Lethal Trajectories (22 page)

Ambassador Thurgoode called again at midnight, Washington time. By that time the president and vice president had been at the center of a huddle of advisers and intelligence experts for nearly three hours.

“Mr. President,” Thurgoode reported, “a major coup is underway in Saudi Arabia. Word on the street is that the coup was instigated by Zionist and CIA-sponsored insurrectionists. Casualties are heavy, and virtually all the dead rebels are carrying American, Israeli, or British weapons.”

“Any word from the palace?” Burkmeister asked.

“We can’t reach anyone there, sir. And we’re hearing reports of heavy fighting throughout Saudi Arabia.”

Thurgoode knew well what scenarios were playing out in the minds of those present in the Situation Room. If Saudi oil was lost to the world markets, the economies of the world would grind to a halt. He heard a muddle of confused conversation over the speaker before the president called for quiet.

“All right, folks, we need to move on this,” the president commanded. “Clayton, please contact Secretary Thompson and have him reinstate the DEFCON 3 military alert. Admiral Coxen, I’d like you to stand the night watch here in the Situation Room. The rest of you, try to catch some sleep. We’ll meet again at 0700. Ambassador Thurgoode, thank you for your prompt action on this matter. Do you feel that you can maintain your presence at the embassy safely?” “Yes, Mr. President, I believe I can.”

“Good. Someone will be standing by here for any updates you can supply.”

“Yes, sir, and thank you, sir.”

The streets of Riyadh were strangely quiet by Wednesday noon. Civilians had cleared out, and the sounds of fighting and machine-gun fire had subsided. One of the heavily armed Marines assigned to guard the embassy reported that sporadic bursts of gunfire appeared to be execution squads in action. A large plume of dark gray smoke hovered over the royal palace, and communications with the Saudi government were nonexistent. Military convoys clogged the streets, which echoed with the constant hovering of Royal Saudi Air Force helicopters. The American embassy remained unscathed, with the exception of a couple of wayward mortar shells, and the ambassador issued a warning to all American citizens in the country to stay locked in their homes or offices and to not go outside under any circumstances. At one thirty in the afternoon, Riyadh time, the ambassador placed another call to the Situation Room. “Admiral Coxen,” he said, “the situation here is surreal. Businesses are closed, television stations are down, the streets are deserted. It’s like being in the eye of a hurricane, knowing we are surrounded by chaos. We can hear intermittent small-arms fire, but otherwise we are in a complete information blackout.

“However, there is a good possibility that the king has been killed or taken prisoner, probably along with other members of the Saud family. We can see helicopters and troop movements, but we don’t know who’s calling the shots. What we do know is that Americans and Israelis are definitely being blamed for the coup.”

“Thank you, Mr. Ambassador,” said the admiral. “You have done an outstanding job of keeping us apprised of the situation. I’m afraid we don’t have any new information on who is behind it, though we have our suspicions. The NSC will be meeting shortly at 1500 hours your time, and we’ll keep you posted.”

Only a few hundred miles northwest of Riyadh, Meir Kahib, head of the Mossad, Israel’s Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations, was brooding over the disturbing new intelligence reports he had received.

The Israeli Army high command was monitoring the Saudi situation closely; the Knesset would be meeting in a special session later that afternoon. If Kahib had it right—if it was a takeover by Monotheistic-led insurrectionists—Israel would soon be in a state of war. And Israel would not lie back like a lamb waiting to be slaughtered. The Holocaust would never happen again. The plan was simple, as it always had been: launch a devastating preemptive strike against their enemies. Meir Kahib was seldom wrong about such things, and he doubted this situation would be an exception to the rule. War was imminent.

T
he bone-tired coup leaders were in a festive mood as they awaited the arrival of their victorious leader, Prince Mustafa ibn Abdul-Aziz—now King Mustafa. The acrid smell of spent explosives, burned-out rooms, and mutilated bodies blanketing the royal palace heightened their sense of destiny. They had survived the carnage, and their meeting in the royal palace was designed to legitimize and demonstrate a sense of continuity in the new regime.

King Mustafa was grateful for the exultant shouts of “Allahu Akbar!” when he entered the conference room.

“Yes, my brothers, Allah is greater, praise Allah!” replied the smiling king with equal euphoria. “We have been watched over throughout our long struggle,” he continued in a voice brimming with emotion, “and we have exceeded our expectations. Fighting is limited mainly to the cleansing operation now underway. I would now like your progress reports and assessments of what needs to be done. Allow me to start with a report on Unit 22.

“Unit 22 was successful beyond all expectation. The hit teams suffered casualty rates in excess of seventy percent, but this worked in our favor as their implied connection to the Zionists and CIA fostered the notion they were part of an overthrow attempt by foreigners. They were successful in taking out key leaders and commanders, and we anticipate the virtual elimination of all potential opposition leaders within a day. The Unit 22 teams assigned to plant the dirty bombs were successful. There was opposition on one of the Ghawar Field sites, but it was snuffed out on the spot. The dirty bombs are now in place.”

The room erupted in cheers, but Mustafa quickly got back to business. “Prince Hahad,” he asked, “please report on your activities.”

“Thank you, King Mustafa,” responded Hahad ibn Saud, the new commander of the Royal Guards. “We were able to take out the top ranks of the Royal Saudi Guard leadership with relative ease; getting to the king was quite another matter. As you can see from the damage done to the palace, the Royal Guards were not about to change sides. The firefight lasted over an hour. Once word got out that this was a foreign-led coup attempt, however, it was easier to convince Royal Guard units outside the royal palace that we were fighting together against a foreign-led insurrection. They were, in fact, quite helpful in rounding up the ‘suspects’ we had identified—although many of them were prominent members of the house of Saud—and in executing those identified as traitors. The Royal Guards are now positioned outside the palace with orders to shoot anyone attempting to force their way in.”

The cheers for Mustafa and Hahad were loud, and Mustafa once again stepped in to ask Prince Ali Abdullah Bawarzi to give his report.

“Thank you, Your Majesty,” replied Bawarzi. “Major Riyadh roads, airports, and institutions have been secured. There is still moderate fighting in Jeddah with holdout loyalist forces, but we expect resistance to end no later than midafternoon today. The airports and other important facilities are secured, and we expect all port cities to be firmly in our hands by later this evening.”

Smiling, Mustafa next turned to General Aakif Abu Ali Jabar for an accounting.

“The helicopters flying overhead and the intermittent flyovers by the Royal Saudi Air Force are there to remind everyone, Your Majesty, that we are in complete control,” Ali Jabar said, bursting with pride. “As promised, all air force transport units were in place, and we have been airlifting our troops to all parts of the country. We have also moved our demonstration nuclear weapon to the test site in the southern wastelands for a detonation no later than tomorrow noon. All objectives have been accomplished.”

Mustafa now looked over to his religious mentor, Mullah Mohammed al-Hazari, for his report.

“King Mustafa, as you know, our most important work is just beginning. We have briefed educational and spiritual leaders on the insurrection. We positioned it as the birthplace of a great jihad that will soon follow. The follow-up work will begin once your announcement is made, King Mustafa. The infidel purges in Saudi Arabia will then commence, and the true ways of Allah will once again be reestablished in our country and throughout the world.”

“Thank you, my brothers, for your wonderful work. May Allah’s will be done,” said King Mustafa with honest gratitude.

An aide came into the room, bowed to King Mustafa, and whispered that the media hook-ups were now in place and he could broadcast at his convenience. He smiled and looked down at his notes.

“My brothers, I will soon go on the air and read my prepared remarks. I would first like to read them to you, for your comments and approval. Please keep in mind that this early morning message, though addressed to our people, is really more for international consumption. We will advise the world we are now in charge and warn them of the perils of retaliation against us. These are critical hours. If anything seems to you to be in any way unclear or weak, we must revise it in the next few minutes. Here is what I will broadcast:

Mustafa looked thoughtfully at the others as he set aside his speech. They erupted in cheers, and Mustafa accepted their approval with a smile before speaking.

“That is it, my brothers. Are there any additions, corrections, or suggestions that you would have me include in my speech?”

Before they began making their suggestions, which he had no intention of following anyway, he called in the media technicians and shortly thereafter began to broadcast his speech—a speech that would rearrange the power dynamics of the world.

P
astor Veronica felt hassled as she hurried through what she had dubbed her Wednesday Workout routine. The weekly church council and staff meetings added to her normal workload, and today she had been zapped with a request to attend an ad hoc fundraising group to upgrade her forty-five-year-old church building. With little time left to prepare for tonight’s Life Challenges group, she was nervous.

She hustled home after the fundraising meeting to help Mandy with her reinstatement essay. She was still upset about her precocious daughter’s suspension from high school, but she tried to look at it as a learning moment for both of them. Mandy had worked hard on the essay, though, and Veronica was pleased with her efforts. She left the house again, now in a better mood, to run a few errands before the meeting.

The car radio was still tuned to the talk-radio station. Not having had a chance to listen to the news all day, she was startled by what she heard.

“For those tuning in late, this is Wellington Crane with a special update on the crisis now exploding in Saudi Arabia. The king of Saudi Arabia and members of the royal family have been assassinated, and fighting has spread throughout the country. A new leader, Mustafa ibn Abdul-Aziz, broadcast just minutes ago that a coup attempt had been thwarted. He blamed the insurrection on Zionist and American CIA forces and said all Saudi oil shipments would be suspended. He warned that foreign intervention would result in the detonation of dirty bombs in Saudi oil fields, an action that would make them radioactive wastelands for decades to come.” The radio faded into static for a moment, and Veronica clicked the failing machine off and on again before getting Crane back on the air.