The building didn’t look penetrable. Thick glass covered what few windows it had, and bars poked through the openings. But then again, they didn’t have to take the building. They just had to ensure they severed communications so the base was shut off from the rest of the world.
Lesueur parked by an old white Corvette, so he was well away from the building but still in a position to see what was going on. He checked his watch and conferred quickly with the others in the Bronco. Another ten minutes. Lesueur sat back and picked his teeth. He chose the best spots to lay the explosives. The first satchel of explosives would go by the front entrance — directly under the sign that said
Wendover AFB Command Post.
Chapter 16
The five miles to Alpha Base took ten minutes to traverse. Gunning the APC at speeds up to forty-five miles an hour, Vikki Osborrn navigated the crew to the nuclear weapons storage area. She kept her eyes glued on the IFF — every time it flashed, she barked an order to change direction.
Renault steered by an image projected from a forward-looking television camera mounted at the top of the personnel carrier. The image came back in ghostly white and gray contrast, as the infrared processing amplified the low light around them.
Bushes, ravines, cactus, and boulders all showed up in eerie detail. Every now and then a brilliant white splotch would bound across the screen as the APC disturbed a jackrabbit from its hole.
They crossed the narrow road leading to Alpha Base and swung south. Harding studied Britnell’s map and directed Renault back toward the picnic grounds outside of Alpha Base.
The base loomed in the background as a white shimmer, growing brighter with every minute. Periodically Renault switched the forward-looking camera off the ground and scanned Alpha Base. The screen automatically reconfigured to adjust for the base’s bright glow.
This is almost too easy, Vikki thought. There has to be something more to it.
She glanced down at the IFF. “Sensor!” Renault jerked the craft to the right. An instant later the light faded. Vikki waited until the flicker disappeared, then breathed, “All clear.”
Renault steered back to his original path, not looking back.
Vikki watched the IFF. She felt flushed, caught up in Renault’s drive to Alpha Base. It was almost like a drug — a yearning to get out and do something. She felt ready.
Alpha Base grew brighter, until it dominated everything on the screen. Slowing to a stop, Renault switched the image from infrared to normal lighting.
The screen blinked. They stopped a quarter mile from the four fences circling Alpha Base. The storage facility lay sprawled in the crater, lights splashing down on every bunker — the five miles across the complex seemed to stretch on forever. To their right lay the main gate. The picnic area was directly in front of them.
Renault turned and struggled from the cramped seat. Standing, he wiped his hands on his pants. “All right, listen up — we’re running behind.” The admonishment was unnecessary; no one spoke. “Mortar squad, half your shells should take out the road to Alpha Base and be ready to hit any vehicles they’ll throw at us. We want to prevent a counterattack. They won’t be able to get a fix on you, so don’t worry about being spotted — the APC will draw them out.
“Once you expend your mortars, fall back to the baseball diamond in the picnic area. Your helicopter is not going to stick around and wait for you. If you’re not there, that’s it. We’re not a damned rescue unit — the nukes come first. So if you want to get back alive, make sure you’re there. Any questions?”
Renault looked around the APC. Most men kept their gaze fixed to the floor. Renault glanced at his watch. “All right, move it. Six minutes.”
He turned back to the control panel and jabbed at the screen. The monitor reconfigured itself in a flash of red and blue. Renault pressed the touch-sensitive display and the rear ramp whirred open. Vikki sat back and watched the men hand out boxes of mortar shells and rifles. The whole process took less than two minutes.
When they finished, the mortar team dispersed. Renault closed the ramp and turned to Vikki and Harding. “Ready?”
Vikki set her mouth. “What now?”
“We wait. Two and a half minutes. And then we go.
Pablo Lesueur let his eyes dwell on the clock before it hit him: ten fifty-two — eight minutes! He struggled upright in the driver’s seat. Punching the man next to him, he grunted, not speaking lest someone near the Bronco might overhear them. The colonel had warned them about the various motion and sound sensors around Alpha Base — nothing prevented the Americans from planting sensors over the rest of the base.
The men stirred. Motioning with his hands, Pablo directed the others to shoulder their satchels of explosives.
A minute had transpired: 2253.
Pablo eyed the command post. The satellite and microwave antennas were easy to destroy. The structures were relatively unhardened against anything more than a high wind.
The short, needle-thin, extremely high frequency antennas covered the building, looking like prickly pears. Optical data lines ran from the building and plunged underground, intertwining with the other optical fibers connecting all base communications. They were buried, but a five-pound explosive tossed down the access hole would prevent any signals from leaving Wendover.
Stupid Americans, thought Pablo. Colonel Renault was right. They pay out the nose to harden their expensive equipment against all sorts of nuclear electromagnetic pulse, but totally discount a strike in their own backyard.
He checked the clock again: 2254.
Pablo nodded for the men to disperse. Shifting the weight of the explosives higher on his shoulder, he grabbed the blanket from underneath his feet and slipped from the van. Once the men were out, they silently split up and went to their various stations.
Pablo raced to the barbed wire. He tossed the blanket on top of the ten-foot-high fence and scaled it.
By the time he was on top of the roof, it was 2256. Four minutes. He set the timer, gave it a quick pat, and peeled out.
Frank Koch moved from one helicopter to another. The choppers weren’t hangared, but left out in the open. As Koch ran, the cool desert air blew through his open shirt, rippling against his flesh. Any other night he would have been chilled.
Tonight he sweated.
Koch’s men had dragged the bodies of five security policemen into the shadows. The pad was isolated, ideal for setting up the charges and hotwiring the helicopters for their assault. Except for a jeep driving past every few minutes, and the guards out by the end of the taxi way, Koch and his men were left alone. He couldn’t have asked for anything better.
But things weren’t going right at all.
Koch personally supervised the installation of the first three explosives, checking the wires and ensuring the timers were set for 2300.
After they wired the third helicopter, things started going wrong.
He heard a “plunk” as he waved the men on, splitting them up to set the rest of the explosives. The alert bird — a helicopter kept ready to instantaneously fly away in case of an emergency — sat well away from the ones they scurried about.