“Sir,” Murdock said. The admiral looked at him. “I suggest we put a twenty-mile-diameter picket fence around that ship. Move when it moves. Use four destroyers with choppers to monitor the area. If a strange chopper comes toward the Chinese destroyer, it will be turned back by firing across its bow if necessary.”
The admiral lit his pipe and puffed a moment. No one else said a word. “Yes, it should work. A minor international violation of airspace, and almost impossible to prove. Yes, I like it. That task force is within hailing distance of the area. I’ll get four destroyers headed over there. In the meantime we’ll have the AWACS folks warn us of any choppers approaching, and the cruiser Cowpens now on station can launch its chopper and warn them away. Yes. I’d say we’re done here.”
Everyone but the admiral stood. “You’re dismissed. Oh, Congressman and Commander Murdock, would you both stay a moment?”
When the others had left, the admiral cleaned out his pipe and put it away. “I’d like both of you to be my guests for lunch. There’s a great little restaurant in town I think you’ll like.” He paused. “Commander, you better have your men rest up. There is something cooking that may boil over any moment. I think it has to do with Kabul, Afghanistan. I’ll send a car to pick you up at 1130.”
Back in the quarters where the men had left their equipment, and now worked over cleaning and oiling it, Murdock talked with his father.
He called the cruiser and found out that Jaybird was cleared for duty by the medics and screeching at everyone to get him back to Athens. Murdock called Stroh, who authorized a chopper ride for Jaybird. He’d be back in the platoon by three that afternoon.
“Now,” Murdock said, looking at his father. “What is Ardith up to since I’m not there to watch her?”
“She’s doing just fine. Ardith told me to tell you that she’s had two more job offers. She calls them positions. Big steps up the ladder, but they are in D.C. She says she hasn’t said yes or no and wants to talk with you first.”
“That woman is going to drive me out of the Navy yet.”
“Couldn’t happen at a better time. The Twenty-first District in Virginia is opening up for a special election next June. Crawford is resigning. He’s not in good health and says he can wrap up his projects by May. Since a slot has to be open before a special can be held, it will be in June. You could move into that district and run.”
Murdock laughed. “Dad, I’m not a politician. I don’t even know what diplomatic means. I take direct action. Couldn’t you just see me putting a stranglehold on some Congressman right on the House floor until he voted my way?”
They both laughed. The Congressman went serious first. “You think about it, Blake. Might not be a chance like this for several more years.”
“I’ll think about it. But first I have forty-nine nuclear warheads to worry about, and some of them probably are in Afghanistan right now. My guess is that we’ll be on our way over there within twenty-four hours. One big drawback: Only one of my men speaks Persian, nobody knows Pashto.”
17
“There is no good way to get into Afghanistan,” Murdock said as he faced the gathering in Admiral Tanning’s office in NATO headquarters in Athens at a 1600 meeting. “The country is landlocked, so we can’t swim in. She’s in the middle of unfriendly countries. Commercial air might work for three or four of us, but not fourteen.”
“So you parachute in,” General Archibald said. “Do that long free fall and get down quickly.”
“Say it works,” Ed DeWitt said. “How in hell do we get out?”
“And whose airspace do we violate flying in there?” Murdock asked. “You have your choice of Pakistan, China, or Iran. None the most friendly.”
“How about the Russian breakoff nations to the north of Afghanistan?” Admiral Tanning asked. “That would be Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan. Yes, I just looked them up on the map. Would they be more friendly for an overflight?”
“We’re not on the best of terms with the three,” General Archibald said.
“Where does that leave us?” the admiral asked.
“At thirty-three thousand feet over Pakistan,” Murdock said. “That sounds like the best we can do.”
“The President wants you to take the lady nuclear warhead specialist along with you, Commander,” the admiral said. “Is that going to be a problem? Does she parachute?”
“With all respect, Admiral, I don’t see how we can take her. She can parachute, but we have no exfiltration route. We’d have to play it by ear and we could lose half our men. We can blow up a few nuclear warheads when we find them.”
Don Stroh coughed and got some attention. “ ‘Find them’ are the key words here, gentlemen. Afghanistan is almost as big as Texas. Lots of places to hide. We damn well better know where those warheads are before we drop in on that country.”
“How?” Murdock asked.
“The Company has some friends left in Kabul. My suggestion is that we talk with them, then we drop in two men to check out the information, and if it’s good and we can find the location of any warheads, then we send in the platoon to take the place down.”
“So that gives us some time for Kat to train four of us how to blow up a nuclear warhead without scattering the radiation over half a country,” DeWitt said.
“Not a lot of time,” Stroh said. “We’ve had our man in Kabul looking for that plane and where the goods went ever since we knew the warheads were going that way. He’s making progress. Actually, the agent there is a woman and extremely good at her job. She has a tentative, but nothing firm. She says within twenty-four she should be able to nail it down for sure.”
“I’ll go in,” Murdock said.
Stroh shook his head. “You’re too damn big. Should be the smallest men you have, especially if any speak Farsi, Arabic, or the two crazy Afghanistan languages.
“Franklin and Khai,” Murdock said. “Both speak Arabic and Franklin has Farsi.”
“What ships do we have in the Arabian Sea right below Pakistan?” General Archibald asked.
Admiral pointed to one of his men in the room. “Find out,” he ordered. The man left at once.
“Do we still have landing rights at Muscat City in Oman?” Murdock asked. “Used it during the Gulf situation. Might be a spot we could take off with a high-flying plane.”
“Once you fly to the Pakistan border you’d have three hundred miles due north to Afghanistan,” Admiral Tanning said. “Anybody know what kind of air defense Pakistan has? Then what about Afghanistan? Do they even have an air force?”
“We’ve got some homework to do,” Stroh said. “I’ll get on the horn and ask the home office about the fighter capability of those two countries.”
“Why not send our two men in on commercial air?” Murdock asked. “Stroh can get them travel papers, local documents, everything they need. Money and a fake company they work for. His meat. Then they meet his lady inside and find the nukes. Maybe the two of them can blow up the warheads and fly out. Be a lot simpler that way. We can give them the skin color they need and they go in as Arabs looking for business.”
“That sounds best,” Admiral Tanning said. “I’ll call my people and the President. Stroh, you get with your boss. Let’s get busy. Oh, Commander. You might have Kat show your two men the best way to blow up a nuclear warhead with the least fallout.”
“That’s a Roger, sir.”
A half hour later, Murdock couldn’t help but grin.
“I don’t like it at all, Murdock,” said Kat. “How can I teach these two men in a few hours what should take weeks to learn? Sure, I can draw them some pictures and show them where to put the charges, but there’s more to it than that.”