by Jason Kasper
The Enemies of My Country
Jason Kasper
Copyright © 2020 by Regiment Publishing.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Severn River Publishing
www.SevernRiverPublishing.com
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
ISBN: 978-1-64875-036-6 (Paperback)
ISBN: 978-1-64875-046-5 (Hardcover)
Contents
Also by Jason Kasper
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Thanks for Reading
Next in Series
Read Last Target Standing
Also by Jason Kasper
About the Author
ALSO BY JASON KASPER
Spider Heist Thrillers
The Spider Heist
The Sky Thieves
The Manhattan Job
Shadow Strike Series
The Enemies of My Country
Last Target Standing
American Mercenary Series
Greatest Enemy
Offer of Revenge
Dark Redemption
Vengeance Calling
The Suicide Cartel
Terminal Objective
Standalone Thriller
Her Dark Silence
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To my brother, Jeremy.
Out of every one hundred men, ten shouldn’t even be there, eighty are just targets, nine are the real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, for they make the battle. Ah, but the one, one is a warrior, and he will bring the others back.
—Heraclitus
Some people just need to get shot in the fucking face.
—David Rivers
1
Northwestern Syria
The Syrian horizon had gone from black to coral with the onset of daybreak, and now that the sun was beginning to lift skyward, it settled on a flame-orange glow.
I stowed my night vision device, rubbing away the phosphorescent green hues to see my surroundings through my own eyes—and as was all too common in my previous incursions into foreign countries, the land was staggeringly beautiful.
Windswept hills of rock and sand undulated as far as the eye could see. From my vantage point under a stone outcropping, the ground fell away to a dirt road slicing through the ancient stream bed below, the rocky cliffs lit with the sun’s first rays. The air was brisk with the fading night, fresh with the smell of a new day ahead. This was a sunrise I would’ve liked to share with my daughter, with my wife, save one small detail.
I was in Syria, and neither my family nor any sanctioned military force knew I was here.
Ian spoke quietly beside me.
“We’ve got a ping.”
I turned to look at him, his face softly lit by the screen of his tablet.
He continued, “This is it—BK is on the move.”
I released one hand from the grip of my HK417, a heavy assault rifle chambered in 7.62mm. Normally I preferred working up close with a smaller caliber, but today’s target called for longer range, greater penetration, and increased stopping power.
Keying my radio switch, I transmitted to the rest of my team.
“Net call, net call. BK has departed. ETA to kill zone six minutes. Cancer, stand by for visual.”
Cancer watched the world beyond his crosshairs, a crystal image of the village in the foothills to the west, and offset his reticle from a building just under two kilometers from his position. He wouldn’t be shooting that far today—not that he couldn’t.
The sniper rifle tucked against his shoulder was the Barrett M107, a thirty-pound beast of a weapon that had been beyond cumbersome to haul up the rocky slopes to his current position. But now that he’d reached his perch, and was currently sweltering inside his ghillie suit, he had the ability to deliver a .50 caliber round into anything within a one-mile radius.
Cancer focused on a faraway single-story building, letting his eyes tick to the dirt road emerging from behind it. For now, all he needed to do was report the make and model of any vehicles headed outbound on the road that snaked through the rocky canyons. Then, when Ian had positively matched the trace of their target’s cell phone to the vehicle in question, Cancer would have a few minutes to reposition himself with a line-of-sight to the kill zone.
And once the vehicle entered that kill zone, Cancer thought with a grin, he’d be able to unleash torrential hellfire. Auto glass, human torsos, engine blocks—nothing was a fair match for the Barrett.
Cancer’s grin faded with his first glance of a vehicle leaving the village. He watched for a split second of disbelief before keying his radio to transmit in his Jersey accent.
“I’ve got eyes-on, ETA five minutes to kill zone, and…we’ve got a problem.”
The apprehension in Cancer’s voice made me uneasy.
“What’s the problem?”
“It’s not one vehicle, it’s three. All pickups, and they’re moving in a tight convoy. Looks like five to eight armed fighters in the back of each truck.”
I looked to Ian.
“Any chance that’s not our guy?”
Ian shook his head, the veins in his balding temples standing out in stark relief. “Tracker is on the move—it’s him. Probably in the center truck.”
Cancer’s voice came over
the radio again.
“What do you wanna do, boss?”
I weighed the options. None were good.
We’d already burned an extensive Agency ratline to move our five-man team into position along this ambush point, awaiting what was supposed to be one vehicle carrying our target. The sudden presence of two additional vehicles and ten to sixteen enemy fighters wouldn’t matter much in Hollywood, where every bullet found its mark and the bad guys all died when they were supposed to.
But if we carried out our ambush here in the Syrian desert, we’d better kill them all on the first go. If they managed to disperse on foot, they’d be able to kill us in a counterassault either immediately or as we tried to reach the vehicles staged for our escape. Letting them pass in the hopes of getting a better opportunity later would increase our exposure time amid extremely dangerous terrain swarming with too many armed militias to count.
I transmitted, “Worthy, hit the first truck when it reaches the chokepoint. Cancer, you’ve got engine block of the trail vehicle, followed by the center truck in the convoy. Ian and I will engage the center truck. Reilly and Worthy, you work front to rear. Questions?”
“Got it,” Cancer replied. “Relocating to get eyes-on the kill zone.”
A moment later, and with a touch of hesitation in his Southern lilt, Worthy replied, “Racegun copies all.”
Beside me, Ian muttered, “David, you sure about this?”
“Not even a little bit,” I admitted, “but we’re going to do it anyway.”
From his vantage point on the eastern flank of the firing line, Worthy readied his M72 LAW with nervous anticipation.
The weapon felt light and powerful in his hands; it was a portable, one-shot rocket launcher designed for taking out a tank. Against an unarmored vehicle, the effects would be devastating.
At least, he thought, that’s how it should have worked.
With weeks of intelligence indicating that BK traveled in a single vehicle, this was supposed to be a very short ambush indeed—one rocket explosion doing the job, with a machinegun, sniper, and two assault rifles raking the debris just to be sure. Then it would be a speedy exfil for the team, who would vanish before anyone else arrived. And when they did, the kill zone would appear as little more than another factional dispute in a country where such attacks were a daily occurrence.
But two additional trucks changed everything. Worthy’s job would be largely the same: take out the lead vehicle at the geographic chokepoint in the canyon below. But now, the team was severely outgunned. They’d lose the element of surprise the instant he fired his rocket, and after that...well, the enemy would get a vote.
Worthy asked, “You think this is a good call, or a bad one?”
To his right, Reilly shifted his position, rocking his massive weapon forward on its bipod. A medic by trade, Reilly had a muscled build that made him a natural pick for wielding the team’s sole machinegun.
He replied in a boyish voice, “With David calling the shots, definitely a bad idea. But so far he’s always come out alive. Against all odds, sure. But alive.”
Worthy nodded and cast a glance at the rifle at his side. As soon as his rocket was fired, that rifle would be his only weapon. He adjusted its position a final time, then stopped moving abruptly.
“You hear that?” he asked.
Reilly glanced right, picking up on the same sound—a vehicle engine churning its way across the winding road below.
There was just one problem: it was coming from the wrong direction.
Reilly pushed himself up on his hands to get a better look, then dropped back down and transmitted.
“Doc has visual on one vehicle inbound from the east. Looks like a civilian sedan.”
David replied, “Is it going to be a problem?”
“Don’t think so. Should pass by a couple minutes ahead of the convoy.”
“Copy,” David transmitted, “we are weapons hold until that sedan is out of the kill zone.”
“Copy,” Reilly answered.
After a moment of silence, David transmitted again.
“Cancer, we are weapons hold, how copy?”
Begrudgingly, Cancer responded, “Yeah, yeah. I got it.”
Worthy smiled. Cancer didn’t have the most polished personality on the team, but when it came time for combat, you wanted him on your side of the fight.
He caught a glimpse of the sedan, a battered white vehicle limping over the rough dirt road below.
To Worthy’s unease, the sedan began braking before it rolled to a stop in the worst place imaginable—the chokepoint of two canyon walls, a point so narrow that only one vehicle could pass. It was the exact point that Worthy planned to deliver his first rocket.
“He’s stopping,” Worthy transmitted. “The sedan has stopped right at my chokepoint.”
I cursed under my breath.
“Did he see us?” I asked.
“Negative. Must have engine trouble—he’s opening the hood.”
Beside me, Ian transmitted for everyone to hear, “ETA two minutes.”
Cancer responded quickly. “Perfect. We wanted a chokepoint, now it’s guaranteed.”
“Negative,” I replied. “We are weapons hold.”
“If that convoy stops at the chokepoint, the guys in the back will pull security and spot us. Then we’re fucked.”
“We’re not getting a civilian killed in the crossfire. If we’re compromised, we break contact and exfil.”
Cancer made no effort to conceal his irritation. “Think about this, man. It’s gonna be self-defense, and we don’t have the manpower to fight them off.”
“We’re weapons hold. That’s final.”
I released the radio switch, a sense of foreboding taking hold in my gut. As was too often the case in combat, there were no good options—anything you did or failed to do could pair with some absurdity of chance in the ensuing chaos, and turn out to be either your destruction or your salvation.
To my eternal relief, Reilly transmitted, “Sedan driver has closed his hood and is continuing movement. Clear of the kill zone.”
Ian followed this up with, “One minute out.”
Keying my radio, I spoke quickly.
“Copy all—ambush is a go. We are weapons hot; Racegun, you have control to initiate.”
Worthy and Cancer confirmed the order, and I nodded to Ian. “Let’s go.”
Grabbing our rifles, we high-crawled over the exposed rock to take up firing positions on the dirt road below.
The kill zone was selected for its location between curves—thus ensuring the slowest possible rate of travel—and for the chokepoint in the canyon walls, where any coherent defense from an elevated attack would be difficult if not impossible.
Drawing the rifle stock against my shoulder, I leveled my aim toward the kill zone and listened to the rumble of the approaching convoy. I whispered to Ian, “You good?”
“Yeah.” He sounded assured, though what he actually felt in that moment, I had no idea. Ian’s specialty was intelligence, not gunslinging, and while I was glad to have him around when his electronic gadgets were required, in the back of my mind he was a tactical liability.
I dismissed the thought as the first pickup came into view, bearing black Islamic State flags. Half a dozen armed men sat in the back. The second truck was just barely visible as the first approached the chokepoint, and with a sense of dread I heard the men begin shouting to each other.
Someone had seen something, and the men were struggling to hoist their weapons upward when I heard a loud explosion—Worthy’s rocket firing from the high ground to my right.
I opened fire on the center vehicle, trying to hit the driver through the roof. My gunfire was dwarfed by Reilly’s machinegun unleashing a rapid staccato burst, punctuated by the deep booming of Cancer’s sniper rifle. Amid the melee, Worthy’s rocket found its mark.
The deafening thunderclap of the lead vehicle exploding brought with it an enormous sand cloud that momentar
ily erased all three trucks from view. I continued pumping rounds into the cloud as fast as I could fire, hearing that all of my teammates were doing the same. In the ideal situation, the lead truck would be immobilized at the chokepoint, but suddenly I saw it bowling forward from the dust and smoke, propelled by the center vehicle now ramming it out of the way.
I desperately adjusted my point of aim to open fire, knowing that my teammates were likewise trying to disable the truck before it could escape. But the canyon road’s tight turns resulted in limited sectors of fire, and the lone surviving truck soon careened out of sight.
“Ian,” I shouted, “what do we got?”
He was already consulting his tablet to see if the signal from our target’s cell phone was stationary or, better yet, destroyed completely. After a few moments, his eyes met mine.