State of the Union

by Brad Thor

  Gary had run through his mind a million times what he was going to say at this moment, but as he retrieved his gun from the sarcophagus and turned to speak, somehow what he had prepared didn’t seem to matter anymore. He could have laughed, he could have simply smiled, but instead he cast one last look at the man who had killed his wife and his eyes said it all—Now it’s your turn. And with that, he turned and left the burial chamber.

  For the first time in his life, despite all his intense training, Helmut Draegar was actually terrified. His restraints wouldn’t give, the LED readout was ticking down, and had he not seen the rusted iron hinge on the door of the alcove behind him, he didn’t know what he would have done. Knowing that the hinge would not be sharp enough to cut through bone, he first had to break his own wrist. Using a small stone about the size of a baseball, he snapped the radius, then the ulna of his shackled left wrist, and then with a primitive tourniquet in place, began the unthinkable.

  Überhof, concerned with the prolonged radio silence, was the first of the backup team to break cover and investigate. He found Draegar, who had dragged himself up from the crypt, missing a hand, bleeding profusely and very near death on the rain-soaked ground of what was once the monastery’s church. He was able to get Draegar away from the ruins just as the piles of plastic explosive detonated in the undercroft and destroyed what remained of the old religious structure.

  Fifteen years later, driving the streets of unified Berlin in search of an all-night pharmacy, it was still hard for Draegar to relive that night. The Russians had given him sanctuary in the days and years after the event. They had made sure East German police reported finding a horribly charred body in the rubble and that it was leaked to intelligence services that one of the Stasi’s best operatives had met with foul play.

  After he had recovered, the Russians had used Draegar and his exceptional skills to train not only their agents, but also the espionage agents of governments they were friendly with. Until recent events had necessitated his evacuation, he had been in Iraq, training Iraqi intelligence officers and helping them to get visas so they could travel to western countries. He had also been providing despotic leaders in the region with lists of assassins that could facilitate “hits” for them in the West, as well as introductions to Russian companies willing to provide sensitive, banned military equipment such as satellite jamming systems intended to interfere with U.S. weapons.

  As far as the world was concerned, Helmut Draegar was dead. And how did he thank his benefactors for giving him a renewed chance at life? He did it by screwing up one of the most important operations they had ever undertaken. Draegar had failed to get the information he needed from Gary Lawlor, which in turn had forced General Stavropol to come to Berlin. Überhof, as good as he once was, was Draegar’s choice, but he had not only missed his opportunity to take out the men who had appeared at the Goltzstrasse apartment, he had allowed himself to be followed to theGeisterbahnhöfe , compromising all of them, and getting himself killed in the process. Not only did they lose Gary Lawlor, and Draegar’s long-awaited opportunity for revenge, but in the fury of the takedown, Stavropol, who had come to Berlin to aid in the interrogation, had dropped his most prized possession, a specially engraved pistol given to him by the Russian High Command—something he valued above all else.

  Stavropol was incredibly angry and blamed Draegar. Berlin was his operation after all, but he had been given a chance to redeem himself and now he had blown that. Fearing the security he assumed had been established at the hospital, Draegar decided to follow Agent Scot Harvath. When the young American operative, whom Stavropol had filled him in on, had driven to the King George, Draegar knew that the Americans had a better handle on the situation than any of them had expected. If you were going to unravel a series of threads, it made sense to begin where the first one started, but the question still remained,what exactly was Harvath doing there ? How had he discovered the place where their entire plan had been hatched?

  A small-time, petty blackmailer, Gerda Putzkammer had no idea that twenty years ago Draegar and his men had not only discovered where she had hidden the information she collected on her customers, but that many nights they were creeping through the crawlspaces themselves collecting as much intelligence as possible from the higher profile clientele that patronized the King George.

  The smartest move of all was when one of Draegar’s men had suggested bugging Putzkammer’s penthouse apartment. For the longest time, they went without uncovering anything of value, but finally, their efforts yielded a particularly precious gem—an American operative by the name of John Parker.

  While Parker never discussed anything in outright detail, the things he did say, along with surveillance of other team members proved extremely helpful in putting together the big picture. In fact, it was Heide Lawlor’s suspicions of her own husband that were the icing on the cake. Listening in on Heide and her caseworker provided the details the Russians needed. Had the woman not been so insistent to her caseworker that her husband was up to something, there might not have been such a need to kill her. But at the rate she was going, she was going to eventually blow her husband’s operation and the Russians couldn’t tolerate that. They had come too far. It was a plum too ripe to let spoil. Heide had to be removed and it had to look like it was done for other reasons. With her out of the picture, the Dark Night operation would be allowed to proceed and they would be able to keep their eye on it.

  But why now was this Scot Harvath returning to the King George? What exactly was he looking for? Though Draegar didn’t get a chance to interrogate the man himself, hopefully by burning the building, he had prevented Harvath from getting whatever it was he was after.

  It would have to be good enough. Berlin wasn’t safe for Draegar anymore. He needed to get back to Russia.

  Chapter 35

  SOMEWHERE OFF THE FINNISH COAST

  STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS—5 DAYS

  T he Advanced SEAL Delivery System, or ASDS, moved silently through the frigid waters of the Baltic Sea. It had been delivered to a secret Swedish naval base on the island of Gotland, via a U.S. Air Force Lockheed Martin C5 Galaxy cargo plane, in what the Swedish government believed was an impromptu, covert NATO training exercise. Harvath and his team flew by private jet to Gotland from Berlin, where they boarded the ASDS with their gear and rendezvoused with theUSS Connecticut , aSeawolf-C lass nuclear-powered attack submarine, waiting two miles offshore. The ASDS was able to attach to the larger submarine via a lock in/lock out chamber in its floor and a dry-deck shelter mounted behind theConnecticut ’s conning tower. This combination of watertight hatches allowed free passage between theConnecticut and the Advanced SEAL Delivery System while theConnecticut was underwater and approaching their target area.

  The enormous nuclear-powered attack submarine was designed with emphasis on high-speed, deep-depth operations. Its engine quieting, combat systems, sensor systems, and payload capacity were greatly improved over its predecessors, theLos Angeles -class attack submarines. It was an investment in technology that kept the United States Navy on the cutting edge of maritime warfare and tonight, that investment had more than proven its value.

  With an unusual number of vessels from Russia’s Baltic Fleet prowling the Gulf of Finland, all of theConnecticut ’s extraordinary stealth capabilities had been called upon to maneuver it undetected into a position off the Finnish coast where it could launch the ASDS.

  The bone-dry, completely enclosed, sixty-five-foot long minisub was considered one of the hottest pieces of equipment the United States Special Operations Command had ever put into service. It could travel at ranges up to 125 miles with a speed of just over eight knots on a series of lithium ion polymer batteries. Its integrated control and display systems, dual-redundant flight control computers, operational software, forward-looking sonar for detecting natural and manmade obstacles, as well as side-looking sonar for mine detection and terrain/bottom mapping, were all state-of-the-art. In addition to a N
avy-certified submarine pilot and SEAL navigator, the craft could accommodate anywhere from eight to sixteen SEALs, depending on the amount of gear their mission required. Tonight, though, Harvath, Morrell, DeWolfe, and Carlson were taking up most of the room.

  As they came within range of their objective, the pilot, whom Carlson had referred to incessantly as ‘Captain Nemo’ since they had boarded in Gotland, told his passengers to begin preparing to get wet.

  Because of the amount of equipment they had to transport, they were limited to exiting in pairs from the lock in/lock out chamber in the floor of the ASDS.

  All four of the men wore brand new amphibious diving suits developed by the Army’s Soldier and Biological Chemical Command lab in Natick, Massachusetts. The amphibious diving suits acted and looked like the typical dry suits designed to keep their wearers warm by preventing water from reaching the skin, but in this case, once the wearers climbed out of the water, the polyurethane-based, three-layer polymer membrane was also designed to soften and become more amorphous, so sweat molecules could pass through it and perspiration could escape, preventing wearers from overheating. Gone were the days of having to change into a separate set of clothes for land-based operations. That said, the waters of the Baltic were absolutely freezing at this time of year, and as added insurance, the men wore an additional fleece lined layer beneath their suits.

  Their LAR VII closed-circuit rebreathers were complimented by military full facemasks with unimpeded field of vision, which provided added facial protection from the icy water. Rebreathers were always the system of choice for covert operations. Regular scuba equipment not only gave off clouds of large visible bubbles, but was also noisy. Closed-circuit oxygen rebreathers on the other hand were quiet, gave off no bubbles and filtered the user’s exhaled carbon dioxide, recharging the remaining nitrogen gas, which makes up a large part of the air, with pulsed oxygen. This economical system allows a diver to stay submerged for four hours or more. The main disadvantage, however, is that the diver is limited to operating in shallow water as pure oxygen begins to become toxic at depths greater than thirty feet.

  Waterproof combat bags protected the team’s M4 machine guns, a light weight version of the M16, which possessed a shorter barrel and a collapsible stock.

  ‘Dummy corded’ to each man, to prevent it from being dropped while underwater, was a highly classified weapon made by Heckler & Koch that didn’t appear in any of their catalogs—the H&K P11.

  The P11 was a special pistol, which could fire five 7.62-caliber darts both above andbelow water. But once those five shots have been fired, The P11 takes even longer than an antique black powder rifle to reload, as it has to be sent all the way back to the H&K factory.

  To navigate the strong currents around Aidata Island, each man commanded a Farallon MkX DPV—Diver Propulsion Vehicle. The Farallon MkX model DPV was a result of a joint research project between the U.S. Special Operations community and Farallon to give American combat divers an extended mission range and greater top speed than normal commercial DPVs delivered. One of the greatest benefits of a DPV was that because a diver didn’t have to propel himself to an objective, he wasn’t doing any work, so his air could last up to fifty percent longer—essentially doubling his dive time.

  The devices looked like minitorpedoes. Because they incorporated a revolutionary new hydrogen based propulsion system, as opposed to the silver zinc batteries being used by other companies, they were much faster than anything previously produced.

  Once Harvath, Morrell, DeWolfe, and Carlson were all outside the mini-sub, they activated their waterproof night vision monocles, powered up their DPVs and followed their GPS displays on predetermined courses for Aidata Island.

  Chapter 36

  T hough he had long since deleted the message, the final transmission Frank Leighton had received from Berlin still floated in the forefront of his mind:

  Your mission has been compromised. Entire Dark Night team terminated. Gary Lawlor seriously wounded. Prognosis unclear.

  Mission parameters now changed. We are coming to you. Will explain at your location. Hold position and exercise extreme caution. You are being watched.

  Frank Leighton had spent most of the last twenty-two hours wrestling with a multitude of questions.Who had killed his teammates? Who exactly was watching him? Was it the Russians? What had happened to Gary Lawlor? How had the Dark Night operation been compromised? Who was this new player, Norseman? And why had his burst transmission been terminated so abruptly?

  Though Norseman had managed to discover the emergency contact location and the code for the burst transmission, Leighton was still not one hundred percent convinced that he was who he said he was and decided to slant the playing field as much in his favor as possible.

  When Norseman said, “we are coming to you,” undoubtedly he meant that he would be arriving with a team of some sort. If they really were concerned about being observed, they would probably arrive under cover of darkness and most likely via the water.

  The first thing Leighton did was booby-trap the site where he had secreted his nuke. If worse came to worse and he was captured, he could at least march his captors into an ambush and maybe be able to escape.

  Next, he made sure his boat was ready to sail. He went over the entire craft from stem to stern and made sure everything was literally shipshape. After that, there was nothing left to do but wait.

  Hidden within a small outcropping of rock on the side of the inlet where his boat was moored, was a narrow fissure just big enough for Leighton to wedge himself into and be concealed. The waiting seemed to last an eternity, but he was patient. The night was dark and did not offer much ambient light, which greatly reduced the effectiveness of the old night vision binoculars now clutched in his hands. When he finally did notice something near the beach, he thought his tired eyes were playing tricks on him. Leighton squeezed his eyes shut for several seconds, trying to dissipate some of the ‘orange burn’ so common with use of night vision optics.

  When he looked back through the binoculars again, the shapes appeared not to have moved.Probably just piles of kelp washed in by the tide, he thought to himself. The Baltic was famous for the large seaweed forests that populated its sea floor. Then, as he was about to lower the binoculars and give his eyes another rest, he noticed it—movement. They were here.

  As Leighton extricated himself from his hiding place, it took several minutes for him to get the blood flowing into his legs again. Though the site had provided an exceptional vantage point, he should have stretched more often. His body was not as forgiving as it used to be.

  With his Finnish-made JatiMatic PDW drawn, Leighton quietly crept toward the beach. He picked his way along the jagged shoreline, slogging through frigid knee-deep tidal pools, while using the abundance of large rocks for cover as best he could.

  When he neared the field of smooth, ocean-tumbled stones that functioned as the inlet’s beach, Leighton crouched behind the last large rock that stood between him and the wide-open space. As the waves splashed against the shore and further soaked his already drenched trousers, he once again raised the night vision binoculars and studied the two shapes he had been looking at before. Upon closer inspection, he still couldn’t tell if they were piles of kelp or something more. But he had seen movement. He was sure of it.

  At that moment, a voice from behind and to the left caught him completely off-guard. “Mr. Leighton, I presume?” Leighton stiffened in surprise.

  “Please set down your weapon and turn around slowly,” continued the voice.

  Leighton did as he was told. As he turned around, the man who had addressed him lowered the M4 he had pointing at him, pulled off the strings of camouflaging kelp that were hanging from his dry suit, and stepped the rest of the way out of the water. “I’m Norseman,” the man said, holding out a gloved hand.

  Leighton was speechless. He hadn’t even heard so much as a ripple from the water. Whoever this guy was, he was good. Though he cautiously
shook the man’s hand, Frank Leighton still wasn’t convinced they were on the same side.

  Harvath shouldered his weapon and removed his fins, tucking them under his left arm. Taking off his gloves, he slid them underneath his weight belt and then signaled the beach and the rusting trawler with a small, waterproof IR strobe. When his signals were returned, Harvath removed his facemask and said to Leighton, “It looks like a nice night for a boat ride. Let’s get going.”

  On the beach, they rendezvoused with Leighton’s two piles of kelp, operatives Morrell and DeWolfe. Knowing that he had spotted at least part of the team made Leighton feel only slightly better. Though his skills were still good, they weren’t near what they used to be.

  Forgoing the courtesy of an introduction, Morrell asked, “Where’s the device?”

  “Let’s establish somebona fides first,” replied Leighton.

  “I thought we already did that.”

  “We’re off to an okay start, but if you think I’m going to hand my responsibilities over to a group of frogmen who show up and just happen to speak English without any accents and claim to be on my side, you’re quite mistaken.”

  “Listen,” snapped Morrell. “Don’t try my fucking patience. This suit is good for only about ten more minutes and then my body heat, which you are prematurely raising, is going to begin leaching out. I’m sure our friends the Russians out there on the water are using thermal imaging to keep an eye on this place. If they notice more than one warm body on this island, they might think there’s a little beach barbecue going on and want to come in for a closer look. We can’t let that happen.”

  Leighton, far from being a pushover, went toe-to-toe with Morrell and said, “Then you’d better keep your cool.”