Clancy, Tom - Op Center 8 - Line of Control

by Line of Control [lit]

  here. These sites were under the control of the brown-uniformed Special

  Frontier Force. Friday had never been to any bomb sites in Srinagar.

  Maybe this was the way responsibility for antiterrorist investigations

  had been parceled out, with the SFF getting the region nearest the line

  of control.

  Friday was motioned along by one of the police officers.

  He would not be able to get into the rubble himself. But he could still

  come up with some sound ideas about how the attack was made. As he

  walked toward the place where the bus had exploded, Friday used his cell

  phone to call Samantha Mandor at the NSA's photo archives. He asked her

  to search the AP, UPI, Reuters, and other digital photograph files for

  pictures of sites struck by terrorists in Kashmir. He also wanted her to

  pull together any analysis files that were attached to the photographs.

  He probably had some of those in his own computer files back in his

  room. But he wanted information that was incident-specific. Friday told

  her to phone back the minute she had the photo and text archives.

  The American operative neared the roped-off bus site. Unlike the two

  buildings, where the walls had kept people and objects from the street,

  the bus debris had been strewn everywhere by the powerful explosion.

  The bodies had been cleared away but the street was covered with metal,

  leather, and glass from the bus itself. There were books and cameras

  that the passengers had been carrying and travel accessories, clothing,

  and religious icons that had been packed in luggage.

  Unlike the buildings, this scene was a snapshot of the moment of impact.

  Friday's cell phone beeped as he neared the red tape. He stopped walking

  and took the call.

  "Yes?" he said.

  "Mr. Friday? It's Samantha Mandor. I have the photographs and

  information you asked for. Do you want me to send the images somewhere?

  There are about four dozen color pictures."

  "No," Friday said.

  "When was the last attack in Srinagar?"

  "Five months ago," Samantha told him.

  "It was against a shipment of artillery shells that were enroute to the

  line of control. The attack caused one hell of an explosion."

  "Was it a suicide bombing?" he asked.

  "No," Samantha said.

  "There's a microscopic image of liquid crystal display fragments that

  were found near ground zero. The lab analysis says it was part of a

  timer. They also said a remote sensor was found in the debris but that

  it was apparently not detonated."

  That was probably part of a backup plan, Friday thought.

  Professionals often included a line-of-sight device to trigger the

  explosives in case the timer did not work or if the device were

  discovered before the timer could activate them. The presence of an LOS

  receiver meant that at least one of the terrorists was almost certainly

  in the area when the device exploded.

  "What about the personnel at the bomb site?" Friday asked.

  "What kind of uniforms were they wearing?"

  "There were National Security Guard officers as well as local police on

  the scene," the woman informed him.

  "Any members of the Special Frontier Force?" Friday asked.

  "None," she said.

  "There were additional assaults against military targets in Srinagar.

  They occurred six and seven weeks prior to that attack. National

  Security Guard officers were present there as well."

  "Did anyone claim responsibility for those attacks?" Friday asked.

  "According to the data file those two and this one were claimed by the

  same group," Samantha told him.

  "The Free Kashmir Militia." "Thank you," Friday said. He had heard of

  them. Reportedly, they had the backing of the Pakistan government.

  "Will you need anything else?" Samantha asked.

  "Not right now," he replied and clicked off.

  Friday hooked the cell phone to his belt. He would call his new boss

  later, when he had something solid to report.

  He looked around. There were no Black Cat Commandos here. Maybe that was

  significant, maybe it was not. Their absence might have been a

  territorial issue. Or maybe the NSG had been unable to stop the

  terrorists and the problem had been turned over to the SFF. Perhaps a

  former SFF officer had been named to a high government post.

  Appointments like that routinely led to reorganizations.

  Of course, there was always the possibility that this was not routine.

  What kind of exceptional circumstances would lead to a department being

  shut out of an investigation? That would certainly happen if security

  were an issue. Friday wondered if the NSG might have been compromised by

  Pakistani operatives. Or maybe the SFF had made it look as though the

  Black Cats had been penetrated. Because budgets were tighter there was

  even more interagency rivalry here than there was in the United States.

  Friday turned around slowly. There were several two- and

  three-story-high buildings around the market. However, those would not

  have been good vantage points for the terrorists.

  If they had needed to use the remote detonators, the carts with their

  high banners, awnings, and umbrellas might have blocked the line of

  sight. If there had been any cooked food stands in the way smoke might

  also have obscured their vision. Besides, the terrorists would also have

  had the problem of renting rooms. There was a danger in leaving a paper

  trail, like the terrorists who charged the van they used to attack the

  World Trade Center in New York. And only amateur terrorists paid cash

  for a room. That was a red flag that usually sent landlords right to the

  police. Not even the greediest landlord wanted someone who might be a

  bomb maker living in their building.

  Besides, there was no need to hide here. It would have been easy for a

  terrorist to remain anonymous in this busy marketplace day after day to

  case the targets, plant the explosives, and watch the site today. But

  Friday did wonder one thing. Why did the police station and the temple

  blow up at the same time while the bus did not explode until several

  seconds later? It was extremely likely that they were related attacks.

  It could have been that the timers were slightly out-of-synch. Or maybe

  there was another reason.

  Friday continued walking to where the bus had been parked. Traffic had

  been diverted from Route 1A to other streets. He was able to stand in

  the broad avenue and look back at the site. This road was the most

  direct way out of here. It fed any number of roads. Pursuit would have

  been extremely difficult even if the police knew the individual or kind

  of vehicle they were looking for. He found the line-of sight spot that

  would have been the ideal place to stand in case the timer failed.

  It was on the curb, near where the bus was parked. It was about four

  hundred yards from the target, which was near the maximum range for most

  remote detonators.

  Obviously, if a terrorist were waiting there for the blast, he would not

  have wanted the bus to blow up yet. He would have waited until after the

  temple explosion then moved
a safe distance away. The bus explosion

  would have been scheduled to give him time to get away. Or else he had

  triggered the blast himself using the same remote he would have used on

  the temple.

  But that still did not tell him why there were two separate explosions

  for the police station and temple. One large explosion would have

  brought both structures down.

  Friday started back toward the other end of the market.

  When he got back to his room he would call the NSA. The market attack

  itself did not bother him. He did not really give a damn who ended up

  being in charge here. What concerned him were the Black Cats. These

  people would have access to intelligence about him and Striker once they

  went into the mountains. If there was even a possibility that the NSG

  was leaking, he wanted to make sure they were kept out of the circuit.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

  Kargil, Kashmir Wednesday, 7:00 p. m.

  As his motorcycle sped through the foothills of the Himalayas, Ishaq

  Fazeli wished he had one thing above all. He had left Apu's farm without

  eating dinner and he was hungry.

  But he did not want food. He had been driving with his mouth open--a bad

  habit--and his tongue was dry. But he did not want water. What he wanted

  most was a helmet.

  As the lightweight Royal Endfield Bullet sped through the mountain pass,

  small, flat rocks spit from under the slender wheels. Whenever the

  roadway narrowed, as it did now, and Ishaq passed too close to the

  mountainside, the sharp-edged pebbles came back at him like bullets. He

  would even settle for a turban if he had the material to make one and

  the time to stop. Instead, Ishaq adjusted to driving with his face

  turned slightly to the left. As long as the pebbles did not hit his eyes

  he would be all right. And if they did he would be philosophical about

  it. He would still have his left eye.

  Growing up in the west, near the Khyber Pass, he had learned long ago

  that the mountains of the subcontinent were not for the weak.

  For one thing, even during a short two-hour ride like this, the weather

  changes quickly. Brutal sunshine can give way to a snow squall within

  minutes. Sleet can turn to thick fog even quicker. Travelers who are

  unprepared can freeze or dehydrate or lose their way before reaching

  safety. Sunshine, wind, precipitation, heat and cold from fissures,

  caverns, and lofty tors--all rush madly around the immutable peaks,

  clashing and warring in unpredictable ways. In that respect the

  mountains reminded Ishaq of the ancient caliphs. They too were towering

  and imperious, answering only to Allah.

  For another thing, the foothills of the Himalayas are extremely

  difficult to negotiate on foot, let alone on a motorcycle.

  The mountain range is relatively young and the slopes are still sharp

  and steep. Here, in Kashmir, the few paths one finds were originally

  made by the British in 1845 at the onset of the Anglo-Sikh Wars. Queen

  Victoria's elite mountain forces used the routes, known as "cuts," to

  flank enemy troops that were encamped in lower elevations. Too narrow

  for trucks, cars, and artillery, and too precarious for horses and other

  pack animals, the cuts fell into disuse at the time of the First World

  War and remained largely untraveled until the Pakistanis rediscovered

  them in 1947. While the Indians used helicopters to move men and

  materiel through the region, the Pakistanis preferred these slower, more

  secretive paths. The cuts peaked at around eight thousand feet, where

  the temperatures were too low at night and the air too cold to support

  simple bedroll camps or sustained marches.

  Not that the hazards or the discomfort mattered to Ishaq right now. He

  had a mission to accomplish and a leader to serve. Nothing would get in

  the way of that. Not precipitous falls, or the homelike pebbles that

  wanted to send him there, or the sudden drop in the temperature.

  Fortunately, the motorcycle performed as heroically -as its reputation.

  More than a year before, Ishaq had taken the Royal Endfield Bullet from

  behind an army barracks. It was a beautiful machine. It was not one of

  the prized vintage bikes from the 1950s, made when the British company

  first set up its factory in India. But the machine was standard

  equipment of local military and police units. As such, it did not

  attract undue attention. And there were tactical advantages as well.

  Like all the Royal Endfield Bullets, the distinctive red-and-black

  motorcycle got exceptional mileage and had a maximum speed of nearly

  eighty miles an hour.

  The bike was durable and the 22 bhp engine was relatively quiet. At just

  under four hundred pounds the bike also caused very little stress on the

  cliff side portions of the road. And the low noise output was important

  as he made his way up into the foothills, where loud sounds could cause

  rock slides.

  Ishaq saw small numbers carved in the side of the mountain.

  They indicated that the elevation was four thousand feet.

  The Free Kashmir Militiaman was behind schedule. He pushed the bike a

  little faster. The wind rushed at him, causing his cheeks to flutter.

  The noise they made sounded almost like the motorcycle engine. By the

  grace of the Prophet he and the machine had become one. He smiled at the

  ways of Allah.

  Section 2E was near the high midpoint of the cuts. Pakistani troops had

  spent years mapping this region. When they retreated from Kargil, the

  troops left a large cache of weapons, explosives, clothes, passports,

  and medical supplies in a cave at the high point of the sector. Sharab

  and her team frequently retreated to the spot to replenish their stores.

  Ishaq had kept an eye on his watch as he pushed higher into the hills.

  He did not want to keep Sharab waiting. That was not because their

  leader was intolerant or impatient but because he wanted to be there for

  her--whenever, wherever, and for whatever reason she needed him. A

  political professor with no prior field experience, Sharab's dedication

  and tactical ingenuity had quickly earned the respect and complete

  devotion of every member of the team. Ishaq was also a little bit in

  love with her, although he was careful not to let that show. He did not

  want her thinking that was the only reason he was with her. She liked to

  work with patriots, not admirers. Yet Ishaq often wondered if the

  leaders of the Free Kashmir Militia had asked her to lead this group

  because she was a woman. When ancient physicians used to cauterize the

  wounds of warriors it took five or more men to restrain the injured

  man--or one woman. For love of Sharab or fear of shaming their manhood,

  there was nothing the men in her cell would refuse to do.

  A 38 Smith & Wesson was snug in a holster under his wool sweater. The

  handgun came to the FKM via the Karachi Airport security police, which

  had bought nearly one thousand of the weapons from the United States

  almost thirty years before. The weight of the loaded gun felt good

  against his ribs. Ishaq's faith taught him that it was only through the

  P
rophet and Allah that a man became strong. Ishaq believed that,

  passionately. Prayer and the Koran gave him strength.

  But there was also something empowering about having a weapon at your

  side. Religion was a satisfying meal that carried a man through the day.

  The Smith & Wesson was a snack that got him through the moment.

  The road became bumpier due to recent rockfall from a cliff. The outside

  corners were also more precarious. To make things worse, a cool drizzle

  began. It nicked his face like windblown sand. But despite all this he

  pushed the motorcycle even harder. If the rain kept up and had a chance

  to freeze, the cut would become brutally slick. He also had to watch out

  for hares and other animals. Hitting one could cause him to skid. Still,

  he could not slow down. Not if he were going to reach the zone in time.

  They always met up here after a mission but never with such urgency.

  First, Sharab usually liked to go back to whatever house or hut or barn

  they had occupied in order to have a final talk with their host. She

  wanted to make sure that whoever she left behind understood that they

  would remain alive only as long as they remained silent. Some of the

  team members did not agree with her charity, especially when they were

  Hindus like Apu and his granddaughter. But Sharab did not want to turn

  the people against her.

  To her, whether they were Muslim or not, most of these farmers,

  shepherds, and factory workers were already Pakistani. She did not want