Brigadni Djeneral Vuk Mihajlovic remained in his seat as the helicopter touched down, a crew member slid open the cabin door on the right side, and his aides and bodyguards clambered out into the night. He didn't like flying, especially at night, and especially as parts shortages and wear and tear claimed more and more of the aging aircraft purchased years ago from the then-Soviet Union. Still, it was the only way a brigade general could maintain personal control of his command, and this time it sounded as though he'd happened upon a special piece of luck.
JNA helicopters in Bosnia tended to fly only short hops nowadays, sticking to hair-raising, low-level flights through mountain passes and valleys just in case NATO or the Americans decided to enforce their ludicrous and arbitrary no-fly-zone decrees. Mihajlovic had been en route from Kotor to the headquarters of his Third Regiment in the hills outside Dubrovnik when the Mi-8's pilot had picked up an urgent radio call from Checkpoint Orandzasta. Normally, he would have ordered the pilot to ignore the signal, but the caller had used a code phrase that indicated he was a JNA advisor with the militias. He'd then reported an ambush on Bosnian-Serb forces that he claimed had been launched by American commandos.
That seemed unlikely. Almost certainly, what the caller had blundered into was a raid by one or another of the anti-Serb militias, probably Croats with the paramilitary HOS, the so-called Croatian Defense Army. There was almost nothing left of the Bosnian Muslim forces, not enough to have caused the slaughter the JNA advisor was screaming about over the radio.
In any case, since Mihajlovic happened to be in the area, it wouldn't hurt to stop and find out what was going on. Mihajlovic was a hands-on type of commander, Russian-trained, popular with his troops. It wouldn't hurt to check on the man's story, especially if the Croats were up to something unpleasant. A commando raid against the naval base at Kotor was a definite possibility, as were guerrilla-style raids against the Serbian supply lines through the mountains above Dubrovnik.
Careful not to give the appearance of unseemly haste, he unbuckled from his jump seat and stepped out of the helicopter. With head bent to avoid the still-turning rotors, he walked toward the building nearby, a decrepit-looking shack that had been the office for the lumbering company here and that now served as Checkpoint Orange.
He was met outside the building's front door by two men, both in dirty mismatches of Soviet-style and Yugoslav army uniforms. "Dobro yutro," he greeted them. "What seems to be the trouble?"
"Good morning, Brigade General," the older of the two men said. "I am Captain Balaban, in command of this post. I-"
"Sir! Senior Sergeant Jankovic," the other man said, abruptly interrupting the militia officer. "I am a JNA advisor with these people."
"You are the one who reported an attack," Mihajlovic said, ignoring Balaban. The militiamen tended to be disorganized and more often than not exaggerated the situation, whatever it was. But the JNA sergeant looked reliable enough.
"Yes, sir. American commandos wiped out a section of Serbian Volunteer Guards not five kilometers from here."
"And how is it you escaped, Sergeant?"
"The chances of war, General. That… and I was able to react swiftly when the attack started." He glanced briefly at Balaban. "The militia handled themselves as well as could be expected under the circumstances. The attackers were almost certainly American commandos. They opened fire suddenly, without warning, when most of our men did not even have their weapons."
"Um. What makes you think the attackers were Americans?"
"Their equipment, my General." He went on to describe the attack, and what he had seen of the two commandos, in precise detail. He did not say — and Mihajlovic did not ask — just what the Bosnian militiamen had been doing at the ruined monastery in the first place, other than to mention that the unit had been standing down, with minimal security measures in place. In all probability they'd been engaged in what the JNA high command euphemistically called "pacification," breaking the stubborn Bosnian-Muslim will to resist, and the Seth general did not care to know too many of the details.
Sometimes, terrible things had to be done to further a cause, to achieve a necessary goal.
When Jankovic had completed his report, Mihajlovic was more than half certain that the sergeant had, indeed, seen Americans… or at least a contingent of NATO commandos. The description of their uniforms — black coveralls, combat harnesses, low-light goggles, silenced automatic weapons — sounded very much like the British SAS, though there were no reports that any Special Air Service detachments were stationed anywhere near the Adriatic just now. German GSG-9 was another possibility; the Germans had been taking a keen interest in military developments in the Balkans, though they were still unwilling to operate outside of the guidelines set by NATO. Americans? Very possible. Delta Force, Army Rangers…
But what could Americans be after at a ruined Bosnian monastery? Jankovic had mentioned a civilian who'd driven up moments before the ambush. That could be significant. A curfew was in effect throughout Bosnia and coastal Croatia; a civilian out in the middle of the night, alone at a place that should have been deserted, was extremely suspicious… and supported Jankovic's contention that the attackers were foreign commandos. "You did not see what became of the civilian," he said bluntly.
"No, my General. I know only that he was there in the custody of two of my men when the attack began."
"And the attack took place-" He consulted his watch. "-just over an hour ago?"
"Yes, sir. I remember looking at my watch when the civilian drove up. It was two-thirty-five."
"Then these invaders, whoever they are, are still in the area. Come with me, Sergeant."
"Yes, sir. Where are we going?"
"To find these commandos, of course. I would like to know what they find so interesting about a deserted, tumbled-down church."
"L-T?"
"Yeah, Razor."
"We got the brass policed, L-T," Roselli said. He'd found the lieutenant standing next to the highway, staring up the mountain, a distracted look on his face. "We're clean."
"Okay. Get your gear together and let's move. It's time to get the hell out of Dodge!"
Roselli, frankly, wasn't sure what to make of the L-T. He'd thought he'd known the man pretty well; eight months of close, hard training and two combat deployments — one in the Indian Ocean, the other just a few days later at the Iranian naval port at Bandar Abbas — were enough to make brothers out of any two men, whatever the differences in their backgrounds or families. Now, though, he wasn't so sure.
It was, he knew, the way Murdock had gunned down that Serb militiaman, right at the end of the firefight. Oh, the fact of the killing alone wasn't the problem. SEALS, like covert forces tasked with counterinsurgency/counterterrorism worldwide, frequently had to get into tight places and out again without being seen and without jeopardizing the op's success by dragging along prisoners. The written orders for this mission had directed Blue Squad to handle prisoners "according to SOP," a bit of verbal misdirection that meant they would not be taking prisoners.
But Lieutenant Blake Murdock was not just another SEAL platoon leader, whatever he might tell the guys. He was the son of Congressman Charles Fitzhugh Murdock of Virginia, and Roselli knew damned well that there was a lot riding on that relationship. According to the scuttlebutt, the elder Murdock hadn't wanted his son to go into Navy Special Warfare in the first place, and had done damn near all he could to get him out. The L-T was a stubborn son of a bitch, though, and the story was that he'd joined the teams in defiance of his dad's wishes.