Without warning

by John Birmingham

  ‘I need orders from a properly constituted executive. I need to get my people out of that septic mess in the Gulf. I need to know what role we’re going to play here, in CONUS, wherever we end up. I need to know what resources we’ll have. I need to get on the phone to Tommy Franks and give him and his people some hope.’

  Culver absorbed the mini tirade with equanimity, waiting him out. When Ritchie was finished, he nodded, slowly. ‘Okay then. That’s what you need. Now this is what I need to get it for you.’

  * * * *

  Dealing with Culver’s Machiavellian schemes was enough to bring his headache roaring back from the dull middle distance, where he’d banished it with a couple of Advils. Ritchie was not at all comfortable being so closely involved in political manoeuvres, but the lawyer was right. The United States had been gutted and one of the very few working and half-intact institutions it had left was the military. He was also right that it would be an intolerable violation of the country’s founding principles if the Republic became a militarised autarchy in the mad rush of a catastrophe. And then, in mocking contrast to these high ideals, there was brute reality.

  ‘The Israeli envoy is here, Admiral.’

  Ritchie popped another painkiller and washed it down with a mouthful of tap-water from his beloved old VF-84 coffee mug. ‘Send him in.’

  The man who entered the room carrying a briefcase was relatively short and his grey, wiry hair had retreated at least halfway back over his head. Tel Aviv had dispatched him as their new ambassador, but Ritchie was adamant that he could not be addressed as such because he had not yet formally presented himself to the President. (The navy man had flat refused to stand in for the latter role himself.) Nonetheless, Asher Warat was the chosen representative of his government, and as such was deserving of good manners and what few diplomatic niceties Ritchie could extend to him.

  ‘Admiral, thank you for seeing me.’ The Israeli smiled, lighting up his wide brown eyes. ‘I understand the demands on your time must be horrendous.’

  Ritchie gestured for him to take one of the two armchairs directly in front of his desk. Warat did so, placing the briefcase by his feet. Through the windows behind the envoy, the old sailor enjoyed a sweeping view from Halawa Heights down to the harbour, which looked magnificent under a high sun. A few wisps of cloud drifted across a hard blue sky and the waters of the base sparkled bright silver on dark blue. Stare at it long enough and you could almost believe nothing was wrong with the world. The long, drawn features of his visitor, sitting smack in the middle of that view, indicated otherwise.

  ‘Everyone has their own troubles, Mr Warat. I’m sure yours are as difficult as mine in their own way.’

  Warat bobbed his head up and down, and his eyes seemed even more watery and forlorn than normal, which was saying something. ‘Life is trouble, Admiral,’ he replied. ‘Especially these days. And I am afraid I am about to make more for you. Much more – or less, maybe.’

  Ritchie was instantly alert, the fatigue of the last ten days sluicing out of him. The small adrenalin surge didn’t help with his headache, however. That just grew worse. ‘How so, sir?’ he asked guardedly.

  Warat consulted his watch and seemed to hesitate. He rubbed his fingers together and shifted nervously in his place, before checking the time again. ‘You will be aware, Admiral, that the strategic circumstances faced by my country have declined precipitously due to the cataclysm, the absolute cataclysm, that befell your own.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Ritchie slowly, as his heart seemed to slow down and grow to about twice its normal size, pressing painfully against the confines of his chest.

  Warat hitched his shoulders and chewed at his lower lip. The man was a veritable Wal-Mart for nervous tics and tells.

  ‘Your own forces in the region have come under attack from Saddam, from the mullahs, and from a whore’s parlour full of opportunists and crazy men. Hamas, Islamic Jihad, al-Qaeda…’

  Ritchie nodded but said nothing. Just that morning they had lost the USS Hopper and two hundred men to a swarm of jihadi suicide attackers on jet skis. You don’t lose an Aegis cruiser every day, and he wasn’t certain when he’d get a replacement. Probably never. It was the sort of thing that would have made headlines all over the world before the Wave. Now it was a minor irrelevancy to most news agencies, obsessed as they were with the accelerating collapse of their own societies.

  The Israeli envoy glanced quickly at his watch again. ‘Your plans to withdraw Coalition forces from Iraq and Kuwait, and US forces from the region in general, are understandable,’ he continued, ‘if short-sighted in the opinion of my government.’

  ‘Well, sir,’ said Ritchie, ‘I am afraid the withdrawal is an operational necessity at the moment. It is not US Government policy, as you would be aware. I would characterise it as a tactical withdrawal, not a strategic retreat.’

  ‘Or abandonment,’ prompted Warat.

  ‘No,’ agreed Ritchie. ‘I would not call it abandonment. But right now, our presence there is making things infinitely worse, and I shouldn’t have to explain to you, sir, that we cannot sustain our forces even in the short term. Our base is gone. Every missile we fire, every ship we lose, every soldier or sailor or airman who dies is a true loss. They cannot be replaced.’

  The Israeli shrugged and sighed. ‘We understand, Admiral. We have lost too. America was our arsenal and we find ourselves in the same position. Unlike you, however, we can stage no tactical withdrawal. We are trapped within our borders, with nowhere to go, and the barbarians at the gate. You will be aware of that. We are already fighting them. It will be a war of annihilation for one or the other.’

  Ritchie ceded the point with a wave of the hand, an almost preternatural dread creeping up on him. It was a physical sensation, something he could feel crawling through his body like ice water rising from his nuts. The diplomat checked his watch one last time. He squared his shoulders and looked Ritchie in the eyes without flinching. His voice firmed up, losing the quaver and uncertainty that had haunted it until now.

  ‘Twelve hours ago, we received a secure data package from our highest placed source within the Republican Guard. His information was so critical that it was cross-checked independently, even though doing so revealed the identity of other sources we have cultivated within the Hussein regime and the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. I am afraid those sources have now been exposed and eliminated. Before losing them, however, they confirmed that a convoy of civilian vehicles crossed the border with Iran and travelled without a military escort, but still heavily guarded, arriving at a warehouse on the outskirts of Mosul at 0300 hours local time yesterday. If you will excuse me, Admiral…’ Warat leaned over and picked up his briefcase, popping the lid and pulling out a sheaf of papers which he handed across to Ritchie.

  They were photographs mostly, with a few pages of printed material that appeared to be chemical analyses. The pictures were obviously close surveillance shots, the admiral noted, taken covertly by somebody at the warehouse.

  ‘The large vehicles you can see in these pictures are standard commercial trucks,’ Warat went on. ‘Two Scania transporters, a Volvo, a Mack Truck, and a Hino heavy diesel. The utility vehicles – SUVs, I believe you call them – provided the escort. The Hino truck carried a shipping container in which was stored an unknown quantity of uranium hexafluoride. I am afraid we have lost track of it. The other trucks, which we were able to continue tracking from Mosul and on to an Iraqi missile battery, contained weaponised anthrax and botulinum.’

  Ritchie glanced briefly at the typewritten pages, but he was not a chemist and they meant nothing to him. He assumed they somehow attested to the contents of the trucks.

  ‘We have no sources within the Iraqi battery, and the exposure of our other assets will have caused Saddam to alter his plans anyway. But we must presume that we now face the mortal danger of a missile strike on Israel with biological agents. Our policy in the face of such threats has always been stated clearly. We will not just ret
aliate, we will strike preemptively.’

  Ritchie placed the documents very carefully on his desk. His hand was shaking and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

  ‘So, my government hereby informs you, Admiral Ritchie, as the commander of friendly forces in the region, that as of one hour ago, the Israel Defense Forces have commenced Operation Megiddo. I am informed by my government that Israeli Air Force units are currently en route to twelve centres. I have here a list of the targets.’

  The envoy passed across a single sheet of paper, which Ritchie took with a trembling hand. Warat, he noticed, seemed abnormally calm by comparison. The Israeli had apparently done all his sweating and shaking when he’d first come in.

  The list was divided into two parts, labelled Counter Force and Counter Value. The former was a catalogue of military bases and suspected WMD sites such as the Iranian Revolutionary Guard training facility at Hamadan, long suspected to also be the Guards’ principal WMD depository. ‘Counter Value’ comprised a short list of cities. The American officer found it hard to breathe. Baghdad, Tehran and Damascus in Syria were slated for destruction within hours.

  ‘You can’t do this,’ croaked Ritchie. ‘You’ll kill millions, tens of millions, of innocent people.’

  Warat’s face was ashen and drawn, but firm. ‘Yes, Admiral. We will. It is either that or millions of our people will die.’

  ‘But…’ Ritchie found it hard to speak. Blood rushed through his ears and dark spots bloomed in front of his eyes.

  The other man sensed his difficulty and pressed on. ‘We have drawn up the target list in such a way that it should not expose your forces to significant radiological effects, and it will not be necessary to fly through airspace controlled by the Coalition. This will not be like 1991, Admiral. We will not require IFF transponder codes; however, the range of some of the longer strikes means that without midair refuelling, our planes cannot return home. My government therefore requests the cooperation of the US Air Force in assigning such in-flight refuelling assets as we would require to successfully complete all of these missions without needlessly sacrificing our personnel. For many of them, it will be a one-way trip otherwise.’

  ‘Are you mad?’ Ritchie stared at the man, who had the good grace to look embarrassed.

  ‘My government did not expect to receive a positive response to this request, but instructed me to make it anyway.’

  ‘Mr Ambassador…’ Ritchie faltered, forgetting that Warat had not been formally received and confirmed as ambassador. ‘Mr Warat, I am afraid I cannot allow this plan to go ahead. Your government must call its planes back.’

  ‘I am afraid they will not do that, Admiral. Under any circumstances. My government is convinced that we face annihilation as a people if we do not act immediately.’

  ‘You will be annihilated if you do,’ protested Ritchie.

  The Israeli nodded glumly. ‘Anything is possible these days, Admiral.’

  Ritchie’s heart was still thundering in his chest, but his head was at last clearing of the shock and disorientation. He took a deep breath and leaned back in his chair.

  ‘Sir, I am afraid I must inform you that I will direct US forces in theatre to interdict this strike and stop it by any means possible. I will further contact our Coalition partners and request any and all cooperation they might provide. And, I will immediately inform the governments of the targeted nations that your strike is inbound and that I will assist them in whatever way possible to repel it.’

  Warat received the rebuke with stoic reserve. Behind him, through the wide glass windows, life went on. Not normally. But it did go on. Some traffic moved through the streets. Children would be playing in suburban back yards as parents did their best to insulate them from the horror of a world collapsing in on itself. High above the idyllic panorama, Ritchie saw the sun glint on the wings of a commercial airliner, outbound. For where, he had no idea, but it was undoubtedly full. The Israeli envoy sighed and quickly recovered his composure.

  ‘My government expected you might react in this fashion, Admiral,’ he said. ‘It would be the honourable thing for you. However, I must point out that your own forces have degraded the air defence nets of Iran and Iraq to the point where they cannot deny our air force. And the IAF has done the same to the Syrian Air Force over the last week of fighting. By warning them, you will do no more than condemn millions to spend their last hours in abject fear.’

  Ritchie slammed an open hand down on the desk with a thunderous crash. ‘Goddamn you, will you listen? You cannot do this and you must not. I am ordering my theatre commanders to interdict your sorties with deadly force. We will shoot you down!’

  Warat’s chin moved up and down like a bobble-headed doll on a dashboard. His shoulders twitched and when he spoke he did not look Ritchie in the eye. ‘My government has prepared for such an eventuality, Admiral. The weapons packages will be delivered with an escort of IAF fighters. They will engage any hostile force that tries to prevent them from accomplishing their mission. Any. Hostile. Force.’

  ‘My God,’ breathed Ritchie. ‘You’ll kill us all. If you do this, how long do you imagine it will be before some maniac in New Delhi or Islamabad decides they need to get the drop on their nemesis? How long will it be before Russia and China decide things will be a lot simpler with us, here in Hawaii, out of the picture?’

  ‘I cannot answer these questions, Admiral, as you well know. But I can tell you that if we do not act, the Jewish people and their state will be wiped out in a second Holocaust. And you know that I speak the truth.’

  Ritchie dropped his head into his hands and rubbed at eyes that burned with a lack of sleep. ‘Get out,’ he said quietly.

  * * * *

  30

  HATZERIM ISRAELI AIR FORCE RASE, BEERSHEBA

  The envoy had lied. Or rather, he had not told the whole truth because he did not know it. The target list that Asher Warat supplied Ritchie with was incomplete, as were other details of the attack, including the fact that many of the warheads would be delivered by Jericho II missiles, not piloted aircraft. In addition to the cities and military facilities on the list, the Israeli Cabinet had added a further thirty-eight sites. Suspected Iranian nuclear centres in Natanz, Ardekan, Saghand, Gashin, Bushehr, Aral and Lashkar A’bad were all slated for destruction, along with the cities of Tabriz, Qazvin, Shiraz, Yazd, Kerman, Qom, Ahwaz and Kermanshah. Five of the nuclear-tipped missiles were inbound on Libya as the ambassador had sat down with Admiral Ritchie, while another three were headed for military bases near heavily populated Egyptian cities. But one mission, the last to depart, had a very different target. The Aswan High Dam.

  Colonel Rudi Molenz sat quietly in the cockpit of his F-15I Ra’am at the end of the main runway of Hatzerim Air Base in the Negev desert. Tel Aviv and his family lay fifty miles to the north, but the bejewelled cluster of lights would be dimmed tonight, as the city hid itself in the dark. He would not be able to glance back over his shoulder after take-off and smile at the thought of his two little children safely in bed, somewhere in that mass of glowing pearls, surrounded by soft toys and dreaming of Daddy’s return. Because there was no guarantee that Daddy would ever be coming home. And worse than that, no certainty that home itself would survive the night or the next day. Behind him, his weapons system officer, Lieutenant Ephron, hummed tunelessly, irritating Molenz, who said nothing. Ephron was nervous and the flat, atonal droning was his release valve. It was the same before all of their missions. When they finally had a release from the control tower, the little putz would shut the fuck up and do his job flawlessly. He always had before.

  A brief crackle sounded in the earphones of his bulbous DASH helmet. ‘Attention Reach One Ninety, please stand by…’

  Molenz felt his balls shrivel and became acutely aware of silence in the back of the cockpit.

  The voice crackled in his Display and Sight Helmet again. ‘You have clearance to execute Plan Magenta. Preliminary release codes: Echo Kilo Four Niner
Three Niner Foxtrot.’

  Molenz had burned the one-use code into his memory but checked the mission pad velcroed to his leg anyway. ‘Release confirmed,’ he replied. ‘Reach One Ninety away.’

  The enormous power of the aircraft’s two F-100 Pratt amp; Whitney engines came roaring up like an angry leviathan as the pilot’s heads-up display blinked into life. The caged fury of the jet fighter completely enfolded him and as always he felt the deep-body thrill of having so much potential power in his hands. Beneath the old familiar sensation, however, lay a dread that ran deeper than anything he had experienced in all the years he had been flying combat missions. It was not the fear of his own death, but of becoming Death itself, because attached to the underside of his Strike Eagle was a thirty-kiloton nuclear warhead in a specially hardened penetrator casing. It was designed to slam into the base of the Aswan High Dam, drilling down through ten metres of concrete, before birthing a small supernova to atomise much of the dam’s solid mass, releasing the superheated waters behind to roar down the Nile Valley like a mega-tsunami towards Cairo.

  Part of him could not believe he was doing this, that it was even happening. But the two aircraft ripping down the tarmac right after his were real. As were the dozen flights he’d watched leaving earlier for much farther flung locations. He’d known many of those pilots. Commanded some of them, trained others. Their goodbyes were restrained but heartfelt. Unlike Molenz, they were flying single-engine F-16s with modified drop tanks to get them all the way to Iran while flying low and fast through the wastes of northern Iraq. They would traverse the edge of the Kurdish regions, where years of British and American enforcement of the no-fly zone had denuded Iraq of air defence assets. Even with drop tanks, however, there would not be enough fuel for them to return. Extraction teams were standing by to evac anyone who made it to the preset rendezvous points. But Molenz knew from looking into the men’s eyes as they shook hands, and in some cases hugged, that they were going to their deaths.