It was on a blustery October day in 1983, in the storm tossed waters off Grenada, that Thomas was to learn the real nature of war and of the system that he had sworn with his life to perpetuate. Thomas was part of a joint Air Force/ Navy special-operations team whose task was to secure Salines airfield for the main Army Ranger assault force that would be landing there twenty-four hours later.
The operation itself was a complicated one. It necessitated a dangerous, low-level, night airdrop into the sea, some thirty kilometers off the southwestern tip of Grenada. Once in the water, they were to rendezvous with a number of small boats that were to be launched from the destroyer USS Clifton Sprague. These boats would then convey them to the beach, where they’d attempt to locate a suitable landing spot and get ashore undetected. Only then would they be free to continue on to the nearby airfield.
Thomas was a member of the combat-control team whose duty it was to covertly position radio guidance beacons near the airfield’s runway.
Once this was achieved, they would be responsible for issuing up-to the-minute weather reports, and effect terminal air-traffic control for the MC-130E Combat Talons making up the main assault force.
This was his first real combat mission, and he was soon to learn things rarely went as planned during war. An unexpected twenty-five-knot crosswind resulted in the loss of four members of the team during the initial parachute jump. One of these men had been his roommate during basic, and Thomas got his first taste of true horror as he sat in one of the Clifton Sprague’s Boston Whalers shivering in the blustery wind and searching the dark seas for any signs of the missing jumpers.
None were ever found. Making the situation even more tragic, a mechanical problem with the Boston Whaler caused the mission to be scrubbed. They tried again the next evening, and once more found thenbest efforts ending in near disaster. And then-failure to secure the airfield caused the entire invasion to be delayed another twenty four hours.
Until this time, he had barely been aware of his own mortality, cocky and filled with false bravado. All that vanished in the black sea off Grenada.
Returning to the Pentagon now was like coming back to a past life. The surroundings were familiar, but the person who walked these hallways was another man. He understood sacrifice, he thought as he turned down a wide corridor lined with dozens of battle flags and a series of engraved names. He understood the courage of those here commemorated, the soldiers awarded the country’s highest decoration for valor, the Medal of Honor. He just wondered if the capacity for either was still in him.
He found the door he was looking for beside the name of Sgt. Alvin Cullum York. It was securely locked, with an electronic keypad above the knob. An intercom was mounted in the wall beside the doorframe, and Thomas pressed the button a single time. After passing the scrutiny of an elevated video camera, the tumbler activated with a click, prompting Thomas to grab the knob and turn it until the door swung open.
The office inside was little more than a collection of some dozen individual work cubes Each of these spaces had room for a single person, a computer, and a pair of two-drawer, legal-sized, fireproof filing cabinets. Only two of the spaces were currently occupied, with Thomas locating the person he was looking for at the far end of the linoleum-tiled corridor.
Callahan was deeply immersed in a computer entry. Thomas spotted his shiny bald scalp as he rounded the side of the cubicle. Since Callahan apparently still didn’t know that his visitor had arrived, Thomas took a second to study his old friend’s cluttered workspace. Unlike the majority of orderly cubicles he had passed, Thomas found this one to be decorated like a typical teenage boy’s bedroom.
Pictures of various war toys took up much of the wall space. Thomas identified an Abrams Main Battle tank, an M1 13 armored personnel carrier with a TOW launcher attached to its turret, several photos showing an MHO self-propelled howitzer in action, and another series featuring the M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicle. Interspersed amongst these colored photographs were smaller ones showing several types of mortars, grenade launchers, an M72 light antitank weapon, and a variety of machine guns. Maps and plenty of Post-it Notes filled the remaining wall space. The cubicle’s desk was equally crowded with a combination of paperwork, office supplies, and the remnants of a partially eaten lunch.
“Please feel free to help yourself to what’s left of that tuna sandwich, Thomas.” The BATF agent jumped at the sound of Callahan’s voice. He hadn’t moved or looked up. “And there’s coffee and soda in the copy room. I’ll be with you in a second.”
Ted’s voice was as deep and gravelly as ever, and Thomas was content to watch him furiously attack his keyboard. Thomas was a self-educated graduate of the hunt-and-peck school. It was obvious that Callahan was an experienced touch typist capable of accessing computer functions Thomas didn’t even know existed.
“Your call earlier really caught me by surprise,” Callahan said as he finished inputting a final command and activated the computer’s printer.
“The last time we talked, you had just been picked to ride shotgun for the famous summit at sea.”
As the printer chattered to life, Callahan finally swiveled around to face his guest. Thomas noted that he could use a shave. The dark circles under his hazel eyes, and the rumpled shirt, indicated he had been at work for some time now.
“Just my rotten luck, they pulled me off the summit yesterday,” Thomas said as he slapped Callahan’s hand in greeting. “Hell, I even went and had my tux cleaned.”
“If my memory serves me right, you never were much for ships,” Callahan said. He pulled out a short stool from beneath his desk and gestured to Thomas to take a seat. “So, did you by any chance see the evening news?”
“Hell, I haven’t even had the time to read this morning’s paper.”
“Then you don’t know about the remarkable UN speech given by the British prime minister this afternoon. It seems the Brits have given their full blessings to Russia’s Global Zero Alert plan. It’s hard to believe, but it looks like that treaty actually has a chance of being signed.”
“It’ll never happen,” Thomas retorted. “No matter how much international support it might be able to generate, I can’t believe the United States would ever sign such a treaty. I mean, come on, Ted. I realize the dangers of continued nuclear alert. But to go to the extreme of pulling the warheads from the delivery systems is ridiculous. What’s the value of a nuclear deterrent, if it’s going to take us several hours to prepare our weapons for use?”
“The Brits seemed to be making a big deal about the dangers of our current hair-trigger nuclear-response policy,” Callahan returned.
“They’re agreeing with the Russians, and taking the stand that such a risky alert posture has no place in today’s post-Cold War world.”
“A Global Zero Alert policy might make good rhetoric, but in reality, it’s totally impractical,” Thomas continued. “It’s been the threat of a nuclear response that’s kept the peace for the last fifty years. Take away our nuclear option and you’re stripping us of one of our greatest bargaining tools.”
“Hey, man, don’t forget that you’re preaching to the choir,” said Callahan, who turned away from Thomas when his printer finally completed its long run. A pile of some fifty sheets of eight-and-one-half-by-eleven white paper lay in the Out tray. Callahan grabbed the stack and handed it to Thomas.
“What’s this all about?” asked Thomas, while flipping through the pages.
“That’s the data you requested earlier this afternoon, Special Agent.”
Thomas pulled out a page at random, and began reading its first three entries out loud. “March 24, 1998; Fort Monroe, Virginia, U. S. Army Training Command — inventory shortfalclass="underline" six M72A2 Light Antitank Weapons.