Seal Team Seven (37 page)

“Has anyone thought to consult with Congressman Murdock about this?” Kerrigan asked. “That's his son out there. I find it shocking that he was allowed to lead
two
dangerous assaults one right after the other, first against the
Yuduki Maru
, and then against the
Beluga
, and that now he's doing this.”

“Lieutenant Murdock,” Coburn said slowly, “is an excellent officer. He does not allow politics, personal feelings, or shall we say, family obligations to divert him from what he perceives as his duty. I am well aware of Congressman Murdock's interest in his son's activities. I'm also aware that neither Lieutenant Murdock, nor myself, nor the President of the United States himself for that matter, can allow personal feelings to jeopardize this operation. I'm sure, sir, that the congressman would be the first to agree if he were here.”

“So what you're all telling me,” Brian Hadley said at last, “is that this sneak-and-peek is a good idea. That we should plan this thing knowing we're going to have SEALs on the ground, or on the water actually, when we send in the Marines.”

“Abso-damn-lutely,” Coburn said. “These people'll be able to tell you things your spy satellites never dreamed of.”

Hadley grinned. “I hope so, Captain. Because I happen to agree with you. This is too God-damned good an opportunity to throw away!” He began gathering up the charts and papers on the table in front of him and putting them into his briefcase. The naval officers rose, began gathering up their own papers, and started to leave.

“Captain Coburn?” Hadley said, looking up.

“Sir?”

“I wonder if I might have a word with you before you go?”

“Of course, sir,” Coburn said. He glanced again at his watch. “I am on a pretty tight sched.”

“I understand you're on your way over there.”

“Yes, sir. First and Second Platoons will be taking part in the main landings.”

“I just wanted to hear it from you, your assessment of young Murdock. He's been pushing pretty hard. Can we push him this much more?”

Coburn considered the question. “If he wasn't up to it, Mr. Hadley, I don't think he would have suggested it. Murdock always has the
Team's
best interests at heart, not his own.”

“Hmm. That was my assessment, based on what I've heard. You know, don't you, that a lot of the SEALs' future is riding on this op?”

Coburn grinned at him. “Tell me something I don't know.”

“Right now, a House investigative committee is going over your Murdock's after-action report on the Japanese freighter. They're explaining to each other how they could have done it better, and they're wondering if all the money they're giving NAVSPECWAR is being well spent. There's serious talk of disbanding the SEALs, Marine Recon, the Rangers, all of the SPECWAR people except the Green Beanies.”

“Give us half a chance, Mr. Hadley. We'll show them that we can deliver plenty of bang for the buck.”

“Yes. From what I've heard about your people, I have to agree.” There was a knock at the door, and Coburn looked up. A young second class electrician's mate stood there, his SEAL Budweiser winking brightly in the overhead fluorescent lighting. “Hey, Chucker! Come on in.”

“Helo's waitin' on the pad and ready to go, sir,” EM2 Wilson called, gesturing with the rolled-up white hat in his hand. “Whenever you're ready.”

“Let's haul ass then. Ah, if you'll excuse me, Mr. Hadley?”

“Of course.” He nodded toward the enlisted SEAL. “That one of your people, Captain?”

“Sure is. A brand-new SEAL, just assigned to an open slot in First Platoon. Isn't that right, Wilson?”

“Yes, sir. Uh, begging the Captain's pardon, sir, but the helo jockey told me that if our asses weren't on board in five minutes we were gonna have to hitch a ride to Oceana.”

“Then we'd better move. Mr. Hadley?”

“You've answered my questions.” Hadley reached out and clapped Coburn on the shoulder. “Good luck over there, Captain.”

“Thank you, sir. But believe me, it's not luck that counts in this game.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, indicating EM2 Wilson. “It's guys like that.”

He picked up his briefcase and headed for the door.

The sun was merciless, glaring down from a brassy, cloudless sky. The yacht
Beluga
was still following along in the wakes of her larger Iranian consorts, but by this time she'd managed to drop back until she was nearly five miles astern of the
Yuduki Maru
, far enough to avoid inspection by curious soldiers or sailors aboard the freighter or the other ships, close enough that it was not obvious that she was hanging back.

Throughout the run north past Al Masirah, zigzagging northwest into the Gulf of Oman at the Tropic of Cancer, then north again through the oil-blackened narrows of the Strait of Hormuz, Murdock had noticed that the Iranian flotilla lacked almost any sense of order or convoy discipline. The
Damavand
continued plowing steadily ahead, towing the dead weight of the Japanese freighter. One or another of the frigates was usually within close support range, but the patrol boats scattered themselves all over the map, and by Sunday morning, two had vanished entirely, probably racing ahead to safe berths in Bandar Abbas.

The formation was made even more ragged by the presence of so many civilian vessels. The Strait of Hormuz was always crowded with commercial shipping, most of it the monster oil tankers bearing the flags of a dozen nations. The biggest were VLCCs—Very Large Crude Carriers—steel islands as long as four football fields end to end, with dead weight tonnages of half a million tons or more. At any given moment, one or more of those monsters could be seen on the horizon from
Beluga
's deck, entering the Persian Gulf riding high and light, or exiting the passage with full loads that seemed to drag those leviathan bulks down until their decks were nearly awash.

It was the seagoing traffic, of course, that invested the Strait of Hormuz with its singular strategic importance. More than once in recent memory, Iran had threatened to use its surface-to-surface “Silkworm” missiles purchased from China to close the strait to international shipping. So far, they'd refrained. Iran also used the Strait of Hormuz for access to the world's oil markets. But when it came to splinter groups like the NLA, or bands of disaffected military leaders who might actually
welcome
the political chaos such a shutdown of the economy might bring, all bets were off, and anything was possible. General Ramazani and his fellow plotters might easily decide to close the Strait of Hormuz permanently, leaving them free to pursue their own military objectives without fear of Western intervention in the Gulf. A couple of tons of radioactive plutonium distributed among the warheads of SCUD or Silkworm missiles and detonated across the shipping channel off Ra's Musandam would do just that. Alternatively, clouds of plutonium dust released from Iran's Gulf islands of Abu Musa and Tunb could close the channel and leave the port of Bandar-é Abbas open.

The situation might even allow Iran's new rulers to practice some good old-fashioned blackmail,
threatening
to close the strait or to poison the Saudi oil fields unless their demands were met. Murdock had a realistic enough understanding of modern international politics to know that the chances of closing ranks against such threats were nil. Japan and much of Europe still depended on the Gulf for nearly all of their oil imports. Hell, even the United States, given its zigzag record in foreign policy over the past couple of years, might cave in and pay rather than risk having the Strait of Hormuz closed. Murdock was frankly amazed that the go-ahead had been given for Deadly Weapon.

Threading their way north past the civilian traffic, the SEALs stuck with the
Yuduki Maru
. The Iranian radio-silence order worked to their advantage, of course, as did their straggling. With luck, the SEALs would be able to sail the
Beluga
all the way into Bandar Abbas, allowing them to provide II MEF with an eyewitness report on the defenses and preparedness inside the port.

Jaybird Sterling had the helm again. The young SEAL trainee did indeed know how to handle a pleasure craft like the
Beluga
, and he'd been standing watch-and-watch at the wheel with Murdock since he'd volunteered to stay aboard. The other two SEAL volunteers were Razor Roselli and Professor Higgins. During Saturday's early morning hours, the former hostages had been bundled up in life jackets and transported two by two in one of the SEALs' CRRCs to a point well clear of the
Beluga
, then hoisted aboard a hovering Sea King sent out from the
Nassau
for the recovery. Colonel Aghasi had made the trip as well, along with eight of the VBSS team SEALs.

Murdock, Roselli, Higgins, and Sterling had remained aboard, ready to make a quick getaway over the side with their diving gear if their cover was too closely probed, but otherwise continuing to report on the Iranian squadron's position and disposition throughout the next thirty-six hours. Higgins had programmed
Beluga
's on-board satellite communications gear to track a MILSTAR relay satellite, giving them secure and untraceable communications with both
Nassau
and the Pentagon.

Now Murdock emerged from below deck into the baking heat of the Gulf sun and walked back to the helm. There was a somewhat lonely emptiness to the sky; American helicopters had continued to dog the Iranian squadron day and night until an hour earlier, when the freighter had officially entered Iranian territorial waters.

Now the four SEALs were alone.

“Looks like we're getting pretty close,” he told Jaybird.

“For sure, Skipper. Maybe we should get shined up and squared away for inspection, huh?”

“Shit, Jaybird,” Roselli called from the top of the deckhouse. “You look just fine to me!”

“You both need haircuts,” Murdock replied, and the others laughed. None of the SEALs looked very military at the moment. All of them had removed their black gear and wet suits and were wearing pieces of uniforms scrounged from the Iranian dead before they'd been put over the side Saturday morning. Jaybird had stripped to the waist; just since yesterday, his California-boy tan had darkened to the point where his skin was as swarthy as that of any Iranian. To aid the disguise, he kept his pale, sun-bleached blond hair covered by a black Navy watchcap. Roselli and Higgins both wore Iranian tunics that, unbuttoned and with the shirttails dangling, gave them the unkempt appearance of a pair of modern-day pirates . . . or a Pasdaran boarding party. Murdock had relieved Aghasi of his peaked officer's cap and tunic, complete with colonel's insignia, and aviator's sun glasses before packing the Iranian off aboard the helo. He hadn't had time to grow the colonel's bushy mustache as well, but to complete the deception he'd smeared his upper lip with a finger laden with camo paint. The disguise wouldn't fool anyone up close, of course, but through binoculars at a range of twenty meters or more, it ought to get by. The SEALs were banking on that peculiar aspect of human psychology that allowed people to see what they
expected
to see, rather than what was actually there.

Raising his own binoculars to his eyes, he carefully swept the horizon from west to east.

They were well into the northern portion of the Strait of Hormuz now. That wrinkled-looking mass of bold gray mountain rising to the north was Iran. Almost due west was the rocky, mountainous island of Qeshm, largest island in the Gulf, with its odd, cone-shaped rain reservoirs and impoverished-looking, ramshackle coastal villages. Through his binoculars, Murdock could pick out the anachronistic intrusion of radar dishes and blockhouses marking an Iranian Silkworm missile battery mounted on the erosion-streaked side of a barren hill. Camouflage tarps had been stretched between poles, shielding SAM sites and vehicle parks from the blazing sun . . . and from the probing eyes of American satellites.

Dead ahead, some fifteen miles across the sun-dazzled water, the port of Bandar-é Abbas—known simply as Bandar to the locals—rose between sea and mountains in blocks and tiers of white stone. A beneficiary of the wars, both trade and military, of the 1980s, Bandar was a large and modern city with a population of just over 200,000. Though the typically squalid tent cities and slums of most Middle Eastern cities cluttered Bandar's fringes, Murdock could make out the gleaming facades of several modern buildings above the noisome tenement hovels of the low-rent districts. Every building seemed in need of paint, however, and the dhows, fishing boats, and motor craft lining the waterfront were uniformly battered, sunbaked, and coated with ancient layers of filth and grime.

Farther west, Bandar-é Abbas's airport buildings were visible as gray and white blurs shimmering in the desert heat. Murdock could just barely pick out the shapes of several military aircraft there—F-4 Phantoms and F-5E Tiger IIs, for the most part, sold to Iran before the revolution—as well as the larger bulk of an Iran Air 727.

Returning his attention to the city's waterfront, Murdock examined several port facilities. One fronting the downtown area was clearly a commercial port and ferry dock; others were marinas occupied by high-sterned, lateen-rigged dhows and fishing smacks. Most of the military facilities appeared to be northwest of the city, tucked in behind the lee of Qeshm Island and the hook of the headland on which the city was built.

And that, clearly, was where
Damavand
was taking the Japanese freighter. Through the binoculars, Murdock identified a small shipyard between Bandar-é Abbas and the port of Dogerdan to the west, with dry-dock facilities, the looming skeletons of hammerhead cranes, the squat cylinders of POL storage tanks, and the long, low tent-roofed shapes of warehouses and machine shops. Numerous yard and service craft lay alongside sun-bleached wharfs; larger ships, a destroyer and a pair of frigates, were tied up alongside a fueling pier. Patrol boats and landing craft were everywhere, almost too numerous to count.