Tom Clancy's Act of Valor

by Dick Couch

  The seemingly hasty operating base was, in fact, a very well-rehearsed and orchestrated mobile presence. It could be set up and taken down in a matter of hours, and moved as conditions dictated. Even though a temporary, transitory facility, it was still an armed presence in a foreign country. Yet it was no rogue operation. This forward operating base was established after careful negotiations with the host nation and the U.S. State Department. While it could have been anywhere in the world, this particular base was in a remote area of Costa Rica, an allied nation. And it was of no small concern to that nation’s American ambassador and his country team. Engel and Nolan had flown to the capital to meet with the embassy chief of staff and the CIA station chief. The two were supportive but cautious; they engaged in diplomacy and espionage, not shooting and killing. Yet they had read the message traffic, and they saw much of the raw intelligence. They knew that there indeed might be a need for a special-operations direct-action team. So the presence of this special-operations strike element was official and sanctioned but could be denied by all concerned should that become necessary—clandestine but not necessarily covert.

  The only part of the complex that was habitable by accepted standards of comfort or military-like in its construct was their little tactical operations center, or TOC. In deference to the computers, the communications equipment, and the large flat-screen monitors, the temperature in this small enclosed area tucked into a corner of one of the warehouses bordered on chilly. There, Senior Chief Otto Miller set up shop, directed his two intelligence specialists, and coursed through the volumes of electronic message traffic that came across his comm nets. Everything about where they now found themselves was an inconvenience or an accommodation, but their computer and communications suites were state of the art. The operational SEALs could live anywhere and under any conditions—not so their hardware. In his little TOC, the senior chief could video-teleconferenc Ktele ae with anyone, anywhere, and transmit and receive text and imagery to and from anyone, anywhere. The senior chief even had an espresso coffee machine set up and was seldom without his favorite coffee mug, a chipped ceramic relic that had been around since Moby Dick was a minnow. Engel and Nolan began to find reasons to visit the TOC—for the coffee, for the company of the senior chief, and for the chance to learn if there might be a target folder taking shape. The latter came about on their fourth day there, but not during one of their nightly visits.

  * * *

  Roark Engel was back on the beach on Coronado with Jackie. The tide was way out, and they were running on a flat, firm expanse of wet sand. He was pushing one of those jogger’s strollers in front of him, and he could just see the sunbonnet of their child over the stroller canopy. For some reason, his dream’s eye could not tell, nor could he remember, if they had a little boy or a little girl. Jackie was radiant, running beside him and smiling. She knew, but somehow he didn’t. He kept trying to peer around the bonnet for some clue—boy or girl. Jackie laughed gently, as she often did when she understood something and he didn’t. Then she put a hand to his shoulder. Only it wasn’t her hand.

  “Hey, sir, wake up.” Suddenly, Engel clamped the offending wrist in a viselike grip. “Easy there, sir. It’s just me, Lance Corporal Jennings from security. The senior chief wants you in the TOC right away.”

  Engel shook himself awake. “Sorry, Corporal. I’ll be right there. Wake Chief Nolan as well.”

  “That’s already been done, sir. He’ll meet you there.”

  Engel glanced at his watch; it was 2:00 P.M. local time—1400. If they were assigned a mission, they would undoubtedly go in at night, so the SEALs were already into their daytime sleep cycle. They called them vampire hours. Engel and Nolan arrived dressed alike: olive drab T-shirts, running shorts, and shower shoes. Both had the beginnings of an on-deployment beard. Nolan’s hair was matted and askew, while Engel was still resplendent in his pre-deployment buzz cut. Nolan headed for the coffeepot, Engel for Miller.

  “What’s up, Senior?”

  Miller didn’t answer immediately. He was focused on his secure laptop, electronically flipping through secret message traffic. Engel waited patiently while Nolan joined them. The senior chief then turned from his computer, all business.

  “Lieutenant, Chief,” he began. “The listening posts down here have been following a series of intercepts that are a little out of character for the normal flow of druggie chatter. We have computer programs in place that listen, sift, track, and correlate information—words, speech patterns, voice inflections, and a whole array of programmable anomalies. They’re at work twenty-four/seven. Over the past several weeks, there seemed to be some new players in the game. At first the analysts weren’t sure if it was a rival cartel or someone else. We’re not here to get involved in turf wars or domestic disputes. We were sent down here to stand ready if it was, in fact, something else. That now appears to be the Krs or case.

  “Three days ago, two CIA types were attacked in a residential apartment complex outside of San José. One was a case officer and the other an agent. The case officer was killed and the agent abducted. There was gunfire and a lot of blood, and in the commotion, one of the opposition was killed and left behind. The dead guy didn’t fit the mold of your run-of-the-mill druggie. And as you know, druggies here in Central America don’t grow or refine the product; they’re just in the distribution chain. From what we can gather from the local gendarmes, he may be Eastern European. On top of that, there’s something of an unwritten rule that the cartels leave Agency personnel alone, and we don’t bother them. The CIA’s priority is terrorism, and as long as the spooks are looking for terrorists, they’re given a free pass. Also, the agent in question was someone special and something of an embarrassment. She was a medical doctor associated with Doctors Without Borders.”

  “Aw, for Christ’s sake,” Engel blurted. “What the hell’s the Agency doing putting someone like that at risk?”

  “You gotta be shitting me,” Nolan added.

  “Yeah, I know, but it is what it is, and it looks like we might have to deal with it.”

  The CIA recruits their agents from any number of sources, always looking for a way inside the group they wish to penetrate. They often provide intelligence to other agencies on the illegal drug traffic, but they seldom work penetration agents on the cartels. The Agency also made a point of staying away from NGOs, especially the big ones like Oxfam, World Vision, and Doctors Without Borders. Everyone recognized and applauded their work, and to use someone under the cover of an NGO or even a nonprofit was a big no-no.

  “Susan, maybe you can help us out with this.”

  Lieutenant Susan Lyons was a trim woman in her mid-thirties with wavy, auburn hair pulled back in a short, no-nonsense ponytail. She was dressed in the khaki uniform of a Navy lieutenant, complete with a Surface Warfare pin and a modest row of campaign ribbons. Ostensibly, she was a Navy intelligence officer. She’d arrived in a light plane early this morning and immediately met behind closed doors with the senior chief. She seemed to wear the uniform well, Engel noted, thinking that she might even be a reservist. But he doubted that she was active-duty Navy. The senior had called her by her first name, and he was religious about military courtesies. Whoever she was, she was something more than a Navy lieutenant.

  “My name is Lieutenant Susan Lyons, and I’m attached to the embassy,” she began, casting a thanks-a-lot look at Senior Chief Miller. “I’m going to give this to you as straight up as I can, and I hope it’ll be enough. The two people involved are Walter Ross and a Dr. Lisa Morales, both U.S. citizens. Your concerns about Dr. Morales working for American intelligence and an NGO are noted. But why she was doing this is not relevant; that’s well above all our pay grades. I can, however, tell you that issues of national security and homeland defense are very much in play here. She was not there just to spy on drug lords, okay?”

  It was not okay, but Engel held his tongue. Nolan started to say something, but Engel put a hand on his knee. “Okay for now, Susa
n. Please, we’re all ears.”

  She gave him a measured look and then continued. “Ross and Morales were tracking some undesirables that were known associates of one Mikhail Troikawicz, better known in the international arms trade as Christo. Morales had even had contact with Christo in her DWB work. Now, we care a great deal about Christo. He supplies a lot of people with a lot of weapons.” She pulled a notebook from her briefcase, flipped to a page, gave it a quick glance, but never looked at it again. “Christo was born in Grozny on 15 April 1964. His uncles were all Chechen separatists; they fought the Russians and profited from the fighting. Christo was not a fighter, but he gravitated to the profit side of the war. After most of his relations were killed, he relocated to Central America, retaining his Chechen clients and taking on the Sandinistas and cartels. He’s a smart guy, with a degree in business from the University of Virginia and an MBA from Wharton. He works all sides of the street, to include legal government purchases for many Central and South American nations.” She hesitated a moment, then continued. “Our side has even used his organization to get weapons to national liberation movements we support. He also supplies weapons to the Russian mafia, the FARC, the Muslim Brotherhood, and just about every al-Qaeda splinter group you can name. When he can, he stays away from the business of drugs, sort of a self-imposed, non-compete agreement. When he can’t, it’s usually as an accommodation for one of his cartel clients. He’s important, and he’s a bad guy. We’ve wanted him for a long time. But he’s a slick one. He’s very wealthy, and he spreads a lot of money about—in the pockets of politicians and for worthy regional and local charities. He makes a sizeable annual contribution to Doctors Without Borders.

  “While he’s tried to upgrade his image, Christo’s Chechen roots have recently dragged him back into the sewer. He’s had a long-standing, on-again/off-again relationship with a character named Abu Shabal. Shabal is a terrorist—a terrorist bent on mass murder. He was involved in the Beslan School Massacre in 2004, and the Russians have a price on his head. He’s reportedly been jumping in and out of training camps in the southern Philippines and in Indonesia. We think he may have even been personally involved in the killing of Ambassador Marguilles in Jakarta, along with thirty-seven schoolchildren. If Christo is bad, then Shabal is evil—evil in the worst kind of way. This is what may have gotten Ross killed and Morales taken alive, and God only knows what they’re doing to her.”

  “All this is interesting, ma’am,” Nolan said, “but what’s the executive version of all this; what’s our bottom line here?”

  Senior Chief Miller smoothly intervened. “Just before sunrise today, we got an ISR platform aloft and on station near where we think they might be holding her. Here’s an overhead shot of the place about a week ago.” He brought up a blurred, thermal image of a scattering of huts that appeared to be a small base camp most likely used for transshipment or repackaging of narcotics on their way north. There was modest activity. “Now this is the way it looked earlier this morning.”

  Miller brought up another thermal/low-light-level video composite of the same camp. It rotated slowly in a clockwise direction, which meant the Kch herISR bird was circling high above in a counterclockwise orbit. The intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance aircraft were marvels of technology in integrated imagery overlay. They could lock onto a piece of earth like this base camp and, using a combination of visual, thermal, infrared, and radar sensors, deliver an enhanced picture that was both encrypted and real time. They were now looking at imagery that was eight hours old. The best imagery was obtained at night when the ISR platforms could fly lower and see better than in the daytime. Neither Engel nor Nolan asked if this was a drone or a specially outfitted light aircraft flown by a military contractor. It didn’t matter. They could see that the number of people in the camp had risen dramatically, as had what appeared to be an increase in security activity in and around the camp.

  “As you guys can see, something’s going on down there, and it doesn’t fit the normal pattern of drug activity. This building here,” Miller said, pointing to a single structure at the edge of the main encampment grouping, “is probably where they have her—if she’s there. We’ve been able to establish that this hut gets traffic at all hours, suggesting this may be where she’s being held and where they’re probably interrogating her. Earlier today, we got a cell-phone intercept that all but confirmed she’s in the camp. So it’s a straightforward personnel recovery mission. It won’t be easy, but it’s doable.” The senior chief smiled wolfishly, “But, hey, easy for me to say. I’m not going in.” He tabbed a key and the image went to a smaller scale showing a river snaking past about a quarter mile from the camp. “We can insert you here by parachute, probably a free-fall drop since the drug-traffic trapline is alert for low-flying aircraft. As for coming out, we have a special boat team with the amphibious ready group cruising offshore. They can be inserted well downstream and be standing by for an extraction. And, who knows, you might need some on-call firepower.”

  “Any intel on the opposition?” Nolan asked.

  “Not much. It’s my guess—our guess,” Miller replied, glancing at Lyons, “that security will be in tiers and on loan, or on lease, from the cartels. From the imagery, there’ll be a dozen or more at the site, but there are sure to be plenty more in the area. So you’ll have to limit your time on target. As for Morales, they know what they have and who they have. They’ll interrogate her and either put her up for sale, what’s left of her, or just kill her. Given the connection to Christo and Shabal, they’ll probably just kill her. So a high-value target but not necessarily high-value security. Standard druggie armed thugs but good ones, and they’ll probably be reasonably alert. They will be well armed with minimal training, but not afraid to fight and die. Lots of collective bravado, tactically primitive, and unpredictable. Most certainly, dangerous.” He gave them a palms-up gesture. “Wish I could be more specific, but that’s about it.”

  “It’s like this, gentlemen,” Susan Lyons said in a quiet voice. “She put herself and her organization at risk to help us. Now she needs our help. A very brave lady is going to die a horrible death unless you can do something about it. And she does have information we’d like the opposition not to have. Yet I know how it is—that on a mission like this, it’s your call. All I can ask is that you please try and help her.”

  With that, she rose and exited the TOC, leaving Miller, Engel, and Nolan Kl, th=sitting in a tight little circle around the flat screen. They were quiet for a long moment before Engel broke the silence. “She certainly does know how it is,” he said, “and she put the turd in our pocket.”

  They all, in fact, knew. Personnel recoveries were dangerous and chancy business. Balanced against the chance of success was a significant risk of failure. Failure came in at least two forms: getting the subject of the recovery killed or getting some of your own guys killed, or both. Ultimately, unless it was a rare issue of immediate national security, the go/no-go decision to commit a team to a personnel recovery operation rested at the task force or local level. Since they were operating as an independent detachment, it was their call—they could be ordered not to go, but it was their call to go. It was Nolan who finally spoke.

  “If it was just some do-gooder who had gotten lost or pissed off the locals, I’d say she made her bed and let her sleep in it. But since she was working for us, well, that makes it different. Kind of binds the cheese, so to speak.”

  Engel nodded. “Yeah. Technically, this makes her one of our own, and we don’t leave one of our own behind. Senior, you’re more read into this than either one of us. You think the good lieutenant is leveling with us?”

  Miller leaned forward, elbows on his knees over steepled fingers. “I think she is. She didn’t say as much, but I think she knows and admires this Morales lady. But I give her credit; she seems to be giving us the straight stuff. Either we go get Morales or she dies badly. Sir, it’s your call. That’s why they pay you the big bucks, and chie
fs like Nolan and I have to make do on starvation wages.”

  “Well, shit,” Engel said. He pushed himself to his feet and began to pace about the TOC. The call would be his—his and Nolan’s. But ultimately, the responsibility was his alone. As with all small-unit commanders, there were three things he must weigh and weigh quickly, as the mission was time sensitive. He had to balance the mission, the lives of his men, and any risk to noncombatants. Noncombatants would be a side issue on a mission like this, but even in a druggie camp there could be women and children.

  “When can we go, Senior?” Engel knew Miller would already be staging assets and arranging clearances to support the mission, should he elect to go.

  “I can have your support package in place by midnight. It would seem a predawn hit would be in order, with an after-dawn extraction.”

  Engel again nodded, this time with some finality. He had only to glance at Nolan for his input—he nodded imperceptibly. “Okay, then, it’s a go. Senior, you know what to do. Chief, roust the boys, and let’s get at it.”

  “You got it, Boss.”

  Nolan left the TOC to get the other SEALs up and moving. Miller returned to one of his communications terminals and set in motion the mechanics of a special- operations personnel-recovery operation. Engel stepped out to find Susan Lyons. He wanted to see if he could get a little more straight talk from her.

  * * *

  Once alerted for a mission and briefed on the mission basics by Chief Nolan, the SEAL Bandito squad set about their business. They’d done this many times before and needed little direction. Each had his own area of responsibility. From now until they launched for the mission, the squad would collectively prepare equipment, plan the mission, brief the mission, and rehearse their actions on target. This is what they would do if they had two days, two weeks, two hours, or, in this case, about eight hours.