Clear and Present Danger

  Robby made the proper arrangements. Whoever set up flag quarters for them knew what Painter liked to drink. Jackson opened a Miller Lite for himself.

  Painter reappeared without his uniform shirt and took a sip from his glass. Then he dismissed his aide and gave Jackson a very close look.

  “I want you to repeat what you said on the way in, Captain.”

  “Admiral, I know I’m not cleared for this, but I’m not blind. I watched the A-6 head for the beach on radar, and I don’t figure it was a coincidence. Whoever set up security on the op could have done a better job, sir.”

  “Jackson, you’re going to have to forgive me, but I just spent five and a half hours sitting too close to the engines on a beat-up old 727. You’re telling me that those two bombs that took druggies out fell off one of my A-6s?”

  “Yes, sir. You didn’t know?”

  “No, Robby, I didn’t.” Painter knocked off the rest of his drink and set the glass down. “Jesus Christ. What lunatic set up this abortion?”

  “But that new bomb, it had to—I mean, the orders and everything—shit, for this sort of thing, the orders have to chop through -05.”

  “What new bomb?” Painter nearly shouted that out, but managed to control himself.

  “Some kind of plastic, fiberglass, whatever, some kind of new bombcase. It looks like a stock, low-drag two-thousand-pounder with the usual attachment points for the smart-bomb gear, but it’s not made out of steel or any other kind of metal, and it’s painted blue like an exercise bomb.”

  “Oh, okay. There has been a little work on a low-observable bomb for the ATA”—Painter referred to the new Stealth attack plane the Navy was working on—“but, hell, we’ve just done a little preliminary testing, maybe a dozen drops. Whole program’s experimental. They don’t even use the regular bomb filler, and I’m probably going to shit-can the program, ’cause I don’t think it’s worth the money. They haven’t even taken those things off China Lake yet.”

  “Sir, there were several in Ranger’s bomb locker. I saw ‘em, Admiral, I touched’em. I saw one attached to an A-6. I watched that A-6 on radar while I was up in the E-2 for the Fleet-Ex. It flew off to the beach and came back from a different direction. The timing might be a coincidence, but I’d be careful putting money down on that. The night I flew back, I saw another one attached to the same aircraft. Next day I hear that another druggie got his house knocked flat. It stands to reason that half a ton of HE’ll do just fine for that, and a combustible bombcase won’t leave shit behind for evidence.”

  “Nine hundred eighty-five pounds of Octol—that’s what they use in those things.” Painter snorted. “It’ll do a house, all right. You know who flew the mission?”

  “Roy Jensen, he’s skipper of—”

  “I know him. We were shipmates on—Robby, what the hell is going on here? I want you to start over from the beginning and tell me everything you saw.”

  Captain Jackson did just that. It took ten uninterrupted minutes.

  “Who was the ‘tech-rep’ from?” Painter asked.

  “I didn’t ask, sir.”

  “How much you want to bet he isn’t even aboard anymore? Son, we’ve been had. I’ve been had. Goddammit! Those orders should have come through my office. Somebody’s been using my fucking airplanes and not telling me.”

  It wasn’t about the bombings, Robby understood, it was about propriety. And it was about security. Had the Navy planned the job, it would have been done better. Painter and his senior A-6 expert would have set it up so that there would have been no awkward evidence for other people—like Robby in the E- 2C-to notice. What Painter feared was the simple fact that now his people could be left holding the bag for an operation imposed from above, bypassing the regular chain of command.

  “Get Jensen up here?” Robby wondered.

  “I thought of that. Too obvious. Might get Jensen in too much trouble. But I’ve got to find out where the hell his orders came from. Ranger’s out for another ten days or so, right?”

  “I believe so, sir.”

  “Has to be an Agency job,” Josh Painter observed quietly. “Authorized higher up than that, but it has to be Agency.”

  “For what it’s worth, sir, I got a good friend who’s pretty senior there. I’m godfather for one of his kids.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “Jack Ryan.”

  “Oh, yeah, I’ve met him. He was with me on Kennedy for a day or two back when—you’re sure to remember that cruise, Rob.” Painter smiled. “Right before you took that missile hit. By that time he was off on HMS Invincible. ”

  “What? Jack was aboard then? But—why the hell didn’t he come down to see me?”

  “You never did find out what that op was all about, did you?” Painter shook his head, thinking of the Red October affair. “Maybe he can tell you about it. I can’t.”

  Robby accepted it without questioning and turned back to the matter at hand. “There’s a land side to this operation, too, Admiral,” he said, and explained on for another couple of minutes.

  “Charlie-Fox,” Painter said when he was done. That was the Navy’s shorthand and sanitized version of an expression that had begun in the Marine Corps to denote a confused and self-destructive military operation: Cluster-Fuck. “Robert, you get your ass on the first plane back to D.C. and tell your friend that his operation is going to hell in a basket. Jesus, don’t those Agency clowns ever learn? If this gets out, and from what you’re telling me, it’s sure as hell going to, it’s going to hurt us. It’s going to hurt the whole country. We don’t need this kind of shit, not in an election year with that asshole Fowler running. Also tell him that the next time the Agency decides to play soldier, it might help if they asked somebody who knows something about it ahead of time.”

  The Cartel had an ample supply of people who were accustomed to carrying guns, and assembling them took only a few hours. Cortez was detailed to run the operation. He’d coordinate it from the village of Anserma, which was in the center of the area in which the “mercenary” teams seemed to be operating. He hadn’t told his boss everything he knew, of course, nor did he reveal his full objective. The Cartel was a cooperative enterprise. Nearly three hundred men had been brought in by cars, trucks, and buses, personal retainers from all of the Cartel chieftains, all of them reasonably fit and accustomed to violence. Their presence here reduced the security details of the remaining drug lords. That would allow Escobedo a sizable advantage as he tried to discover which of his colleagues was making the “power play,” while Cortez dealt with the “mercenaries.” He had every intention of running the American soldiers to ground and killing them all, of course, but there was no special hurry in that. Félix had every reason to suspect that he was up against elite troops, perhaps even American Green Berets, formidable opponents for whom he had due respect. Casualties among his force, therefore, were to be expected. Félix wondered how many he’d have to kill off in order to alter the overall balance of power within the Cartel to his personal advantage.

  There was no point in telling the assembled multitude, of course. These harsh, brutal men were used to brandishing their weapons like the Japanese samurai warriors of all those bad movies that they liked to watch, and like those actors playing at killers, these men were accustomed to having people cower before them, the omnipotent, invincible warriors of the Cartel, armed with their AK-47s, swaggering down village streets. Comical scum, Cortez thought.

  It was all rather comical, really. Cortez would not mind a bit. It was to be a diverting and entertaining exercise, something from half a millennium before, when brutal men would tether a bear in a pit and let dogs at it. Eventually the bear died, and though it was frequently rather hard on the dogs, you could always get new ones. Those new dogs would be trained differently, to be loyal to a new master.... It was marvelous, Cortez realized after a moment. He’d be playing a game, with men instead of bears and dogs, a game that hadn’t been played since the time of the Caesars. He understood n
ow why some of the drug lords had gotten the way they were. This sort of Godlike power was destructive to one’s soul. He’d have to remember that. But first there was work to do.

  The chain of command was established. There were five groups of fifty or so men. They were assigned operating areas. Communications would be by radio, coordinated through Cortez, in the safety of a house outside the village. About the only complication was the possible interference of the Colombian Army. Escobedo was taking care of that. M-19 and FARC would start making trouble elsewhere. That would keep the Army occupied.

  The “soldiers,” as they immediately took to calling themselves, moved off into the hills in trucks. Buena suerte, Cortez told their leaders: Good luck. Of course, he wished them nothing of the kind. Luck was no longer a factor in the operation, which suited the former colonel of the DGI. In a properly planned operation, it never was.

  It was a quiet day in the mountains. Chavez heard the pealing of church bells echoing up and down the valley, calling the faithful to Sunday liturgy. Was it Sunday? Chavez wondered. He’d lost track. Whichever day it was, traffic sounds were less than normal. Except for the loss of Rocha, things were in rather good shape. They hadn’t even expended much of their ammunition, though in another few days they were due for a resupply drop from the helicopter supporting the operation. You could never have too much ammunition. That was one truth Chavez had learned. Happiness is a full bandolier. And a full canteen. And hot food.

  The topography of the valley allowed them to hear things especially well. Sound carried up the slopes with a minimum of attenuation, and the air, though thin, seemed to give every noise a special bell-like clarity. Chavez heard the trucks well off, and put his binoculars on a bend in the road, several miles away, to see what it was. He wasn’t the least concerned. Trucks were targets, not things to worry about. He adjusted the focus on the binoculars to get the sharpest possible image, and the sergeant had a good pair of eyes. After a minute or so he spotted three of them, flatbed trucks like farmers used, with removable wooden sides. But they were filled with men, and the men appeared to be carrying rifles. The trucks stopped, and the men jumped out. Chavez punched his sleeping companion.

  “Oso, get the captain here right now!”

  Ramirez was there in less than a minute, with his own pair of binoculars.

  “You’re standing up, sir!” Chavez growled. “Get the fuck down!”

  “Sorry, Ding.”

  “You see ’em?”

  “Yeah.”

  They were just milling around, but it was impossible to miss their rifles, slung over their shoulders. As both men watched, they divided into four groups and started moving off the road. A moment later, they were lost in the trees.

  “It’ll take ‘em about three hours to get here, Cap’n,” Ding estimated.

  “By that time we’ll be six miles north. Get ready to move.”

  Ramirez set up his satellite radio.

  “VARIABLE, this is KNIFE, over.” He got a reply on the first call.

  “KNIFE, this is VARIABLE. We read you loud and clear. Over.”

  “KNIFE reports armed men entering the woods five miles east-southeast our position. Estimate reinforced platoon in strength, and heading our way.”

  “Are they soldiers, over.”

  “Negative—say again, negative. Weapons in evidence, but no uniforms. I repeat, they do not appear to be wearing uniforms. We are getting ready to move.”

  “Roger that, KNIFE. Move immediately, check in when you can. We’ll try to find out what’s going on.”

  “Roger. KNIFE out.”

  “What’s that all about?” one of the case officers asked.

  “I don’t know. I wish Clark was here,” the other said. “Let’s check in with Langley.”

  Jackson managed to catch a United red-eye flight out of San Francisco direct to Dulles International Airport. Admiral Painter had called ahead, and a Navy sedan took him to Washington National, where his Corvette had been parked, and remarkably enough, not stolen. Robby had played it all back and forth in his mind during the entire flight. In the abstract, CIA operations were fun things to think about: spies skulking about and doing whatever the hell it was that they did. He didn’t especially mind what this one was doing, but, damn it, the Navy was being used, and you didn’t do that without letting people know. His first stop was at his home to change clothes. Then he made a phone call.

  Ryan was home, and enjoying it. He’d managed to get home Friday evening a few minutes ahead of his wife’s return from Hopkins and slept in late Saturday to shake off the lingering effects of travel shock. The remainder of the day had been devoted to playing with his kids and taking them to Saturday-night mass so that he could get another long night’s sleep, plus reacquainting himself with his wife. Now he was sitting on his John Deere lawn tractor. He might be one of the top people in CIA, but he still cut his own grass. Others seeded and fertilized, but for Jack the pastoral act of cutting was therapy. It was a three-hour ritual done every two weeks—somewhat more often in the spring, but by now the growth rate was down to a reasonable level. He enjoyed the smell of the cut grass. For that matter, he enjoyed the greasy smell of the tractor and the vibration of the motor. He couldn’t entirely escape reality, of course. Clipped to his belt was a portable telephone whose electronic chiming was noticeable over the rumble of the tractor. Jack switched off as he hit the activation button on the phone.

  “Hello.”

  “Jack? Rob.”

  “How you doing, Robby?”

  “Just got myself frocked.”

  “Congratulations, Captain Jackson! Aren’t you a little young for that?”

  “Call it affirmative action, lettin’ the aviators catch up with the bubbleheads. Hey, Sissy and I are heading over to Annapolis. Any problem we stop by on the way?”

  “Hell, no. How about lunch?”

  “Sure it’s no trouble?” Jackson asked.

  “Robby, give me a break,” Ryan replied. “Since when did you get humble on me?”

  “Ever since you got important and all.”

  Ryan violated an FCC rule with his retort.

  “Little over an hour okay?”

  “Yeah, I’ll be finished the grass by then. See ya’, bud.” Ryan terminated the call and placed one to his house, which had three lines. It was, perversely, a long-distance call. He needed a D.C. line for his work. Cathy needed a Baltimore connection for hers, plus a local line for other matters.

  “Hello?” Cathy answered.

  “Rob and Sis are coming over for lunch,” Jack told his wife. “How about hot dogs on the grill?”

  “My hair’s a mess!” Caroline Ryan announced.

  “Okay, I’ll grill that, too. Can you set up the charcoal for me? I ought to be finished out here in twenty minutes or so.”

  In fact, it took just over thirty. Ryan parked the mower in the garage next to his Jaguar and went into the house to wash up. He had to shave, too, which he barely finished doing when Robby pulled into the driveway.

  “How the hell did you make it this fast?” Jack demanded. He was still wearing his dingy cut-offs.

  “You prefer I should be late, Dr. Ryan?” Robby asked as he and his wife got out of the car. Cathy appeared at the door. Handshakes and kisses were exchanged as everyone caught up on what they’d been doing since the last time they’d gotten together. Cathy and Sissy went into the living room while Jack and Robby got the hot dogs and walked out to the deck. The charcoal wasn’t quite ready yet.

  “So how do you like being a captain?”

  “Be even better when they pay me what I am most clearly worth.” Being frocked meant that Robby could wear the four stripes of a captain, but still drew the pay of a mere commander. “I’m getting a CAG slot, too. Admiral Painter told me last night.”

  “Shit hot!” Jack clapped Robby on the shoulder. “That’s the next big step, isn’t it?”

  “So long as I don’t step on my weenie. The Navy giveth, and the Navy ta
keth away. I don’t get it for a year and a half, which means giving up part of my delightful tour in the Pentagon, sob.” Robby stopped for a moment and got serious. “That’s not why I came.”

  “Oh?”

  “Jack, what the hell have you guys got going in Colombia?”

  “Rob, I don’t know.”

  “Look, Jack, this is cool, okay? I fucking know! Your security on the op sucks. Hey, I know you got need-to-know rules, but my admiral is kinda pissed that you’re using his assets without telling him about it.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “Josh Painter,” Jackson answered. “You met him on Kennedy, remember?”

  “Who told you that!”

  “A reliable source. I’ve been thinking about it. The story back then was that Ivan lost a sub and we were out to help ’em find it, but things got a little rough for a while, explaining why my RIO had to have brain surgery and my Tomcat needed three weeks before it could fly again. I guess there was more to that than met the eye, and it never made the papers. Shame I can’t hear the story. Anyway, we’ll set that one aside for a while. This is why I’m here:

  “Those two druggie houses that got blown up—the bombs came off of an A-6E Intruder medium attack bomber belonging to the United States Navy. I’m not the only one who knows. Whoever set up this operation, well, the security’s for shit, Jack. You also got a bunch of light-infantry soldiers running around. Doing what, I don’t know, but people also know that they’re down there. Maybe you can’t tell me what’s happening. Okay, it’s compartmented and all that, and you can’t tell me anything, but I’m telling you, Jack, the word’s leaking out, and some folks in the Pentagon are going to be big-league angry when this sucker hits the networks. Whatever dickhead set this thing up is in way the hell over his head, and the word from on high is that us guys in blue and green suits will not repeat not get left holding the bag this time.”