The Sixth Martyr, page 17
part #1 of Alpha Squad Series
“Tony, I’m going to Mazari Sharif.”
He nodded. “Uh, huh, you picked a tough one, Joe. I take it you believe Sarah’s son is there.”
“I do. Maryam will be there, too, and the bastards who’re responsible for kidnap and murder. Ahmadi, and this Commander Ghulam Samar we’ve heard about. They’re all in there, so that’s where I have to go.”
“And when you get there?”
“I kill Ahmadi and Samar, and bring the children out.”
“Just like that, you think they’ll let you walk in?”
“One man, acting alone should be able to get inside the town. I was thinking about those UN medical uniforms. I’ll pretend to be a doctor.”
He chuckled. “You wouldn’t stand a hope in hell. You don’t look anything like a doctor. But I do have a better idea.”
He nodded. “Go on.”
“We all go, we have the United Nations vehicle, so it’ll look authentic, carrying doctors and nurses. What’s the betting they’ll want to keep us there, ready to handle the casualties in the coming battle? One man in a medic’s scrubs wouldn’t look convincing. But a team…that’s something else.”
“I can’t ask any of you to do this, Tony. You’ve done more than enough as it is.”
“Too bad, there’s no other way. There’re plenty of scrubs in the trunk of the Land Cruiser. We play doctors and nurses, and they’ll think it’s Christmas, or whatever these people celebrate. An entire medical team, falling right into their greedy little hands, an instant casualty station, how could they resist it?”
They rejoined the others, and Hammett explained the plan. The response was unanimous, and they pulled the cartons from the trunk of the vehicle. Ten minutes later, they’d dressed in the baggy UN scrubs, and apart from a certain amount of dirt and grime, they all looked the part. Except Javed, the boy was slight, and looked too young to be a doctor. There was nothing to fit him. Sarah had the answer.
“You’ll have to wear a nurse’s uniform, Javed. I’m sure there’s one to fit you.”
“A nurse?” He looked horrified, “Those are girl’s clothes, and I’m a boy. No, I won’t do it.”
“There isn’t any other way, I’m afraid. Do this for Maryam. Or you can stay here.”
Slowly, he removed his clothes, and she pulled a white dress over his head, the same as the one she was wearing. She finished off with a scarf on his head, and he looked the part, until she looked down at his filthy sandals. “Perhaps some different shoes would work better.”
She produced white shoes, and he slipped into them. His skin color was brown, and they all knew if it had been white, he would have gone a deep shade of red.
“You look perfect, Javed. Just like a nurse.”
“I look like a girl,” he growled.
“A pretty girl,” she murmured. No one smiled.
They were ready. They tucked their weapons beneath the voluminous scrubs and climbed back aboard the Toyota. Tyler took the wheel again. He started the engine and swung onto the road that led to Mazari Sharif, a journey of around one hundred miles. He was going to find Sarah’s son, to save him, and to save the life of a twelve-year-old girl. Along the way, he intended to kill a couple of merchants of death.
* * *
Samar and Ahmadi inspected the ambush on the approaches to Mazari Sharif. “We don’t have enough men,” Ahmadi grunted, “You said we needed a hundred to cover each side of the road. I count no more than fifty.”
He shrugged. “Desertions are a problem. Some men do not believe we can win.”
The Mullah flared. “We will win. We must win. It is the will of Allah.”
“As you say, Mullah. Sadly, not all of our men see it your way.”
“That is their misfortune. What about the missiles?”
“Everything we have. Russian Strelas, RPGs, and, of course, the American Stingers.”
“Good.”
He gazed at the fighters crouched in hiding, and most failed to meet his eyes. They didn’t have that much faith in the word of God, as handed down by Habib Ahmadi. No matter, they would still inflict a terrible slaughter on the invaders. These men would die in the process, he had no doubt, but that was too bad. In the streets, houses, and alleyways of the city, the rest of the Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters would make them pay in blood for every step they made.
He also had his secret weapon. Even though four of the martyrs had run, he still had two, Akram and Maryam. Two children would be enough, provided they were close to the target. His detonator was smashed, but Akram had assured him he would carry out the deed himself. The Generals would die, and the Coalition would understand what a terrible price they would have to pay for invading the Islamic nation. Ghulam Samar would be impressed, although his pleasure may be short lived. He’d yet to decide how to deal with the Regional Commander.
After all, surely Mullah Ahmadi would be the better man to occupy the top slot. Yes, a stray bullet would be the best way, anonymous, and final. Next, we will take back Kabul, put the Taliban back into power, and at their head, the new President of the Islamic Republic, President Habib Ahmadi.
* * *
He stood in the center of Chiras, and he couldn’t work it out. The gateway to the north of the country, and they’d abandoned it. The question was why.
General Kabir Shah shook his head. “It is incredible. I thought they would at least put up a token resistance. My men are checking through the town now, looking for booby traps, but so far they’ve found nothing.”
“Could it be the Taliban has given up the fight?”
He shrugged. “Anything is possible. We’ll know when we attack our next objective. Mazari Sharif. We must be careful and look for signs of ambush. We never came across those hostiles the CIA mercs reported, although we sent several recon flights over the area.”
General Pike kept his expression neutral.
Two days after the report came in, thanks to not treading on your Afghan political niceties.
“Tell you what, General Shah. We’ll send another drone over the approaches, and give it a discreet look over. If we find anything, this time we paste it with everything we have.”
Shah scowled. “General Pike, I warned you about airstrikes without independent verification of the target. We must make sure.”
Pike had been thinking of nothing else since his decision to hold back on the force reported outside Chiras. He had a strong suspicion they’d been there, and he’d left them alive to fight another day. Like at Mazari Sharif.
He gave the Afghan a level stare. “That’s fine with me. You want verification, send your own troops in, and see if they get shot up. Otherwise…”
Shah’s expression went through a range of emotions, from anger to thoughtfulness, and to fear. If he failed to take American advice, and took heavy casualties as a result, his masters in Kabul would recall him, and his military career would be over. Finally, he smiled at Pike and spread his hands.
“Perhaps you are right, General. After all, should they bomb civilians by mistake, we’re talking about a few shepherds and goat herders. Send a drone to survey the area, and if you see anything that looks suspicious, you have my full agreement to send in an air strike.”
“I’d like that in writing, General Shah.”
He gave a warm smile. “But of course. What are friends for?”
* * *
The General Atomics MQ-1 Predator flew at twenty thousand feet, nosing through the skies on the route between Chiras and Mazari Sharif. Back at the operations center in Nevada, the controller watched the camera feed carefully. He saw a few wandering shepherds, a donkey train, probably a drug convoy, but little else. Twenty klicks south of the target area, the UAV flew almost silently over the town of Sulgara. In response to the impatient inquiry from the commanders in the field, the controller intoned ‘negative’ to the barked question.
Deaf to the rising tension below, the UAV flew on, and the cameras probed the roads and features of the ground around them. The operator was thinking about ending his shift in another forty minutes, home for a shower, a cold beer, and a game of pool in the local bar. His attention wandered, and at the last minute he refocused. Just in time to jerk his head up in astonishment.
“Hostiles, hostiles. Sir, we have probable ambush site five klicks south of the city, on the road from Sulgara. I’m bringing her around for a second pass.”
“They won’t see you?”
“Nope,” he replied, not knowing the man on the other end of the line was a three-star General, “There’s no chance of that. This bird is invisible.”
“Good. We’re watching the feed now. Interpret it for us.”
“Fifty insurgents either side of the road. Weapons look to be light and heavy machine guns, RPGs, and wait…they have a ton of missiles down there. Some of them look like Stingers. American Stingers, scores of them. Where would they get those?”
Thousands of miles away, in Afghanistan, Pike felt a twinge of embarrassment.
We handed those missiles to them, to fight the Soviets.
“Anything else you see down there?”
“Nothing else, but it’s enough, Sir.”
“Thank you, Sergeant. If you see anything else, you let us now pronto, got that?”
“Yessir.”
* * *
Captain Jason McGrath, Missouri Air National Guard, flew at an altitude of ten thousand meters, high enough to avoid the reported presence of Stinger ground-to-air missiles. He didn’t dwell on the irony of the enemy having U.S. supplied advanced weaponry with which to pluck his aircraft from the sky. It was enough to know they were there, and his flight of four A-10s had more than enough sophisticated electronics onboard to avoid them. At least, that was the theory.
They were coming up on the reported ambush position, and they watched the ambush site with eagle-eyed gaze. There weren’t enough places for the hostiles to hide. If they were there, they’d find them. He looked hard at a place of interest, and yes, there was movement. Before they realized the aircraft were overhead, they were moving around, getting into position. One group had even lit a small fire. He grinned as he thumbed the transmit button.
“This is Thunderbolt Leader. If anyone is in any doubt about the target position, you need glasses. We’ll keep flying north and turn through one hundred and eighty degrees to hit them from where they least expect it. Shoot them up good and hard, boys. I don’t like the thought of those bastards sneaking up on our guys. Rick,” he said to his wingman, Richard Martins, “When you’ve made your pass, circle around half a kilometer out, and take out any leakers. The rest of you, follow me around for the second pass. Okay, let’s do it, guys.”
Three double clicks came into his headset as his fellow pilots acknowledged, and he pushed the throttles forward. The two General Electric T 34 turbofans increased to full power, and the aircraft accelerated to its maximum speed of a whisker over five hundred miles an hour. At ten kilometers to the north, he banked and pulled back on the stick. The aircraft almost stood on its tail as it swung through a tight turn to head back on a reciprocal course. It was too much to hope the hostiles hadn’t noticed them, and so it proved. As he came up on them, his altitude now reduced to one thousand meters and dropping, they were starting to move. Too late, and if they hadn’t realized the awesome power of the Warthogs, they were about to find out first hand.
He took the group to the east of the road, and at five hundred out, pressed the fire button. The 30mm GAU-8/A Avenger rotary cannon roared, and the airframe shook like a wet dog. In fact, the entire aircraft was a flying gun. Designed with a single purpose. To destroy ground targets from low-level, and those targets included armor, thin-skinned APCs, trucks, and finally, enemy personnel.
The Taliban group disappeared in a cloud of smoke, chips of stone, and spurts of dust churned up by the intense gunfire. Five hundred rounds of 30mm ammunition does a lot of damage, and the other three aircraft came in behind him, one for his target on the east side of the road, and the other two A-10s to the west. No one launched any Stingers to his intense relief. They’d probably caught them with their pants down, and they flew on past the target. They turned again at half a kilometer out. The Warthogs swept in for a second attack run, and no more than a few hostiles survived. Some were running like crazy to escape the devastation from the sky, and others cringed behind what they hoped would be enough cover. Evidently, they hadn’t experience of the GAU 30mm cannon shells. Most were staring death in the face.
He squirted off a further three hundred rounds, which left around three hundred in the magazine. The shattering roar of the other three planes’ gunfire was loud. Rick Martins was several hundred meters to the west, pursuing a group of three Talibs who mistakenly thought they could outrun the awesome power of the Warthogs. Martins disabused them of that notion, sending a short volley of fifty rounds in their direction. It was more than enough, and as he banked away for a third pass, he saw there was no need; three living, breathing, human beings reduced to bundles of bloody rags in less than a second.
Too bad, guys. If you want to throw in with a mass killer like bin Laden, that’s the kind of medicine you can expect.
Jason McGrath pulled back on the stick, climbed to two thousand meters, and stared down at the landscape below. No movement, just piles of corpses, with the Warthogs, the ‘Angels of Death’ circling overhead. Looking for anything they’d left undone; there was nothing undone. Death had arrived in this place, and all was still. He thumbed the transmit button.
“We’re finished here. Time to head for home.”
“Cap’n, I see a vehicle a few klicks to the north west. You want me to check it out?”
“Do it now. We’ll circle and see if we have any more business.”
Two clicks in his headset acknowledged, and Martins zoomed away. Less than three minutes later, his voice came on the radio.
“Nothing for us there, Cap. It’s a white Toyota SUV with UNHCR markings.”
“Acknowledged. Assemble on me, mission accomplished.”
They flew away, and for a short time, the sky was clear. Until the black specks appeared from in the distance, and a new predator appeared. Vultures.
Chapter Ten
They heard the yammering of the GAU cannons in the distance, and soon they saw the darting shapes of ground attack fighters as they swooped down on their targets. Tyler and Hammett exchanged satisfied glances.
“A-10s, Warthogs. Pasting the fuckers.”
The merc nodded. “Warthogs, no question. I reckon that means our brave Generals listened to Langley. They finally decided to get off their fannies and take notice. The Taliban aren’t slouches when it comes to staging an ambush, and they could have killed a lot of good men. The Soviets got a bloody nose a few years back. I’d hate to think of our own guys walking into that kind of a bloodbath. We’ve had a lucky escape. We’d have been in the wrong place at the wrong time if we’d taken the other road. The way things are, we may get a clear run all the way into Mazari Sharif.”
“Until we encounter the enemy. Then all bets are off.”
“Yeah, that’s the sixty-four-dollar question. What do they do when they see us? Kill us or use us.”
Tyler shrugged “We didn’t have any choice, and I think we’ll be okay. An entire United Nations medical team gift-wrapped and falling into their hands just when they expect to take heavy casualties. They’d be madmen if they didn’t fall for it.”
He muttered something about they were madmen, and Tyler made no comment. None was necessary.
“It’ll work,” Sarah reassured them, “It has to work.”
He glanced back at her and squeezed onto the rear seat with Diaz, Murphy, and Javed, who couldn’t have been unhappier in his nurse’s guise, complete with disguising Islamic headscarf. He ignored the boy’s murderous look.
“That’s okay for you to say. I’m supposed to be a UN surgeon. If they ask me to remove a chunk of lead from a Taliban casualty, I’m going to have a problem.”
Murphy chuckled. “The poor guy on the operating table is going to have more of a problem, Joe. I wouldn’t like to swap places with him.”
“I can’t argue with that. Assuming it goes okay, our big problem is shaking them off when they take us to their casualty station. It could be a hospital, but we don’t know yet. But if we can’t get away, and they wheel in the casualties for us to deal with, we’re screwed. Are we all packing?”
“Affirmative,” Hammett said, “That’s the big advantage of wearing loose scrubs, you can hide an anti-tank missile inside these things.”
He looked at Javed. “What about you, do you have a weapon?”
“I have my AK-47.”
Murphy chuckled again. “Where is it, hidden inside your bra, kid?”
Sarah elbowed him hard. “Shut it. He’s doing very well. Javed, where is the rifle?”
His face darkened. “It is under my dress.”
“That’s excellent. You’re a brave boy.”
They drove on, and no one spoke until they sighted the first of the buildings in the distance.
“Mazari Sharif coming up in around three clicks,” Hammett said quietly, “Make sure no one has a weapon on show. They’ll stop us any moment.”
They fidgeted. Each man wanting the reassurance of a gun in his hands when approaching the enemy, and knowing it was impossible. They drove for another kilometer and stopped. Taliban fighters had blocked the road with an old bus slewed sideways, and the guns pointed at them were sufficiently eloquent to persuade them not to do anything stupid. They didn’t do anything stupid.
Joe slowed and braked to a halt. He pressed the button to lower the window and smiled at the swarthy fighter with the huge beard. The man stared back at him with a cruel and hostile gaze, showing blackened, broken, and missing teeth. “Good afternoon, friend. We’re from the UN. Is this the right road for Mazari Sharif?”
