Counterfire sts-16

by Keith Douglass

  “Yes, sir, Colonel. We’ll find it.”

  The colonel walked out and Murdock frowned. Some one-squad projects. He wondered what they would be.

  19

  The following afternoon, Murdock, DeWitt, and Lam sat in a meeting room at the Rama Army Base in Ramallah. Colonel Ben-Ami led the group of planners from the three services.

  “I’ll come right to the point. We have several targets in the West Bank that we have been wanting to strike at. One of particular urgency has seemed to be out of our reach.

  “This is a man known only as El Cuchillo, which is Spanish for The Knife. You may have heard of him. He was one of the top planners in what we Israelis still call the Munich Massacre at the Olympic Games in Germany on September 5, 1972. Most of the weightlifting team was killed in the botched attempt at rescuing them from where they were kept hostage in a dormitory. Eleven Israeli athletes, five members of the Arab Black September gang, and one German were all killed in the rescue try. The Knife planned and directed the hostage takeover, but was not on the site at the time of the attack. He also carried out three deadly terrorist bombings and submachine-gun attacks at the Jerusalem airport. He has been the leader in at least twenty bombing attacks on Israel and her people in which more than three hundred have been murdered.

  “He is now in his late seventies, says he is retired from his ‘police’ work with the PLO and that he is no longer interested in politics. He is also a rich man from what most experts agree are terrorist attacks on other nations that were probably paid for by OPEC.

  “With his money he has bought a whole village. He is the mayor, the chief of police, the master of everyone who lives there. He is now known as the King of En Gedi. Technically, En Gedi is outside of the West Bank, in the territory of Israel. But it’s so close to the Palestinian Authority area that they in fact control it. Most of the people there are Arabs, intensely loyal to Cuchillo.

  “Israeli citizens or Army personnel can’t move about there freely. Besides the PA, the whole town’s residents devote themselves to his protection. We have lost two three-man squads going in there deeply undercover to take him out. He’s a blight on the face of mankind. We would like to remove him from this earth by any means possible.

  “Which brings us back to En Gedi and the Dead Sea. As you know, the Dead Sea is not a sea, but a lake which is fifty miles long, eleven miles wide at points, and at the deepest over thirteen hundred feet down. It is the lowest body of water on earth. It is truly a dead lake, with no fish or wildlife strong enough to live in it. Its only life is a few strains of bacteria. Salinity is three hundred parts per thousand, which is from two to five times as salty as the Great Salt Lake in Utah, where they have a commercial brine shrimp operation.

  “Why am I talking about the Dead Sea? We now believe it’s the only way to get to The Knife. His defenses are in a semicircle around the palace he has built on the very edge of the Dead Sea. That’s one of the reasons we have the U.S. Navy SEALs with us. You have much more practical experience in saltwater operations than our men do, and you have simply been trained to a higher level of aquatic efficiency.

  “That is our first target for the day. We won’t leave you out on a stick. We will carry out helicopter raids on another known terrorist who lives nearby. The attack should pull a lot of resources from the protection around The Knife, and make your attack on him at least possible. I don’t want to delude you SEALs. This will be one of the toughest missions that you’ve ever undertaken.

  “With some arm-twisting and cooperation, we think we can insert you into the Dead Sea about twenty miles below En Gedi. At night you should be able to walk along the shore at most points. We’ll get into that when we do our detailed planning.

  “Now, for the rest of you we have some projects that are dry. Last night one of our cars was stopped by Palestinian Authority officers. For some reason, one of the officers became suspicious. Both cops at the checkpoint were killed and our car made it back with no further incident. However, the Authority has tightened greatly the movement by car and truck in their controlled sectors. It will make it harder for us to move through their zones by car for probably six months. We may have to utilize helicopters at times, which draw too much attention. We’re working on that.”

  Murdock stood. “Sir, could we be excused to work with our planning group on our target situation? If you send along one of your men to help us with planning details, that would help. I’d guess there is no tremendous hurry on this one.”

  “No time line, correct, Commander. Yes, go work on your planning. I’ll send two men who know the area to your quarters.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  * * *

  Later, the entire Third Platoon gathered around a table in the big room at their quarters where the two Israelis had laid out a large-scale map of the lower half of the Dead Sea. The Israelis introduced themselves. The first was Lieutenant Ebenezer, the second, Corporal Almon. The officer was tall and thin, ramrod straight, his uniform pressed and perfect. The corporal was short and a little heavy, with eyeglasses and a thin mustache. Ebenezer used a pointer and located En Gedi, and then moved the wand to the darker-colored area to the west.

  “These are the Judean hills. They are not exactly the Alps, but they do present some difficulties. We’ve sent one team through them, but ran up against outposts of The Knife as far away as fifty miles. The closer the team made it to the sea, the heavier the protection became, until they were unmasked and butchered before they even saw the Dead Sea or the large palace where The Knife now lives.”

  “Salinity in the sea was what again?” Jaybird asked.

  “On the surface and for fifteen feet down, it’s a regular thirty-three percent, winter or summer.”

  “Wow. I swam once in the Great Salt Lake, and I remember they said it varied there from five to sometimes fifteen percent. Won’t it be hard just staying underwater out there?”

  Ebenezer smiled. He was about thirty, and had the underwater badge on his blouse. “Yes, it can be. When we dove in the Dead Sea, we used additional five-pound weights to help keep us just below the surface. Depends on your basic weapons package and how much ammo you carry.”

  “Can you get us closer than twenty miles?” Lam asked.

  “That is a problem. The Authority ranges over that area down there. They provide an outer ring of protection for their hero El Cuchillo.”

  “We’ll have to use the rebreathers,” DeWitt said.

  “So, you get us into the sea down twenty miles and we make it to the target and do him,” Murdock said. “Then how do we exfiltrate?”

  “We’ve heard that the Authority has power boats that can patrol the sea near their area,” Lieutenant Ebenezer said. “The boats in that salinity float extremely high in the water and can go thirty knots instead of twenty.”

  “Boats would not be a big problem,” Mahanani said. “We’ve tangled with some of the toughest.”

  “No chance to get overland to that town over there, Yatta?” Bill Bradford asked.

  “That town is also in an area where the Palestinian Authority has a lot of control,” Corporal Almon said.

  “So if we have to go back down into the Dead Sea,” Murdock said, “can you pick us up at the same point you dropped us off?”

  “That depends,” Lieutenant Ebenezer said. “We’ll be in the Authority’s unofficial zone. We might disturb them some when we take you in, and then as we get back to our safe house or home country. If we do, it will be tougher to get you out.”

  “Hell of a lot easier than walking,” Luke Howard said.

  “We’ve been left high and dry a time or two,” Murdock said. “The men like to see the extractors do their work after we’ve done ours. Why not a chopper pickup? I don’t remember the Palestinians having an air force.”

  “Possible, possible. We’ll need communication with you. The small radios won’t do for that. We need something with a hundred-mile radius. I’ll provide two for you before you leave.”
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  They talked about weapons, and decided on one Bull Pup since this should be an up-close operation.

  “Yeah, oh, yeah, maybe,” Jaybird croaked. “Hey, I’ll carry a second twenty over my back. I say we take some long-range protection just in case we need it.”

  They moved on. Timing. How long would it take the SEALs to move twenty miles up the beach and in the water after drop-off? They decided on a night raid.

  “We work best at night,” Franklin said, who had just come in from the hospital.

  “Who’s that we, Franklin?” Fernandez chirped. “Not what your girlfriend tells us.” Everyone laughed.

  “What’s the shoreline like?” Senior Chief Sadler asked. “Is it swampy and marshy, full of salt brine, or hard and firm for hiking?”

  “Much of it’s on the mushy side, no plant growth, salty mud I guess I’d call it,” Corporal Almon said. “You’d have to move away from the water fifty feet to get solid footing.”

  “Any people in that desert?” Jefferson asked.

  “Almost none until you get to the immediate area around the little town of En Gedi. It has developed into a minor farming zone with small plots of fertile ground under cultivation and most truck garden crops for easy sale.

  “Last we knew, there were about three hundred people in the little town. About half are farmers and the rest earn their daily bread by protecting The Knife.”

  “He’s retired by now?” Bill Bradford asked.

  “Not a chance,” Ebenezer said. “He works every day, helps maintain a PLO web site, has e-mail and a satellite phone. He’s sharp, vindictive, active. When he was asked by some of his followers when he was going to retire, he said he would quit when the U.S. and the Jews all got out of all of the Arab lands, including Israel.”

  “How many men will we need?” DeWitt asked. He looked at Murdock.

  “One squad should be able to do it, but we may need the rest of the platoon for backup and security once we get to the target. I’d say we take both squads, unless that presents some transport problems for the Israelis.”

  “Eight or fifteen, not much difference,” the corporal said. “I assume that your wounded man will not make the trip.”

  “I checked with the hospital last night. He’s restricted to the post for a week, so he won’t be going. Tough luck, Franklin.”

  “Hey, Skipper,” Franklin bellowed. “I’m fucking ready for duty. I hardly even limp anymore.”

  “Sorry, sailor, the medics have spoken.”

  Corporal Almon watched the interchange with a grin. Then he went on. “We’ll either go in to the bank by sedan or chopper. Just how will depend on the situation in the surrounding territory and the temperature of the terrorists and their scale of attacks during that week. A chopper would be my first guess here.”

  “Any timing?” Senior Chief Sadler asked. “Like any holy days where they would be less vigilant?”

  “Do unto them,” Lieutenant Ebenezer said, laughing. “I know what you mean, but their holidays don’t offer much help, and I don’t know of any coming up soon.”

  “We’d want an early start in the afternoon from our Initial Point, so we can hit any inhabited areas just after dark so we don’t tip our hand,” Murdock said. “We’d want to get to the water as soon as possible after full dark. Will it be all desert down there that we’ll be going across on this side of the Judean hills?”

  “Our only IP is here at Rama; we’ll figure out the timetable for the aircraft we use. We can bring in a chopper here. We do from time to time, and the locals are used to seeing them come and go. No problem there. Yes, we leave at all times of the day and night.”

  “How far and how much time do we need to get from Rama to the insertion place?” Jaybird asked.

  “A direct line between the two is a little over fifty-two miles,” Corporal Almon said. “A flight line to take advantage of the Jordanian hills would be about fifty-seven miles. Remember, this isn’t Texas. We’re a small country.”

  “Flight time for the forty-six would be about fifteen minutes,” Commander,” Jaybird said. “That’s at a hundred-sixty-five-miles-per-hour max speed.”

  “I’d guess your Israeli choppers would have about the same speed,” Murdock said.

  “Maybe five minutes more,” Corporal Almon said.

  “Are we ignoring moving up the water by IBS?” DeWitt asked.

  Murdock looked around the group. “Oh, for our Israeli friends. The IBS stands for Inflatable Boat Small, a Zodiac-type rubber boat that can do eighteen knots with a fifty-five-horsepower motor. Carries eight, so we’d need two of them.”

  “I’m sure we could get them quickly from the U.S. Navy if you request them,” Lieutenant Ebenezer said.

  Murdock looked around.

  “Beats hell out of walking twenty miles,” Luke Howard said.

  “Stand a better chance against their patrol boats if we had the ducks,” Jaybird said.

  “So we lose them going in, we can always run back down the bank or swim if we have to,” Mahanani said.

  “Request the IBS and motors operationally ready from the U.S. Navy,” Murdock said.

  Lieutenant Ebenezer nodded at the corporal, and he hurried out. “Done. We’ll give you a time line on when we can have the two boats here on site.” The Israeli looked down at his notes and a map.

  “One more thought,” he said. “We try to confuse the PA folks when we can. Our people will probably want to fly straight past En Gedi, stay in the mountains, and touch on the small community of Arad, which is about eighteen miles below En Gedi and inland some. That way the Palestinians there will report that our chopper flew over their town and the Palestinian Authority will be totally confused about where we’re heading. We’ll swing around and drop you at a point maybe three miles north of the village of Newe Zohar, which is also right on the Dead Sea and on the only road south along that body of water. This may increase our flight time by two or three minutes.”

  “Sounds like a good idea,” Murdock said. “Have we missed anything?”

  “Special ammo and charges?” Senior Chief Sadler asked.

  “I’ll have an ordnance man talk to the senior chief about that as soon as we’re done here,” Lieutenant Ebenezer said. “We can furnish you with anything you need except the special twenty-millimeter rounds you use. I don’t suppose regular twenties would work.”

  “Never tried them. No reason they shouldn’t work as contact rounds,” Jaybird said.

  “So we wait on the confirmation by the Navy on the IBSs,” Murdock said. “I think we’re through here.”

  “One point,” Ebenezer said. “How many of you speak Arabic?” He said the last sentence in Arabic.

  Murdock replied in kind. “I do, but not well.”

  Franklin spoke up also in the Arabic tongue. “My Arabic is a little better than the skipper’s, but not much.”

  “You’ll have no need for your Arab clothes, but another Arabic speaker could be handy. I’ve been authorized to accompany you, if it meets with your approval.”

  Murdock looked around at his men. Most nodded or grinned. Jaybird settled it.

  “Oh, yes, nothing like a local native guide in a terrifying foreign country.”

  “Yes, Lieutenant,” said Murdock, “we’ll be glad to have you on board, but your rank will be negated. In the field we’re all yardbirds, buck privates, working as a team. You’ll be attached to Lieutenant DeWitt’s Bravo Squad. Glad to have you on board.”

  The Israeli smiled. “Great, glad to be with you. I know how to take orders, Commander. All of your men outrank me on this mission. I’m so pumped up I can hardly wait.”

  20

  At the last minute they decided not to wear wet suits.

  “Won’t be in the wet long enough to make them worthwhile,” Lieutenant Ed DeWitt said. “That water is warm anyway if we do get damp.”

  They would take no rebreathers either, just their cammies and a full load of combat gear and ammo. Two men carried ammo “co
llars,” the rigs that packed goods in pouches front and back with a hole in the middle to push your head through.

  They had modified their weapons stance a little. Vinnie Van Dyke would keep his H & K 21-E machine gun, and Fernandez would take along his PSG1 71.62mm NATO round sniper rifle. They would take two Bull Pups, and the rest would handle the familiar MP-5 submachine gun.

  “Gives a better balance in case we run into some long-range problems before we actually get into the town,” Murdock said. “There’s a road that hugs the west bank of the Dead Sea, but we don’t know how close. We don’t want to get into any confrontations down there fifteen miles from the target. We’ll make every attempt to stay out of any trouble before we hit the palace.”

  They were suited up and all set to go, waiting in a ready room near the small airfield at the Rama Army Base. The helicopter had been loaded with the two IBSs and two drag bags with extra ammo and explosives.

  “Just saw the bird again,” Jaybird said. “She’s a converted U.S. forty-six. Looks like she’s been updated all the way and has a spit and polish on her that shows the Israeli thoroughness. No worry about this old bird not making the round trip.”

  DeWitt nodded. “Good.” He turned to Lieutenant Ebenezer, who now wore cammies and rubber boots like the rest of them. He had told them to call him Eb. “What do we know about the inside of the palace or the grounds?”

  “Nothing. We have aerial shots of it, which you’ve seen. The general layout, but we don’t know what or who are in which of the buildings. On that score we’ll have to play it by ear.”

  An Israeli Air Force officer looked into the room. “Time to load up, gentlemen. This way.”

  They followed him, looking a little like overloaded mountain climbers. The troops stepped into the familiar form of the forty-six and settled against the sides. The two fully inflated IBS boats were wedged into holders at the aft end of the craft, just in front of where the hatch would swing down for their quick departure.