“We need someone with more experience than a first lieutenant to head the team,” Gregory said. “Captain Trimler will have to be in command, Jamison his exec.”
Stansell started to feel a little better.
Pullman stuck his head in the door and motioned for Stansell to join him outside. “Damndest thing you’ve ever seen, Colonel. This Kamagami has got the camp almost up. When a platoon gets finished he’s having them do calisthenics, the old daily dozen, and finishes them off with a two-mile run.”
“Quite a top kick?”
“Colonel, he hardly says a word. Doesn’t need to.” Pullman then handed Stansell a message. “From General Mado. We’re getting three F-11 is in Monday, and Sundown has approved your request for F-15s. We get one E model out of Luke and eight C models for escort. You get to choose the units and the pilots. Looking pretty good, Colonel.”
Stansell had to agree, but then why was his right ear demanding a scratching?
Admiral Scovill nodded at the naval officer sitting in an armchair outside the Oval Office reading a book. Scovill nodded in approval when he saw it was Hawking’s A Brief History of Time. The “football,” the soft leather bag carrying the nuclear launch codes, was in the chair beside him and the wrist chain was long enough for him to get comfortable. A boring job, following the President around with nothing to do. But the military aides who rotated the duty did not complain — after all, it was a path to promotion, and when you thought about it, you could say you had the whole world in your hand.
Andy Wollard, the President’s Chief of Staff, ushered the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs into the office. Scovill was surprised to see Cyrus Piccard, Secretary of State, sitting on one of the couches next to the Secretary of Defense. Piccard had been at Geneva conducting the failing negotiations with the Iranians for the release of the POWs. The meeting late in the evening and the sudden appearance of Piccard could only mean one thing — something had gone very very wrong.
“Please sit down,” the President said. Scovill sat next to Mike Cagliari, the National Security Advisor, directly across from Bobby Burke, the Director of Central Intelligence. Wollard found a chair in a corner and would take voluminous notes. “Okay, Cy, lay it all out for us.”
“The talks are stalled. Hell, they’ve all but collapsed. The Libyans keep upping the bid for the hostages and I think the Iranians expect us to match it. It’s been coming apart ever since that press conference when Whiteside told the world what the Libyans were doing.”
“You’re not talking directly to the Libyans?” the President said quickly.
“Of course not, it’s all coming through a third party.”
“Who?”
“The Russians. Who else? The Libyans have the bid up to a million and a half dollars for each POW. The only good news is that the Iranians aren’t biting. At least not yet.”
“Any ideas why?”
“Internal politics, sir.” This from Burke, the Director of the CIA. “The Islamic Republican Party is trying to align with the IPRP to keep control of the Council of Guardians. But the IPRP wants half of the POWs as a sort of collateral. An Iranian show of good faith.”
“So it’s a rescue or nothing,” the President said. Determination had replaced long-felt frustration. “Terry, when will Delta Force be ready to go?”
“Fifteen to eighteen days,” Scovill answered.
“Why so long?”
“Mr. President,” the Secretary of Defense put in, “that’s not a long time to get a mission like this ready. And there are problems. First, the Iranians are moving an armored regiment into place forty-two miles from the POWs. We’ve got to find a way to block them. Second, Soviet agents have been sighted around Fort Bragg, where Delta Force is training.”
“What the hell is going on?” The President was looking at Burke. “I thought the Air Force was going to run cover for them?”
“It’s glasnost, Mr. President,” Burke told him, tight-lipped. “We have to reciprocate as things loosen up in the Soviet Union and our people are allowed to move around inside Russia. All of which gives the Soviets more freedom to move around over here. While we’re getting dividends in other areas, we’re paying for it by allowing them increased freedom of movement. Those agents are pros and they know where to look. They haven’t bitten on the Air Force cover and probably see it as a Red Flag exercise. We’re fairly certain they don’t know what Delta is preparing for but they’re curious. If the FBI rolls the agents up, the Russians will get even more interested.”
“Can we use the Air Force and Rangers at Nellis?”
“Doubtful, sir,” Scovill said. “They’re really a second team.”
“Okay, continue. Don’t leak anything as we originally planned. I want a tight security lid on this whole operation. Find a way to sneak Delta Force into position and keep the Air Force and Rangers at it. Cy, get back to Geneva and stall. If you have to, make it look like I’m seriously considering outbidding the Libyans. It will help give the Iranians a reason to keep the POWs together. Gentlemen, we’re fast running out of time on this one.”
CHAPTER 15
Mokhtari stomped up the steps to the third floor, two guards behind him. He wanted the POWs to hear his hard leather heels ringing, to let the fear of anticipation work for him. He moved down the wide corridor, stopping occasionally and having the guards throw open one of the twenty-six cell doors so he could see inside. He could have slipped the small shutter back that covered the barred window set into each door but that would have been too quiet. He wanted them to think he was picking someone at random.
“No, not that one,” he shouted in English, slamming a door shut. The tension and fear could be felt as he worked his way down the cell block. When Mokhtari tired of the game, he pointed to a cell. The guards threw the cell door back. The four men in the cell were sitting at attention on the edge of their bunks, as Mokhtari dictated they must be during the day. The two men on the top bunks were lucky because they did not have to keep their bare feet on the cold cement floor. To be caught talking to each other or not sitting at attention was worth a stay in the Box or a beating.
“Him.” Mokhtari pointed at Master Sergeant John Nesbit. The guards wrenched him to his feet. One hit him in the stomach. Then they dragged him out of the cell and down the stairs to the basement.
The men appointed as lookouts were already on the floor of their cells, peering through the gaps under their doors, monitoring the movement of the guards. Feet were off the floor and blankets unfolded as the men sought warmth. A warning tap by a lookout would send the entire floor back into position as Mokhtari’s regulations dictated. It was a carefully rehearsed routine and most of the men could fold a blanket quicker than a guard could unlock a door.
By the time Mokhtari had Nesbit in the basement a message was on its way to Leason’s cell. “What the hell …” Leason mumbled to himself as the tap code came through. His cellmate, Doc Landis, was still locked up in the administration building in the cell next to Mary Hauser. The reports reaching the colonel indicated the doc was okay but that Hauser had been raped.
Nesbit was a command post controller and an expert on communications equipment, codes and procedures. Mokhtari would either break the sergeant and make him talk or kill him. Leason considered if there would be a vital compromise of U.S. security if Nesbit told what he knew. “Vital, but not fatal,” he decided. He wanted to keep Nesbit alive, but he needed a way to pass that message to the sergeant. He tapped out a code asking for a volunteer to go into the box. Maybe one volunteer could do it if the guards threw the man into the right box — the one with a water pipe running up the back wall that made for an effective transmission line into the prison.