by Don Bendell
The ASA, the Army Security Agency, had top secret units emplaced around Vietnam then with radio equipment that was directional finding and could also read the power of enemy radio transmissions. At the same time, they had a fleet of twin-engine propeller-driven Mohawk aircraft with the same capabilities. The planes would fly around, shoot an azimuth on an enemy radio transmission, and then ASA operators in an office miles away would intersect the azimuth between both radios and pinpoint the enemy radio. Also, by determining how powerful the radio transmission was, ASA analysts could determine the size and type of radio and determine if it was one with an enemy company, battalion, regiment, or division headquarters.
In this case, for Boom’s team, a North Vietnamese Army (NVA) division had been emplaced near the border of Laos where the main tributaries flowed into North Vietnam aimed toward Hanoi.
Operation Tailwind was going on down south with Prairie Fire team insertions as a diversion for a big operation further north in Laos called Honorable Dragon. Because so many teams were being inserted into Laos and engaging NVA units, G2 (headquarters intelligence) wanted to know why this division was sitting tight.
Boom’s team was inserted to infiltrate into the NVA divisional staging area, take plenty of photos, reconnoiter, and then create some “silent sabotage,” as Boom called it, and sneak away and call for pickup.
With the young lieutenant leading, the whole team took hours to low crawl into the division ammo supply reserves. There, they hid for two hours and quietly removed the copper-jacketed bullets from 7.62-millimeter rounds, used in their AK-47s, SKSes, and light machine guns. They then poured out the gunpowder from each round and replaced it with C4 plastic explosive, then put the bullets back together and replaced them at random among the stockpiles of ammunition. In so doing, the NVA would later distribute the ammunition; at some point, while fighting, each of those rounds would explode in somebody’s rifle and take most of the soldier’s head along with it. This would create a tremendous psychological deterrent to good aiming at American soldiers. Literally gun-shy, NVA soldiers would then start shooting from the hip or holding the rifle up very high or next to tree trunks to try to save their heads from shredding, thus ruining their aim at American soldiers.
Following sabotaging the small-arms ammo, Boom took two 82-millimeter mortar tubes for the supplies, and working quickly, and using a length of bamboo, he tamped C4 plastic explosive at the bottom of the tube all around the firing pin. When firing rounds from the 82-millimeter mortar, NVA soldiers would drop a round down the tube and duck. At the bottom of the tube was a firing pin that would detonate the blast that would propel the explosive round out the tube and towards the enemy. When a round was dropped in with the C4 around the pin, the mortar tube itself became a giant bomb and would explode, also detonating the round. The bursting radius would be quite large and many casualties would be inflicted. In a much bigger sense than the exploding bullets this would have a tremendous psychological effect on soldiers firing the mortars.
Boom and the team successfully exfiltrated the division headquarters area with plenty of photographs and worked their way to a jungled ridgeline ten kilometers away. The next morning they were extracted on Stabo rigs, or harnesses kind of like horse collars on a cable where the men had hands free to fire weapons, which hoisted them up through the triple-canopy jungle and into the confines of one of the Greyhounds, a Huey helicopter unit that bravely flew support for MAC-V/SOG.
In the morning, the patrol set out for a hidden valley ten miles distant. They moved rapidly, and the men chatted with each other incessantly until they had gone five miles. Suddenly, just like Boom had witnessed during the Vietnam War, these warriors simply “sensed” the near presence of the enemy. They stopped talking, and rifles came off their shoulders and were carried at a modified port arms position.
They moved off the trail and slithered into the trees, waiting. Soon an LPA (Lao People’s Army) patrol came by, heading in the opposite direction, the men talking and laughing as if they hadn’t a care in the world. The Montagnard-Hmong guerilla unit waited unmoving in the jungle for ten more minutes. Then, as one, they came out of the trees and reassembled on the trail.
Boom Kittenger could not ever get over that. It was the same way in the Vietnam War decades earlier, working with the parents and uncles of some of these very men. That uncanny knowing sense they possessed that warned them of the enemy presence. It was incredible to Boom.
The patrol kept moving steadily and quietly toward the objective, which they reached by afternoon. The patrol went up a ridgeline and down the other side. Halfway down, they dropped to their bellies and low crawled, pulling themselves along the damp rain forest floor. They came out at the edge of a large valley and Boom could finally see for the first time.
Before them were numerous buildings, barrack-type buildings, and all made of rattan on raised stilts, holding them several feet off the jungle floor. Under a large—very large—camouflage netting was an obstacle course.
There was a large water tank, and it, too, was suspended on a high stilted platform, the stilts actually trees that had been cut off and leveled. Above it, too, was camouflage cargo netting with many jungle branches and greens woven into the netting. To any aircraft flying over, it would look completely innocent.
There was what looked like a stilted rattan building with classrooms inside and there were numerous men going in and out of all buildings. There was also something very interesting to Boom, another building perfectly square, also rattan, also camouflaged, but it was obviously a Muslim mosque.
There were guard towers and machine guns emplaced, as well as an antiaircraft position, ammunition bunkers, and various training emplacements and devices.
Boom got a digital camera out of his backpack and plugged it into a digital bursting device that would immediately transmit the video and/or photographs he was about to take via satellite back to Langley with a feed going into the very bowels of the Pentagon.
While the rest of the patrol took up defensive positions along the jungle fringe, Y-Ting escorted Boom, and they crawled around the training camp perimeter taking video and digital stills, transmitting it back stateside immediately. This process took them until well after dark, but they simply donned the night vision devices Boom brought for most of the patrol.
At one point they stopped, as an apparition seemingly rose in front of Boom, but they quickly saw it was the hood of a large cobra. It swayed back and forth, but the former Green Beret grabbed a stick and tossed it aside. They went on. It took two more hours to gather the rest of the patrol and get out of there.
By midnight, they were far enough away that they could set up a night location. Boom spent some time on a satellite phone telling about the number of Laotian, Thai, and Arabic Muslims he saw in the camp. Y-Ting told him that there were also several Pilipino and/or Indonesians in the group.
7
BACK IN DELTA CHARLIE
It was during the workday in the United States, in Washington, D.C., in fact, and the J-2 of USARPACOM, or the chief intelligence officer for the U.S. Army Pacific Command, concluded his briefing to the Senate Intelligence Committee about the Laotian al Qaeda training and operations of Boom Kittenger and his patrol.
Sen. James Weatherford asked more questions than all the others. He was deeply troubled and knew he must get word to Nguyen Van Tran and Muhammad Yahyaa immediately. He headed for his office and called the Vietnamese embassy in Washington, which was located in a suite on Twentieth Street northwest.
He said, “I am sorry. I meant to get the number for the Viennese Orchestra. Wrong number.”
As soon as the operator got the coded message, the information was passed on to Nguyen Van Tran.
Tran moved quickly to a private office and unlocked a drawer. He checked out a cell phone that had never been used and headed for an Oriental restaurant a few blocks away.
By this time, he knew that the senator had time to leave the Capitol building, so he dialed t
he senator’s cell phone.
James Weatherford answered, “Hello.”
Nguyen Van Tran said simply, “Thai restaurant we meet at before. Twenty-third Street.”
The senator said, “In ten minutes.”
Instead of taking his limo, he hailed a cab and headed toward the restaurant. The cabbie wore a turban on his head and was dark-skinned. Weatherford wondered if he could even speak English, but the man said in very broken English, “Where go?” The Middle Easterner had been waiting there for over an hour when he spotted Weatherford looking for a cab.
The congressman told him the restaurant and the man nodded, pulling away from the curb and forcefully inserting his taxi into the constant flow of traffic.
They were there in minutes, and he pulled roughly up to the curb, looking at the meter and saying, “Figh dollors fifty, please.”
The multimillionaire senator handed him a five-dollar bill and a one-dollar bill, brusquely saying, “Keep the change,” as he quickly exited the cab and entered the restaurant.
As soon as he entered the establishment, the turban-clad cabbie put the meter down and picked up the microphone, saying, “This is Agent Fernella. I transported the suspect to target restaurant number three one minute ago, over.”
A voice on the other end of the scrambled radio transmission replied, “Good work, over.”
Fernella said, “The cheap bastard only tipped me fifty cents, over.”
The voice chuckled, “What did you expect from him? Class? Move a block away and maintain surveillance. Do not pick him up again. Smith will bring his cab into position. Over.”
Fernella said, “Wilco. Out.”
The FBI agent pulled his taxi down the street, made a U-turn, and pulled up next to the curb, parallel parking it facing back toward the Thai restaurant. Inside the senator ordered Tom Yung Goon, a Thai shrimp soup with straw mushrooms specially seasoned with lime juice, lemon-grass, and hot peppers. The man with his back to him at the next table, Vietnamese in appearance, ordered Tom Kha Gai, also a soup of southern Thailand made with slices of chicken in coconut milk flavored with Thai herbs and seasoning.
A few minutes later, another man came in who looked Middle Eastern and sat down across from Nguyen Van Tran. Muhammad Yahyaa ordered a plate of drunken noodles.
With inconspicuous whispers, James Weatherford sold out his fellow countrymen, Sgt. Maj.-ret. Brandon “Boom” Kittenger, U.S. Army Special Forces, a man who had dedicated his entire adult life to the service of the United States of America, risking his life for the country for close to forty years, as well as the two premiere CID spec ops agents, Maj. Bobby Samuels and Capt. Bo Devore.
Nguyen Van Tran whispered, “Need photographs, papers about dis Boom and operation.”
James said, “Tran, you be here eating tomorrow at one p.m. sharp. Wear a blue suit and maroon tie. Do you have them?”
“Yes.”
Weatherford went on, “An army sergeant will come in and set a valise down by you. Pick it up when you leave. I’ll have a set for you, too, Muhammad. You can get it later from Tran.”
Muhammad said, “Okay.”
Nothing else was said by any of the men.
In the FBI surveillance van, a man dialed a cell phone; in the restaurant, a teenaged boy and girl waiting for take-out hugged and cuddled, until the boy’s phone rang.
From inside the van, a voice said, “The directional mike is not working. Do you have the bottom of the fake school-books pointing toward them?”
The juvenile-looking special agent replied, “Yes, Mom. Of course. I’ll be home as soon as my order gets here.”
He gave the female agent a look like he was getting a lecture. She giggled and pulled out her lipstick. While she placed the glossy red on her lips she snapped ten photographs from the bottom of the tube. The three plotters paid no attention to the teenagers up at the counter, until their order was delivered, and they paid and left. Muhammad stared at the rear end of the female agent and had his usual lustful thoughts.
In the van, the FBI technician called it into headquarters that the mike in the restaurant was not working. This was shared with Langley, the National Security Council in the basement of the White House, and the Pentagon. There was a lot of cursing going on.
Outside the restaurant cameras were clicking from three different locations as James Weatherford was picked up by another FBI agent in a different taxi. Muhammad and Tran were both followed by surveillance teams. All three men were now on twenty-four-hour-per-day surveillance, and now associates and assistants were starting to be watched.
Bobby and Bo left work and contemplated their new assignment. They would be part of the massive task force to take on the al Qaeda expansion operations into the Far East, the Pacific Rim, or Papa Romeo, as the briefers were already referring to the area of operations. The problem was that the senator James Weatherford also knew about the task force and knew that Bobby and Bo were involved.
He also knew that Bobby, an army major, was singularly in charge of a multiagency task force earlier that year in pursuit of two al Qaeda operatives who had smuggled two suitcase nuclear bombs into the United States, transporting one to Miami, Florida, to detonate and the other to New York City to detonate simultaneously. The task force was comprised of agents and operatives from the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Treasury Department’s Secret Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency, the Department of Defense, the Citizenship and Immigration Services, the Miami-Dade Police Department, and the New York City Police Department, as well as several other agencies.
The plans the al Qaeda made for that operation were even more complex than that on 9/11. The bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima were fifteen kiloton nuclear bombs; and in Nagasaki a brick building, albeit a very well-built brick building, a little over 200 yards from ground zero essentially survived the atomic blast without being demolished.
The al Qaeda had purchased, it was reported, over twenty backpack nukes on the world illegal-arms black market.
The Soviet RA-115 backpack nuclear bombs only weighed just over fifty-seven pounds each and could fit not in a backpack but a large suitcase, so they could be carried and hidden almost anywhere. The al Qaeda operatives’ challenge was to put them where they could rain fire and fear on the U.S. populace.
With a nuclear bomb, over 50 percent of the damage done and lives lost is from the initial blast, then over 35 percent is from the radiation wave, and then all the rest is from fallout and residual effects. The blast from a 1-ton backpack is considerably less than the 15-kiloton bombs that hit the Japanese cities in World War II, but the falloff with nuclear bombs is not really that great as the size decreases. For example, the ground-zero blast from a 1-megaton nuke, which would be like 1,000 backpack nukes, has only a 70 percent increase over a two hundred kiloton nuke. So with nuclear bombs, it is like comparing a hole in the ground seven to eight miles across, as opposed to four to five miles across.
An airburst nuclear bomb could spread radiation over a very large area, but would do significantly less blast damage, as almost all explosions blow up and out.
The attack on the World Trade Center was indicative of and was supposed to be a symbolic gesture of attacking America’s enterprise system of capitalism, and the attack on the Pentagon was obvious. Flight 93 was intended to strike the White House and would have made bin Laden ecstatic. Neither he nor any of the al Qaeda leadership had any idea that the World Trade Center would collapse from the intense heat. They had hoped for the death of hundreds, but when they collapsed, they thought Allah was indeed blessing them.
Now the al Qaeda had counted on two RA-115 backpack nuclear bombs to create more damage than Hiroshima and Nagasaki with one-fifteenth the blast power of each.
The AQ figured that by bombing halfway up the Empire State Building, they would achieve bin Laden’s goal of attacking a major American landmark, but
from a practical application, they would destroy most of the building, sending pieces of brick, concrete, metal, desks, chairs, computers, and other items in a hail of destruction with all of those items becoming falling deadly pieces of shrapnel spread in all directions. Additionally, the upper half of the building would be gone and all the people within, many below would die, and the radioactive fallout from the blast being raised high above the ground would spread over a large area, especially if prevailing winds were not blowing out toward the ocean. Had they blown the building lower, much of the shrapnel falling would not be deadly, but from that elevation, they reasoned even a falling coffeemaker could become a deadly weapon.
Usama bin Laden had long dreamed and spoken about an American Hiroshima, wherein they would detonate two nuclear devices simultaneously during daylight hours for maximum terror effect in two American cities with large Jewish populations. So while Bobby went to New York City to thwart the effort there, Bo had gone to Miami, Florida, the other target city of the al Qaeda plot.
The metropolitan area of Miami had a population of 5.5 million people, many celebrities lived there, and most important, the Miami metro area had a very large Jewish population so most of the al Qaeda leadership saw it as a no-brainer.
There was no Empire State Building in Miami, but there was the Four Seasons Hotel and tower on Brickell Avenue in Miami, which had a height of exactly 788 feet 9 inches, making the tower the tallest U.S. building south of Atlanta and tallest U.S. residential building south of New York City. So it was much more than the tallest building in Florida. It also had office space for lease and hotel rooms, which would more easily facilitate unencumbered bomb emplacement. The construction of the sixty-four-floor high-rise was a reinforced concrete structure incorporating core shear walls, post-tensioned slabs, and perimeter columns with spans between the columns that reached forty feet. It would work.
Bo and Bobby both had been very successful in killing the two al Qaeda operatives before they even had a chance to emplace the nuclear devices in the buildings.