Uncivil Liberties

by Gordon Ryan

  Ashore, the activity increased dramatically over the next several minutes with the sounds of the Brisbane fire brigade racing to the scene of the fire. What had started to be a dress white ceremonial day, an easy day of public relations and naval pride in support of the Queensland celebrations, had quickly turned into an inferno of immense proportions. Cartwright knew that sailors had died, that more might yet die under her orders. It was the classic lesson in command that had been reviewed at the Naval College at HMAS Creswell. Her instructor’s words rang clear in her mind. ‘Command isn’t a question of whether or not you’re prepared to die for your crew, but whether you’re prepared to order some of your crew to die for everyone else.’

  In only moments, on a clear Easter Sunday morning, in the tight confines of the Brisbane River, Lieutenant Commander Kate Cartwright, commanding officer of HMAS North Lakes, had joined with the proud heritage of Australian naval officers who had taken their place in a long line of naval engagements, stretching back through Guadalcanal, Coral Sea, and the Battle of Matapan, and even further back to Gallipoli in WWI, almost one hundred years earlier.

  Today’s astonishing actions were not so public, not so openly declared, not so clearly defined, and came from a far more cowardly enemy, but from this morning’s opening attack, Australia had unceremoniously been put on notice: they were about to reap the rewards of defying the terrorists of the world.

  While not a classic naval battle in the traditional sense, Lieutenant Commander Kate Cartwright had exercised her command authority during the initial encounter of what would prove to be a long and costly domestic terrorist conflict. As later honors commending her bravery and that of her crew—two of whom, including Lieutenant Christensen, her executive officer, had died fighting the inferno—would demonstrate, the young commanding officer, as her equally young junior sailor had predicted that day months earlier, had indeed “come ‘round.”

  In 2001, the Royal Australian Navy had stopped and boarded the MV Tampa in the Indian Ocean, some 140 kilometers north of Christmas Island. The ship had been bound for Australia and was loaded with refugees, mostly from Afghanistan. After a period of detention on Nauru, with some immigrants being admitted to New Zealand, Australian immigrant visas were granted to many of the former refugees, including two brothers who were eight and eleven years old at the time of their admission to Australia. The family had settled in northern Queensland.

  Twelve years later, on a warm fall day, the temperature hovering just below 28º Celsius, both brothers, now in their twenties, strolled along the beach front in Surfer’s Paradise. They were about to reward their adopted country with the full measure of their devotion to Al Qaida, Islam, and the World Jihad movement.

  Situated seventy-five miles south of the Brisbane River, Surfer’s Paradise is one of the most populated recreational destinations on the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia. On a beautiful Easter Sunday, the Strand was jammed with enthusiastic people. Nearly every nationality could usually be found in the cosmopolitan crowd at this popular Gold Coast tourist spot, and today was no exception. Close to eight thousand people jammed Cavill Avenue, the distinctly commercial tourist area at Surfer’s.

  Millions of tourists and locals frequented the area annually, plying its outstanding beaches, trendy shops, and multiple restaurants with food from many cultures available within two or three blocks. Increasingly over the recent ten years, high-rise hotels and resort facilities had dotted the horizon, making the Gold Coast an international, yet affordable, playground.

  The Easter weekend provided yet another opportunity—for many, the last before winter—to yet again enjoy the fruits of living in one of the most beautiful places on earth. The two clean-shaven, young, and highly fit Afghani brothers jostled their way through the boisterous crowd, rounding the corner near O'Malley’s Irish Pub and heading west down Cavill Mall. Within moments, they were immersed in the throng, elbow to elbow with people from all walks of life. Carrying a beach towel wrapped around his arm, the younger of the brothers concealed a silenced weapon and found it easy to place several shots in quick succession as they pushed their way through the milling people. Both men were several meters away before the victims even had time to realize they had been shot. Only when the victims had fallen to the pathway did the multitude react. For most of the tourists, the reaction was to simply step over or around the prostrate bodies.

  Within moments, dozens, perhaps hundreds, of people had pushed and shoved their way past the three people who were lying on the footpath directly across the street from McDonald’s. Their jumbled bodies seemed to be the result of a collective trip and fall accident. With passersby unable to even see the confusion until they were right on top of it, medical help was not summoned until someone finally stopped to render assistance and saw the blood pooling beneath the first person they tried to help to their feet. The cry for police and ambulance then traveled swiftly through the crowd until one of the shop owners placed a call for help. Even the emergency medical personnel had difficulty pressing their way through the crowd, and by the time they reached the injured people, all three were dead from small-caliber gunshot wounds, inflicted at close range. Two had died from damaged internal organs—one had simply bled out while waiting for help.

  Long before medical help arrived, the two gunmen, unseen and, in the din of the crowd, unheard by anyone, had made their way further west to where Cavill Mall turns into Cavill Avenue, and vehicular traffic began to compound the crowd control issue. The brothers passed throngs of people, various restaurants, shops, and entertainment buskers who had gathered even more people to watch their show.

  In front of the statue of Matey, a mixed-breed dog who became a fixture on Cavill Avenue in the fifties with his wandering and friendly nature, a large assembly had gathered to watch a swagger man as he, and his trained dog Molly, entertained the crowd. By the time Molly completed her act, jumping up and standing on the soles of the busker’s boots while he lay on his back on the ground, his feet propped up in the air, four additional people had suffered bullet wounds, one of them dying immediately, dropping toward the ground to hang over the single-strand cable that separated the people from the grass-enclosed park area in front of the RSL Club and the Veteran’s Memorial.

  Further up the avenue, near the Tiki Village resort, the two men entered their rental car, made the ten-minute drive inland, and pulled in to the parking facility at Pacific Fair Shopping Centre, the largest indoor/outdoor mall in the area, packed with thousands of tourists and sightseers. In the next hour, nine more people would die from gunshot wounds in the mall or parking area, one of whom was not discovered until the following morning, slumped in the back of her van.

  Although the three attacks—at Cavill Mall, Pacific Fair Shopping Centre, and the morning’s air assault on the Royal Australian Navy vessels in the Brisbane River—were coordinated within an hour of each other, they escaped the immediate recognition by authorities, at least as far as public announcements were concerned, that they were possibly related. It was not until later that evening, when the news stations received a recorded message from an organization calling itself World Jihad, that the Office of the Prime Minister publicly acknowledged the relationship of the attacks.

  From the sketchy and unsubstantiated attack plans that had been outlined by the captured weapons dealer, Wolff, and the conclusions drawn by Trojan in their analysis of impending disaster, Queensland, Australia, fourteen hours ahead of Washington D.C., was the first to learn about the validity of the threat.

  As Easter Sunday rolled around the world, the fear of further terrorist attacks took on new meaning as Muslim extremists unleashed a new order of terror against predominately Christian populations in the Commonwealth nations and the United States of America. Innocent Australian citizens were the first to shed blood in the latest round of terrorism. Great Britain would follow some ten hours later. And America was to be next, but on a far broader scale.

  Chapter 16

  Turner Fiel
d

  Atlanta Georgia

  Easter Sunday, March

  (The Next Day, USA time)

  The Atlanta Braves took the Sunday afternoon game 6–3 against the Los Angeles Dodgers in a nearly packed house. William Foster and his wife, Shari, made their way down the exit ramps on the west side of Turner Field, along with nearly 36,000 other happy Braves’ supporters. Another winning season was underway, and the Damn Yankees had better get ready for the next World Series.

  The owner of a miniature golf course and driving range about twenty miles north, Foster had lived in or near Atlanta all of his forty-four years. He’d met and married Shari eighteen years earlier, and they had three children, all of whom were distraught that they hadn’t been allowed to attend the game, but Foster had been adamant: “The Easter Sunday game is traditional for me and Mom.”

  Easing through the exit, shoulder-to-shoulder with several hundred other patrons headed for the west parking area, Foster was at first confused by what appeared to be his wife’s stumble. He tried to grab her elbow to keep her from falling, but he was unable to support her weight and she dropped to the pavement, with the crowd trying to step around her rather than halting their progress. He knelt to speak to her as people continued to jostle around them as they pressed ahead. He spoke to her, but her eyes appeared confused, disoriented. The fans continued their relentless surge to get to their cars and to head home.

  At Safeco Stadium, Seattle, Washington, the story repeated itself. Not to be outdone by his Ford Motor Company competition’s “Employee Appreciation Day” the previous month—a chartered fishing vessel into Puget Sound with 125 employees on board—Ralph Tunston, owner of four Toyota dealerships located along I-5 from Seattle to Portland, had purchased 136 tickets to the Easter Sunday game, pitting the Seattle Mariners against the visiting California Angels. There was to be a picnic dinner following the game at Northwest Fantasy, the new theme park developed west of Puyallup.

  Three chartered buses were waiting at the southern entrance of Safeco Stadium and everyone had been advised to be on their bus by 4:15 or find their own way to the picnic. The only person to not make the bus was the boss, Ralph Tunston. As the buses pulled away from the stadium, Ralph was being lifted into an emergency vehicle for transport to Seattle’s Emergency Trauma Center, one of the finest in the nation if the victim arrived within the ‘golden hour.’ But no trauma team on earth could have saved Mr. Tunston, who was shot in the back. He was pronounced dead on arrival. Cause of death: a gunshot wound through the rib cage, entering from the back and exiting the chest, after tearing a hole through the heart.

  Helen Clark was essentially a ‘plank owner’ in Busch Stadium, St. Louis, Missouri, having attended the first game, a twelve-inning marathon against the Atlanta Braves, after completion of the new stadium in 1966. She’d attended hundreds of games since. Her ten-year-old niece, Shelly Liston, and their German Shepherd, Gus, remained in their vehicle in the parking area of Busch Stadium for over an hour after the stadium had emptied out. One shot to the head of each of the women and one to the chest of the dog had left them quietly in their van until later that afternoon, when the clean-up sweepers began to scour the lot.

  America’s favorite pastime had taken on a new dimension, and a lazy afternoon at the ballpark had forever changed.

  Chapter 17

  Reston, Virginia

  Easter Sunday, March

  Pug Connor sat near the open door of the balcony of his three-bedroom, three-storied townhouse in the suburban community of Reston, Virginia, a slight breeze playing against the curtain on the first truly warm day of the late arriving spring.

  Pug nibbled at the second slice of homemade pizza from the previous evening as the fourth and final round of the Honda Classic Golf Tournament was being broadcast on ESPN. Chad Sorensen, a thirty-one-year-old club pro from Southern California, who had regained his touring card the previous year, was leading the event by two strokes. Immediately after Sorensen teed off on the fifteenth, the Breaking News logo scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

  11 dead or wounded in multiple shooting incidents at sports arenas throughout the nation. Further information to follow.

  Off and on throughout the day, highlights of the burning frigate in Brisbane and the shootings in Surfer’s Paradise had been reported on network television. Pug felt as if he were waiting for the other shoe to drop, but as yet, nothing had transpired in America, and he’d received no notice of action related to a response directed at Australian terrorists.

  Pug clicked the remote and shifted channels to Fox News. Weekend anchors Jonathan Sharp and Leslie McWilliams sat behind the joint presentation desk, their normally well-groomed appearance and calm demeanor disrupted by what appeared to be slight tension. Leslie was speaking.

  “ . . . not only that, Jonathan, but literally moments before the top of the hour, the Fox News desk received an unidentified claim that the shootings were planned and directed by . . .” she paused, looking at a small slip of paper in her hand, “ . . . by a group calling themselves World Jihad. For those of you who have just joined us following announcements on other networks, throughout the past ninety minutes we have been receiving reports of multiple gunshot injuries at various locations throughout America. At last report, thirty-seven people have been shot in nineteen separate locations, primarily at professional baseball stadiums after the close of the games when crowds were leaving the grounds. There are eleven confirmed dead at this time, with reports still coming in.”

  Pug was up and grabbing his keys by the time the audio shifted to Jonathan Sharp.

  “This is unprecedented . . .” he heard Jonathan say as he clicked off the TV.

  “You got that right, buddy,” Pug said as he bounded down the stairs, two at a time, to his ground-level garage.

  Pug’s cell phone rang just as he exited the Eisenhower Executive Office Building elevator and headed for his office. The name on the caller ID was not unexpected.

  “Good evening, Mr. Secretary.”

  “You’ve seen the news?”

  “Yes, sir. I’m just entering my office.”

  “Good. I assume you’ve alerted the team and have arranged to assemble Trojan. I’ll be there in twenty minutes,” General Austin said.

  “They’re on the way, sir.” When Pug reached his desk, his mobile rang again, with no name visible.

  “General Connor.”

  “Pug, it’s Colin McIntyre.”

  “Good afternoon, Brigadier. You’ve been watching the news, I presume.”

  “Indeed, and receiving initial reports from Whitehall. We’ve had several incidents at home as well, it would seem. Add that to the bombing and shooting incidents in Brisbane yesterday, and it would appear the war has started.”

  “Yes, sir, it would appear so. I’ve advised Secretary Austin that I am convening Trojan to discuss our next step.”

  “And what is the next step, Pug? How will you seek to curtail these not-so-random attacks?”

  “Brigadier, as we said at our last gathering, this is not a question of using Delta Force, SAS, or Seal teams. Even the Marines or British Para’s can’t storm this beach. There are no easy answers.”

  “Correct, indeed. General, would you be willing to allow an outsider under the tent flap at your meeting?”

  “Sir, there will be nothing discussed that would not benefit from your presence. We’re gathering at the EEOB conference room immediately.”

  “Thank you, Pug. I’ll be there as quickly as I can.”

  By 1630, seven of the eight Trojan members were assembled, plus Brigadier Colin McIntyre, military attaché to the British Embassy. In the short history of their tenure, they had used existing staff for a couple of covert missions, but increasingly it was certain they would need to call on outside military assets.

  General Pug Connor and Carlos Castro made up the command structure. The remainder of the team included two Army Rangers, Captain Ted Prince and Lieutenant Carlyle Sanderson, Navy Lie
utenant Roger Steppes, a SEAL team leader, and two experienced FBI Hostage Rescue Team members. One man each from the CIA and FBI were assigned as liaison, although not designated as part of Trojan. The JCS tried a politically correct attack and had criticized Connor for not appointing any women to the team, but he had stood fast in his decision, and their end run failed.

  One of the attributes that all Trojan team members had in common was that each of the men seated around the table would rather have been at the pointed end of the stick—all had actually been there on more than one occasion—commanding the action team, rather than sitting around this table discussing options. As Director, Pug used the training he had received from General Austin, that most intelligence operations were won or lost in the planning stages. None of the team agreed, but they all followed their orders and had begun to coalesce as an operational team.

  When General Austin and then Brigadier McIntyre arrived, Trojan assembled in the conference room. On a large monitor on the far wall, the Fox News live feed continued to update the casualty lists. Forty-seven people had been shot, most at close range in crowded conditions. Thirty-four were confirmed dead, including seven children. Most importantly, the group calling itself World Jihad had issued a statement to Fox News via a taped message. Pug had already called the television station to request a copy of the electronic version of the tape be relayed to the White House, which was then transmitted to his office. The Trojan team sat around the room listening to the surprisingly well-spoken male voice deliver his tirade in excellent, British-accented English.

  “Allah be praised. This is the voice of World Jihad. We have struck at the heart of your country. This is only the beginning. Hundreds of Allah’s warriors have been placed throughout America, England, and Australia. No longer will your people be safe from Allah’s justice. No longer will you have free access to violate the homeland of those who follow the true faith. We can strike wherever and whenever we choose. You believe your government has created homeland security. You have no security. Your families are not safe, your children are not safe, your homes are not safe, your schools are not safe, your communities are not safe. Now you will know what the oppressed people of the world have suffered for many years at the hands of the Great Satan. You will feel our pain. You will suffer as we have suffered. Prepare to die. This is the voice of World Jihad. Allah be praised.”