Clancy, Tom - Op Center 8 - Line of Control

by Line of Control [lit]

  off with a timer in a suitcase or backpack well padded to take the bumps

  of the road. Maybe the passenger who was carrying the luggage got off

  here, deposited additional explosives in the temple and police station,

  and walked on. Perhaps the bomber was someone who had been masquerading

  as a pilgrim or a police officer. Perhaps one of the men Friday had been

  sitting with or looked at had been involved.

  Perhaps one or more terrorists had been killed in the blast. Anything

  was possible.

  Friday continued to look around. He was not going to see anyone. In

  terrorist terms, years had passed. Whoever did this was dead or long

  gone. And he could not see anyone watching from the street, a room, or a

  rooftop.

  The best way to deal with this now was with intel. Collect data from

  outside the targets and use it to pinpoint possible perpetrators. Then

  move in on them. Because this much was clear: Now that Hindu targets had

  been attacked, unless the guilty parties were found and punished, the

  situation in Kashmir was going to deteriorate very, very quickly.

  With nuclear war not just an option but a real possibility.

  CHAPTER NINE.

  Srinagar, India Wednesday, 4:55 p. m.

  Sharab was sitting forward in the passenger's seat of the old flatbed

  truck. To her left the driver sat with his hands tightly clutching the

  steering wheel. He was perspiring as he guided them north along Route

  1A, the same road that had brought the bus to the bazaar. Between them

  sat Nanda, her right ankle cuffed to an iron spring under the seat. Two

  other men were seated in the open deck of the truck, leaning against the

  bulkhead amid bags of wool. They were huddled under a tarp to protect

  them from the increasingly heavy rain.

  The windshield wipers were batting furiously in front of Sharab's dark

  eyes and the air vent howled. The young woman was also howling. First

  she had been screaming orders at her team. Get the truck away from the

  market and stick to the plan, at least until they had additional

  information.

  Now she was screaming questions into her cell phone.

  The young woman was not screaming to be heard over the noise. She was

  screaming from frustration.

  "Ishaq, did you already place the call?" Sharab demanded.

  "Of course I placed the call, just as we always do," the man on the

  other end informed her.

  Sharab punched the padded dashboard with the heel of her left hand. The

  suddenness of the strike caused Nanda to jump. Sharab struck it again

  but she did not say a word, did not swear. Blaspheming was a sin.

  "Is there a problem?" Ishaq asked.

  Sharab did not answer.

  "You were very specific about it," Ishaq went on.

  "You wanted me to call at exactly forty minutes past four. I always do

  what you say."

  "I know," the woman said in a low monotone.

  "Something is wrong," the man on the telephone said.

  "I know that tone of voice. What is it?"

  "We'll talk later," the woman replied.

  "I need to think."

  Sharab sat back.

  "Should I turn on the radio?" the driver asked sheepishly.

  "Maybe there is news, an explanation." "No," Sharab told him.

  "I don't need the radio. I know what the explanation is."

  The driver fell silent. Sharab shut her eyes. She was wheezing slightly.

  The truck's vents had pulled in slightly acrid, smoky air from the

  bazaar blast. The woman could not tell whether it was the air or the

  screaming that had made her throat raw. Probably both. She shook her

  head. The urge to scream was still there, at the top of her throat. She

  wanted to vent her frustration.

  Failure was not the worst of this. What bothered Sharab most was the

  idea that she and her team had been used. She had been warned about this

  five years ago when she was still in Pakistan, at the combat school in

  Sargodha. The Special Services Group agents who trained her said she had

  to be wary of success. When a cell succeeded over an dover it might not

  be because they were good. It might be because the host was allowing

  them to succeed so they could be watched and used at some later date.

  For years Sharab's group, the Pakistan-financed Free Kashmir Militia,

  had been striking at select targets throughout the region. The modus

  operand! for each attack was always the same. They would take over a

  house, plan their assault, then strike the target. At the moment of each

  attack whichever cell member had remained behind would telephone a

  regional police or military headquarters. He would claim credit for the

  attack on behalf of the Free Kashmir Militia. After that the FKM would

  move to another home.

  In the end, the isolated farmers whose homes and lives they briefly

  borrowed cared more about survival than about politics.

  Many of them were Muslim anyway. Though they did not want to cooperate

  and risk arrest, they did not resist the

  FKM.

  Sharab and her people only struck military, police, and government

  offices, never civilian or religious targets. They did not want to push

  or alienate the Hindu population of Kashmir or India, turn them into

  hawkish adversaries. They only wanted to deconstruct the resources and

  the resolve of the Indian leaders. Force them to go home and leave

  Kashmir.

  That was what they were trying to do in the bazaar. Cripple the police

  but not harm the merchants. Scare people away and impact the local

  economy just enough so that farmers and shoppers would fight the

  inflammatory presence of Indian authorities.

  They had been so careful to do just that. Over the past few nights one

  member of the party would go to the bazaar in Srinagar. He would enter

  the temple dressed in clerical robes, exit in back, and climb to the

  roof of the police station.

  There, he would systematically lift tiles and place plastique beneath

  them. Because it was in the middle of a night shift, when this section

  of the city was usually quiet, the police were not as alert as during

  the day. Besides, terrorist attacks did not typically occur at night.

  The idea of terrorism was to disrupt routine, to make ordinary people

  afraid to go out.

  This morning, well before dawn, the last explosives were placed on the

  roof along with a timer. The timer had been set to detonate at exactly

  twenty minutes to five that afternoon.

  Sharab and the others returned at four thirty to watch from the side of

  the road to make sure the explosion went off.

  It did. And it punched right through her.

  When the first blast occurred Sharab knew something was wrong. The

  plastique they had put down was not strong enough to do the damage this

  explosion had done. When the second blast went off she knew they had

  been set up. Muslims had seemingly attacked a Hindu temple and a busload

  of pilgrims. The sentiments of nearly one billion people would turn

  against them and the Pakistan people.

  But Muslims had not attacked Hindu targets, Sharab thought bitterly.

  The FKM had attacked a police station.

  Some o
ther group had attacked the religious targets and timed it to

  coincide with the FKM attack.

  She did not believe that a member of the cell had betrayed them. The men

  in the truck had been with her for years. She knew their families, their

  friends, their backgrounds. They were people of unshakable faith who

  would never have done anything to hurt the cause.

  What about Apu and Nanda? Back at the house they had never been out of

  their sight except when they were asleep.

  Even then the door was always ajar and a guard was always awake. The man

  and his granddaughter did not own a transmitter or cell phone. The house

  had been searched. There were no neighbors who could have seen or heard

  them.

  Sharab took a long breath and opened her eyes. For the moment, it did

  not matter. The question was what to do right now.

  The truck sped past black-bearded pilgrims in white tunics and mountain

  men leading ponies from the marketplace. Distant rice paddies were

  visible at the misty foot of the Himalayas.

  Trucks bearing more soldiers sped past them, headed toward the bazaar.

  Maybe they did not know who was responsible for the attack. Or maybe

  they did not want to catch them right away. Perhaps whoever had framed

  them was waiting to see if they linked up with other terrorists in

  Kashmir before closing in.

  If that was the case they were going to be disappointed.

  Sharab opened the glove compartment and removed a map of the region.

  There were seventeen grids on the map, each one numbered and lettered.

  For the purposes of security the numbers and letters were reversed.

  "All right, Ishaq," she said into the phone, "I want you to leave the

  house now and go to position 5B."

  What Sharab really meant was that Ishaq should go to area 2E. The E came

  from the 5 and the 2 from the B. Anyone who might be listening to the

  conversation and who might have obtained a copy of their map would go to

  the wrong spot.

  "Can you meet us there at seven o'clock?" "Yes," he said.

  "What about the old man?"

  "Leave him," she said. She glanced at Nanda. The younger girl's

  expression was defiant.

  "Remind him that we have his granddaughter. If the authorities ask him

  about us he is to say nothing. Tell him if we reach the border safely

  she will be set free."

  Ishaq said he would do that and meet the others later.

  Sharab hung up. She folded the cell phone and slipped it in the pocket

  of her blue windbreaker.

  There would be time enough for analysis and regrouping.

  Only one thing mattered right now.

  Getting out of the country before the Indians had live scapegoats to

  parade before the world.

  CHAPTER TEN.

  Siachin Base 3, Kashmir Wednesday, 5:42 p. m.

  Major Dev Puri hung up the phone. A chill shook him from the shoulders

  to the small of his back.

  Puri was sitting behind the small gunmetal desk in his underground

  command center. On the wall before him was a detailed map of the region.

  It was spotted with red flags showing Pakistan emplacements and green

  flags showing Indian bases. Behind him was a map of India and Pakistan.

  To his left was a bulletin board with orders, rosters, schedules, and

  reports tacked to it. To his right was a blank wall with a door.

  Affectionately known as "the Pit," the shelter was a

  twelve-by-fourteen-foot hole cut from hard earth and granite.

  Warping wood-panel walls backed with thick plastic sheets kept the

  moisture and dirt out but not the cold. How could it? the major

  wondered. The earth was always cool, like a grave, and the surrounding

  mountains prevented direct sunlight from ever hitting the Pit. There

  were no windows or skylights. The only ventilation came from the open

  door and a rapidly spinning ceiling fan.

  Or at least the semblance of ventilation, Puri thought. It was fakery.

  Just like everything else about this day.

  But the cool command center was not what gave Major Puri a chill. It was

  what the Special Frontier Force liaison had said over the phone.

  The man, who was stationed in Kargil, had spoken just one word.

  However, the significance of that word was profound.

  "Proceed," he had said.

  Operation Earthworm was a go.

  On the one hand, the major had to admire the nerve of the SFF. Puri did

  not know how high up in the government this plan had traveled or where

  it had originated. Probably with the SFF. Possibly in the Ministry of

  External Affairs or the Parliamentary Committee on Defence.

  Both had oversight powers regarding the activities of nonmilitary

  intelligence groups. Certainly the SFF would have needed their approval

  for something this big. But Puri did know that if the truth of this

  action were ever revealed, the SFF would be scapegoated and the

  overseers of the plot would be executed.

  On the other hand, part of him felt that maybe the people behind this

  deserved to be punished.

  A "vaccination." That was how the SFF liaison officer had characterized

  Operation Earthworm when he first described it just three days before.

  They were giving the body of India a small taste of sickness to prevent

  a larger disease from ever taking hold. When the major was a child,

  smallpox and polio had been fearful diseases. His sister had survived

  smallpox and it left her scarred. Back then, vaccination was a wonderful

  word.

  This was a corruption. However necessary and justifiable it might be,

  destroying the bus and temple had been vile, unholy acts.

  Major Puri reached for the Marlboros on his desk. He shook a cigarette

  from the pack and lit it. He inhaled slowly and sat back. This was

  better than chewing the tobacco. It helped him to think clearly, less

  emotionally.

  Less judgment ally Everything was relative, the officer told himself.

  Back in the 1940s his parents were pacifists. They had not approved of

  him becoming a soldier. They would have been happy if he had joined them

  and other citizens of Haryana in the government's fledgling caste

  advancement program.

  The Backward Classes list guaranteed a gift of low-paying government

  jobs for underprivileged natives of seventeen states. Dev Puri had not

  wanted that. He had wanted to make it on his own.

  And he had.

  Puri drew harder on the cigarette. He was suddenly disgusted with his

  own value judgments. The SFF had obviously viewed this action as a

  necessary extension of business as usual. Trained jointly by the

  American CIA and the Indian military's RAW--Research and Analysis

  Wing--the SFF were masters of finding and spying on foreign agents and

  terrorists. For the most part, enemy operatives and suspected

  collaborators were eliminated without fanfare or heavy firepower.

  Occasionally, through a specially recruited unit. Civilian Network

  Operatives, the SFF also used foreign agents to send disinformation back

  to Pakistan. In the case ofsharab and her group, the SFF had spent

  months planning a more elaborate scheme. They felt it was necessary to

  frame Pakistan terro
rists for the murder of dozens of innocent Hindus.

  Then, when the Pakistani cell members were captured--as they would be,

  thanks to the CNO operative who was traveling with them--documents and

  tools would be "found" on the terrorists. These would show that Sharab

  and her party had traveled the country planting targeting beacons for

  nuclear strikes against Indian cities. That would give the Indian

  military a moral imperative to make a preemptive strike against

  Pakistan's missile silos.

  Major Puri drew on the cigarette again. He looked at his watch. It was

  nearly time to go.

  Over the past ten years more than a quarter of a million Hindus had left

  the Kashmir Valley to go to other parts of India. With a growing Muslim

  majority it was increasingly difficult for Indian authorities to secure

  this region from terrorism.

  Moreover, Pakistan had recently deployed nuclear weapons and was working

  to increase its nuclear arsenal as quickly as possible. Puri knew they

  had to be stopped. Not just to retain Kashmir but to keep hundreds of

  thousands more refugees from flooding the neighboring Indian provinces.