“On the way,” came the reply as one of the guards in back of the stopped truck jumped out and took a quick look around the driver’s side of the rig. Chaos took two quick shots at him, with one round hitting the guard’s left arm and missing with the other. The guard quickly realized he’d be safer back in the company of his prisoners and tried jumping back in just as Arielle came around and hit him in the leg as he crawled back in. The headlights of the approaching truck forced both Chaos and Arielle to fan out on either side to remain in the dark as the ISIS truck came to within fifty yards of their friend’s truck. The trailing vehicle — and its occupants — found themselves in a terrible kill box as Chaos and Arielle fired at them from opposite front corners while Jonathan fired at them from the rear. However, this fortunate situation for the Sayaret team only lasted a few seconds as the guards in the truck quickly realized the situation and began firing at both Arielle and Chaos, driving Chaos closer to Ave and Jonathan while Arielle ran to the cover of the guard shack.
“Ave’s down,” Jonathan radioed to his friends.
“How bad?” Chaos followed up.
“Took a round in the chest. I’m still here… hurt’s like hell,” came the soft reply.
“On the way,” Chaos called out as he started to circle around towards the driver’s side of the four by four.
“Here comes the scout vehicle,” Arielle advised as she hopped in their 4Runner and brought it around perpendicular to the trailing escort vehicle and then instantly turned on the headlights, bathing that rig with her high beam headlights and unleashing her M-4 on full auto on the entire rig as she stepped away from the 4Runner. The scout rig came barreling in with four of the guards firing their AK-74s on full auto as if there was no shortage of ammunition.
“Ah, Jeez! I’m hit,” Jonathan cried out.
“How bad?” Arielle called back, as the scout vehicle pulled in between the trailing escort and the prisoner truck.
“One round in the arm, another in the thigh. Damn! This really hurts! I don’t see a lot of blood but this hurts.”
“How’s Ave?” Arielle asked, as she started heading towards Jonathan while still trying to stay out of the headlight wash.
“He’s bad. Not sure if he’s going to make it,” Chaos replied.
“There go our guys,” Jonathan radioed as a guard from the scout vehicle ran towards the driver’s door on the prisoner truck, pulled out the dead driver and started driving off, followed in quick order by the scout. All firing from the trailing escort rig had ceased when Arielle raked it over with her M-4.
“I’ll give our friends in Raqqa a head’s up that they’re on their way up there and should be there in a few hours,” Arielle told Chaos. “Jonathan, let’s get you and Ave in our rig and get out of here.”
“Yeah, ours is just too shot up, even for this country,” Jonathan agreed. “Ave’s going to need some help. He’s in bad shape.”
“I’ve got Ave,” Chaos replied. “We need to get out of here, and fast. Do we have an escape route planned?”
“We really don’t. There’s a place southeast of the Baghdad Café that is still well east of Damascus that could serve as a good evac sight.”
“Okay, I’ve got a better idea. We have a Special Forces base at Al Tanf on the border with Iraq and Jordan. We can be there in about an hour and a half — and you’ve seen what an SF medic can do. I’ll give Jim a call and let him know we’re on the way. He’ll let them know to expect us just after daybreak. You drive. I’ll tend to Ave and Jonathan.”
“That’d be great. Let’s get going,” Arielle replied as she threw a grenade into their abandoned rig.”
VII
“Felix, how soon can you get to the White House?” James Carmichael asked as soon as the Director of Central Intelligence answered his cell phone, sparing the usual pleasantries.
“Now? It’s what, 10:30? Give me about twenty minutes. What’s up?”
“I just got off the phone with Tamir Pardo. We have a meeting at the White House in half an hour.”
“What’s this about? It can’t be good,” Felix replied.
“It’s the Russians. I’ll give you the full briefing, along with everyone else, but I think Tamir’s found the smoking gun. I’ll see you there.”
“Tom, thanks for arranging this on such short notice and at this late hour,” Jim said to Tom Fleming, the president’s chief of staff.
“Sure, what’s this about, anyway?” Fleming asked as the Secretary of State Andrea Johnson and National Security Adviser Pam McDowell walked into the White House Situation room together. “It sounded pretty urgent.”
“It’s urgent,” Carmichael replied, as the President and Vice President walked in.
“Looks like we’re all here, Jim, you’ve got the floor,” President Barre advised.
“Very well, thank you, Mr. President. I just received a phone call from Tamir Pardo, the head of Mossad. It turns out, Russia had a hand in the attacks on Boston and New York. We all know two of the cargo ships were part of the Russian merchant marine and that they left the port of Latakia in Syria. It turns out that the Russian naval commander on scene knew of this operation, in all of its details, and forwarded word up the chain of command, all the way to St. Petersburg, the headquarters of the Russian Navy. He’s got the hard evidence of this and he’s sending it our way. I already have the folks at the NSA looking over all of their data from Echelon to see what else they can find now that we know where and when to look, and more importantly, now we know what we’re looking for. Tamir’s thinking this didn’t stop in St. Petersburg, and I don’t believe it did either. The Navy would never do something like this on their own.”
“Jim, just what are you saying?” Pam McDowell asked.
“I’m saying the Russians not only knew of this attack, to some degree, they actually facilitated it. We don’t have all of the details as yet and I don’t believe they planned this attack. I believe the planning for this was all Iran and Hezbollah. According to Tamir, a colonel with the Iranian Quds force approached the Russian naval commander in Latakia about the operation and asked for their assistance. The planning at this stage had been completed but they needed Russian assistance at the port. In essence, I believe the Russians were willing participants in this entire venture and helped facilitate and coordinate an operation that, at last count, killed more than 16,300 Americans.”
It’s not very often that you can hear a pin drop in the middle of a national security meeting in the White House Situation Room, but this was one occasion. The news of Russia’s involvement, to this extent, completely dumbfounded the entire staff.
“You can prove all of this?” President Barre finally asked Carmichael.
“Yes, sir, we can, and the Israelis have seemingly uncovered the entire operation. I’ll be able to lay out virtually the entire operation for you by tomorrow morning.”
“Eric, what do we have for carriers in the Mediterranean right now?” President Barre asked Defense Secretary Eric Axelsson.
“Sir, the Abraham Lincoln is in the Red Sea on its way home from the Persian Gulf. The George H.W. Bush is currently in the Med right now on its way to relieve the Lincoln.”
“What about NATO? Shouldn’t we get them involved in this?” McDowell asked.
“Mr. President,” Carmichael interrupted, “I’d suggest waiting on discussing this with NATO until Tamir gets back to us with more details. In the meantime, Tamir mentioned that they have a team spinning up for an operation that he thought we might want to be a part of. He also wanted to know where the Jimmy Carter was and if she might be available as well. His team is the same one that took part in the Tehran raid a couple months ago, minus their commander who got his shoulder pretty well shot up.”