‘This is the pilot, estimate your location in ten minutes, over.’
‘Leila, roger . . . rope ladder is in position on the starboard side.’
‘Make a run along the hull,’ Kazaz ordered when he reached the tanker, towering above him. He checked Leila’s draft. The hull markings were registering 20.5 metres, close to the maximum of 21 metres. The helmsman brought the pilot boat alongside and Kazaz swung on to the ropes in one practised movement.
‘Shukran . . . thank you,’ said Kazaz, and he climbed sure-footedly to the deck high above him, where Abdullah Hadid, the master of the Leila, was waiting.
‘Ahlan wa sahlan . . . welcome on board,’ the short, wiry master said, extending his hand, a look of relief on his face. Despite his twenty years experience as a ship’s master, Hadid was never comfortable in the close confines of a port or terminal where he was unsure of the currents and where the shipping lanes were crowded. Together, they signed the ship’s register and commenced the pre-unberthing safety check with a tour of the tanker’s vast deck, checking on mooring lines and anchor cables. Kazaz ensured that the Chiksan arms, the marine loading arms that enabled the crude to be pumped into the huge tanks, were safely disconnected and stowed on the sea island. Satisfied, he stepped into the Leila’s elevator with the captain and rode up seven storeys to the bridge, above which flew a red and white flag, indicating the pilot was on board.
English was the international language of the sea, and having ascertained that Captain Hadid, along with the Leila’s chief engineer, could communicate well, Kazaz familiarised himself with the layout of the bridge: the chart table, radars and helmsman’s position, and the repeater dials, and then he briefed Hadid on the plan for unberthing.
‘The wind is from the north-west at 25 knots, and the current is running at one and a half knots, so we’ll use that to help ease the stern away from the aft dolphin,’ Kazaz explained, while he waited for the four tug captains to confirm they were secured.
‘Standby engines, single up lines,’ he ordered. Kazaz walked across to the port wing of the big bridge and watched the dolphin crews cast off all but the essential mooring hawsers at the bow and the stern.
‘Leila stern . . . let go aft . . . port twenty . . . dead slow ahead.’ Kazaz listened while his orders were repeated back to him. ‘Manifa, Najimah, Tanajib, half astern.’ On the bridge of the stern tug, Tanajib, the meter registering the strain on the line touched 80 tonnes and the stern of the huge tanker slowly swung away from the aft dolphin.
‘Bow, this is bridge, let go for’ard . . . midships . . . dead slow astern . . . Manifa . . . come around to port.’
The massive tanker eased out into the channel and the four tugs, like attentive sheep dogs, responded instantly to Kazaz’s measured commands. When manoeuvring a behemoth like this, Kazaz knew well that slow was good, and degree by degree, the monstrous bow, nearly 300 metres for’ard of the bridge, came around onto a heading for the narrow and treacherous Strait of Hormuz.
‘It is sheesham timber,’ Yousef explained to the Iranian Mirjaveh border guard, who seemed to be having difficulty reading the invoice. ‘Two truckloads destined for a furniture shop in Bandar Abbas.’ Yousef knew that if the border guards checked, they would find that Sheesham Furniture Bandar Abbas was a registered business, but eventually they would discover it was a shell company. ‘They make very good furniture there,’ Yousef added with a smile. The guard relaxed a little, walked around both trucks and returned a short while later with the paperwork stamped and approved.
Yousef settled back into the front passenger seat of the Bedford and the convoy headed north-west on Highway 84, across the Kavir-e Loot desert, where the temperature of the sand could get as high as 70˚C, and on toward Zahedan, an Iranian desert city of half a million people. The air temperature had climbed and a heat haze shimmered off the desert on either side of the road.
Yousef connected his laptop through a satellite link, opened up the stamp website and logged in under the username of ‘Ledifni’.
‘Have just acquired a US #231 1893 Columbian Commemorative stamp,’ he posted, together with the image of the American Bank Note Company’s two-cent stamp. ‘A much-desired boost to my collection . . . it is giving me a great deal of happiness.’
An hour later, the Bedford trucks ground their way past flat-roofed houses toward the centre of the city, where a large crowd had gathered near the Ali Ibn Abi Talib Mosque, chanting Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Three bodies swung in the breeze beneath a makeshift gantry, suspended from thick ropes around their necks. Yousef could hear the governor shouting through loud speakers. Two days before, an explosion had rocked the centre of the city.
‘Let this be a lesson! These terrorists have been corrupt on earth. They have waged war against God, and they have acted contrary to national security! They were agents of arrogance . . . agents of arrogance!’ the governor warned. It was a term the clerics used to refer to the United States. ‘There is no doubt they were hired by the Great Satan to disrupt our lives!’
Yousef directed the driver to take a side street that led to one of al Qaeda’s safe houses, where the two Toyota four-wheel drives were fuelled and ready to go.
A short while later, the enlarged convoy, led by Yousef in one of the Toyotas, headed west across the desert for Bam, the site of an ancient citadel on the old Silk Road which dated back to the sixth century BC. But the citadel was now in ruins. On 26 December 2003, an earthquake registering 6.6 on the Richter Scale had struck, killing 26 000 people, and the old fortress had been destroyed.
From there, the convoy headed northwest again, before turning south on Highway 91, where the trucks were forced to engage low gear as they ground their way up into the barren rocks of the Jebal Barez mountains. At the top of the range, Yousef could see a vast plain stretching below them, and in the distance, the Halil River and the city of Jiroft, one of the hottest places in Iran. They pushed on to the south, past the suddenly green cultivated fields of Anbarãbãd, and on through Kahnooj and Dehbãrez, until they reached Minab, 100 kilometres to the east of Bandar Abbas. Minab was famous for its prawns and date palms, but more importantly for Yousef, it provided a safe house close to the coast and the Strait of Hormuz.
Yousef led the way through the centre of the city, past the roadside portraits of the bearded Ayatollah Khamenei, dressed in his traditional black turban and robes. The traffic was surprisingly light, and Yousef guessed correctly that the city’s occupants had gravitated to the famous Panjshambe Bazar or ‘Thursday’s Bazaar’, where vendors were selling anything from ghalyeh mahi, a spicy fish stew, to Persian carpets. Here, the older women wore the full-length burqa. Younger women wore long dresses and the headscarf or hijab, and to protect their faces from the heat, many women wore colourful woven masks, unique to this part of Iran.
A short distance past the city centre, Yousef turned off into a dirt lane leading to a lone, adobe mud-brick house. For the past two years, it had been home to al Qaeda agents inside Iran. Yousef gave orders to unload the timber from the trucks and configure the missile tubes.
Over 2000 kilometres away, in his villa in the hills above Islamabad, it was seven-thirty p.m. General Khan received the alert on his laptop, and he reached for a mobile he used rarely. ‘Columbus has landed,’ he texted. A further 12 500 kilometres away in Dallas, it was eight-thirty in the morning and Sheldon Crowley was at his desk on the eighty-second floor of EVRAN Towers. He sent a short encrypted direction to René du Bois, in the headquarters of the Crédit Group in Paris. ‘Buy oil and sell all other stocks’.
The World Federation of Exchanges based in Paris took in fifty-two regulated stock market exchanges around the world. René du Bois smiled and he swivelled in his leather chair toward a bank of screens providing him with a dizzying array of up-to-the-minute financial charts. One screen showed the total value of world equities at US $54.57 trillion. The Dow Jones industrial average was up nearly half a per cent, Standard & Poors 500 Index was up a third of
a per cent, and the Nasdaq Composite Index was also up by 0.98 per cent. The figures would have meant little to the average person in the street, but to Du Bois, they represented gains of hundreds of millions of dollars. He keyed in a code, and a string of classified assessments from highly paid market analysts in Crédit Group appeared on another of his screens. Oil had rallied, and more importantly, Crédit Group analysts had estimated that over the next twelve months, world demand for oil would increase by 850 000 barrels per day, taking global demand to over ninety million barrels a day. Growth in the Chinese economy, even though down 0.2 per cent, was still expected to be at a healthy 7.5 per cent.
Not for very much longer, Du Bois mused. With insider knowledge, Crédit Group had made billions getting out of equities before the devastating effects of the 2008 crash. The value of world stocks had plunged a staggering 47 per cent, but stock markets had largely recovered since then. Pharos was right, it was time to strike again.
Du Bois keyed in another code, and pulled up the top twenty-five oil stocks by capitalisation. Over the past few weeks, Crédit Group had quietly increased its holdings in companies like ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell, the Brazilian behemoth Petrobras and its counterpart in Asia, Petro China. The sheer volume of stock had driven share prices up nearly two percentage points, but Du Bois knew the surge in oil stocks in twenty-four hours’ time would be considerably more dramatic, and the impact on world stock markets would not stop there.
Abdullah Hadid, the master of the Leila, rubbed his eyes. He had been on deck for nearly twenty-four hours, right through the tricky berthing at Ras Tanura, and the loading of over two million barrels of crude, but he would not hand over to the officer of the watch until the massive tanker was clear of the Strait of Hormuz and well into the Gulf of Oman where they would head for the Arabian Sea.
Hadid checked the radar plot, noting the blips on the screen that represented other ships. The southern shipping lane was reserved for outbound vessels, and Leila was almost abeam of the fishing village of Khasab, located on Oman’s Musandam cape at the northernmost tip of the Arabian Peninsula. Ahead was the Gulf Lexicon, a Liberian flagged tanker of just over 200 000 tonnes. Ten nautical miles behind, another Dutch flagged tanker of similar tonnage, the Black Viking, was maintaining a steady 12 knots, smashing through the heavy chop. Hadid knew it would soon be time to begin a series of changes of course that would take the Leila through 270 degrees around the notorious bend between the coast of Iran and Oman. Hadid also noted a line of radar blips in the northern inbound shipping lane. Even though there was a three-kilometre median separating the inbound and outbound lanes, when large ships were operating in close proximity, that was not a lot of distance.
Hadid walked outside on to the port wing of the Leila’s bridge and scanned the horizon through his binoculars. It was as he suspected. Even though the sun was setting, the shape was unmistakable. The 100 000-tonne Nimitz-class nuclear aircraft carrier USS Truman was entering the Gulf to join the American Fifth Fleet based out of Manama in Bahrain, just to the south of the Saudi refinery. Although the massive carrier’s top speed was classified, it was powered by two nuclear reactors generating over a quarter of a million horsepower. The carrier’s four huge screws gave the ship a staggering speed of over 30 knots. Manned by over 3200 officers and men, and escorted by the guided missile cruiser Gettysburg, and an array of destroyers, she carried ninety aircraft, including F/A-18 fighters, F-14B Tomcats, EA-6B Prowlers, and E-2C Hawkeyes. Hadid smiled to himself. Navigation laws in the confined waters of the Gulf stipulated they be on the surface, but the US Navy didn’t always comply with regulations. Lurking beneath the relatively calm evening waters would, he knew, be the USS Hyman G. Rickover, and the USS Bergall. American nuclear carriers never went anywhere without at least one, and usually two nuclear submarines for extra protection. Ten nautical miles astern of Carrier Group Ten, an even larger vessel was looming on the horizon, all 500 000 tonnes of her: the Atlantic Giant, a tanker so massive it was too big to fit through the new locks of the Panama Canal, and too big to manoeuvre in the English Channel.
Hadid checked his position. They were now abeam the small fishing village of Kumzar, the most northerly inhabited place in Oman and accessible only by boat. It was time to begin the long turn that would take them around the rocky islands at the tip of the Arabian Peninsula.
‘Starboard ten,’ Hadid ordered.
‘Starboard ten,’ the helmsman acknowledged. Even though the ship’s powerful hydraulics had acted in an instant, turning Leila’s state-of-the art rudders, such was the momentum of a supertanker that Hadid knew it would be several hundred metres more before the bow started to turn. Even in an emergency, with the engines straining at full astern, he knew it would take more than three nautical miles to stop her.
He looked past the myriad pumps and pipelines running for hundreds of metres up to the Leila’s bow. The sun was setting, shedding an orange glow on the white, choppy surface of the sea.
Yousef led the small convoy back down the dirt lane into Minab, and then south along the coast on Route 91. The missile launchers were now fully assembled on the back trays of the Bedford trucks, and covered with tightly lashed tarpaulins. To the west, the sun was setting in a fiery ball, reflected in a purple-orange heat haze over the shipping lanes of the Hormuz Strait and the Persian Gulf. To the east, a line of bare rocky hills paralleled the Iranian coast.
Traffic was light, and Yousef drove steadily. They passed through the small towns of Talvar and Bemãni-ye-gachine, veering closer to the coast until they reached Bondãrãn. Here, Yousef took a minor road that led east into the hills, the desert broken here and there by small oases where palm trees flourished on water courses. Three kilometres further on, Yousef turned off the road.
‘Those palm trees over there,’ he commanded, directing the trucks. ‘Get the tarpaulins off, quickly . . . Get them ready!’ Yousef knew they might still be seen by the Infidel’s drones, but the sun had now set, and at least they were hidden from view on the ground. He climbed a rocky outcrop and focused his powerful binoculars on the shipping lanes in the Strait. Yousef could not believe the images in the twin lens. It was beyond his wildest dreams. ‘Alhamdulillah! Allah be praised!’ he cried.
‘Starboard ten,’ Hadid ordered.
‘Starboard ten,’ the helmsman acknowledged.
The Atlantic Giant was approaching from the east. As big a supertanker as the Leila was, Hadid never ceased to be in awe of the ULCCs, of which there were only three in the world. The Atlantic Giant was still riding relatively high in the water, and Hadid guessed that she had already loaded some crude prior to calling in to the Gulf. Powered by a massive 50 000-shaft horsepower engine, the turbulence from her single 30-foot diameter, 50-tonne propeller was clearly visible. Capable of fitting four St Paul’s Cathedrals into her holds, and longer than the Empire State building was tall, the Atlantic Giant would take on another two million barrels of crude oil.
Captain Rogers, together with his crew, weapons controller Sergeant Michelle Brady, and CIA intelligence analyst Major Ryan Crowe, took their places in the Creech Air Force Base briefing room and waited for the commander of the 432nd Wing, Colonel Joe Stillwell, to begin.
‘The president has ordered an increased presence in the Persian Gulf,’ Stillwell began, ‘and as a result, the Fifth Fleet is being reinforced with the Harry S. Truman Carrier Group Ten,’ said Stillwell, throwing up real-time classified satellite imagery on to the screen. ‘Notwithstanding the progress being made on the Iranian nuclear issue, the second carrier is a response to the increasingly aggressive rhetoric coming out of Tehran, including their threats to close the Strait of Hormuz. The Iranians have a layered strategy,’ Stillwell continued, ‘and they base this on anti-ship cruise missiles, naval mines and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard’s fleet of fast attack craft.’ He flicked up a photograph of the small but deadly speedboats. ‘They’re armed with torpedoes and rocket launchers, and our ships are particularl
y vulnerable in this busy waterway. It’s not only narrow, but movement is restricted by up to twenty supertankers a day transiting the area. As a result, we now have an additional task, protecting the Fifth Fleet.
‘We’ll be operating our aircraft out of Qatar, providing twenty-four hour coverage over the Persian Gulf,’ Stillwell continued, pulling up a satellite overhead of the huge al-Udeid Air Base outside of Doha, the capital of Qatar. The Arab monarchy was located on a peninsula just to the south of Bahrain and the Ras Tanura oil refinery. With the third largest natural gas reserves in the world, the tiny country was the world’s richest. ‘Any questions?’
‘What’s the situation with the Iranians, sir?’ Sergeant Brady asked.
‘In terms of potential for a conflict to escalate out of control, the Persian Gulf is on a par with the Cuban missile crisis,’ said Stillwell. ‘The present standoff with Iran over nuclear weapons is only the latest in a long history of brinkmanship.’ Stillwell flashed up an image of the Iranian minelayer, Iran Ajr, the mines clearly visible on her decks. ‘Most of you guys are too young to remember, but in September 1987, we launched Operation Praying Mantis, tracking the Iran Ajr out of its home port in Iran into international waters where it started to lay mines in the shipping channels. Our Special Forces helicopters and a SEAL team attacked the ship and disabled it. Unfortunately, we were not able to recover all the mines and the guided missile frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts was holed the following year when it hit one. During Praying Mantis, we sank an Iranian frigate, a gunboat and six of their armed speedboats . . . so this area can blow out of control very quickly.
‘As to operations in the region’s airspace,’ Stillwell continued, ‘some of you who have joined us recently may not be aware that last year, Captain Rogers was conducting surveillance over international waters in the Persian Gulf, when his predator drone was engaged by two Iranian Su-25 fighters.’ Stillwell allowed himself a smile. ‘They’re not very good shots,’ he said, ‘but nevertheless, the Revolutionary Guard are aggressive, and they may try again.’ Stillwell paused, choosing his words carefully. ‘But they are playing a very dangerous game. It goes without saying that we are not, repeat not, to engage Iranian aircraft unless specifically authorised to do so.’
The Alexandria Connection Page 25