by Don Bendell
Colonel Gresham had started out as an enlisted man, a grunt, and then made it through the Special Forces qualification course and earned his Green Beret and Special Forces tab as a weapons specialist. He attended language school for Tagalog, which is a native dialect from the Philippines, and worked on an A-Detachment with the 1st Special Forces Group in Okinawa, working his way up to sergeant first class, while also taking night and correspondence classes and getting his bachelor’s degree in organizational management, with emphasis on management of human resources.
At the suggestion of the 1st Group commander, he applied for and was accepted to Officer Candidate School and graduated as the honor graduate. He spent a year as a second lieutenant platoon leader with the 82nd Airborne at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and then was snatched to the USA J. F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center, where he was promoted to first lieutenant and became an aide-de-camp to the commanding general of the center. He soon made captain, and after begging the general for command time, he became a detachment commander of an ODA, or Operational Detachment-A, referred to by many as an “A-team,” with the 10th Special Forces Group at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, and then he and the group relocated to Fort Carson, Colorado.
He went through Selection for C.A.G. and was a Detachment-Delta operator for some time, but then, after making it to lieutenant colonel, he ended up becoming deputy commanding officer of the 10th Group. When he finally hit the list for full bird, he was slated to take over either the 10th Group or the 1st Group, and he knew he eventually would have made brigadier and maybe ended up in command of Special Forces, but he made his feelings very clear that he wanted command of 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, even if it meant sacrificing a star or two on his lapel. After becoming an operator, Gresham became a true believer that this unit was the elite of the elite and was very much needed, especially since he made his eagle after September 11, 2001.
One day, Poke was speaking to Weasel in his office, and he said, “Top, I need to speak with the Old Man,” just as Colonel Gresham was walking in the door.
“The Old Man?” he joked. “The Old Man? Why not just call me Pops or Grandpa, since I already have one foot in the grave?”
Weasel said, “That sounds great, Colonel, since every swingin’ Richard in this unit but you has a nickname. You are Pops from now on!”
So that was how the colonel got his nickname, but Charlie was a different story. One guy tried nicknaming him “Chief” and another “Tonto,” and they both got educated.
Charlie was not totally friendly when he explained, “Every white guy in the world, just about, calls just about every red guy in the world either Chief or Tonto, and every white guy thinks he is the first person to think of the nickname.”
In Delta and Special Forces, merciless teasing is the name of the game, so Weasel immediately picked up on Charlie’s irritation and said, “You know, we are in the army and need to be politically correct, guys, and I can see someone will get punched if you guys call Charlie by such a racially charged name, so from now on, in order to be more sensitive we’ll call him Pocahontas.”
All the operators, who were actually gathering for beers at the end of the day at the Green Beret Club on Smoke Bomb Hill, just roared with laughter, including Charlie, who laughed at himself and shook his head. It did not take long for that name to be shortened to “Poke.”
One of the men in the conference room was Damien Percy Rozanski, a retired major general from the Military Intelligence branch who had spent almost his entire career in staff positions. He was a devout politician and a devout liberal. The current commander in chief was a conservative and so were many officers in the GWOT, regardless of what they showed the public, so Percy, as he was called by his very few close friends, was sneaky and underhanded in many of his dealings. He had political ambitions and clearly saw himself as the future savior of the Democratic Party. He now held a position as an undersecretary of Homeland Security and had a very arrogant attitude toward many in the room and wherever he went. Maybe it was because of his membership in the Mensa Society, or maybe it was because what he saw in the mirror and what the public saw were opposites. When he glanced into the looking glass, he always viewed a Great Dane, but when the public viewed him most saw a sad, old, overweight basset hound.
Kerri Rhodes, the national security advisor to the president, was there.
A very large gentleman, behemoth actually, was there who was an assistant director of the CIA. His name was Bunny Hawkins.
Another participant was Randall Yost, deputy director of the DIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and who was a recently retired colonel who’d spent much of his career with the U.S. Army Rangers, until he got enthused about Military Intelligence when he became the S2, the intelligence officer, of his Ranger regiment.
There were several more bureaucrats there, from several government agencies.
Charlie was introduced by Weasel to everybody in the room, and he made his assessments based on eye contact, firmness of handshake, and demeanor. He really liked Bunny Hawkins, Kerri Rhodes, and Randy Yost, but he was totally put off by Rozanski and a few others. This initial assessment of people was very strong.
After people grabbed coffee, tea, and pastries, they were all seated and Weasel went up to the podium.
“Ladies and gentlemen, this briefing is classified top secret and no foreigners regardless of a need-to-know. It will automatically be downgraded at four-year intervals and declassified, unless otherwise attended to, at the end of a twelve-year period. Nothing discussed herein is to be discussed verbally or in writing anywhere outside this room, which is electronically swept daily. Are there any questions on this matter just discussed?”
Without comment, he introduced Pops, who walked out from behind the podium.
Pops said, “How many in this room have not heard of an Iranian named Davood Faraz Dabdeh?”
Charlie wondered what that guy’s story was.
CHAPTER SIX
Bad Guy
GISELLE Michelin grew up in the Alsace-Lorraine part of the south of France, the wealthy daughter of a couple who had made their mark in world culinary markets with a very large array of fine French wines and liqueurs. A beauty who graduated from the Sorbonne, she was multilingual, very rich, and loved to play, especially skiing all over the world. On this particular day, she wore a tight one-piece ski suit and was standing at the top of a sunny slope at almost twelve thousand feet in elevation, flashing her eyes at the handsome ski instructor she’d hired at the lodge. The noise of the red, enclosed two-person ski lifts opening and closing was distracting, but it was important to her to bat her eyes at this tall, dark, and handsome foreigner at the top of the mountain. Actually, she was the foreigner in his land, not the other way around, but in her mind, he was the foreigner.
She would hold back on the way down, so his male ego would not be deflated if he learned how good she really was. She had only hired him for his looks and build, and was not concerned about learning to ski. She had been on some of the world’s most challenging expert slopes, but she had this thing for ski instructors, especially in foreign lands.
Giselle looked into his dark brown eyes and saw the dark tan of his skin beneath his ski goggles. It took her breath away. Looking out across the snow-filled valley, they headed down the hill, with him following her.
He stared at the movement of her muscles beneath her tight-fitting ski suit, and lust filled his mind. He would have this woman today, he decided. He had her checked out before they even left the lodge to grab their skis and climb into one of the lifts.
There were two lodges at the base of the mountain, and he had the largest suite available, because he was filthy rich, and he was so very, very powerful. It took only a few minutes by the fire in the lodge and then a short meal, and they were headed to his suite.
He held her at the big picture window looking up at the slopes, his muscular arms wrapped protectively around her from behind. He slowly pulled her long ha
ir off her shoulder and kissed her gently on the back of her neck. She felt a tingle running down her spine, and as if she could barely breathe. She lifted one of his hands up to her mouth and started sucking on his index finger. His left hand slid up under her breast and her breath caught. Then he slowly moved it back down. She wanted it to move back toward her breast, which is the way he wanted her to feel.
Suddenly, she felt her suit fall away from her body, and only then realized his hand had stealthily moved away and undone her ski suit. Now her sports bra fell to the floor, and she got goose bumps all over. She wanted to reach up and scratch her breasts, which she always did after removing her bra, but she did not want to move her hands, or anything.
She knew he was doing something behind her and then knew what it was as she felt his hardness against her. He had removed his own clothing. Now his left hand returned and lingered just below her left breast, but then dropped down again. Her breathing became heavier. His left hand now came up on her shoulder, and he slowly spun her around, and their first kiss was soft, very soft. Then their lips came together with a passion, and parted, and his tongue started teasing into her mouth and then withdrawing.
He lay her down on the antique Persian rug in front of the raging fire, and slowly kissed softly down her body until he was where he knew he would send her to the heights of ecstasy. She started cooing and was soon screaming in orgasmic delight, as he alternated teasing her and pleasing her, and the passion kept building.
She wanted their bodies to become one, so badly now.
“S’il vous plaît? Please?” she begged. “Get eenside me now. I beg you.”
She felt him as he did so, looking into his dark brown eyes and holding on to his very muscular massive arms as he entered and went deep inside her.
They both spoke in English, which each knew quite well.
Finally, he spoke, saying, “Scream!”
This took her by surprise, and she said, “Qu’est-ce que c’est?”
He laughed and she saw his large hand come up in the air and whack her viciously across her face. She felt her cheekbone break and could no longer see out of her left eye.
She could not believe what was happening, and now he pumped in and out of her vigorously, injuring her with each thrust. She started screaming, and he laughed loudly. He punched her full power in the face, breaking her nose and pulping her lips. Giselle was barely conscious now.
She awakened slowly and saw him naked in front of the mirror. She reached up and touched her face and wanted to scream again. It was all large swollen areas, and her left eye was swollen completely shut; her nose was shattered, and she felt that half her teeth were missing. Giselle now noticed that her ribs must be broken, as she could barely breathe. She panicked as Davood Faraz Dabdeh walked over to her. He bent over smiling, and stood back as his big leg went up in the air. She saw his heel almost in slow motion as it came down stomping at her face, and she felt all the bones smash as it crashed into her, and then the pain started subsiding, as the life ebbed out of her body. The last thing she heard was Davood picking up the telephone.
“Send up that valet named Muhammad.”
Minutes later, a well-built, handsome Iranian twenty-year-old showed up at the door of the suite and was shocked when he saw the dead woman in front of the fireplace. Davood was still nude and still sexually excited.
Speaking in Persian, he said, “She is just a woman. We must get rid of her body later. We will make it look like an auto crash. Women are for procreation. Men are for pleasure. Remove your clothes and come to my bed.”
Few people knew about the Dizin, Shemshak, Ab Ali, Darbandsar, and other ski resorts in the mountains north and northwest of Tehran, but this was where Davood posed as a ski instructor and easily met with numerous foreign and domestic agents. He enjoyed skiing, and also met many beautiful women to abuse and men to make love to.
He and the mullahs and oil sheiks behind him felt that Osama bin Laden and al-Zawahiri had really slipped in stature, because they’d lost so many warriors in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Davood Faraz Dabdeh was an up-and-comer. He was born in Iran, but spent much of his life in Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan. He was incredibly wealthy himself from his own family’s oil fortunes, and most important he was ambitious and ruthless.
One of his vices was raping and murdering women, and in Iran, under Sharia law, homosexuality could call for death by hanging, stoning, or being cut in half. On Monday, September 24, 2007, during a speech to students and faculty at Columbia University, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad declared that there were “no homosexuals in Iran.” As crazy as this sounded to every thinking person in the world, this was something he wanted to stringently enforce. Davood, however, was totally immune, because he brought so much to the table for not only Iran, but also that group of fanatical Muslims who desperately wanted the demise of Jews and Christians and who came from not only Iran, but Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Libya, Afghanistan, and several more countries.
Muhammad had two friends help him take Giselle’s body to her rental vehicle. They drove it down the road leading toward Tehran and simply sent it over the side, after setting it ablaze with her behind the front wheel. Then they all jumped in Davood’s Cadillac Escalade and rode back to the ski resort. All three young men went home that night with plenty of rials in their pockets.
As he showered, the handsome Iranian terrorist pictured Giselle’s wealthy parents hearing about her death and wailing. He started to laugh and wondered how stupid infidels were for giving so much import to women. To him, infidels, all infidels, were completely stupid anyway.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Plan Your Work, Work Your Plan
CHARLIE Strongheart looked around the conference room, wondering about each man. He knew he was about to be given a mission, and he wondered what role each man would play, and if any would have the naiveté or downright stupidity that might send him to his death. Just then the door opened, and Custer came in the door. He nodded at Weasel and Pops and grinned at Charlie. Charlie winked at him. The large, very beefy man walked over to the coffeepot and poured a huge cup of coffee.
He sat down in the chair next to Charlie and finally said, “Sorry for the disruption, Pops, but I just got paged.”
Pops said, “This is a singleton operation and Charlie is the primary, but you will be his backup, Custer. Top, will you come up and give the security lecture again?”
Weasel jumped up. “Airborne!”
He gave the same cautioning words from memory and turned the floor back over to Pops.
Custer was a chief warrant officer on Charlie’s team who had opted for Warrant Officer School when both were sergeants first class. He had been a Ranger for a while but wanted more and went through Selection for Special Forces when he was in his late twenties. Like Charlie, he had served on ODAs (Operational Detachment-A, or A-Teams), and he worked on the SCUBA Committee for a while down in Florida, then came to Charlie’s team in Detachment-Delta after his C.A.G. selection.
Custer was one of those men who was just always bigger than anybody and everybody, but he never looked fat. His father was a decorated Ranger in Vietnam, his grandfather a decorated Ranger in WWII and Korea. His great-grandfather was a doughboy in WWI, and his family went back in the military all the way to the Revolutionary War. His great-great-grandfather was a corporal with Major Reno in the Battle of the Little Big Horn. Benteen and Reno were two officers who split off from Custer’s main column before the battle, which would become famous as Custer’s Last Stand. Both of their units had staggering losses, but were not wiped out like Custer was. This Custer’s great-great-grandfather had survived the battle.
Because of this background and because Charlie was a descendant of Sitting Bull, the famous Hunkpapa Lakota who was credited as the chief reigning over the Battle of the Little Big Horn, the colonel himself nicknamed CW3 Jace Daniel, as Custer.
Actually, Sitting Bull was a holy man, which had much greater import than being a chie
f. There were many chiefs who were battlefield commanders in that battle, such as Crazy Horse, Gall, Rain-in-the-Face, but for the most part each tribe, and consequently nation, did not have overall chiefs like the white man has shown, but elders and councils. The feeling was that no man should have a boss telling him how to live. Sitting Bull was like the Billy Graham for the Lakota.
The Lakota or Sioux were a nation; then that Lakota nation was further broken down into various clans, or tribes, such as the Hunkpapa, Oglala, Minniconjou, Teton, Yankton, Brule or Sicangu, Izipaco, Sihasapa, Ooinunpa, and more. Many white men and others often have misunderstood these distinctions. The names Lakota, Dakota, and Nakota, also called the Sioux, actually mean “friend” or “ally.”
Pops told about the ironic backgrounds of Jace Daniel and Charlie Strongheart, as well as their experience and training in the army. He then introduced all the people in the room.
This was followed by an introduction of retired General Rozanski. He had planned to start a PowerPoint presentation on Davood Faraz Dabdeh, but the conference room door opened.
A beautiful, athletic-looking, well-built woman entered the room, and Charlie and Jace gave each other a slight grin. Custer and Poke had never met her and were anxious to learn about her. She apparently would be part of this operation. She spotted them both and walked over very confidently and sat down between them. Without speaking, she turned and shook hands with each of them.
There were actually some women in 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, and nobody outside of Detachment-Delta knew about them. They essentially stayed to themselves, trained together, and were called the “Funny Platoon” by the other C.A.G. operators who sometimes worked with them. Most were military intelligence, civil affairs, or psyops specialists of varying expertise, and were used with male Delta operators when there was a need for covert activity and a married couple or boyfriend and girl-friend pair might raise less suspicion. They were also used when it was less conspicuous for a woman to be in a certain area than a man.