Kingston from California, a member of the House Military Affairs Committee."

"My God-"

"Her plane was a chartered VIP special, nobody aboard but her, her entourage, and both Greek and American security. This wasn't just a random one-of-the-passengers-has-a-gun hijacking. They were clearly after her in particular."

"This is starting to sound a little crazy," Murdock said, shaking his head.

"We've received a list of the people who should have been on board," Chief Hawkins said. He handed a computer printout across the table to Murdock. "Besides the distinguished lady from California, we have nine congressional staffers, five males, four females. Two U.S. Secret Service men assigned to Ms. Kingston more or less permanently. A U.S. Army colonel, a military liaison officer out of the American embassy staff in Athens. Three other American military personnel, two males, one female, all officers of the colonel's personal staff. Six Greek DEA men. And the crew of the aircraft, of course, all Greek. Pilot, copilot, engineer, three female attendants, one security man."

"With all of that security aboard," Murdock wondered, "how the hell did the bad guys get aboard in the first place?"

"That, Lieutenant, is a question we would very much like answered. Since there is no evidence that anyone forced their way aboard at the airport at Salonika, there really are only two possibilities. A number of armed terrorists could have been hidden aboard the plane before the passengers boarded."

"Or it was an inside job," Murdock said, reaching out and picking up a deck plan schematic of an NAMC YS-11 lying on the table among the maps. "Either the aircraft's crew or the Greek security element."

"That's what we think. Right now, the CIA and Army Intelligence are probably going over the personnel folders of those security men with microscopes. Meanwhile, we've been given a mission alert and told to start planning an immediate op."

Murdock laid the aircraft schematic down and turned his attention once again to the map of the Greek border. "Question, Captain."

"Yes?"

"Why us? I mean, I'm delighted, I'm sure… but that aircraft's last known heading is taking it into a country that's completely landlocked. According to this map, there are exactly two airfields that handle commercial traffic, one up here in the capital at… what is that? Skopje?"

"Pronounced 'Skop-yay,'" Coburn corrected him gently.

"Skopje, right. And the other one's down here, tucked in between the mountains, these lakes, and the inland border of Albania."

"Ohrid," Commander Garrett said. "Used to be a heavy tourist area, until the war sent the tourist trade to hell. Then it was the site of a round of Balkan peace talks that failed."

"And you're wondering why the SEALs are in on this," Coburn said.

"The question had crossed my mind. This looks like the sort of dream-sheet op the Delta boys would kill for."

"And the Army Rangers, and Airborne, and the Army Special Forces, and the Marines, and the Air Force 7th Special Operations Squadron up at Rhein-Main, and probably half a dozen special-warfare commando groups you and I have never even heard of. Right now, I imagine there's something very like a feeding frenzy going on back at the Pentagon, as all of the services line up for a piece of this one.

"The one advantage we have right now over all the rest is, we're here. And they aren't."

"Delta Force will probably get their tickets punched on this one," Monroe said. "They have a team ready for immediate deployment and local caches of arms and equipment. They were alerted as soon as we got word that the aircraft was off course and are probably working out scenarios right this moment. And you're right, of course. While the SEALs' combat responsibilities do extend inland, Skopje is one hundred sixty kilometers from the Adriatic. That's pretty dry, even for a SEAL."

"What Navy Intelligence is interested in," Coburn said, "is what went down at Salonika International two days ago. Even if this was an inside job, there had to be people at the airport who were in on it. Greek Military Intelligence is following that angle. And we're going to help them. But diplomatically."

"Sir?"

"To start with, we want your team to go into Salonika. Have a look around. Work with the Greek DEA. That's why we dug up Papagos here. Speaks Greek like a native."

"That's me, Lieutenant," Papagos said with a bright grin. "Nick the Greek Papagos."

"Where you from, Papagos?"

"Chicago. South Side. But my parents was from the old country, see? Patrai, down on the Peloponnisos."

"You ever been to Greece?"

"Me, sir? Never. I joined the Navy t'see the world, y'know? But I speak the lingo okay. Milao ellenika."

"How about you, uh, Stepano?" Murdock asked.

"I am Serb," the blond ET replied. Murdock could hear a fairly thick East European accent. "From Pittsburgh now, sir. Originally Belgrade."

"Josip Stepano was Yugoslavian," Coburn said. "Got into some trouble with the local police and had to skip the country. Naturalized citizen."

"I have been American fifteen years now," Stepano said, and Murdock could hear the pride in his voice.

"Well, I'm real happy to meet both of you," Murdock said. "Looks like we're going to need you guys. Salonika, huh?"

"That's right," Coburn replied. "How much do you know about our relations with Greece just now?"

"Prickly. That's about all I know."

"Prickly describes it quite nicely. Greece is a member of NATO, of course. So is Turkey, though, and Turkey and Greece are bitter blood enemies. Ottoman Turkey ruled Greece until the early 1800s. There were lots of massacres on both sides, and believe me, both sides have long memories.

"Then there's the Macedonian problem. You see, when Yugoslavian Macedonia voted independence for itself and applied for UN recognition a couple of years ago, we supported it, while Greece opposed it. The whole Macedonian question is very, very touchy so far as Athens is concerned. They'd like nothing better than to see the Serbs control Yugoslav Macedonia. An independent Macedonia might give their own Macedonians some unpleasant ideas."

"Like independence?"

"Exactly. Our relations with the Greeks have not exactly been pleasant lately. When the Pan-Hellenic Socialists came to power under Papandreou in 1981, the government went pretty far to the left, anti-European Community, anti-U.S., anti-NATO. The center-rightists took a slim parliamentary majority in 1990, but they've been just barely hanging on. The Greek economy is in a shambles. There have been threats of another military coup, like the one that ended the monarchy back in '67."

"I'm afraid the current Greek government has no particular reason to love us," Garrett explained. "There have been some unhappy incidents. One of our ships accidentally fired a missile into a Greek destroyer in 1992, during some joint maneuvers. Bad business, that. Besides, Washington has been leaning pretty hard on them for a long time to keep the lid on the Turkey-Greece conflict. Lately we've been leaning on them some more, trying to get them to bend our way over Yugoslav-Macedonian independence and to keep imposing sanctions against Serbia. And last year, Greece slapped an embargo on Yugoslav Macedonia, which, of course, is landlocked. Most of their oil comes in through Salonika. We've been at odds with Athens over that too."

"At the moment," Coburn said, "Greece tolerates us and is willing to cooperate on most matters, at least at a distance. But that toleration probably won't extend to allowing a major military presence in their territory. If Washington pulls its typical big-brother act, sends in the Marines or a division or two of Army troops, most Greeks are going to see that as the ugly Americans throwing their weight around, impugning their military's abilities-"

"Impugning their manhood," Presley put in. The others laughed.

"The Athens government won't like the implication that they're weak. Their armed forces won't like the implication that they can't keep order or handle their own military problems. We're going to have to tread very carefully over there."

"I take it we're going to have to cooperate with the Greeks on this one," Murdock said.

"So far as investigating the hijacking, which involved Greek security personnel and a Greek airliner over Greek territory, yes. Definitely. If it turns out the hijackers are in Yugoslav Macedonia, the picture may be different, but we're going to have to start south of the border. Our embassy in Athens has started the ball rolling so far as putting small U.S. military teams into Greece to work with local military and law enforcement agencies."

"Well, who the hell are the bad guys anyway?" Murdock wanted to know. "We must have some ideas, some place to start."

"We do," Garrett said. "There are several active Macedonian pro-independence movements going on both sides of the Greek border. The ones north of the border have a longer history, and more practice. The ones south of the border didn't really get restive until their cousins up north kicked over their traces, but they're making up for their late start with plenty of enthusiasm. Our best guess right now is that one of the Macedonian independence groups is behind the hijacking."

"What groups?" Murdock wanted to know. He disliked the idea of trying to come to grips with a faceless enemy. "Who are they?"

"The International Macedonian Revolutionary Organization is a good bet," Garrett said. The IMRO's been around since, oh, 1893 or so. First they fought the Turks. Then they fought the Serbs. And there are reportedly some splinter groups."

"The EMA's one of the biggest," Presley said. "They've been making a nuisance of themselves lately. Car bombings, assassinations, that sort of thing." Murdock blinked. "EMA?"

"A Greek acronym for a phrase that translates as 'United Macedonian Struggle,'" Garrett said. "We think they're a Greek offshoot of the Slavic IMRO."

Murdock shook his head unhappily. "I thought the Macedonians were Slavic, not Greek. Or am I missing something?"

Coburn laughed. "Son, you've just grasped the essentials of Balkan politics. No label can ever do justice to a hodgepodge mix of Serbian, Romanian, Bulgarian, and Greek Slavs." He stopped, took a deep breath, and began counting off names on his fingers. "Not to mention Albanians, Greeks, Turks, Croats, Hungarian Magyars, Greek Orthodox, Macedonian Orthodox, Serb Orthodox, Muslim, Catholic, atheist, and the Lord alone knows what else, most of them hating everyone else in the neighborhood. In this case, most Macedonians are Slavs… but there are plenty of Greeks who would like to see Greek Macedonia independent for one reason or another."

"The worst part of all of this," Garrett went on, "is the number of outside parties who have an interest in Balkan politics. Italy is poised to become the money man for the emerging Balkan republics, something like Japan in Asia today, and they have a vested interest in Trieste, up the Adriatic coast here. Austria and Hungary both want to see Slovenia stay independent, and that independence would be threatened if the war spread. Russia has a keen interest, of course. Yugoslavia was an ally, an anus and energy market, and a fellow Communist state, even if old Tito never saw eye to eye with the Kremlin. Besides, Russian Slavs don't want to see their South Slav cousins — that's what Yugoslavia means, by the way, 'South Slav' — they don't want to see them pushed around."

"The Russian ultra-nationalists," Presley said, "have been talking about re-imposing the socialist workers' paradise on the whole region. They're afraid all-out war in the Balkans could spill over into Moldova, Ukraine, and even Russia itself. Besides, there are all of those lovely warm-water ports on the Adriatic. Dubrovnik, Kotor, Split, and all the rest."

"Then there's Turkey," Coburn said, "which would love an excuse to get into a general war with Greece, even if they are both members of NATO. We've got literally dozens of players in this show, all with hard reasons to either back or block Macedonian unity."

"Sounds like that old cliche, the Balkan powder keg," Murdock said.

"If you want cliches," Coburn said, "try this one. The Ellen Kingston hijacking is the fuse, and it's burning damned short now. Fumble this one and we touch the whole damned mess off."

"What do you think the terrorists, whoever is behind it, what do you think they're trying to accomplish?"

"Lieutenant, that's anybody's guess right now," Garrett said, smiling through his beard. "We probably won't know until they do try to contact us. Chances are they'll have a list of political demands. You know, U.S. recognition of a Greater Macedonia, or something like that. Maybe leverage from Washington against Athens."

"And then there's the Armageddon scenario," Presley said.

"Armageddon scenario? What's that?"

"The idea that someone, the EMA or the Serbs or some other damned bunch of malcontents, actually wants a general war, that they kidnapped Kingston because they knew we would intervene militarily. You see, if Bulgaria, Greece, Turkey, Italy, Russia, and the United States, along with most of the other nations of Europe, all wound up involved in a devastating war, maybe they — whoever 'they' might be — could have a chance to move in and set up as the local tough kids on the block."

"There are some in Belgrade," Garrett said, "who have actually been boasting that the first World War started in the Balkans… and that the third one will too."

"Good God, why?"

"Is matter of pride," Stepano said. "Serbs, some Serbs anyway, see themselves as martyrs, as victims of centuries of persecution. By Turks. By Nazis. Now by Americans."

"What," Murdock said, "because we're trying to stop the slaughter of the Bosnian Muslims?"

Stepano shrugged. "They see it as their chance to get even. Like I say, they think they're victims. It is… it is insanity."

"'They?'" Garrett said. "Aren't you a Serb?"

"I," Stepano said, straightening a bit, "am American. Sir."

"Good man," Murdock said. "It's going to be good to have you with us." He meant it. The complexities and the passions of Balkan politics left him feeling cold and a little lost.

And this mission was one where getting lost — just one little screw-up — could mean not only the loss of his team, but the beginning of World War III.