The ISIS Gambit

XXX

“Colonel, we’ve been monitoring a warehouse in Raqqa, Syria, as requested. We’re seeing some activity outside the building. Actually, it’s from what might be the loading docks for this warehouse.”

“Lieutenant, just what are you saying?” Brigadier General Rod Manchester, the deputy director of the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), asked his satellite imaging lead.

“Sir, we’ve had the Keyhole”—a KH-12 spy satellite—“parked pretty much directly over Raqqa and we’re getting real-time data. We recently saw a couple army trucks back up to what we believe to be the loading docks of this warehouse. The trucks are covered and they were able to get under an overhang from the loading dock so we couldn’t see what was loaded onto the trucks. However, we’re thinking that something was definitely loaded as the truck seems to be sitting a little lower, as if something pretty heavy was loaded on the truck.”

“Are you saying they’re moving those bombs?”

“That’s what it looks like. From what we could tell, they had a couple Humvees escorting them, too, so I’m thinking at the very least, they’ve started to move them. Where to, is anyone’s guess as we didn’t have the capability to follow the trucks all that far. We lost them at the north edge of town.”

“Good work. Hang on a second,” Manchester told his analyst as he dialed his phone. “Jim, Rod Manchester over at the NRO. One of my analysts just noticed that it looks like ISIS’s starting to move the bombs.”

“Are you sure about this? We’ve got GPS chips on them and everything looks as though they’re staying put.”

“We’ve got a Keyhole parked directly over Raqqa and we witnessed two deuce and a half trucks and a few Humvees escorting them away from the building heading north of town. If these are the same trucks our boys use, I’d guess they could probably hold about four bombs per truck. If that’s the case, we’ve lost track of at least eight of them.”

“You realize what’s north of Raqqa, don’t you Colonel?” Carmichael asked rhetorically.

“Yeah, I do,” came the fatalistic reply.

“How does the B-61 compare to your nukes?” Stonewall asked Dani. “I’m assuming you’re familiar with your own bombs.”

“Stonewall, you can be so infuriating at times,” Dani replied.

“What? You make it sound like that’s a state secret or something,” he replied with a grin as a lounge pillow came flying right at him.

“Yes, I am familiar with ours,” Dani replied, knowing she was clearly acknowledging the obvious. Yours is a little more sophisticated as the B-61 has a ‘dial-a-yield’ mechanism that can be set for a specific mission. We’ve never been concerned with adjusting the size of the yield — if we’re going to detonate one, there’s no reason for us to scale it back — we’re going to want the maximum effect.”

“Certainly understand that, if things have gotten that bad that you’re going to use a nuke, no sense in limiting its effect.”

“Does Rivka know how involved you are with everything that’s going on?” Jackson continued, changing the subject. “Now that you’re going to have either a niece or a nephew, is she going to be a little more concerned with what all you do for Tamir? I know this week’s a little more involved than most but the next few days could be pretty crazy.”

“I think in a way she does. I mean, I couldn’t really hide my injuries from Tehran. Plus, she’s seen the scars I’ve picked up — I mean, anytime I wear a short sleeve top the scar across my left arm sticks out like a sore thumb, and with a bikini at the beach, there’s no hiding the scar across the side of my chest. Of course, getting shot a couple months ago really got her attention. I think that shook her up a bit.”

“How much longer do you plan on staying with the Unit?”

“I don’t know. I love what I do, in spite of the danger. At the same time, both my dad and Tamir are pretty banged up physically. I mean, you can’t tell looking at them but… well you know, this lifestyle really takes its toll on the body. I don’t want to be an arthritic cripple when I’m forty — and that’s not too far off — so I’ll probably stay on for a few more years and then call it quits — unless something better comes along,” she added with an impish grin.

“’Something better’ huh?” Jackson replied. “And I’m sure you don’t have anything in mind, either, right?” he added, knowing full well what she meant.

“Oh… I might. How ‘bout you? You’ve been at this a lot longer than I have and that black patch over your eye tells a clear story of where you’ve been.”

“I’ve already moved beyond being one of the ‘door-kickers’ and I’m pretty much a ‘violence-manager’ when it comes to the actual action. Of course, that doesn’t mean I’m not in the thick of it at times, as you well know. But, yeah, it’s definitely taken its toll on me. I’d like to stay in the business but move on to more of the strategy side of things at some point — especially if they give me a star. If that happens, pretty sure I’ll be kicked upstairs — but for right now, I really enjoy what I do.”

“I’m pretty sure you’ll be getting that star. What do you think our prospects are for getting everyone, and everything back?” Dani asked.

“And unscathed?” Jackson asked, finishing her question.

“Yeah, as this has ‘frontal assault’ written all over it.”

“Pretty good, I think. I mentioned a couple days ago that I’d worked with the Kurds a few years ago. They’re good fighters and I’m sure they’ll be helping us out with this. Since JSOC is doing the initial planning, I’m sure Logan’s included them in on this. It only makes sense — they’re already here and they know the landscape — plus, many of us in the teams have worked with them before and know several of them on a personal basis. The biggest hurdle we have this time is that ISIS knows we’re coming — they don’t know when, and they don’t know how, but they know we’re coming — and that makes achieving the element of surprise that much more difficult. That doesn’t rule out deception — that’s one of the main rules in the Special Forces. In this case, we need to figure out a way to make them believe what they see is what they expect — when that won’t actually be the case, make sense? We’ll do it but no one said it was going to be easy.”

“Do you know General Logan?”

“Not personally, but I know of him. He’s got a Ranger background, not Special Forces, so that concerns me a little — we do things differently than the Rangers — but the 411 on him is that he’s pretty sharp and listens to his people. I know a couple SF guys on his staff so we’ll be okay. Plus, there’s a better than average chance I’ll know someone that we’ll be working with, after all, I’ve been in this AOR for quite a few years — it’s kind of its own brand of networking.”

“So, now, we’re just waiting for word from Jim, right?”

“That’s about it, though I don’t see him, or Logan for that matter, nixing this. Getting in there early makes — there he is now,” Jackson indicated.

“Jim, what’s the word?” Stonewall asked.

“It’s a go, but you probably already guessed that. I need you to swing by the consulate there in Tel Aviv tonight once you land and check in with Major Dale Wolfson. You know him. He had an A-team in Afghanistan with you a few years back. He’s on Logan’s staff right now and will brief you on the plans for everything. He’ll be jumping with you into Raqqa.”

“Yeah, I know Wolf. He’s a good guy. We should be back around eight-thirty or so. We’ll meet up with him when we land. Any word on anything else we need to know about?”

“No, Tamir and the IDF know fully well what’s going on. I believe Wolf was supposed to brief the IDF General Staff on the plans to date. I don’t anticipate anything major changing at this point, and Logan’s had several conference calls with the Israelis as well so everything should be ready.”

“Okay, we’ll be in touch,” Jackson indicated as he ended the call.

“Who’s Wolf?” Dani asked.

“We served in Afghanistan together. I was the battalion commander and he had one of my A-Teams. Knowing Wolf, he probably volunteered for this mission — he hates staff work. Most SF guys do but he’s excellent in the field. One February early on, we had a mission in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan where we were called in to support a NATO mission. We had three A-Teams involved in this and we were under the command of British brigadier general. This guy didn’t know how to use us SF guys — he wanted to treat us like we were Rangers and pretty much storm a fixed position similar to Pont-du-Hoc at Normandy. I talked it over with him to get a feel for what he ultimately wanted. I took this back to my three team leaders and looked at the objective, which was a fixed position at the pass separating Afghanistan from Pakistan. The Taliban were holding this pass and completely blocking it for us. Remember, this is February, in the mountains. Wolf comes up with the idea of inserting above the Taliban fortification. Before Wolf deployed with his team, he took his entire team out to Colorado and had the entire team take part in the Grand Traverse.”

“What’s the Grand Traverse? I’ve never heard of it?”

“It’s a ski-mountaineering race in Colorado. It starts at midnight and covers roughly 40 miles of the back country of Colorado, from Crested Butte to Aspen. There’s some steep inclines and some even steeper drop-offs that each participant has to cover. He thought this would be a great training opportunity when he learned where his team would end up in north eastern Afghanistan. Anyway, he split his team four ways — each three man squad took a different position on a ridge or peak that overlooked the Taliban position. I really don’t think anyone thought he’d be able to get his team in position, especially the Taliban. Once they got on station, they not only had a view of our target position but the entire valley — the Taliban position quickly became untenable. This ‘impregnable’ position of theirs was taken in no time at all. Our British general was thoroughly impressed.”

“And that’s what I love about this job,” Dani added. “Where else can you get paid for this type of training? I’m not crazy about getting shot at, but with the type of training we go through and the ‘outside the box’ ideas we entertain, it’s really a lot of fun.”

“That it is,” Jackson agreed, “but it kind of comes as a package deal.”

“Yes, it does, doesn’t it?”

“Mohammed, when do you expect Dr. Kayani to get to Batman?” Baghdadi asked his chief of operations.

“It’s about a five hour drive so I would expect that he’ll be there in an hour, maybe a little more. He’ll be letting me know once he arrives.”

“Very good. And if everything goes as Dr. Kayani believes it will, we’ll be ready for the first attack Monday morning, correct?”

“That is correct, Imam,” Abdul Khouri, Shishani’s chief of staff, replied.

“The pilots have all been screened and are ready to go?”

“That they are. All of the pilots know the mission and have embraced it enthusiastically. At this point, everything rests with Kayani.”

“Are we ready for the American raid?” Baghdadi asked.

“Absolutely. We have virtually a full brigade scattered throughout the old city and everyone’s been advised to expect a raid from both the Israelis and the Americans at any time. As one, the troops are all excited about the opportunity to take on either one of them. They’re all ready to move on a moment’s notice. Once we see where the Americans are coming from, we’ll be able to mobilize the entire brigade and concentrate all of our forces on them once we’ve made contact. In addition, we’re transferring several antiaircraft units from Turkey and should have them emplaced by Monday morning. We also have people on the lookout for anyone looking suspicious, as if they might be an advance scout or spy. I’m sure they are already here in the city — it’s just a matter of finding them. This is not easy as they are trained to blend in to their surroundings. We have electronics scanning for any radio communications as well.”

“I take it that we have not found anyone yet?” Baghdadi asked.

“We have not,” Abdul Khouri, Shishani’s chief of staff.

“We’ve been keeping an extremely close watch on everything since the Israelis tried to rescue their pilots early in the week. So far, nothing, and no one, has appeared out of the ordinary. If someone’s scouting the place out for either the Israelis or the Americans, they are very good.”

“They are here, Imam, I’m sure of it. We’ve already stepped up security with the arrival of the Americans so if they’ve inserted any scouts here, we’ll find them,” Shishani added.

“Okay, remain diligent. I’m sure they are here, too. I would be,” Baghdadi replied. “Where are we at with our plans for our guests, both the Israelis and the Americans?”

“We’ll begin with the Israelis on Monday,” Khouri replied. “We’ll bring them out two at a time to the Clock Tower Roundabout and put them in the cage one at a time. We’ll videotape the whole thing, just like we did with the Jordanian.”

“Wonderful, this should be another huge PR coup for us.”

“Yes, that is our goal. This is likely to be one of the biggest blows they have ever received, possibly ranking as high as the first days of the ’73 war.”

“And what of the Americans?”

“We haven’t decided on them as yet. We’ve been ‘interviewing’ the Secretary of Defense for much of the day but so far, he hasn’t been too cooperative. It might serve to wait on him until later in the week when he’s seen the fate of the Israelis, plus the impact of the Mahdi operation.”

“That is fine, Abdul. At present, he isn’t the highest priority,” General Shishani replied. “Imam, are you off to the Odessa tonight?” Shishani asked.

“Yes, we are. With Kayani out of town, I thought I’d mix things up a bit and head over there for tonight. Ladies,” Baghdadi said, looking to Johnson and Marshall, “we’ll be spending tonight over at the Odessa Hotel.”

“I heard you never slept in the same place more than a couple days in a row,” Colonel Marshall replied.

“In my position, you can never be too careful. Besides, I thought you’d appreciate a more comfortable place tonight.”

“You’re all heart,” Marshall sarcastically replied.

“We have burkas for you for the trip over but I will need them once we get there.”

“Of course, you will,” Colonel Marshall replied.

“I’m not hiding under a burka,” Secretary Johnson replied.

“Madam Secretary, if you prefer to parade through the streets completely naked, I could certainly have you do that.”

“Give me the damned burka!” she added in frustration.