by Ralph Peters
He had grown up in a world where armor ruled the night, when magic night-vision devices and perfect communications had made his kind masters of the midnight hour. But this was a different world. First, the jamming had gone crazy again. Then a tank in Alpha Company and a Bradley in Charlie had each run over an EMP mine, wiping out every electronic system on their company property books.
For almost two hours, Maxwell had remained unaware of the company-level crises. Waiting in his command post and listening to slivers of the war, he’d blamed the jamming for the lack of updates from his subordinate commanders. Meanwhile, his forward companies had been fighting for their lives. Even Bravo Company, with intact comms gear, had been hard up against it, infiltrated by commandos wearing cool-suits that masked the body-heat signatures that should have registered on Bravo’s thermal sights. With the noise of battle all around and artillery fire falling like an endless avalanche, Maxwell had lost control of his battalion without realizing it.
Only when he grew restless and went forward on a personal recon — half to keep from dozing off — had he encountered the Alpha Company first sergeant, who’d peeled off from the fight to alert battalion.
Maxwell had turned around just in time to warn his command post to be prepared for a knife fight. Suicide commandos had penetrated the line. The TOC got hit just minutes after he got back.
After that, it hadn’t been a question of commanding his battalion but of survival. The Headquarters Company clerks and jerks had gotten their chance to kill or be killed in pitch darkness, guided only by tracer streams and cries. Maxwell would’ve retrieved his sword, on practical grounds. But there hadn’t been time. The Jihadis came out of the darkness in waves. Screaming and hurling grenades. Firing wildly. After breaking his carbine while beating a Jihadi to death, Maxwell had scavenged a weapon from a dead soldier. After that, he fought with short bursts and the bayonet. When he wasn’t fighting for his own life, he tried to impose order on the free-for-all.
Where Jihadis had tangled themselves in the wire, they blew themselves up as Maxwell’s men approached. After that, his soldiers shot anything that screamed or even rustled.
One of the commandos had gotten inside a tank. That set off a razor fight in a locked closet. Out of ammunition, another soldier fought with his bare hands for the cab of his V-hull truck, finishing the job only by biting through his enemy’s neck and thumbing out an eyeball.
Neither side took prisoners.
The first orange crack split the horizon into heaven and earth. As if the night had been slashed open with a saber. Maxwell could see faces. Bodies. Damage.
“Sergeant Major?” he called.
No answer.
“Captain Barnes?”
No answer.
But plenty of his soldiers remained alive. More and more of them emerged, ghostly, from the gray depths between the trees. More had survived than seemed reasonable after those infernal hours. But it was hard to spot one who wasn’t smeared with blood.
Black lumps littered the ground. Lot more of them than of us, Maxwell thought. But it was slight consolation. Behind scorched trees, a comms vehicle smoldered.
In the eternal voice of the eternal sergeant, an NCO asked the world, “Anybody got any fucking coffee? I don’t care how cold it is…”
What was he supposed to do now? Use semaphore? Messengers? In one of the not-quite lulls between wave attacks, he’d managed to raise brigade and report the EMP mines. At least, he thought they’d copied him. Higher had to know about that par tic u lar threat. Before everybody in the corps started running into them.
Call the mental roll: Two companies dead, as far as their electronics went — would they have replacement comms gear somewhere up the chain? Actual casualty figures unknown. A battalion headquarters in shreds. And an enemy who meant business after all.
What was a commander supposed to do under the circumstances?
Maxwell had no trouble answering his own question: Fight.
QUARTERS ONE, FT. HOOD, TEXAS
Sarah Colmer-Harris wasn’t sure she should answer the phone. The crank calls had reached a level of vitriol that shocked her, despite all that she’d heard in her courtroom years. But there was also a chance it would be her daughter calling again. She dreaded that call, too. She didn’t have anything left to give to anyone else just now.
Ready to curse the caller, she picked up the phone. “Hello?”
“Sarah?”
“Oh, God. Gary? Is it you?”
“For better, or worse. Worse, if you were close enough to smell me.”
“It’s so good to hear your voice. I can’t tell you how good.” She wanted not to cry. But her strength fled. “Is everything okay? Are you all right?”
“I’m tired. Otherwise unscathed. I wake you, darling?”
“No. I hadn’t gone to bed yet.” She glanced across the room to the half-packed, ill-packed suitcase. “It’s just so wonderful to hear your voice.”
“I love you, Sarah.”
“And I love you. God, I feel like I’m back in high school, and the boy I’d been mooning about for months just called.”
“Who is he? I’ll kill him.”
“Only you.” She wiped the wet from her nose with the back of her hand, then rubbed at her tears. “I wish you were here.”
“Wouldn’t mind being there myself. Better than you being here, under the circumstances. Just had one of the memorable meals of my life.”
“Are you all right? Really?”
“Yes, Sarah. I’m all right. Are you all right?”
“Fine. Better now. Since you called.” How much did he know? she wondered.
“Listen, Sarah… I can’t tie up this line. I’m breaking my own rule. But… here it is… the reason I called…”
She cringed. Beginning to shrivel inside. He knew.
“What? Tell me.”
“Sarah… I just wanted you to know that I love you. I needed to tell you that I love you unconditionally, without reservation, and with all my heart. And I have unlimited faith in you. In all things.”
“You’re making me cry.”
“You’ve been crying for the last five minutes. You’ve probably got snot all over the phone.”
“Mr. Romantic.” But he was, he was.
“I love you, Sarah. That’s all. How are the girls?”
She hesitated. Then she forced herself to speak. Before he began to suspect something.
“Gary… I’ve got something to tell you. But promise me you won’t get upset. You’ve got to promise me.”
“That’s hard, Sarah. What’s wrong?”
“It’s nothing so terrible. I just don’t want you hearing rumors and—”
“What’s wrong, Sarah?”
“It’s Emily. She’s… been in an accident. Nothing terrible, nothing too serious. Miranda’s with her.”
“She’s going to be all right, though?”
“Yes,” she lied. “She should be fine.”
Dear God, she prayed to the being she didn’t believe in, Dear God, just let me get through this. Don’t let him know. Please. He doesn’t need this now. I can bear it for the two of us. Until he comes home.
“Well, if anything—”
“She’s going to be fine.”
“Sarah… I’ve got to go.”
“I know. I love you.”
“And I love you. Give my love to Emily. Tell her she’s got terrible timing. And give Miranda a hug for me. A big one.”
“I promise. Gary… Come home safe.”
“I promise. I’ll be there before you know it. What did the monkey say when he caught his tail in the meat grinder?”
“ ‘It won’t be long now.’ Gary, sweetheart… If your men only knew what a little boy you are…”
“I’m relying on you not to tell.”
“I won’t. Girl Scout’s honor. I love you. I love you.”
“I love you, Sarah.”
Then he was gone. And Sarah turned back to the labor of
packing for the flight to her daughter’s funeral.
EIGHTEEN
AT TAYYIBAH, IRBID VILAYET, EMIRATE OF AL-QUDS AND DAMASKUS
“Salaam Aleikum!” Suleiman al-Mahdi said as he rose from his nest of cushions. Instead of his uniform, the emir-general wore layered white robes trimmed in gold. Crossing the room to greet Montfort properly, he switched to English: “The hours I have waited for you, my friend, allowed me to ponder the distance our journeys have taken us!”
The emir-general approached with open arms, as if to embrace Montfort. But just when al-Mahdi’s heels stopped clacking on the tile floor, he shifted to the posture for a handshake. The Arab’s grip was firm, distinctly unlike the pudgy Saudi paws Montfort recalled from an earlier war. Al-Mahdi’s robes accented, rather than concealed, his slump-shouldered build. He had the eyes of a successful pawnbroker.
“I hope your immediate journey was not too difficult?” the Arab said. He released his grip on Montfort and swept his right hand toward a wall. “This house is very dear to me. It belonged to my grandfather, you know. The Royal Jordanian general. I loved to visit in my youth. The water here is very sweet, the people respectful. But please! Sit down, General Montfort.”
Al-Mahdi gestured toward a low table laden with plates of fruit and ceramic carafes. Tea steamed, delivered just as Montfort’s he li — cop ter throbbed in for a landing. Montfort faced a choice of a cushioned divan, less plush than al-Mahdi’s own, or a chair with gilt arms and a striped satin seat, a knockoff of a reject from Versailles.
Montfort took the chair. The emir-general dropped back onto his throne of cushions. A black grape fell onto the tabletop, an extravaganza of mother-of-pearl inlay. The Sunni Arabs Montfort had encountered over the years presented themselves as Islam’s Calvinists, but their appetite for florid interiors hinted at private indiscipline.
Veering east from the Jordan Valley, the flight up the Wadi al Tayyibah had been difficult for the pilots, who had to scrape the neglected fields below the wadi’s walls to evade the MOBIC’s own radar coverage. But Montfort had felt nothing resembling worry. He had no fear of death, although his dismissal of it had more to do with pride than with his faith.
“You look weary, my friend,” al-Mahdi told him. The emir-general leaned toward the table and lifted a bowl of dates. “Please. Let me offer you nourishment. You are my guest, after all. In my grandfather’s house, we cannot be enemies. And I had these dates brought in just for your pleasure. They come from the finest grove between the Tigris and Euphrates, not far from Baghdad. Where, I’m told, you acquired a taste for them, when you were a young warrior.”
Montfort shook his head. No, thank you. Al-Mahdi smiled. Amused. After setting down the bowl, he brought a glistening date to his lips, bit into its flesh, and sucked away half of the dense, brown pulp. After swallowing, he said, “You see, General Montfort? They are not poisoned. Neither my duty as a host nor my judgment would permit such a thing. And, truth be told, assassinations have never brought my faith lasting successes. They were our version of what your military used to call ‘surgical strikes.’ Or ‘decapitation strikes,’ to be still more precise. Just as such shortcuts did not work for you, they also failed us. Although we quite liked to dance about and celebrate the death of this fellow or that.” He smiled again, finished the date, then said, “No, the easy solutions never work. Do they? We must grip our problems in their entirety and act boldly if we want results that endure. But you do look weary — some tea, at least?”
Montfort reached for his cooling glass of tea. “I need to confirm that everything’s on track.”
“But do try a date. They’re wondrous. On track? You rather exceeded our agreement regarding Jerusalem. But I ascribe that to uncontrollable enthusiasm. In the future, however, I will expect our agreement to be honored ‘to the letter,’ as your diplomats like to say.”
“Jerusalem was always to be ours. To administer as we see fit.”
“Well, then, you’ve simplified your task, I suppose. You haven’t left a great deal to administer. But done is done.”
“Since we’re on the subject of things not going quite as planned,” Montfort said, “I have to tell you that there’ll be a slight delay in Nazareth. In eliminating your target group. General Harris is being obstinate.”
“You told me he would not last. That he would be removed.”
“Some things take time.”
“Do you have the time? Do we?”
Montfort tasted the tea. Too sweet. Like mint syrup. “I’ll take care of Nazareth. And General Harris.”
Al-Mahdi finished his own remaining tea in a gulp. And he sighed. “I allowed for difficulties in Nazareth, given the tender sentiments of General Harris. We’ve taken certain measures of our own. To simplify your task. But I wonder about this ‘Flintlock’ Harris. He seems a clever fellow. Moreso than I was led to expect.”
“He’s not. Astute, perhaps. But certainly not clever.”
“But isn’t that a more dangerous quality? To be astute? Doesn’t Aristotle tell us that cleverness precludes depth? In The Poetics, I think. Although I hope you will not pin me down. A clever man will outwit himself in the end. But an astute fellow?”
“I’ve never read Aristotle.”
“Aristotle is a waste of time. But one remembers what one is forced to learn. My point is that there may be more to General Harris than his portrayal as a ‘simple soldier’ has led us to believe.”
“I’ve known Gary Harris for over thirty years. Don’t worry about him. His sense of duty will be his undoing.”
“He sounds like a Jihadi.”
“Don’t worry about Harris.”
“I don’t worry about him. I merely wonder about him. As I have said. But don’t you find it pleas ur able to analyze your enemies, General Montfort? To solve the marvelous puzzle of the man who seeks to kill you and your kind?”
“What would I find if I analyzed you? Right now?”
“You would find a man asking himself if you will deliver all that you have promised, after you have received all that you have been promised.”
“You’ll get everything we agreed to. Once we have Damascus.”
“And your Air Force will support me? When I march against the sultan in Baghdad? And when I reckon with the Shia heretics to the east? What will you tell your associates in the Pentagon, in Washington?”
“That we’re helping Muslims destroy each other.”
Al-Mahdi’s smile returned, spreading his whis kers. “Exactly right. But you and I understand the importance — the indispensible nature — of purifying our faiths. How many Christians do you think you will have to destroy? In the end?”
“Not so many.”
“That is how it begins. With ‘not so many.’ But there is always another apostate, a heretic, a renegade… another traitor. Myself, I expect to go on killing for the rest of my life. The struggle is never done. And there is neither tragedy nor dishonor in such a struggle that finds no end. On the contrary: A faith that triumphed completely would go to sleep — that was the tragedy of the Arab world in our days of greatness, you know. We were so successful that we just dozed off. And when we awoke, having slept through the Ottoman centuries, we found that the French and English, and, later, you Americans had crept into our house and stolen everything we expected to have for ‘breakfast, lunch, and dinner,’ as you put it.” He picked up a date but delayed lifting it to his mouth. “One of your great founding fathers has written that your system of government must be refreshed now and then with the blood of patriots. So it is with religion: A healthy faith demands a struggle, an enemy, a Shaitan. Our religion — any religion — must be refreshed with the blood of heretics and infidels.” He grinned. “Were there no heretics left, we would have to create them. Were we deprived of infidels, we would have to imagine them. And we will, my brother. We must. Faith without struggle is the faith of a eunuch.”
“My faith tells me that neither of us will reach our goals if things go wrong dur
ing the next forty-eight hours.”
“I apologize for rambling. You’re right, of course. This is no time for chat. Tell me, then, where we are at this moment, General Montfort.”
Montfort sat wrapped in a blanket of exhaustion. Al-Mahdi’s philosophical pretensions had only annoyed him, every word a weight on his eyelids. He wished he had a glass of hot tea now. But he was not about to ask for one.
“At this moment, I need al-Ghazi to hold Harris’s forces as close to their current positions as possible. Whatever it takes.”
“Easy enough to say! But my men are suffering, such losses cannot be sustained.” The emir-general shifted on his cushions. “I need to preserve my own forces. For the other battles to come.”
“Well, I need you to hold Harris. Minimize his gains. Until 1800 hours today. Six p.m.”
“I understand ‘1800 hours.’ But your General Harris is a tough fellow, you know. He doesn’t make mistakes.”
“Everybody makes mistakes. Harris has made his share. He’ll make more.”
“Perhaps. But not on the battlefield.”
“I need you to hold him until 1800. That’s less than twelve hours.”
“And then?”
“My forces will conduct a forward passage of lines, and I’ll assume control of the attack in the north.”
“Of Harris’s corps, as well?”
“Not yet.”
“So… After 1800, all of the attacking units will be yours. From the Military Order of the Brothers in Christ. And we will begin to give way.”
Montfort nodded. “As we agreed. But they can’t just quit. Neither of us wants a bloodbath like we had over Jerusalem. But it has to look like a fight — as though my men have broken through where the Army couldn’t. On both axes of advance, with the initial main effort directed east to Tiberias and the supporting attack northeast along Highway 65, then swinging east into the Upper Galilee — at which point it becomes the main effort.”