“Thank you. I look forward to meeting you, Mr. Mcmillan.”
The agent waited until the phone clicked on the other end. Damn! The whole country and world was looking for President Alneuf, and he’d just gotten off the phone with him. The rebels hadn’t captured the deposed president as their radio broadcasts had reported.
He hurriedly scribbled the appropriate log notations, and checked to see that the voice-actuated recorder was reset to the intercept-and-record position. He tossed the digitized tape of their conversation onto the table.
Thirty seconds later, Paul was out of the windowless, steel lined compartment. CIA work was never as glamorous as novels made it, but instances like this made it rewarding. Stepping into the corridor, the agent hurried down a flight of stairs, two steps at a time, to the second floor and onto the balcony. A Marine sentry watched the crowd below in the courtyard.
“Lots of people?” Paul asked as he approached.
“They’re still delivering them,” the Marine replied.
Another truck pulled in front of the embassy. About twenty people, some with families, crawled out of the military vehicle and were escorted by unsmiling rebel sentries to the entrance.
“How many now?” Paul asked.
“Over six hundred as of this morning.”
Paul shook his head. “Well, we should be all right as long as they leave the electricity and water alone.”
The Marine looked at him. “Haven’t you heard? They turned the water off an hour ago.”
The truck pulled away. Combat-garbed Marines opened the gate to allow the refugees inside the compound.
“The Nassau amphibious readiness group is closing the coast,” the young Marine offered. “Then we’ll show those assholes who the hell they’re messing with.”
“Can’t get here soon enough for my taste,” Paul said as he eased past the sentry. “Good luck, Marine. See you later.”
The Marine waved. From the distance, sporadic gunfire echoed through the night. Lights in the building had been turned off to reduce targets for the snipers, who periodically peppered the embassy. The number of sniper incidents had increased today. Since 1800 hours, two Marines and two refugees had been wounded. The wounded Marines were already back on the perimeter.
Paul reached the ambassador’s offices and entered without knocking.
Thirty minutes later the message left the embassy, released by the chief of station, to the duty officer at Falls Church, Virginia.
* * *
The CIA duty officer printed the message as soon as it appeared on her console. She ripped it from the printer and hurried upstairs to the deputy director’s office. The secretary said the deputy director was out jogging, but was due back soon. She offered to wait for the former Marine Corps colonel’s return, but the secretary said she’d see that he got it.
Okay, the duty officer said reluctantly, and then left. But she’d return later, she said to herself. She’d return for two reasons. One, professionally, she wanted to ensure that the deputy director received the message. Two, he was single and so was she; he was much older, but she preferred them that way.
An hour later the deputy director strolled through the door as his secretary locked the safes and turned off her computer.
“Going home?” he asked as he rubbed his short salt-and pepper hair with a small towel that he always took with him when he ran.
“Yes, sir,” she replied. “I put the phone calls and messages on your desk that came in while you were out scaring the natives, running around the park at this time of night.”
“Still daylight, Sheila. Got to run sometime or all that beer and pasta I love will go right to the tummy.”
“It’s disgusting anyway, a man your age without a beer gut. Not to mention without a wife. What do you think you’re doing to the world’s image of the American couch-potato male?”
He chuckled as he moved to the inner door. “Good night, Sheila.”
“Good night, sir,” the elderly secretary replied as she pulled the door shut behind her.
He saw the stack of work on his desk that had piled up during his two hours away, nearly started to go through it, but decided at the last minute that a quick shower was more attractive. If he started through the stack, he’d find himself sitting there an hour later, his wet gym shorts stuck to the leather upholstery with the air-conditioning behind him aggravating his sports arthritis.
Thirty minutes later, dressed in Docksider slacks and an open-necked Gucci navy-blue shirt, the deputy director turned the air-conditioning down before he sat down and began methodically going through the stack of messages and phone calls. He shuffled them periodically to keep the stack as neat as possible as he worked through the pile. Being single allowed him to stay as late as he wanted; sometimes he slept on the couch rather than go home.
Meticulously he read each note, one at a time. Several required phone calls, and he made them. Some he put back in his in box for tomorrow. Others, he read, crumpled, and tossed into the nearby burn bag for the night staff to shred. Around nine o’clock he reached the message the duty officer had brought earlier; at the same time she appeared in the doorway.
“Yes?” he said, his eyebrows raising in question as he looked at her.
“Sir, I was just checking on the message I brought up from the chief of station in Algiers about President Alneuf.” “What message?” he asked as he glanced down at the one in his hand.
“Wait a minute, here it is.”
He read it, slowly lifting the phone as his eyes moved down the message. “Go tell the chief of station to expect instructions within the next four hours and tell him that, yes, we will arrange President Alneuf’s evacuation.” He punched the programmed telephone number on the STE-II secure telephone. Looking up, he saw her still standing there.
“Go!” he said. “Go and relay my instructions to him immediately!” He waved her away.
“Do you want to chop it before it goes?” she asked as she backed away.
“No, just tell him we’re working the issue, we agree and will be back to him ASAP!” he replied sharply. “Now get down there and get that reply out. When they’ve acknowledged, come tell me.”
She ran out of the room. At least he’d invited her back, she thought.
There was something about Italian men that … Well, later. First things first. She ran down the stairs, not bothering to wait for the elevator.
The director answered the phone. “Mr. Digby-Jones,” the deputy director said, “we need to go secure.” Then he relayed the information and tactfully guided the political appointee through the maze of what they had to do.
CHAPTER 2
“Where is Mr. Dig Byjones?” the president scanned the security council members seated around the table, and they shook their heads and shrugged their shoulders.
After several seconds when no one answered, President Crawford continued impatiently. “Here I am late for a meeting and he still can’t be here when I arrive.” He threw his pencil down on the table.
“And, this is a meeting where the advice of the director of Central Intelligence would be appreciated, and what do we have? No DCI is what we have!”
President Crawford shook his head, started to say something, thought better of it, and instead, looked at the secretary of defense. “Roger, bring me up to date on what we’re doing militarily.”
“Mr. President, the USS Stennis is off the coast of Norfolk, conducting routine sea trials and carrier qualifications for a bunch of F-14s and F-18s out of Oceana. She’s been ordered to return to Norfolk to outfit for an immediate deployment to the Mediterranean. After turnaround, two F-14 fighter squadrons from Oceana, will bingo aboard as soon as she clears the Norfolk channel. Two F-18 squadrons — one of them the Marine Moonlighters from Cherry Point, a couple of S-3A antisubmarine birds from Jacksonville and an E-2C early-warning aircraft out of Norfolk. Estimated time for the Stennis battle group to deploy is three to four days after return.”
Roge
r Maddock paused to take a sip of water. “I’d estimate nearer five days for the carrier battle group to get organized, outfitted, and turned around. At max speed, she can be at the Strait of Gibraltar eight days later. Commander in chief, U.S. Atlantic Fleet, is in the process of identifying the escorts for the battle group and will have that done today.”
“Escorts?”
“Yes, sir. The cruisers, destroyers, auxiliary ships needed to round out protection for the carrier and provide the logistic support to keep the group steaming.”
“So, the United States is going to have to wait nearly two weeks before a carrier battle group is in the Med?” Crawford asked, leaning forward, his hands spread out on the table.
“Yes, sir, Mr. President,” the secretary of defense replied sheepishly. “We only have eight carriers. In the meantime, European Command has ordered two squadrons of Air Force F-16s from our northern Italian base at Aviano to Brindisi near the tip of Italy’s boot. They arrive today to augment the four other F-16s that landed yesterday.
Those four, already in Brindisi, are flying air protection for the RC-135 reconnaissance missions. An Air National Guard C-130 transport aircraft, carrying additional Air Force F-16 ground-crew personnel, arrived a few hours ago. We are moving airborne tankers from the States to Brindisi. I have given approval to recall the RC-135 involved in drug-interdiction operations in South America, and the Air Force will turn it around to the Med within the next forty-eight hours.”
“Will those F-16s help if I order the evacuation of citizens from Algeria?”
“Sir, the F-16s won’t have the range to reach Algeria from Brindisi until the tankers arrive, but they will be able to provide combat air protection over Sigonella and Souda Bay in the event Libya initiates another attack. They are already providing air protection over the survivors of the USS Gearing.”
“Roger, we needed the air protection and the carrier in the Mediterranean before the attack. Why didn’t we have those?
Doesn’t seem to me we had much in the Med when this Libyan attack occurred.”
“Mr. President, we don’t have the maritime forces to patrol everywhere, sir. We made a conscious decision, years ago, to deploy a carrier in the Med for only a few months a year. It seemed acceptable at the time. It gave us our show of force and kept our presence evident, while giving us the flexibility to show the flag elsewhere. We just do not have enough carriers to keep one in the Mediterranean permanently.”
“Seems pointless to me, Roger. We didn’t have a carrier this time, which brings another question. Why so many aircraft parked so close together in Sigonella?” President Craw ford picked up a photograph in front of him and tossed it to the secretary of defense, who was sitting to his left. It nearly slid off the end of the brightly polished conference table. “Why? I want to know why! Look at this photo taken before the attack. What the hell was the admiral thinking?”
Roger Maddock peered over his bifocals at the satellite photograph of Sigonella Air Base, and decided it would be pointless to point out to the president that the commanding officer of Sigonella is a Navy captain, not an admiral.
“It’s our only major base remaining in the Mediterranean, Mr. President. It’s a logistics base, not a fighter base. It’s not as big as Rota, Spain, so the aircraft have to be parked closer together.”
“And I guess we think Libya didn’t know this? Didn’t the Navy do any thinking before they crowded this base?” President Crawford asked sarcastically.
“No one expected the Libyans to do something like this,” Roger replied meekly. “Besides, the Italians are responsible for the air defense of Sigonella. It is a NATO base.”
General Eaglefield, sitting beside the secretary of defense, wiggled uncomfortably in his seat and bit his lower lip in an attempt to keep his comments to himself. Rebutting the president of the United States — his commander in chief — was not a good career move. What he wanted to say was that the crowded situation in Sigonella was caused by the administration, not the military. Crawford and his two predecessors had closed most overseas bases, but had never reduced operational commitments, and had never ever closed a base state side even when the military had no use of it. The American military was a political pull-toy for the president and Congress. Policing the world was good politically, and when the political heat got hot, then a little military action overseas took the American public’s mind off it.
Look at that aspirin factory in Sudan.
To meet the never-changing operational tempo, the military overloaded the remaining, overseas bases. Sigonella and Souda Bay were two of them. If Rota had remained open, the scale of the catastrophe in Sigonella would never have occurred. But he didn’t say it. He probably should have, but what would it have accomplished? If he ever wrote his memoirs he’d say it then. General Eaglefield looked around the room. With the exception of him and General Stanhope, not a soul around the table had one day of genuine military experience.
“Yeah, and no one expected the Japanese to sail halfway across the Pacific Ocean and sink the United States Pacific Fleet in 1942 either.
You’d think our Navy would remember Pearl Harbor.” President Crawford rubbed his temples, and then in a softer voice continued. “Roger, update me when this has been worked out. I want to read the reports on the Gaeta attacks and on the USS Gearing.”
“Sir, it was 1941.”
“1941?”
“Yes, sir, the attack on Pearl Harbor was in 1941 and the Navy does remember.”
“Okay, Roger. Point taken. What is the status on rescuing the survivors of the USS Gearing!”
“USS Miami is headed into the Gulf of Sidra to rescue the survivors. We have no helicopters in the Med with the legs to reach that far, and the Italians and Greeks refuse to commit their own that close to the Libyan mainland. The Nassau battle group is moving into position off the coast of Algiers to conduct what is beginning to look like an opposed evacuation.”
“Roger, Algeria is very important, but I want those sailors rescued. I want them out of the water, and if I have to, I’ll send the entire damn Army into Libya. I swear I will. But I want those Americans out of the water first! Have you been reading the papers? They’re coming home!” He slammed his fist down on the table.
“The American public is firmly behind you, sir, on the decision to retaliate against Libya,” Franco Donelli offered. “The polls show—”
“According to the battle-damage assessment provided by that Defense Intelligence Agency, those Tomahawks wiped out most of the Libyan senior military leadership,” Bob Gil fort said, interrupting. “The question this will pose is: Who now is in charge of the Libyan military? The junta has only retained its power through the support of the Libyan military.”
The president nodded his head. “Bob, Roger; it is a disgrace to America for our young men and women to still be out there, floating in the middle of the Mediterranean. How long has it been?”
“About thirty hours, Mr. President. As I said, sir, Sixth Fleet has detached the USS Miami from the Nassau battle group. It’ll take her twenty-four hours to get there.”
“Miami?”
“Yes, sir. She’s the fast-attack submarine that launched the Tomahawk retaliatory strike.”
The secretary of state, Robert Gilfort, raised his hand and interjected, “Mr. President, if I may, those sailors are important, but so is our situation in Algiers.” He unfolded a sheet of paper in front of him. “I have an update from our ambassador to Algeria, Mrs. Becroft. She says refugees are continuing to be trucked into the compound. Three hours ago over five hundred refugees were crammed into it. The portable toilets are kaput and unless we do something soon — she estimates within the next forty-eight hours — the embassy will have a major health crisis on their hands. She wants to know how much longer before the Marines show up. And she wants more Marines on the ground at the embassy.
“Options? Do we have any, or are we being backed into a corner where we don’t?” President Crawford asked, his
chin cradled in his hands.
“What is going on in North Africa?” he asked quietly.
“No, sir, I don’t think we’re in the proverbial corner yet,” replied Gilfort. “The British have asked to coordinate the evacuation of their citizens in the event they are unable to dispatch their rescue force down there in time. His Majesty’s Government says that it will take seven days for their forces to arrive.”
“Seven for them, twelve for us, and they’re asking us for help? We should have had a stronger presence in the Med than what we have.”
“Yes, sir,” Roger Maddock added. “I believe the British think we already have sufficient forces in the Med and they don’t. The British are outfitting a carrier task force around the HMS Invincible — their remaining Harrier aircraft carrier. We are discussing combined operations with their forces and ours once they arrive in the area. We should have an answer shortly.” “Good,” the president said, nodding his head. “About time some of our allies showed up.” He paused a moment. “Sorry about that. If I depend on anyone in Europe, it’s the British. It’s unfortunate that our relationship is so low-key nowadays. We should have been more attuned on how a common European currency and the growing European Community was going to affect American influence. I sometimes wonder how the common British citizen feels about being ruled from the Continent.”
“Sir?”
“Nothing, Bob. Just thinking out loud. Back to the subject at hand.
CNN had a news bulletin just before this morning’s earlier, disastrous press conference; a bulletin that a reporter from the Washington Times — Franco, I want him out of the White House Press Corps; I told you once and I mean it. He never sticks to the script. According to CNN, the Libyans say they acted in self-defense after the USS Gearing fired on their aircraft and ships while violating Libyan territorial waters.”
“Yes, sir. I received a short communique from Ambassador Cannets about that. Alex says the Libyans are displaying radar images and photographs to anyone who will listen at the United Nations, hoping to prove that the Gearing was less than nine nautical miles off their coast.”
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