The Command

Previous Books by David Poyer

Tales of the Modern Navy

Black Storm
China Sea
Tomahawk
The Passage
The Circle
The Gulf
The Med

The Hemlock County Novels

Winter Light
Thunder on the Mountain
As the Wolf Loves Winter
Winter in the Heart
The Dead of Winter

The Tiller Galloway Novels

Down to a Sunless Sea
Louisiana Blue
Bahamas Blue
Hatteras Blue

The Civil War at Sea

A Country of Our Own
Fire on the Waters

Other Novels

The Only Thing to Fear
Stepfather Bank
The Return of Philo T McGiffin
Star Seed
The Shiloh Project
White Continent

DAVID POYER

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ST. MARTIN'S PRESS
New York

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a work of fiction. Characters, companies, and organizations in this novel are either the product of the author's imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously, without intent to describe their actual conduct.

THE COMMAND
. Copyright © 2004 by David Poyer. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.stmartins.com

Map by Paul J. Pugliese

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Poyer, David.

The command / David Poyer.

    p.    cm.
ISBN 0-312-31836-7
EAN 978-0312-31836-9

1. Lenson, Dan (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. United States. Navy— Officers—Fiction. 3. Americans—Persian Gulf Region—Fiction. 4. Terrorism—Prevention—Fiction. 5. Destroyers (Warships)—Fiction. 6. Persian Gulf Region—Fiction. 7. Ship captains—Fiction. I. Title.

PS3566.O978C66   2004

813'.54—dc22

2003028058

First Edition: June 2004

10    9    8    7    6    5    4    3    2    1

E
X nihilo nihil fit.
For this book I owe thanks to Bob Berkel, Steve Boyer, Ina Birch, Wayne Burch, Al Chester, Katharine Cluverius, Mike Cohen, Donald J. Davidson, Drew Davis, Bart Denny, Mona Dre-icer, Ernest Duplessis, Marie Estrada, George W Fleck, Clive Foster, Sohrab Fracis, Sloan Harris, Michael Holm, Donna Hopkins, Bill Hunteman, Chris Borroni Huxtable, Sarvar Irani, Deborah Lee James, Marty Janczak, Sean Jenkins, John Kirby, James King, Ted Koler, Shea Kornblum, A. J. Magnan, Bob Malouin, Edison McDaniels, John McE-leny, Peter Mercier, Paula Mills, Joe Navratil, Gail Nicula, Paula Paschall, Jim Pelkofski, Lin Poyer, John Pucky, Sally Richardson, Josea Salam, Scott Schwartz, Sandra Scoville, Asia Sharif-Clark, Matt Shear, Denny Shelton, Denise Strother, Terry Sutherland, Chan Swallow, Jim Tankovich, Bill Valentine, Kimberley Walz, Mark Young, and many others who preferred anonymity. Thanks also to Commander, U.S. Atlantic Fleet; Commander, Second Fleet; the Eastern Shore Public Library, the Northampton Free Library, the Joint Forces Staff College, and to the crews, goat lockers, and wardrooms of USS
Deyo
(DD-989) and USS
George Washington
(CVN-73). Thanks to USS
Donald Cook
for the names of her ship's boats, and to personnel of R/V
Gosport
and USS
Hue City
for live training in boarding and search. My most grateful thanks to George Witte, editor and advisor of long standing, and to Lenore Hart, best friend and reality check. As always, all errors and deficiencies are my own.

 

 

 

The single best augury is to fight for one's country.

                                              —Homer,
The Illiad

T
HE mountains were silver and cobalt and jet. They flashed like jewels in the golden rays of the declining sun. Waterfalls arched over shadowy gorges. They were pristine and stark and very beautiful, and above them, floating in the crystal air like distant planets, towered range after range of the Himalayas.

The base lay where the road ground upward from a dusty plain. For years the Soviet flag had flown above it. Its guard towers had been manned by the elite security troops of the Twelfth Department. For a while, after they left, the flagpole had been bare. Then, one night, had disappeared, leaving only a wrenched-off stub embedded in the concrete.

Now the bunkhouses stood empty. Armor, heavy trucks, self-propelled howitzers waited in forlorn rows on the dusty hardstand. The guards had been hastily organized by a newly and equivocally independent state. The tanks, the artillery tubes, the other weapons might or might not belong to that state. Like much else in the wreckage of an empire, their status was … unclear.

The base commander was eating rice and lamb shashlik by the light of a kerosene lamp when his subordinate, a captain, barged in without knocking. Neither was Russian, though they wore threadbare Soviet uniforms.

The captain explained in great distress that one of the special weapons seemed to be missing.

“When was the last inventory?” the commander asked, fingers halted halfway to his mouth. A clump of rice detached itself from the ball and fell to the floor.

“Three months ago, when you arrived.”

“But they must be counted! Every day!” the senior officer shouted, flinging his bowl down. It shattered, and rice and meat splattered the planks.

“Yes, there's an inventory—a count—we sign for them at each guard change,” the captain stammered. “But—well, you'll see. But you have to come!”

THE jeep wouldn't start. There was no money for parts or repairs, or even blankets for the men, and the winter nights at this altitude were cruel. Usually no one got anything on payday, either. The commander reflected he could hardly blame his troops for looting the buildings for scrap metal, gutters, wiring, furniture, doors, windows. He'd seen small arms in the marketplace in town, and prisms and sight telescopes and radios, obviously from tanks. The two officers seized rusted bicycles instead. As the captain shouted to a grizzled sergeant to sound the alarm, they cycled with soft-tired wobbly haste across the compound.

The bunker was sunk into the earth. It was surrounded by barbed wire, light towers, and a sign that warned of great danger, special security, severe penalties. But the wire hung loose, the lightbulbs had been stolen, and the guard who met them was drunk.

The captain pointed to a lock that looked impressive, but wasn't locked. The alarm panel was dead; outside power had been sporadic for a long time, and there was no fuel for the base's generators. The commander nodded silently, expression menacing. Sensing disaster despite his condition, the guard staggered after them, muttering and weeping, as they entered the cage and moved from weapon to weapon.

It looked as if six bulky shapes filled out their gray plastic shrouds. But when the commander ordered the sniveling guard to pull them back, only five of the oblate cylinders met the eye. Where one had rested on a transport dolly, cardboard ration boxes had been stacked and cleverly shaped. The dolly was gone, too.

Staring at the remaining weapons, at the ranting, reeling trooper, the broken strands of rope and skid marks on the concrete floor, only one conclusion remained to the commander: where there had been six 203-millimeter nuclear artillery shells in his custody, there were now only five. Behind him more guards poured in, pointing rifles, shouting in a babble of Kazakh, Uighur, and Russian.

“These shells weigh a metric ton,” the captain said, wringing his hands. “This took many men. A truck. A crane. Someone knows how they got in here, who they are, where they took it.”

The old sergeant came in, and snapped to attention in the rigid Soviet style. He reported that the guard company was present and accounted for except for two men. He gave their names.

“Chechens,” the captain said, face paling. “Oh, God is great, God is great. It was the Chechens.”

“We must report this at once.” The commander's voice was outraged. “Close the gates instantly. Post double guards. Muster patrols in trucks to search the town. Get me the Defense Ministry. Also the Russian liaison. We will find who did this, and where the thieves have gone.”

A truck engine faltered, then roared into life. A shot cracked as a stumbling recruit dropped his rifle. As his troops scattered, shouting, the commander slid his hand into the back pocket of his uniform trousers.

To feel the tight thick roll of American currency nestled there.

I
 
DUST AND SMOKE