“Arielle, have you made it to Aviano yet?” Zivah asked Dani over her satellite phone.
“We have, and it’s amazing here,” Dani replied. “We’re at the foot of the Alps in northern Italy and it’s just breathtaking. The base is almost right up against the mountains. I could move here tomorrow.”
“That sounds wonderful. Say, can you look at something for me if I send you a couple pictures?”
“Sure, what’s up?”
“We received several photos from one of the teams in Raqqa this morning. Several of them show someone we haven’t seen before leaving the al-Qadim mosque. He looks familiar but I can’t place him.”
“Send them over and I’ll look at them right away. We’re not going to get started here for about another half hour so your timing’s perfect.”
“Okay, I just sent them to your phone.”
“Got ‘em. Let’s see… yeah, I know him. Wait a minute. Zivah, where did you say these were taken?” Dani asked with an urgency in her voice that startled her.
“Just this morning, outside of the mosque al-Baghdadi usually holds court at in Raqqa. Why?”
“Zivah, get these to Tamir right away. This guy is Dr. Mohammed Kayani. He studied under AQ Kahn. Zivah, ISIS has thirty-four American nuclear bombs and now they have a nuclear engineer that knows how to build, and reengineer, these things.”
“Oh, my God,” Zivah practically whispered.
“Yeah, this situation suddenly got a lot more serious.”
“I’ll let Tamir know right away. Thanks, and hurry back. We’re going to need you!”
“Stonewall, that was Zivah. She just sent these pictures to me,” Dani said as she showed Stonewall the pictures on her phone. “Our team in Raqqa just sent these pictures to us — this guy’s a Pakistani who worked under AQ Kahn — the ‘father’ of Pakistan’s nuclear program.”
“And he’s in Raqqa… Just how long do you think it would take him to turn one of these B-61s in to a fully functional nuke?”
“Worst case scenario, just a few days. If he needs to reengineer the core, that could take a while and I’m pretty sure he doesn’t have the equipment to do that in Raqqa. If he has access to the proper equipment, probably no more than a few weeks.”
“So, if we go with your ‘few days’ estimate, that means Monday, Tuesday at the latest, and they could have a few of these things fully functional.”
“That’s right.”
“Any chance Tamir can get us hooked up with one of your teams in Raqqa? If you could spend all afternoon here in the weapons vault, we could fly back to Tel Aviv tonight and then insert into Raqqa early tomorrow morning before sun up. That wouldn’t give you as much time as you’d probably like here but we’d be able to get you into Raqqa that much sooner.”
“That could work. I should at least be able to get a good idea of the bomb’s design this afternoon — that’ll have to do at this point. I wouldn’t think hooking up with one of the teams would be that difficult. We’d have to jump into Raqqa but there’s plenty of sites to do this, especially northeast of the city.”
“I’ll bounce this off of Jim but I don’t think he’ll have a problem with it — I don’t think we have many options at this point,” Jackson added as he punched Jim’s number on the sat phone.
“Jim?” Stonewall asked into the phone. He wasn’t expecting his friend to answer on the first ring, though five-thirty in the morning wasn’t too terribly early for Carmichael during the week, a Saturday morning was a little different.
“Hey, Stonewall, what’s up?” Jim asked somewhat apprehensively.
“Everything okay over there?” Stonewall asked, sensing something was wrong.
“Ah, no… we have a new president. President Barre collapsed this morning from a massive stroke. It sounds like he was dead before he hit the floor.”
“What?!? Is Donner up to speed on everything?”
“Yeah, that she is. She’s ex-navy, a sub driver. She’s a quick study and very cool under pressure. We’ll need that in the coming days. What do you have?”
“We have a bigger problem than we thought with these nukes. Dani just learned that a Dr. Mohammed Kayani is in Raqqa. He worked under AQ Kahn in Pakistan.”
“Great. We didn’t need that.”
“No, we didn’t. We’ve been working on an idea. We’ll spend the day here and then head back to Tel Aviv tonight. Early tomorrow morning, we’d hop an Israeli plane and HALO into Raqqa before sunrise and hook up with one of the teams Pardo already has there. For that matter, we should be able to hook up with one of the teams that Logan should have there by now — if he doesn’t have anyone there by now, he’s not doing his job. When I was still with the 5th Group, we had Kurds with us who would jump at a mission like this.”
“Okay, has Tamir signed off on this yet?” Jim asked.
“Not yet. Dani’s discussing that with him now but it only makes sense. With Kayani in Raqqa, we need someone up there that knows something about nukes. She was part of their Iranian team trying to snuff out their nuclear program so she’d be a natural fit for this. She’s more than qualified so that shouldn’t be an issue, either.”
“Okay, I can’t imagine Tamir turning this down. Let me talk this over with Stan and see who all we’ve managed to insert up there. I’d like you to meet up with our guys instead of theirs but either way should work. For now, go ahead and plan on this.”
“K, I’ll get back to you this afternoon.”
“Good morning, everyone. Thanks for coming in on a Saturday morning. Before we begin, President Deidre Donner is here for a brief statement and a few of your questions,” Chris Thompson said to the stunned White House gaggle.
“Good morning everyone. That’s correct. This morning at approximately 3:05, President Jack Barre suffered a massive stroke — a ruptured brain aneurysm, really. He was immediately transported to George Washington University Hospital and underwent emergency surgery. However, he had already succumbed to the stroke. Dr. Mike Lee actually told me that he was probably gone before he hit the floor. We received the news here at the White House a couple hours ago, at which time we called a judge from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals to administer the oath of office.”
“Madam President, had the president been ill prior to this happening?” a reporter from the New York Times asked.
“Nothing that was thought too concerning. He had been complaining of a headache all week that had gradually gotten worse which is really the only complaint he mentioned. At this point, we don’t know if that’s related to this morning’s tragic event.”
“What about the First Lady?” another reporter asked.
“She was taken to the hospital at the same time as the President, though she wasn’t with him when he collapsed. She’ll be residing here for the time being and I’ll continue to live at the Naval Observatory until arrangements can be made to move into White House but no timetable has been set up yet.”
“Did the President see the latest video from ISIS before he died?”
“Yes, unfortunately, he did. I say unfortunately as this was one of the last things he saw. For the career he had and the life he led, I think it’s too bad that that hideous video was among the last things he saw.”
“So, is that an accurate video?” the Fox News’ White House correspondent asked.
“I can’t comment on the entire video but I can confirm that the women in the video are indeed Secretary Johnson and Lieutenant Colonel Susan Marshall. She was the co-pilot of the Secretaries’ plane.”
“Chris, so what happened that the Secretaries are hostages of ISIS?” another correspondent asked.
“Last night, we received confirmation that the Secretaries’ plane was forced down late yesterday afternoon at Batman air base in extreme southeastern Turkey.”
“What do you mean, ‘forced down?’”
“As we currently understand it, they were jumped by four F-16s based out of Batman. You have all heard of the unrest in Turkey that started yesterday afternoon. We called the Secretaries home right away but we had no expectation at all that much of Turkey’s air force would join with ISIS.”
“Didn’t they have any type of escort in the region?” another correspondent asked out.
“Yes they did — a pair of Eagles and a pair Raptors were in the region but, like I said, ISIS’s fighters got the jump on them.”
“Chris, that doesn’t make any sense. How do four Vipers get a jump on a pair of Raptors? The Vipers can’t even see the Raptors on radar?” another reporter asked.
“The Raptors were in the region but were not expecting any problems. The Secretaries’ plane flew directly over Batman so they flew directly into the Vipers’ path. Once intercepted, a single Raptor shot down all four of the Vipers, too late for the Secretaries, unfortunately.”
“Chris, if I can follow up, you haven’t answered my question: what do you mean when you said they were ‘forced down’?”
“At least one of the F-16s fired their cannon at the Secretaries’ plane, taking out one of the engines and then shooting the cabin full of holes.”
“Oh, my God!” several correspondents cried out.
“What about casualties?”
“We don’t have a full accounting but I can confirm that Colonel Bob McKenzie, the pilot of the aircraft, was killed. We have already contacted his family so they are aware of this. There were several other fatalities and injured, but again, we do not have a full accounting. We only know of Colonel McKenzie’s death as Secretary Axelsson helped Colonel Susan Marshall fly the crippled plane.”
“Have their families been notified? I’d hate to think of them waking up on a Saturday morning to see their wives and mothers in this video.”
“Yes, we have notified the families of each of them. That was among the first things President Donner ordered this morning.”
“What about the bombs they showed in the video? Are these really our nuclear bombs?” another correspondent asked.
“I cannot comment on that.”
“What do you mean? Those bombs in the cargo hold of the plane are definitely American — the labeling on each one is pretty clear.”
“As I said, I simply cannot comment.”
“In other words, it’s another mission for the SEALs,” simply a statement from another reporter.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Thompson replied. “You know as well as I do that ISIS is nothing more than a propaganda machine. Plus, ISIS has more than demonstrated their penchant for video editing.”
“I understand that,” the reporter replied, “it’s just that the pictures of the bombs in this instance looked incredibly authentic, right down to some of the serial numbers on them.”
“Like I said, I can’t comment on this.”
“Stan, Jim Carmichael. Say, I’m following up on something we found out earlier this morning about ISIS. Do you know what type of PAL the B-61s at Incirlik had?”
“Yes, we do, they were predominantly CAT Cs. They’re an older device that we were in a bit of a rush to get upgraded. They disable the device but do not actually destroy the weapon,” Kaufman replied somewhat hesitantly.
“So, I take it that we can’t remotely access these devices, then either, can we?”
“No, we can’t. Why?” Kaufman asked with noticeable growing trepidation. “What’s up?”
“I just heard from Colonel Tom Jackson….”
“This the same guy you had in Iran a couple months ago, right?” Kaufman asked.
“Yes, it is. He’s currently in Aviano with Mossad’s agent getting the once over of the B-61. It sounds like they’ve identified an engineer by the name of Mohammed Kayani that’s currently up in Raqqa. Apparently, he worked under AQ Kahn in Pakistan.”
“What? You’re sure about this, right?”
“As sure as we can possibly be. The photos were taken just this morning.”
“We got a problem. I need to let General Logan know right away. Meet me at the White House in an hour.”
“General, I’ve just finished the eighth bomb,” Dr. Kayani advised General Shishani. “I need to get started on the planes as soon as possible if we are to meet our deadline.”
“Excellent. We need to let the Imam know right away. He is most anxious. How long do you think it will take to fix the planes?”
“That should not take too long. It might actually take longer to drive up to Batman than it will to update the aircraft.”
“That is very good news. Will the work on the bombs slow down due to your absence up north?”
“Not really, my staff knows how to disassemble the weapons. This has to be done anyway so while I’m away this evening and tomorrow, they’ll continue their work. Once I return, I’ll be able to work on their reassembly right away.”
“Imam, Dr. Kayani here informs me that he is ready to head up to Batman with the first of the bombs.”
“Wonderful. So, we could essentially launch the Mahdi operation Sunday evening? Is that correct?”
“Yes, I believe it is. I still hope to get up there tonight and that will give me all day to work on wiring each of the planes to accommodate the B-61s. I don’t anticipate any problems with the wiring so I would think tomorrow night we’d be ready to go. I’ll keep General Shishani apprised of the status of the work on the planes.”
“You’ll never get away with this,” Secretary of State Johnson piped in.
“Madam Secretary, glad to know you’re still with us,” Shishani said, giving her a lecherous look. “However, at this point, I don’t believe there’s anyone to stop us. You see, Dr. Kayani has disabled the GPS devices so you will not be able to track them but he has not done anything to actually destroy the GPS chips — if that is what you are referring to.”
“You see, Madam Secretary,” Kayani continued, “your American friends can still locate the GPS devices. We have simply removed these devices from the bombs themselves. Once we have all of these devices removed, we’ll simply move them to a warehouse on the other side of the city.”
“As to the actual mission… well, that is something you really don’t need to concern yourself with."
“Jeff, good to see you,” General Kaufman said to President Donner’s chief of staff, Jeff Taylor. “How’s the new president doing so far?”
“She’s doing just fine, General. Thanks for asking,” President Donner replied as she walked into the Situation Room.
“Glad to hear that, Madam President,” Jim Carmichael added as he entered the room with his boss, DNI Felix Jones. “Hope you don’t mind a bit of chaos on your first day as president.”
“I thrive on it, Jim. But before we get too far along, what do we know about Colonel Marshall?”
“Madam President, she’s something else,” Kaufman replied. “She graduated in the top five percent of her class at the Academy. She’s the consummate athlete playing tennis and swimming at the academy and currently runs about five miles every morning and holds a fourth degree black belt in Jiu Jitsu. She’s a bomber pilot, both Bones and B-2s, and served a couple tours in Afghanistan and one in Iraq before transferring to her current assignment. Her husband was killed in Iraq by a suicide bomber about three years back. She has a son who’s a senior at Columbia and a daughter following in her footsteps, she’s a sophomore at the Air Force Academy. Consistent over-achiever, I’d expect her to be putting on her Eagles sometime next year.”
“I assume we’ve notified both of the kids?”
“Yes, we have, though it is a bit early out in Colorado for a Saturday morning.”
“Good, not what anyone wants to wake up to but I’m glad we got to both of them first. Okay, what’s next?”
“Madam President, this morning, Colonel Tom Jackson called me from Aviano Air Base. He’s there with a Mossad contact of his who’s—
“Right, we just discussed this yesterday afternoon, though it does seem like last week,” President Donner cut him off.
“Well, Lieutenant Colonel Yaniv reviewed some photos their advance team took in Raqqa this morning and she identified a Pakistani nuclear engineer named Mohammed Kayani. This guy apparently worked under AQ Kahn.”
“Wonderful. General, what does this do to our timetable?” President Donner asked Kaufman.
“It accelerates it dramatically,” the general replied.
“Madam President,” Carmichael interrupted, “when I spoke with Colonel Jackson, he raised the possibility of him and Yaniv HALO-ing into Raqqa sometime early in the morning and meeting up with either one of the Mossad teams or a team of ours that we’ve managed to insert. Lieutenant Colonel Yaniv worked on Mossad’s Iranian team for a few years trying to snuff out Iran’s nuclear program — this would be a pretty similar operation.”
“Except that in Iran, the Israelis had an established safe house, operated in a much more civilized society and didn’t have the pressure of dealing with live nuclear weapons,” Pam McDowell added.
“Jim, what would you have Jackson and Yaniv do? What would their orders be?” President Donner asked.
“It’d be multifaceted: First, they’d be looking for the bombs. Each one has a GPS chip but, as General Kaufman told me about an hour ago, these could simply be removed and the bomb reassembled — and then moved and we’d have no idea where they’re at. Second, they’d be on the lookout for this Dr. Kayani and, if the opportunity presented itself, take him out. Third-”
“You mean assassinate him?” McDowell interrupted.
“Yes, I mean assassinate him,” Carmichael replied, glaring at the national security adviser. “Taking this guy out would definitely slow things down for them and give us more time. And third, since they’d be part of the advance recon team, anything they could relay back to us for the follow up raid that everyone knows is coming would only help matters.”
“Okay, General,” President Donner began, looking at Kaufman, “ISIS stole these things on Friday afternoon — their time. Just how long would it take this Kayani guy to remove or bypass the PAL and turn this into a functioning nuclear weapon?”
“No more than a few days and he’d have several of them done. To get all of them done, probably about a week.”
“So, ‘a few days’ puts us at Tuesday? Monday at the earliest? Can we react that fast?”
“Yes, ma’am. From a logistical standpoint, we’ll be ready to roll in about eight hours. I’d prefer to give Logan’s troops a few hours to get ready and finalize their planning. Plus, this will give them an opportunity to review the latest intel from the teams on the ground. I’d say kickoff around four AM local time, Monday morning.”
“How sure are we of the locations? Baghdadi is known for not spending the night in the same place for more than a couple nights.”
“Madam President, we’re aware of that,” Carmichael added. “We’re pretty confident that since he has Andrea and Colonel Marshall with him, pretty much round the clock, he’ll be a little more confident in his security and, possibly, let down his guard just a bit. We fully believe that he’ll be in the Al-Qadim mosque along with the rest of the hostages. Plus, I’ve been in contact with Tamir Pardo in Tel Aviv, and they remain confident that their pilots are still in the same mosque.”
“Okay, get Colonel Jackson and his Israeli partner on the ground in Raqqa. They’ll need the frequency to locate the nukes so make sure they have that as well. Let them know that kickoff is scheduled for Monday morning. Anything else?”
“Not at the moment, Madam President.”
“Okay, what I’m hearing then, is that we could go in roughly twenty-four hours from now — approximately tomorrow at dusk in Raqqa or thirty-six hours from now which would be early Monday morning. General, how much lead time would you need if we launch tomorrow evening?”
“Probably a couple hours, Madam President.”
“That would be, what, about nine-thirty our time tomorrow morning. Okay, let’s reconvene later this afternoon, call it six o’clock — that’s the eight hours you indicated General — and see where we’re at with everything.”
“Oh, and General,” President Donner said, looking directly at General Kaufman with a fire in her eyes he hadn’t seen before, “if we get the chance, we need to put Baghdadi down like the rabid dog he is — and if Colonel Marshall is the one who does it, I am perfectly fine with that. Do you understand?”
“Perfectly, Madam President.”