Martain balked. His heart was racing a mile a minute. His breathing was rapid but controlled. His whole being was riveted on the Soviet aircraft now racing to the north as his thumb stroked the safety cover over the missile arming switch. He didn't want this to end, at least not like this.
For the first time in his life he was doing what he was trained for. He had the drop on the Communist and he wanted to splash him, now. He called for permission to continue pursuit. The controller denied him permission and repeated his orders. Martain came back to argue, but was cut short by the commander, who repeated in a clear and uncompromising voice that Omaha
Flight was to break contact and follow previously issued instructions.
Martain watched the two Soviets, now mere dots in the bright-blue sky, for a moment before he turned. "Shiiit," uttered in a low and disgusted voice over the open radio net, preceded the turning of Omaha.
Flight as Martain complied with his orders.
The first serious confrontation between the Great Satan and the Lesser Satan had ended in a moral victory for the United States.
Colonel Sulvina stood on the balcony of the Soviet Embassy looking out over the city they had secured almost without a struggle. With his tunic unbuttoned, one hand 'in his pants pocket and the other holding a half-empty glass of vodka, he listened to the sounds of rifle fire.
Mopping up. Here and there small pockets of Revolutionary Guards held out, hell-bent to die for Allah. Intelligence estimates, revised after the 28th Combined Arms Army had entered Tehran, showed that the entire defending force in and around that city had never exceeded four thousand. Why Tehran had been given up so freely baffled Sulvina. It didn't matter, he thought as he scanned the city skyline before him.
They would eventually find the bastards somewhere along the line and send them to Allah. If not today, then tomorrow. As far as he was concerned, tomorrow was fine. He was too tired just now, and so was the rest of the army. There was plenty of time tomorrow to make more martyrs.
He took a long drink, then turned his head toward the garden below.
Soldiers were still searching for bodies buried there. The staff of the Soviet Embassy had stayed on in Tehran right up to the beginning of the invasion on 25 May. To have evacuated them might have alerted the Iranians that something was about to happen. So for reasons of national security, the staff, including most of the families, had stayed on. The Iranians had spared no one when they entered the embassy on the twenty-fifth. Sulvina watched impassively as two soldiers carefully brushed away dirt from a body in a shallow grave.
The body belonged to a girl not more than ten years old. Her pink dress was spattered with dried blood and speckled with dirt.
Gently they lifted her from the grave and placed her in a cotton shroud.
Sulvina kept telling himself that she had died in the service of the State.
He knew that. But to what end her death served the State, he could not say.
Such thoughts were disturbing, bordering on treasonous. He turned to walk back into the office.
He stopped, however, in the doorway and stared at the desk before him.
Piled to one side were reports from the units on their status, locations and intelligence estimates. On the other side were orders from Front Headquarters and requests for information. He was not concerned about them.
They were routine and could be handled by one of his subordinates. It was the single red folder in the center of the desk that he stared at.
Sulvina lifted the glass of vodka to his lips and drained it before proceeding any further. Thus fortified, he walked up to the desk, seated himself, opened the folder and began to reread the reports it contained.
Any joy that he had experienced when the 28th Combined Arms Army reached Tehran ahead of the other two armies had been snuffed out when a young KGB major woke him and handed him the red folder two hours ago. As he studied the reports again, he found it hard to believe that the Iranians could do such a thing. If the CAA intelligence officer's estimate was right, this could have terrible consequences for them all.
He carefully read the report of a young captain who had been with the lead elements that entered Tehran; then he reread the intelligence officer's covering report. They supported each other. Sulvina got up, walked over to a map of Iran and began to study it, wondering where he would have taken half-assembled nuclear device if he were the Iranians.
More important, he wondered what they intended to do with it, when and if it became functional.
Tarorn, Iran 0845 Hours, 11 June (0515 Hours, 11 June, GMT) The Blackhawks came in low and fast. Ahead of them two A-10 ground-attack aircraft, affectionately called Warthogs, were working over several positions with their 30mm. guns. From where he sat in one of the Blackhawks, Second Lieutenant Cerro could see two AH-64 Apache attack helicopters coming up. The Apaches would take over covering the air assault when it actually touched down and the A-10s left. Because they were out of range of friendly artillery, the Warthogs and the Apaches were the sole fire support the men of A Company, 2nd of the 517th Airborne, would have as they went in.
Although resistance was expected to be very light, the division commander was going to ensure that everything would be done to keep up momentum while minimizing losses. He had the firepower available and would use it whenever possible.
The Iranians on the ground, on the other hand, did not have the firepower they needed to combat the Great Satan on equal terms. All they could do was lie low in their foxholes and bunkers and wait until the enemy had landed.
Once the enemy was on the ground, the Iranians could employ their advantages-superiority in numbers and a belief in their cause that bordered on fanaticism. While the balance sheet showed that they were losing everywhere, it also showed that neither the United States nor the Soviets were winning. The leaders of Iran knew that they could not win a war against both, or even one, of their opponents. What they could do, however, was keep both of their enemies from winning. In a no-win situation, Iran would come out ahead.
The commander of the local militia, Major Hasan Rahimi, was a veteran of many desperate fights. He had been a battalion commander, in the war against Iraq before he lost his right eye. No longer fit for front-line duty, he had been assigned to command regional militia forces and a small training center near Tarom. His hopes of serving his country and Allah as a fighter had almost died. Now, with the Great Satan striking north, he again had the chance to lead men in battle.
Rahimi had been ordered to hold the crossroads at Tarom. To do so, he had fewer than three hundred men and only a couple of mortars. More men could have been fielded, but there were no weapons for them. Other militia units would eventually arrive, but until then he and his men would have to hold.
The Americans, using helicopters to strike deep and almost without warning, made it difficult for Rahimi to decide where to concentrate his forces. After studying the area, he established dug-in positions at the most likely landing zones, with alternate positions covering the road leading up from Bandar Abbas, in case there was a ground attack.
His plan of battle was simple. Holding half of his force as a mobile reserve, he dispersed the rest to the dug-in positions. The men occupying those positions would hit the transport helicopters as they were about to land. That would be when the Americans were most vulnerable, with the landing transport helicopters blocking the supporting fire of the attack helicopters. Rahimi, leading the mobile reserve, would lead a counterattack as quickly as possible against those Americans who were able to land. He could not allow the Americans to become established. Once they were, they would be able to bring all their awesome firepower to bear, firepower Rahimi could never hope to match.