Rogue Forces (29 page)

It didn’t take long for Wilhelm to arrive in a Humvee. He screeched to a halt just inside the parking ramp area far enough in to get a good look at the scene. As he studied the area in stunned disbelief, three soldiers with M-16s raced out of the Humvee, one hiding behind the Humvee and the other two fanning out and taking cover behind nearby buildings.

“Warhammer, this is Alpha, those Scion guys are not in custody,” Wilhelm radioed from the Humvee. “They are off-loading their aircraft. Security is not in sight. They’ve deployed unidentified robot-looking units with weapons visible. Get First Battalion out here on the double. I want—”

“Hold on, Colonel, hold on,” Macomber cut in on the command frequency. “We don’t want a fight with you. Calling out the troops and starting a gunfight will just get the Turks outside riled up.”

“Warhammer switching to Delta.”

But on the secondary channel, Macomber went on: “You can flip channels all day long, Colonel, but we’ll still find it. Listen, Colonel, we won’t bother you, so don’t bother us, okay?”

“
Sir, vehicle approaching, five o’clock
!” one of the soldiers yelled. A Humvee was driving up to Macomber’s position.

“Don’t shoot, Colonel, that’s probably McLanahan,” Macomber radioed.

“Shut the hell up, whoever you are,” Wilhelm radioed, drawing a .45 caliber pistol from his holster.

The newcomer came to a stop, and Patrick McLanahan stepped out, with his hands raised. “Easy, Colonel, we’re all on the same side here,” he said.

“Like hell,” Wilhelm shouted. “Sergeant, take McLanahan into custody and put him in the Triple-C under guard.”

“
Look out
!” one of the soldiers shouted. Wilhelm just caught a blur of motion out of the corner of an eye—and as if by magic, the gray-suited figure who had been near the hangar appeared
out of the sky
right beside the soldier closest to McLanahan. In an instant he snatched the M-16 rifle out of the soldier’s startled hands, bent it in half, and handed it back to him.

“Now cut the shit, all of you,” Macomber shouted, “or I break the next M-16 over someone’s head.”

The other armed soldiers raised their weapons and aimed them at Macomber, but Wilhelm raised his hands and shouted, “Weapons tight, weapons tight, put ’em down.” It wasn’t until then that he noticed that one of the large robots had appeared
right beside him
, covering the twenty or thirty yards between them with incredible speed and stealth. “
Jeez
…!” he breathed, startled.

“Hi, Colonel,” Charlie said in her electronically synthesized voice. “Good call. Let’s have a chat, okay?”

“
McLanahan
!” Wilhelm cried. “What in hell is going on here?”

“Change in mission, Colonel,” Patrick replied.

“What mission? Whose mission?
Your
mission is over. Your contract’s been canceled. You’re under
my
jurisdiction until someone takes your ass back to Washington.”

“I’ve got a new contract, Colonel, and we’re going to get it set up and running right now.”

“New contract? With whom?”

“With me, Colonel,” a voice said, and to Wilhelm’s surprise, Iraqi colonel Yusuf Jaffar emerged from the back of Patrick’s Humvee, followed by Vice President Ken Phoenix and two Secret Service agents.

“
Jaffar
…I mean, Colonel Jaffar…what is this about? What’s going on?”

“General McLanahan’s company has been hired by the government of the Republic of Iraq to provide…shall we say, specialized services,” Jaffar said. “They shall be based here, at Nahla, under my supervision.”

“But this is
my
base…!”

“You are wrong, sir. This is an
Iraqi
air base, not an American one,” Jaffar said. “You are guests here, not landlords.”

“McLanahan can’t work for you! He’s an American.”

“Scion Aviation International has State Department approval to operate in three dozen countries worldwide, including Iraq,” Patrick said. “The original contract was a joint cooperation agreement with both U.S. Central Command and the Republic of Iraq—I just reported to you. Now I report to Colonel Jaffar.”

“But you’re under arrest, McLanahan,” Wilhelm argued. “You’re still in
my
custody.”

“As long as the general is in my country and on my base, he is subject to my laws, not yours,” Jaffar said. “You may deal with him as you wish when he leaves, but now he is mine.”

Wilhelm opened his mouth, then closed it, and opened it again in blank confusion. “This is insane,” he said finally. “What do you think you’re going to do, McLanahan?”

“Baghdad wants help inducing the Turks to leave Iraq,” Patrick said. “They think the Turks will start tearing up the country trying to eradicate the PKK, and then create a buffer zone along the border to make it harder for the PKK to come back.”

“All that’s going to accomplish is angering the Turks and widening the conflict,” Wilhelm said. “You’re crazy if you think President Gardner’s going to let you do this.”

“President Gardner is not my president, and he is not Iraq,” Jaffar said. “President Rashid does this thing because the Americans will not help us.”

“Help you? Help you do what, Colonel?” Wilhelm asked, almost pleading. “You want us to go to war with Turkey? You know how these Turkish incursions work, Colonel. They come in, they attack some isolated camps and hideouts, and they go home. They drove a little deeper this time. So what? They’re not interested in taking any land.”

“And General McLanahan will be here to make sure it does not happen,” Jaffar said. “America will not interfere with this.”

“You’re going to replace my regiment with McLanahan and his
robot planes and robot…whatever
these
things are?” Wilhelm asked. “His little company up against at least four Turkish infantry divisions?”

“It is said that Americans have little faith—they believe only what is in front of their noses,” Jaffar said. “I have seen it is true for you, Colonel Wilhelm. But I look at General McLanahan’s amazing aircraft and weapons, and all I see are possibilities. Perhaps as you say the Turks will not take our land or slaughter any innocent Iraqis, and we will not need the general’s weapons. But this is the largest force ever to enter Iraq, and I fear they will not stop at breaking apart a few camps.”

Jaffar stepped over to Wilhem and stood right in front of him. “You are a fine soldier and commander, Colonel,” he said, “and your unit is brave and has sacrificed much for my people and my country. But your president is abandoning Iraq.”

“That’s not true, Colonel,” Wilhelm said.

“I am told by Vice President Phoenix that he was ordered to go to Baghdad and speak with my government about the Turkish invasion,” Jaffar said, “including establishing a security buffer zone in Iraq. Gardner not only condones this invasion, but he is willing to give up Iraqi land to placate the Turks. That is not acceptable. I look at you and your forces here on my base, and I see only hardship for my people.”

He stepped over to Patrick and looked at the Tin Man and CID unit there on the ramp. “But I look at General McLanahan and his weapons, and I see hope. He is willing to fight. It may be for money, but at least
he
is willing to lead his men into battle in Iraq.”

The expression on Wilhelm’s face was changing from anger to surprise to outright confusion. “I don’t believe what I’m hearing,” he said. “I have an entire brigade here…and I’m supposed to do
nothing
, in the middle of a Turkish invasion? I’m supposed to sit back and watch while you fly missions and send out these…these Tinker Toys? Baghdad is going to fight the Turks? Five years ago you didn’t have an organized army! Two years ago your unit didn’t even exist.”

“Excuse me, Colonel, but I don’t think you’re helping yourself here,” Vice President Phoenix said. He walked over to the Army colonel. “Let’s go to your command center, let me inform Washington about what’s going on, and ask for guidance.”

“You’re not buying into this nonsense, are you, sir?”

“I don’t see we have much choice right now, Colonel,” Phoenix said. He put a hand on Wilhelm’s shoulders and led him back to his Humvee. “Kind of like watching your daughter go off to college, isn’t it? They’re ready for their new life, but you’re not ready to see them off.”

“So, General McLanahan,” Yusuf Jaffar said after Wilhelm and his men departed, “as you Americans say, the ball is now in your court. You know Baghdad’s desires. What will you do now?”

“I think it’s time to test the Turks’ real intentions,” Patrick said. “Everyone has been very cooperative so far, and that’s good, but they’re still in your country with a lot of troops and aircraft. Let’s see what they do when you start insisting.”

A
LLIED
A
IR
B
ASE
N
AHLA
, I
RAQ

T
HE NEXT MORNING

“Movement at the front gate, sir!” the Turkish captain of the troops surrounding Nahla Air Base heard on his portable radio. “Combat vehicles lining up to exit!”

“
Bombok
!” the captain swore. “What’s going on?” He threw his coffee out the window and exited his armored personnel carrier. A Humvee flying an American flag and pulling a trailer was entering the entrapment area, with another Humvee-trailer combo outside waiting its turn. The weapon cupolas on each vehicle had machine guns and grenade launchers mounted, but they still had canvas covers on them, they were locked in road-march position, and the gunner’s stations were not manned.

“Where do they think they are going?” the Turkish infantry captain asked.

“Should we stop them?” his first sergeant asked.

“We have no orders to interfere with them unless they attack us,” the captain said. “Otherwise we observe and report only.”

The Turks watched as the first Humvee exited, then pulled out away from the front gate and stopped to wait for the second. The Turkish captain stepped over to the front passenger side of the lead vehicle. “Good morning, sir,” he said. He saw it was a civilian. He knew the Americans employed a lot of civilians to work at their military bases, but to see one out here was rather bizarre.

“Good morning…er, I mean,
günaydin
,” the man said in clumsy but understandable Turkish. “How’s it going?”

“Very well, sir,” the captain said in a low voice. The American just smiled and nodded. The Turk used the opportunity to peek inside the Humvee. There were two civilians in the rear seats and a lot of supplies under green tarps in the very back. One civilian passenger looked military, and he wore a strange outfit, like a scuba diver’s wet suit, covered by a jacket. He looked straight ahead and did not return the Turk’s gaze. The twenty-foot flatbed trailer was empty.

The American stuck out his right hand. “Jon Masters.”

The Turkish captain frowned, but took his hand and shook it. “Captain Evren.”

“Nice to met you,” Jon said. He looked around. “You guys doing okay out here? Anything we can get you?”

“No,
efendim
,” Evren said. He was waiting for some kind of explanation, but apparently this man was not interested in offering anything but chitchat. “May I ask where you are going, sir?”

“Just driving around.”

Evren looked at the gaggle of Humvees, then back at Jon with a stern expression. “At this hour, and with trailers?”

“Why not? I’ve been here in Iraq for a couple weeks and I haven’t seen anything of the countryside. Thought I’d better do it while the doin’ is good.”

Evren didn’t understand half of what the guy just said, and he was getting tired of his goofy smile. “May I ask please where you are going, sir, and what you intend to do with the trailers?” he repeated, much more forcefully.

“Just around.” Jon drew a circle with his finger. “Around. Around here.”

Evren was getting angry with the guy, but he had no authority to detain him. “Please be mindful of other military vehicles, sir,” he said. “Some of our larger vehicles have limited visibility for the driver. An encounter with a main battle tank would be unfortunate for you.”

The veiled threat didn’t seem to have any effect on the American. “I’ll tell the others,” he said idly. “Thanks for the tip. Bye-bye now.” And the convoy headed off.

“What should we do, sir?” the first sergeant asked.

“Have the checkpoints report their position to me as they pass,” Evren said, “then get someone to follow them.” The first sergeant hurried off.

The convoy of Humvees drove around to the north side of the base on public highways. They passed a Turkish army checkpoint at one intersection, where they were stopped so soldiers could look inside the vehicles, but not detained or searched. They continued north for a couple more miles, then exited the highway and drove farther north through a muddy open field. Ahead they saw stakes pounded in the ground with yellow “Caution” and “Keep Out” tape strung between them, and a few hundred yards beyond that was the wreckage of Scion Aviation International’s XC-57 Loser. The Turkish missiles apparently hadn’t hit the plane directly, but proximity fuses exploded the warheads near the pod-mounted engines atop the fuselage, shearing two of them off and sending the plane hurtling to the ground. It had landed on its left front side, crumpling most of the left wing and left side of the nose, and there had been a fire, but the rest of the plane sustained what might be called moderate damage; most of the right side of the plane was relatively intact.

There was a lone Russian IMR engineer vehicle parked at the tape border, with two Turkish soldiers on guard duty with it. The IMR had a crane mounted on the back and a blade in front resembling a bulldozer. The soldiers discarded cigarettes and coffee and got on portable radios as they saw the convoy approach. “
Hayir, hayir
!” one of them shouted, waving his hands. “
Durun! Gidin
!”

Jon Masters got out of the Humvee and trudged through the mud toward the soldiers. “Good morning!
Günaydin
!” he shouted. “How’s it going? Any of you guys speak English?”

“No come here! No stay!” the soldier shouted. “
Tehlikeli
! Dangerous here!
Yasaktir
! Prohibited!”

“No, it’s not dangerous at all,” Jon said. “You see, that’s
my
plane.” He patted his chest. “Mine. It belongs to me. I’m here to take a few parts back with me and check it out.”

The first soldier waved his arms in front of his face in a crossing motion while the second picked up his rifle, not pointing it but making it visible to all. “No entry,” the first said sternly. “Prohibited.”

“You can’t prohibit me from examining my own plane,” Jon said. “I have permission from the Iraqi government. You guys aren’t even Iraqi. What right do you have to stop me?”

“No entry,” the first soldier said. “Go away. Go back.” He pulled out his portable radio and began speaking while the second soldier raised his rifle to port arms in an obvious threatening gesture. When the first soldier finished radioing his report, he waved his hands as if trying to shoo away a youngster, shouting, “Go now.
Siktir git
! Go!”

“I’m not leaving without looking at my plane…what
you
guys did to my plane,” Jon said. He quickly walked past both soldiers, then walked backward toward the plane. The soldiers followed him, shouting orders in Turkish, confused and getting angrier by the second. Jon held up his hands and walked backward quicker. “I won’t be long, you guys, but I’m going to look at my plane. Leave me alone!” Jon started to run toward the plane.

“
Dur
! Stop!” The second shoulder raised his rifle into firing position but not aiming it at Jon, obviously to fire a warning shot. “Stop or I will—”

Suddenly the rifle was snatched out of his hands in the blink of an eye. The soldier turned…and saw a person wearing a head-to-toe suit of dark gray, an eyeless helmet right out of a science-fiction comic book, a framework of thin flexible tubules all across its skin, and thick gauntlets and boots. “
Aman allahim
…!”

“Don’t be rude,” the figure said in electronically synthesized
Turkish. “No weapons”—he reached out with incredible quickness and snatched the portable transceiver away from the second soldier—“and no radios. I’ll give them back only if you show me you can behave.” The Turks backed away, then started to run when they realized they weren’t going to be captured.

“C’mon, guys, let’s go,” Jon said, trotting toward the stricken XC-57. “See, I told you it wouldn’t so bad.”

“Rascal One, this is Genesis,” Patrick McLanahan radioed to Wayne Macomber. “You’ve got a couple vehicles headed your way, about ten minutes out.” Patrick had launched a small unmanned attack aircraft called an AGM-177 Wolverine, which had been brought in via the 767 freighter. It resembled a cross between a cruise missile and a surfboard. It was normally air-launched, but had the ability to be fired from a truck-mounted catapult. The Wolverine carried infrared and millimeter-wave imaging and targeting sensors so it could autonomously locate, attack, and reattack targets programmed for it. It had three internal weapons bays for attacks on different types of targets, and it could also attack a fourth target by flying into it kamikaze style. “Radar has a helicopter about ten minutes to the east,” he added. “We don’t know if it’s headed this way or just on patrol, but it’s close.”

“Copy, Genesis,” Macomber replied. He waved at the Humvees to move in. “C’mon, we’ve got company, get in there and help the egghead,” he ordered. “I want to be out of here ASAP.” The Humvees rolled in, and technicians began unloading power tools to start opening the plane up.

“I’ll be here all day at least, probably for the next two days,” Jon Masters radioed.

“Masters, I’m not here to cart the entire aircraft back to the base,” Macomber radioed back. “Grab any classified stuff and only the most essential black boxes that are intact, and let’s get out of here. We’re out in the open with three hundred Turkish soldiers coming for us and another fifty thousand in the area.” That reminder seemed to make everyone work a little quicker.

“That helicopter is definitely coming your way,” Patrick radioed.
“About seven minutes out. The ground forces have increased in size—looks like six vehicles now, four troop carriers and two armored vehicles. How’s the plane look?”

“Masters says it doesn’t look that bad,” Whack said. “I think he’d say that if it was nothing but a smoking hole in the ground.”

“You’re right about that. Okay, they’re setting up roadblocks north and south on the highway, and all six vehicles are headed your way.”

“Copy.”

“No fighting unless it’s absolutely necessary, Rascal. We’re all still friends, remember.”

“I know. I’ve been extremely cordial and nice so far.”

“They should be in sight on the highway now.”

Wayne turned and saw the trucks unloading a total of about twenty troops with rifles, the armored vehicles on guard flanking the trucks and off-loading their own dismounts, and the same Captain Evren Jon spoke with at the front gate, scanning them with binoculars. “In sight. I see infantry weapons only so far. Rascal, this is One, we’ve got lookylous, stand by.” A few minutes later, Whack saw several soldiers and Captain Evren board their armored personnel carriers and slowly drive toward them. “Here they come.”

Evren’s APC stopped about thirty yards in front of Whack, and five soldiers dismounted, fanned out about six yards apart from one another, and lay prone on the ground with rifles raised. Whack noticed that the gunner’s cupola atop the APC was manned and the barrel of the 12.5-millimeter machine gun aimed right at him; there was also a Russian-made AT-3 “Sagger” antitank missile mounted on its launch rail, aimed at one of the Humvees. The second APC moved away, heading around Whack toward the XC-57.

“You!” Evren shouted in English. “Raise your hands and turn around!”

“
Hayir
,” Whack replied in Turkish via his electronic translator. “No. Leave us alone.”

“You are not permitted access to the plane.”

“We have permission from the Iraqi government and the plane’s
owner,” Whack said. “This is a legal salvage operation. Leave us alone.”

“I repeat, raise your hands and turn around, or we will open fire.”

“I am an American, I’m not armed, and I have permission from the Iraqi government. You’re a Turkish soldier. I don’t take orders from you.”

Now Evren seemed to be confused. He pulled out his portable transceiver and spoke into it. “He’s obviously reached the limit of his rules of engagement,” Whack said over the command network. “Here’s where it’ll start getting interesting. Keep an eye on the second APC; it’s flanking me and heading your way.”

“Got it in sight, One,” came the reply from Charlie Turlock.

“The helicopter is about five minutes out, Rascal,” Patrick said.

“Copy. Let’s hope it’s just the TV news.” Whack thought for a moment. “I’m starting to get nervous about that machine gun and Sagger missile on this APC, guys,” he said. “Everyone, find some cover away from the Humvees.” Through his translator, he said, “Point your weapons away right now!”

“You will surrender immediately or we will open fire!” Evren shouted in return.

“I’m warning you, point your weapons away and leave us alone, or I’m going to rough you up,” Whack said. “I don’t care about this NATO ally shit—lower your weapons and go away or you’re all going to wake up in the hospital.”

Through the sensitive microphones built into the Tin Man suit, Whack heard Evren say the word
ates
. A three-round burst of rifle fire rang out, and all three rounds hit Macomber’s left thigh. “
God bless it
,” Macomber snarled. “The guy shot me in the damned leg.”

“He was only trying to wound you,” Charlie said. “Take it easy, Whack.”

Evren was obviously startled to see the figure still standing, even though he’d clearly seen all rounds hit. “One more warning, bub,” Whack shouted in Turkish. “If you don’t drop your weapons, I’m going to play a little tune on your skull with my fists.”

He heard Evren say, “
Ohn ekee, bebe, sicak
!” which meant, “The twelve and the baby, go hot,” and Whack radioed, “Take cover, knock out the APCs,
now
!” just as the gunner on the 12.5-millimeter machine gun opened fire.

With a blast of supercompressed air, Whack launched himself through the air and landed atop the armored vehicle. The gunner tried to follow him as he sailed at him, nearly knocking himself out of the cupola. After Whack landed, he bent the barrel of the machine gun until the weapon exploded from the pressure of unexpelled gases. But he wasn’t quick enough to stop the AT-3. The wire-guided missile flew off its launch rail and hit one of the Humvees, sending it flying through the air on a cloud of fire. “Everyone okay?” he radioed.