by Geoff Wolak
‘What was that?’ Moran asked as I put away my phone.
‘Americans think it was radio controlled, and evading them.’ The team laughed louder. ‘They shot it down.’
An hour later, the day warm, and Dick was ready, a whoosh witnessed by men with fingers crossed, and this missile was behaving itself, heading towards Saudi.
As they worked on the next missile David Finch called. ‘Wilco, we just got news that a town in Saudi Arabia had a close visit from a cruise missile. It came in from the south, missed the town and destroyed a large greenhouse.’
‘Twenty-year-old missiles badly maintained. US Navy just chased one around the skies, random flight path.’
‘Old missiles, poorly maintained, yes. But the Saudis will be miffed, what with al-Qaeda firing at them.’
‘It never pays to support terrorists.’
‘No, quite. How’s it going?’
‘We’re on foot and moving towards where we saw a missile launched from.’
‘Just an empty launcher left behind probably.’
‘And some engineers for us to shoot, paperwork to collect. Talk soon.’
Dick informed me that the last missile was a dud.
‘Can you rig it to blow?’
‘I can rope the sled, arm it, launch it. After half an hour it blows anyhow.’
‘Do so, we’re leaving when ready.’ To the tams I shouted, ‘Set fire to all the trucks and launchers, make it look like they were destroyed by and airstrike maybe.’
The team got to work, trucks and launchers set alight, soon a smoke column rising high.
Slider called. ‘We can see smoke.’
‘We’re destroying everything here, we got the IDs and phones. Be moving out soon, get ready.’
It took half an hour, but we had most trucks and launchers burning nicely as Dick rigged the final missile. I led the team west, and towards a point where I could RV with Slider. Radio contact made from high ground, I called Slider’s team north, my team sworn to secrecy. I had to stop them from laughing.
As Slider came in from the south the final missile blew, a massive eardrum-piercing blast, a huge pall of smoke and sand rising.
‘What the fuck was that?’ came over the radio from Ginger.
‘We rigged everything to blow, set fire to it all. Relax.’
Slider’s team clambered up pink rocks to us, took in the smoke columns and then followed us north, an hour to reach the wadi, Pumas and Lynx called for.
Admiral Jacobs called as we stood there. ‘Wilco, two missiles were targeted at the Saudis, I just had the fucking White House on the line!’
‘We go there too late, saw them launched, destroyed those we found and burnt the camp, killed the men. How many missiles were sent up today?’
‘Four we know about.’
‘We blew one, sir.’
‘So one’s left.’
‘Just sand north of us, sir, so how did the Saudis see the missiles? On radar?’
One missile skimmed over a town, hit some farm, and one hit the control tower in a Saudi air base, demolished the tower, but the warhead never went off.’
‘Poor maintenance of the missiles, sir, they were probably aiming south or east.’
‘Yeah, well one was a fucking good shot, right at the tower, nothing higher for a thousand miles of sand in any direction. It was more than luck!’
‘Wounded at that Saudi base, sir?’
‘Three men wounded when the tower was damaged, but they’ll live.’
‘Pity.’
‘What?’
‘About the tower being destroyed, sir,’ I quickly got out. ‘Another claimed victory for the terrorists.’
‘Yes. Apart from the fact that the terrorists in this case get money from Saudi, so I think there could be some harsh language later today between sponsor and sponsored!’
‘I’ll be back at base in half an hour, sir.’
‘Any wounded?’
‘No, sir, we’re fine.’
‘We got wing camera footage of the dog fight, looks good.’
I forced my smile away. ‘Talk soon, sir. And, sir, chats between us are fine, but if you mention the Saudis in the wrong circles your career will come to a swift and painful end.’
‘No shit.’
Back at base, stepping down, I could see Kovsky and Hicks waiting with Clifford.
‘No wounded?’ Clifford asked.
‘No, they’re all fine, sir. We saw a missile launched, got there too late, but we killed all the engineers and the fighters, blew the final missile, got IDs and phones. Two engineers were Egyptians.’
Kovsky noted, ‘Something for the CIA to look at, at least, and no one killed from those missiles. Expensive waste of time for the fighters.’
We walked inside, the kettle knocked on.
Harris began, ‘You heard about the attacks on Saudi?’
‘Yeah, from Admiral Jacobs. I think they programmed the missiles wrong.’
‘One was radio controlled,’ Kovsky told me. ‘Pilots chased it for ten minutes before shooting it down.’
I hid my grin. ‘Or just plain faulty, twenty-year-old kit.’
Harris noted, ‘Saudis won’t be pleased…’
‘Those that live by the curved sword,’ I told him, Kovsky squinting at me.
The American Wolves started to return during the day, some with tales of exploding fighters, many not having seen anyone nor any thing, not so much as a snake nor gerbil seen in the sand. Tracks had been found at certain points, and Harris and his team collated the reported detail and drew lines onto a map, soon excited by the idea that a patrol had walked past us and missed us – now somewhere northeast of us.
I had Swan and Nicholson placed in a Lynx midday, and I sent them off to follow some tracks in the sand.
They returned an hour later having finished off four wounded fighters, and were soon describing a scene of carnage, an accident with a suicide vest having torn up the fighters’ patrol, the wounded men having lain on the sand for several days and bled out, not a pleasant way to die; cooked alive during the day, frozen like meat in a fridge at night.
A Lynx had found two fighters thirty miles west and had shot them dead, no one else seen nearby, no jeeps and no tracks, so we had to assume that the men were somehow very lost. I updated Haines and he had found tracks today, but the person making those tracks had walked around in a circle and headed west again, perhaps wounded and delirious – or lacking a compass.
Kovsky found me in the officers mess as we lost the light. ‘We’ve been looking for launchers, but so far no luck. What they are reporting is that the camps previously detailed have thinned out, small pockets of men seen.’
‘They scattered after the bombing, yes, and that makes it hard to find them, but it also makes our job easier; an isolated group of twenty men are easy to kill. Can you ask your Marines to get ready for some leg stretch?’
‘How many?’
‘As many as you like. Drop them at the point where the SAS are now – or will be in the morning I guess, and make camp. Oh, and ask for those medics of yours in the east.’
‘They’re on standby,’ Kovsky informed me. ‘The tents here, they supplied them.’
‘Then they can come occupy their own tents, and maybe have a team volunteer to go forwards into the wadi by helo. Drop them at the new Marines camp tomorrow if they’re happy to do that.’
Half an hour later, and I was stood up on the flat roof when the cute RAF Air Traffic Controller stepped out, coffee mug in hand, warm jacket on.
‘Gets cold at night, sir,’ she noted as I took in the Lynx, search missions still being flown.
‘No moisture to hold in the heat,’ I told her.
‘I … should apologise, sir, for not speaking to you sooner.’
I puzzled that. ‘About what?’
‘Trish Deloitte, sir.’
My eyes widened. ‘How the hell did you know about her?’
‘She’s my older sister.’
‘After university I sorted my act out, followed her into the RAF.’
‘Oh … right. Jesus.’ I shook my head. ‘Why volunteer for a job like this?’
‘I didn’t, sir, I was down here on a six-month posting anyhow. Some of the men inside are my team, I assess and train them.’
‘This is not a safe spot, so now I’ll worry about you.’
‘I’m an officer in the RAF, with responsibilities and obligations, an officer in a fighting service, so … I’m supposed to be capable of doing this.’
‘Still, it’s a worry; I don’t want to report your death to her.’ I took in her dark outline. ‘How … er … how is she, anyhow?’
‘She quit the RAF for civilian ATC, but hated it, so now she works in a friend’s book editing firm, London.’
‘Married..?’
‘Not yet, a few boyfriends.’
‘How much did she tell you?’
‘All of it, starting with Count Bourbon the Third.’
I smiled.
She continued, ‘She has a scrapbook of your newspaper stories, so it’s a big scrapbook, and we both sat down to watch Camel Toe Base when I was on leave a month back. That name...?’
‘A joke, yes.’
‘We figured it was. And when I saw you here it was very surreal, you’re just like the character in the film, that actor could be your twin.’
‘I should have been on a commission,’ I quipped.
‘I figured this would be a quiet few weeks, but you brought the trouble with you.’
‘Trouble follows me, yes, but I’ll try hard not to get you killed here, and if I think this base will be hit I’ll ship you out – whether you damn well like it or not, responsible RAF officer or not.’
‘She said you would. And she’s now writing, writing a love story, from her experiences of course…’
‘Oh. Well if it’s about our time in the RAF it will be dull.’
‘That part will be the first half, the second half will be fiction, you rescuing her in later life.’
‘Oh, well that could work, yes. Another lady suggested that. Tell me, does anyone else know about me and her?’
‘No, she keeps it quiet.’
‘She’d be a target if the media got hold of it, so warn her, I don’t need her death on my hands.’
‘She knows Kate Haversham.’
‘And do people know about that relationship?’ I pressed.
‘Hell, yes, Kate boasts about you at parties.’
I sighed loudly and took in the distant horizon. ‘I would hope she keeps her gob shut, I already have armed men watching her.’
‘How much … time do you spend with her … if you don’t mind me asking?’
‘A brief visit once a month, but I agreed to make her pregnant, second child from the same father and all that crap. I send money.’
‘No …steady girl, sir?’
I regarded her dark outline. ‘No, the job gets in the way. I get less sex than most eighteen year olds.’
‘And if we met one day in the UK, would you send me away because of Trish?’
‘Don’t hold back, girl, speak your mind.’
She smiled. ‘I’ve lived with your ghost around us for years, and now here you are, my knickers getting wet.’
I almost choked. ‘You have really bad timing, you know that.’
‘So … in answer to the question posed, Major?’
I coughed out a laugh and shook my head. ‘As I said to another lady recently, I live in a hole in the ground and get shot at, the bar is not set very high when it comes to girls.’
‘So I could scrape over the bar then…’
I closed in, a hand inside her jacket, a nipple felt to a gasp. ‘Let’s see if we survive the next week, eh.’ I left her stood there with her steaming coffee, walking down shaking my head, a stiff cock being forced away. I needed a holiday, some time away from this.
In the billet, Salome was changing, the guys trying not to look. I threw my hands in the air and walked back out, the guys puzzling that action. In Colonel Clifford’s office I sat and sighed.
He looked up. ‘Problem?’
‘Women problems.’
‘Ah. Well I’m not well qualified to assist on that one. Are you … good with the ladies?’
‘From time to time, yes, I had the body to attract them, but scarred now obviously. Now I have the fame, the dangerous hero, and it’s an attraction to some women.’
‘I can imagine, yes, the larger than life hero of the big screen. That Israeli major…’
‘Wants to, but I won’t. If she was killed on a job…’
‘Yes, a problem, taking your lady to the front line and seeing her killed in front of you. Would put most men off their stride, to say the least.’
‘The years go by fast in this job,’ I said with a sigh.
‘Given your chosen occupation, I’d honestly say … grab every chance you get. Your life expectancy is not looking good.’
I laughed. ‘Thanks.’ I studied him for a moment. ‘If you could go back … would you change it?’
He eased back. ‘No, is the simple answer. It hurts to lose someone, but that’s no reason not to be with them and to try. We had twenty good years, great years, and we generally only get the one chance at it – so I can’t complain.
‘In your case, I’d suggest that you find someone you don’t care about, and won’t care about, and make it just about some sex between missions, some light relief. The job you’re in – it needs a lack of distractions.’
I nodded as I thought.
‘That lady doctor..?’
‘Pregnant, second time, but we’ll never get together, she’s a world class pain in the arse, very set in her ways.’
‘Your father. Does it … hurt?’
‘Only in the sense of … they took something from me, something of mild interest. When someone steals something from you it’s the principal, more than the item.’
‘You were not close?’
‘No,’ I sighed out. ‘But we got on OK, and I’d rather have him there to chat to now and then, a reassuring anchor to the past.’
‘My father is eighty-two and still going strong. Apart from his bad habit of pinching the arse of his nurse.’
I laughed loudly.
‘No, seriously, they called the police on him.’
In the morning I found that the SAS had pushed forwards almost forty miles overnight, a wide part of the wadi found with firm sand – no headlights used nor needed. The Pathfinders, Paras and Marines had caught up, two small teams left behind.
The SAS were now past the camp that the SEALs had hit and on ten miles, halting in the middle of a wide flat area, a large force given the other units now with them.
I ordered them south to the rocks, and to wait the US Marines, some supplies to be stacked up ready for anyone who needed those supplies. We stacked up the Pumas and four of the Lynx and sent them off, a one-hour flight to reach the SAS, the large jeep convoy easy to find in the sand.
Supplies dumped down, the Pumas and Lynx returned to us, the US Navy starting to ferry US Marines ashore and inland via a dog-leg route, roads and tracks avoided.
At 2pm the Marines were all down, camp being made in the heat, the British men assisting, Max taking photographs, but the Marines had no less than four reporters in with them, video cameras rolling.
When Kovsky asked about the SEALs I studied the map and the known enemy dispositions. ‘Have them land with the Marines, then walk south, we’ll drop supplies. They have … twenty miles to the first contact, then they push on south.’
Mitch called at 3pm. ‘We’re up a hill above a road junction, thirty miles from you just about, OP set-up, but we just had a sneak peak down the road south and there are APC and light tanks, trucks, 105mm, the works.’
‘Give me the coordinates.’
He read them out twice.
‘Who’s with you?’
‘Greenie plus the six spies.’
‘So I think it best you don’t attack down the hill.’
‘No shit.’
‘Standby for an airstrike.’ I handed Harris the coordinates and he checked the map.
‘Yes, road junction,’ he confirmed.
I faced Kovsky. ‘Sort a bombing and strafing run, fast as you can, please.’
He wrote down the coordinates and stepped out, sat phone to his ear.
‘Tanks?’ Hicks queried.
I told him, ‘APC with turrets, could be 30mil, light tanks – so more like armoured cars I guess.’
‘And if they head here?’
‘Lynx have anti-tank missiles, and thirty mil cannon, so they’ll make a mess of those vehicles. But … we could probably do with some anti-tank weapons.’ I went and found the Omani major, and he knew of French 105mm mounted on armoured cars that the Omanis had purchased. He would make some calls; there were bases around Salalah.
Kovsky had an airstrike booked, but I had four Lynx make ready, anti-tank missiles fitted, and they would dust off after the US Navy had done its bit.
Half an hour later the F18s dug up a road, a few APC and light tanks knocked aside and sent flying, deep craters left in the road, a cloud of dust blocking out sunlight in the valley.
Mitch used his aircraft radio to chat to the AWACS, and with the F18s pulling out the Lynx were sent in, a few damaged vehicles finished off, a few fighters killed by door gunners, Mitch relaying the action to us.
‘Scratch one vehicle convoy,’ I told the senior men in the HQ room. ‘But I’m thinking they’re not al-Qaeda, but Islamists from the south, the uneasy allies with al-Qaeda. Still, I don’t like APC that close to the border, and whoever they are – they’re not Houthis, not from the slightly illegitimate government in Sanaa having a pleasant day out the office.’
‘Got a tasking for us?’ Hicks asked.
I studied Hicks for a moment. ‘Major Harris, where would you place the Greenies?’
He tapped the map. ‘West of the main US Marines camp, south twenty miles, high ground with six small camps around it. High ground has a plateau according to the map, and the Omani major confirmed that.’