TERCOM’s recommendations had always been clear cut: dispatch half a wing of F-15Es to the United Kingdom and send Delta Force into Beirut. The rescue completed, the F-15Es would have gone on a little retaliatory raid to teach the terrorists’ sponsor a lesson — Israeli style. It would have been quick, clinical, and a clear signal that the United States would not tolerate terrorist acts.
But it wasn’t to be. The doves in the Security Council had blocked any such move on the grounds it was highly provocative. And now, to make matters worse, they still knew nothing about the terrorists. It was not the first time he had felt so utterly at a loss. The trouble with their intelligence machine it was so damned… patchy. They had made the Libyan connection in 1986, but it had been close. This one was shaping up to be a bitch.
He continued reading aloud. Terrorists and captives were met by boat, a local fishing smack, and removed from the beach. Within minutes they had sailed into the night.
‘Which brings me to current events,’ Jacobson said. ‘We’re still looking for that boat. The Navy does not believe it can get very far. And as soon as it is located, there is a detachment of SEALs on stand-by to go in and get them.’
There were a few curt nods. TERCOM was man-aging to maintain an even strain. Its present mood was in keeping with its tough reputation in the White House.
Following a presidential decree, the Committee was set up in total secrecy in August 1990 to co-ordinate the counter-terrorism activities of US Special Operations Command, USSOCOM, and Washington’s diverse intelligence agencies.
The catalyst that propelled TERCOM into being was Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait and the bleak promise of decades of terrorism ahead once hostilities were concluded. Thankfully, a promise unfulfilled, but at the time the President had not wanted to take any chances. None the less, Operation ‘Desert Storm’ provided an amazing opportunity for TERCOM to test the ample resources at its disposal.
Until the Gulf crisis, there had been much duplicated effort amongst the USA’s intelligence and anti-terrorism assets, resulting in wasted resources and, worse still, missed opportunities in the war against terrorism.
From the start there were difficulties. One of the main ones was the antipathy between TERCOM and certain members of the National Security Council, the President’s inner sanctum of political advisers, who saw TERCOM as a threat to their collective status as crisis manager.
However, within informed military circles, TERCOM’s creation was hailed as a turning point, the seal on American military resolve to fight the new enemy.
In a crisis situation, the President and the NSC injected political reality into TERCOM’s decision process. Once the necessary political approval had been given, TERCOM passed its directives to USSOCOM, controllerate of almost forty thousand active-duty and reserve troops who were ready, twenty-four hours a day, to wage low-intensity warfare against America’s unconventional enemies.
Jacobson flipped a page on his clipboard.
‘I should advise you that I have had to take precipitate action over the matter of the F-15Es that were due to have been dispatched to the UK. Owing to the investigative efforts of a British magazine, I took it upon myself to inform the Washington Post of our activities in this area.’
There was a light ripple of discord from across the table.
‘According to my information, this British publication was to have listed a damaging exposé of our vacillation in the days leading up to our present situation. By giving selected aspects of this story to the Post, I believe I have been able to take the sting out of the British revelations. Let’s hope I am right, gentlemen.’
The restlessness across the table ceased. His eyes accustomed to the dimmed lighting now, Jacobson glanced at each of the four faces opposite him. There was no more dissent.
TERCOM was chaired by Ryan Newhouse, former Congressman and founder of the Crown Corporation, a Washington-based think-tank built upon a few meagre DOD contracts, which by the early eighties Newhouse had sculpted into a megalith.
As for the three others, whether by coincidence or design, they had been drawn from the rich vein of professional Cold Warriors who would otherwise have been forced into early retirement by the fall of the Berlin Wall.
General Carl Copeland had been forty years with the US Army Rangers. Francis Triola Jr. had headed the National Security Agency’s East German section, while John Wegner had left behind a directorship at the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Jacobson himself had been a senior analyst in Middle Eastern affairs with the Central Intelligence Agency. Disillusioned with the way things had been drifting in his department at Langley, he had been only too glad to step on board at TERCOM after Newhouse had explained its mandate.
It amused Jacobson that TERCOM had been left to administer the Romeo Protocol. This secret agreement, signed between the presidents of the United States and the Soviet Union in Moscow in July 1991, allowed for the co-operation of US and Soviet special forces in times of mutual crisis.
In the late 1980s, with the Soviet Union’s ‘peace offensive’ at its height, the US Government’s military posture had already started to undergo a dramatic change. Combating terrorism, insurgency, regional warfare, and violence engendered by narcotics trafficking were predicted as the chief military priorities of the 1990s.
‘Lick’, or Low Intensity Conflict, became the buzzword of the government’s chief military advisers, as the Soviet Union shifted from Evil Empire to the Administration’s flavour of the month.
TERCOM had implemented its own unique solution to the Romeo Protocol. Instead of fighting the President and the NSC on the issue — a battle it could only lose — it linked the Soviets’ elite Spetsnaz antiterror force with one of the USA’s most singularly lacklustre special operations units — a USAF outfit that supposedly specialized in antiterror operations.
Jacobson couldn’t remember its name, but it was led by a man who had disgraced himself during a penetration mission into Panama in December 1989. The guy had been acquitted at the secret tribunal, but only for the lack of evidence, it was said.
The Soviets, TERCOM believed, wouldn’t notice the difference. But they would learn nothing of military significance during the exchange visits that had been set up. USSOCOM was happy, because its special ops techniques remained secret. And a select few politicians slept better at night knowing that relations between the super-powers had thawed a little more as a result of their secretive efforts.
The thought coincided neatly with the last item on his sitrep.
‘I should say, gentlemen, that we have received an offer of assistance from the Soviet Union through the channels established by the Romeo Protocol. According to General Aushev, they have specific intelligence on the identity of these terrorists should we agree to accept his offer of help.’
The Chairman leant forward into a pool of light cast by the recessed bulb above the table.
‘How has the White House reacted to this offer?’ Newhouse asked.
‘With some gratitude,’ Jacobson admitted. ‘The NSC wants our formal response urgently.’
‘I think we already know the answer.’