The Espionage Game

by Susan Glinert Stevens

The flight from theNew Babylonsuper cannon to the observation site took just a few minutes. It was located on a hill about five kilometers away from the cannon. Although the hill was lower than the others, the view was nevertheless panoramic. The firing port ofNew Babylon was the centerpiece. It was across the valley and well to the north so that any debris from the shot would fall safely away from them.

  “How soon?” Khalid asked while he wandered from the helicopter to the row of aluminum patio chairs that had been set up.

  “About ten minutes, Marshal,” Puzitsky replied. “I suggest that you put these on, sir,” he added, handing the Iraqi leader what looked like a khaki plastic poncho and a gas mask. “Things might get a little dusty around here before we leave. While the chemical isn’t dangerous, it can dirty your clothes and make you cough. We use this NBC gear as a precaution.”

  Khalid glanced around and saw that most of the others were already donning the Nuclear, Biological and Chemical protection equipment and that Puzitsky had a bag for himself in his other hand.

  “Why?” he asked in confusion. “The cannon doesn’t produce poisonous gases, does it.”

  The Russian had an amused expression. “No, sir, this isn’t for the cannon, it’s for the smoke rockets we’re about to set off. If you remember, I told you in the tunnel that we had several defenses against the Americans’ wonder weapons that allowed them to put bombs through opened windows during the Gulf War.”

  “Such as?”

  “Well, one of the easiest counter-measures is smoke. It’s been used in warfare for thousands of years. We’re about to fire several hundred rockets and cover the valley with a thick smoke cloud so that the American satellites can’t see the gun flash ofNew Babylonwhen we fire it. Unfortunately, the chemicals settle down on everything and make a mess. It’s just easier to wear the NBC gear and keep it off of you.”

  “I thank you,” Khalid said loudly enough so that the others could hear, surprising Puzitsky. He winked at the Russian. “We have to keep up appearances, you know,” he whispered.

  The smoke rockets began going off about five minutes later. Khalid sat in his aluminum chair looking like an apparition from some nuclear nightmare. Shrouded in plastic, his face was covered by a gas mask with a cylindrical canister for the snout. Others sat on either side of him, but it was impossible to tell who was who.

  The gentle popping sounds of the rockets exploding a thousand meters over their heads continued for several minutes and as Khalid watched, the sunny bright morning sun gradually faded as a thick cloud formed over them. Soon it was almost dark, giving the valley a sinister appearance. Puzitsky tapped him on his arm.

  “Cover your ears with your hands and keep your mouth open until after the sound of the gun blast reaches us,” the Russian shouted. “The blast isn’t harmful, but it could cause ringing in your ears if you don’t.”

  The Iraqi leader indicated that he understood and returned his attention to the location of the super cannon. Thirty seconds later, there was a brilliant flash as a hundred-meter long flame suddenly erupted from the barrel. It was made even more brilliant by the gloomy light. A second or two later, the gun blast reached them. While loud, it wasn’t the end of the world. It certainly wasn’t deafening.

  However, Khalid didn’t mind. He sat dumbfounded for a moment after the firing, watching the smoke cloud over the valley boil angrily. His dream had come true. He had his weapon.

  TheAl-Harbi , the Javelin, projectile fired byNew Babylon rose to an altitude of nearly thirty thousand meters in less than a minute. Inside, a small computer used data from the RussianGlonass global positioning system to calculate its exact position to within a few meters and its exact speed to within a few centimeters per second. An instant later, the computer detected a slight error in the pitch and yaw of the missile and so fired small thrusters to correct them. It then fired the main rocket engine of the first stage.

  An American FEWS satellite circling the world some eight hundred kilometers overhead saw the exhaust of the Javelin. Known as the Follow-on Early Warning Satellite, it was a replacement for the DSP satellite originally designed some thirty years earlier to detect Soviet ballistic missile launches.

  Although not designed for it, the DSP satellites nevertheless proved themselves invaluable during the Gulf War by detecting Iraqi Scud missile launches against both Israel and Saudi Arabia. The lesson learned, the DSP satellites were soon replaced by the much-improved FEWS which were specifically designed to spot the shorter-range missiles.

  The FEWS satellite watched the Javelin for nearly two minutes while the Iraqi missile fired its first and then its second stage. Five minutes later, the information had been relayed from the Nurrungar, Australia, ground station to Washington, D. C. Two minutes after that, the information was broadcast over the Talon Shield warning system to all American theater commanders, including the computers controlling the Patriot missiles sold to Israel after the Gulf War. Long-range radars began operating, filling the space over Jordan and Iraq with radar pulses.

  Mahoud Abdel Wahab was a proud and sometimes arrogant man. Born to the desert over sixty years ago, he had spent his life as a shepherd in the desert of western Iraq. While the younger men left for the cities of Baghdad and Amman, he remained in his desert guarding the herd of sheep and goats that constituted his meager wealth.

  Over time, he had come to regard the desert as his, to be wandered and grazed by his flock as he saw fit. Then, two weeks ago the Iraqi army arrived with a number of Russian infidels. They had the audacity to order him off his desert, warning him to stay at least ten kilometers away from a strange circle they had made with oil in the middle of his best pasturage.

  The strange markings were nearly a hundred meters in diameter, with a large dot in the center. Even though Mahoud Abdel Wahab had no way of knowing it, the markings when seen from an airplane looked exactly like what they were—a target.

  Unarmed with anything more than a shepherd’s crook, Mahoud had little choice but to obey and wait patiently for the soldiers to withdraw. That had happened the night before. The soldiers got onto their trucks just as the sun was setting and left, leaving nothing but the strange markings in the middle of Mahoud’s best pasture land. Fearful of ala’ni, or curse, Mahoud drove his flock back to the pasture but remained well away from the markings, staying at least a hundred meters away.

  As the Javelin began its downward plunge, the miniature computer inside calculated its position and speed for one last time and made the final adjustments by firing its thrusters. Soon it would again enter the atmosphere and once out of the emptiness of space, it would have little control over the path it took. However, this would no longer matter. It was now on a ballistic curve that would almost guarantee that the warhead would hit its intended target. As it fell, electronic sensors detected the radar beams searching for it, arming the countermeasures system.

  However, the radars in Israel saw nothing. Not only was the Javelin still well outside their 250 kilometer range, they wouldn’t see the missile even if it were in range. The depleted uranium-based ceramic forming the outer shell of the Javelin absorbed the incoming radar energy like a sponge, affording the warhead a great deal of radar stealthiness. In fact, the missile would have to be within ten kilometers for the radars to see it.

  As the Javelin plunged into the atmosphere, the outer ceramic coating began to heat and glow. Downward it fell, its rounded nose gradually turning a brighter and brighter red. At an altitude of thirty kilometers, the defensive system fired, first separating the warhead from what was left of the third stage and then blowing the third stage up so that it formed a mass of debris which would reflect even the weakest radar signals.

  A moment later, the radar screens in Israel reported the breakup of the missile’s third stage as a flood of echoes formed a cloud. The computers quickly filtered out the jamming, but they saw nothing of the warhead itself as it fell toward a large bull’s eye painted with oil in the western Iraqi desert.

  M
ahoud Abdel Wahab had no way of knowing that the Iraqi soldiers had made a mistake, placing the target nearly three hundred meters from the intended impact point. The explosives in the warhead’s detonation system fired as planned at exactly eight hundred meters above the ground. Although the depleted uranium in the nuclear core did not undergo a nuclear reaction, the explosives nevertheless blew the warhead into thousands of fragments, forming a shotgun like blast of metal particles which tore apart Mahoud and his flock an instant later.

  “Super cannon!” the president roared. “What do you mean, super cannon!”

  “Exactly that,” CIA Director Boswell replied in a subdued voice. He looked around the room. Secretary of State Louis Downley, Secretary of Defense Gilbert Van Dyne, as well as Lazarus Keesley were present.

  “I thought you said that they have a laser in that valley?” the president snapped at Lazarus Keesley.

  “I suggested it as a possibility last week, sir,” Lazarus responded quietly. “Later that same morning, I found out that a number of mysterious steel pipes have been shipped from Russia to Iraq over the last several months. While they appeared to be ordinary pipes such as might be used in an oil refinery, the Russians had shipped them under heavy guard for some reason. That’s what put us onto it. Last week some of those pipes were on the train we photographed just outside of the Gomazal Valley.”

  “Are you sure?” The president eyed Lazarus suspiciously.

  “I have evidence this time,” Lazarus said. “And, in my own defense, please remember that the theory about the laser was presented as pure speculation. Would you like to see the data?”

  “Goddamn right I do!” President Hayward grumbled. “I don’t want to hear any more bullshit like that you gave me about a laser!”

  Lazarus cleared his throat as he opened his briefcase. “Let me begin with this morning. As you know, our FEWS satellite positioned over the Indian Ocean detected the ignition of a rocket engine over eastern Iraq. It was a most unusual sighting because the satellite only saw the missile’s engine burning while it was already at a high altitude. There was no climb-out phase to the launch. It was as though the missile suddenly appeared in space and then fired its motor.”

  “Any number of phenomena could explain that,” the president insisted.

  “Possibly,” Lazarus agreed. “However, it was the first time we ever spotted a ballistic missile in a sub-orbital trajectory in which we did not record the actual launch. Even the weather can’t prevent us from seeing the climb-out phase. Once the missile is above ten thousand feet, we should spot the infrared signature of the first-stage rocket engine.”

  “You have an explanation?” President Hayward asked.

  “Yes,” Lazarus replied. “There was no first stage rocket.”

  “Because it was fired from a monstrous cannon?”

  “Exactly.”

  The president eyed Lazarus while he mulled over the supposition. “You said that you had other evidence.”

  “For one thing we were able to track this rocket long enough to calculate its trajectory. It landed in western Iraq.…”

  “Let me guess. It was launched from this mysterious valley, wasn’t it?” the president interjected.

  “Yes,” Lazarus answered. “Of course we don’t have precise enough data to say exactly where in that valley it was launched from, but we can say within a few miles of where it occurred. The Gomazal Valley is right in the center of that territory.”

  “Tell me about this super cannon.” The president handed back the photograph and leaned back in his desk chair. “Why are you so sure there is one in that valley now?”

  “I think it’s been there since 1990, or at least most of it has been.” Lazarus Keesley took a second folder out of his briefcase. “This is a small part of the information we have on the so-called Iraqi super cannon affair of 1990. In point of fact, the material we have fills almost two complete filing cabinets. What I have here is just a sample.”

  He placed a photograph on the table of what looked like a pipeline laid up a steep hillside. “This is theNew Babylon 350-mm super cannon that the Iraqis constructed in 1989 near Jabal Hamrayn. It’s a town about 125 miles north of Baghdad. As you can see, except for a sunshade built over it, there is virtually no cover. This cannon was merely a proof-of-concept test piece. It was, by the way, blown up right after the Gulf War cease fire.”

  He placed a second photograph on top of the first. It showed a storage yard full of pipes. Each pipe had thick flanges on either end and was encased in a blanket of lumber that looked vaguely like a round shipping crate. “These are four-meter long sections of the one-meter diameterBig Babylon super cannon Saddam Hussein was installing at Iskandariyah. That’s a small town about fifty miles south of Baghdad. These pipes were cut up on-site by the UN right after this photograph was taken and thus they were never used.”

  Lazarus waited while the president picked up the photograph and examined it.

  “I remember the stories,” the president said. “Everybody, including me, thought that the super cannon was just a lot of hogwash concocted by the Israelis.” He placed the photograph on the table. “Wherever did they get the expertise to design them?”

  “From Dr. Gerald Bull, a Canadian scientist.” Lazarus held up a photograph of a middle-aged man, almost grandfatherly in appearance, with a pleasant, round face.

  “He was one of those tragic personages,” he commented as he handed the photo to the president. “Gerald Bull was undoubtedly one of the best minds of our time. He was a brilliant scientist with a dream: He wanted to build a cannon to fire shells into space orbit. In point of fact, he was probably the best aerodynamicist and ballistician of our day. What happened is nobody over here wanted to support Dr. Bull’s research, and so he made a deal with the devil himself, Saddam Hussein.”

  “Didn’t he get killed?” Louis Downley, the secretary of state, asked. “I vaguely remember a hell of a stink about some scientist being shot just a few months before the Gulf War. Everybody still thinks that the Mossad did it, but they deny it.”

  “You have a good memory, Louis,” Lazarus remarked. “It was the same man. He was shot to death in April 1990 in Brussels. The police found some papers in the safe in Dr. Bull’s Brussels apartment after he was murdered. They outlined the general scope of the deal. Under a project namedBabylon , Dr. Bull designed a total of four super cannons.

  “So, which cannon is this?” Gilbert Van Dyne, the secretary of defense asked as he picked up the picture of Dr. Bull.

  “Given the diameter of the pipe sections we have seen on the railroad train just outside of the valley, it’sNew Babylon they are working on.”

  “Do we know anything more about it?” the secretary of defense inquired. He had remained quiet for most of the conversation so far.

  “Only the rough specifications,” Lazarus answered. “I had a couple of our scientists who know something about artillery ballistics look at it. Neither had any doubt that it could hit Israel from even the eastern side of Iraq. One of them also pointed out that the further the cannon is from its target, the fewer degrees of traverse were needed to cover a large target. He calculated that if theNew Babylon super cannon were aimed at Tel Aviv, only ten degrees of left and right traverse would be needed to hit any point in Israel.”

  “Oh, shit!” the president murmured. “Have the Israelis been told?” He cringed in anticipation of their response.

  “Not yet, Mr. President,” Lazarus responded. “I wanted you to be briefed first.”

  “Then don’t tell them anything,” the president ordered. “Not until we know exactly what is going on. If this thing can fire nuclear weapons at Israel, there will be hell to pay. Let’s be sure of it first. Have you gotten any new information on it yet?”

  Lazarus shook his head. “No, sir, we haven’t. They are blocking our view of the valley with smoke rockets every time a reconnaissance satellite comes into view, and this morning they did the same thing just before they fired the ca
nnon itself so the FEWS satellite couldn’t detect the gun flash.

  “Is there something we can do?” The president glanced around the room with a worried look.

  “Yes, sir. We can try the SR-96. It should be ready soon,” Gilbert Van Dyne, the secretary of defense replied.

  “Send in the SR-96 as soon as possible. I’ve got to know what they’re doing in that goddamn valley,” the president ordered.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Several days later.

  “Welcome home, young lovers!” Fred Kelder called boisterously when he opened the door to Madeline and Jerry’s home for them. Jerry suspected a homecoming party when he noticed that the lights of their trailer were already on.

  There were about ten people inside, all of whom Jerry recognized immediately. They were, by and large, directly related to the CLEO project.

  “Welcome home, Jerry, Maddy,” General Winslow called. He rushed from the kitchen with an open bottle of beer in each hand. “Here, Jerry, have a beer. The doctor said it would be all right.” He glanced at Fred Kelder.

  “I want to thank you for volunteering to have the implant,” he added as he handed Jerry the bottle. “Does it hurt?”

  “Actually, not much,” Jerry replied.

  “Want a beer, General?” Madeline asked with an impish smile. “I want to see what you guys did to my house while I was gone. Anybody else want another beer?” she called aloud as she backed out of the little knot of people surrounding Jerry. It might have been a homecoming party thrown in Jerry’s honor. However, it was in her house, and therefore she was determined to be the hostess.

  “It was sort of quiet around here with you two at Brooks,” Fred Kelder commented. He glanced over to Madeline who had begun to make the rounds of the guests. “Did she behave herself?”

  “Like a lady,” Jerry guffawed. “Except when they tried to keep her out of the operating room. However, they learned real quick that you either did things Maddy’s way, or you did things Maddy’s way—the hard way.”