"No SEAL action in that area either, sir," added Admiral Anderson.
If the interruptions annoyed McCone, he didn't let it show as he continued. "The second choice is Cuban dissidents. That sounds good except for the fact that they've been pretty well crushed by the Cuban state police, so we don't think they have either the numbers, the weapons, or the skills to pull off something like this. Also, Santiago is a hotbed of pro-Castro activity, so, while there certainly are dissidents out there, I don't see them doing it."
Kennedy agreed. "What about the exile community in Miami?"
McCone shrugged. "They've been silent about it. The FBI has poked around, but they say it wasn't them and I believe it. Frankly, if it had been, I think they'd be crowing from the rooftops. The FBI says the dissidents no longer have much in the way of any military capabilities. I wonder about that, however."
Again, Kennedy agreed. J. Edgar Hoover himself had said that the Miami exiles were toothless.
"Any other suspects?" JFK asked.
"Three," McCone said. "The first is Castro himself. He might have figured that the war is lost and wants Ortega out of the way instead of being a living hero and a rival."
"You believe that?"
"No sir. The second choice is organized crime, but, again, I just don't see them being able to do this."
Kennedy smiled, "Not their style unless Ortega shows up wearing cement galoshes. What's your next choice?"
McCone turned to Kraeger and Elena. "You two figured it out, tell him."
Kraeger swallowed. "Sir, we think it was the POWs from Guantanamo."
Kennedy leaned forward, intrigued. "Go on."
"Sir, we checked personnel records and found that a number of the prisoners were from Cuba, and one had even been raised in Santiago. It isn't too much of a stretch to think of them forming a raiding group and attacking Ortega's HQ. They can't communicate with us in code because they don't have one, and they sure as hell aren't going to say anything in the clear. Havana figures out what happened and they'll smash the POWs and we'd have a lot of casualties."
"Where would they get the weapons and uniforms?" Marine General Shoup asked almost eagerly. Many of those boys in the compound were his marines. If they had pulled off the raid, he wanted the world to know it.
Elena smiled and answered, "Money talks, general. What they couldn't buy, they probably stole. We've picked up complaints from the Santiago area from officers whining about missing weapons and uniforms. At first we thought it was people who’d lost or sold stuff trying to justify it." She caught the president looking at her. Had he just winked?
Kennedy sat back and smiled. "Jesus Christ. Now what do we do?"
Shoup was agitated. "Mr. President, it's all the more reason to send the marines in now. We've got twenty thousand of them in ships off the southern coast of Cuba and right between Santiago and Guantanamo Bay. If the Cubans get wind of what the CIA suspects has happened, or they figure it out themselves, our boys in that camp will be toast."
"And what about the missing nuke?" Kennedy inquired.
Wheeler answered. "That was the gist of the argument when you arrived. Some of us no longer believe that the nuke exists, if it ever did. They believe that the time for using it has long since passed since the army is bearing down from the north. Naval air has pounded a couple of suspected sites based on information provided by Romanski and Ross. We wonder if the whole thing wasn't a red herring designed to keep us chasing our tails. Either that or it has been destroyed by our planes."
"Interesting," Kennedy said thoughtfully. "And what if it wasn't? Didn't you say, General Wheeler, that our landing on the north coast was a surprise to the Cubans? What if that nuke is still in the south and pointed out to sea where the marines are expected to come ashore? And how much longer will it take the army to reach Santiago and free the POWs?"
"Perhaps three days."
"Why so long?" Kennedy snapped.
"Mr. President," Taylor said, "Resistance is crumbling, but it hasn't disappeared. There are still many pockets of resistance where the fighting is intense. We could suffer many, many casualties if we attempt to move any faster. Also, the farther we push inland, the rougher the terrain gets, which obviously favors the defense."
Kennedy turned to Shoup. "And when can the marines land and free them?"
"Tomorrow."
There was silence while the president thought it over. He nodded as if to himself, and then sighed. "General Shoup, the marines go in and God help us if that nuke exists."
Chapter Twenty
The morning after the re-capture of the three nuclear warheads and the Luna rockets, Captain Pyotr Dragan had been called into General Pliyev's office. The general was clearly unhappy and the reason was obvious — one nuke was still missing.
Dragan had stood impassively as the general had smashed a cigarette into an ashtray with enough force to spill ashes onto the floor. "I have been on the phone with our embassy and there have been numerous radio communications with Moscow. While Khrushchev is mildly pleased that the three nukes have been retrieved, he is thoroughly angry that they were stolen in the first place and is horrified that one remains in the hands of that bearded lunatic in Havana. You are to be commended formally for your efforts. However, you have one more task."
Dragan had smiled. "Let me guess, comrade general. You want me to move heaven and earth to find the lost missile." Pliyev had laughed harshly. "You may move earth all you wish, but we do not believe in heaven. However, if it helps, do whatever you have to."
That had been several weeks earlier and, as he sat tired and filthy in a Cuban swamp, Dragan recalled telling the general that he had spent the night thinking about the feasibility of just such an assignment. Both men concluded the obvious, that the missile would be on the way to Guantanamo to protect and hold the base against the inevitable American counterattacks.
Dragan had asked for and received a squad of Spetsnaz along with a full platoon of regular soldiers. He also got technicians from the 74th Motor Vehicle Regiment. It had been from that regiment that the Lunas had been stolen and it was their men who'd had their throats sliced. Dragan had not lacked for volunteers to help disable and transport the weapon when it was found.
For equipment, he'd taken a number of vehicles. These included one truck mounted battery of Oerlikon anti-aircraft guns, and a pair of heavy trucks with cranes and winches strong enough to lift the damn thing if it became necessary to dispose of the tracked vehicle on which it was mounted. He also had a towed 37mm anti-aircraft gun, although he thought it would be fairly useless against American jets. Still, it did make his men feel good that they had one more weapon to shoot back with. His platoon of regulars traveled in regular trucks.
Driving slowly and at night, it had taken them what seemed an eternity to drive the more than four hundred miles to the boundary of Oriente Province, the home of Guantanamo Bay. It struck him as ironic that the province had also been Castro's sanctuary before the revolution when his miserable little force had hidden out in the Sierra Maestra Mountains to the west of Santiago. As he drove through the area, he could see how a handful of men could hide from an army, which was precisely his problem. Where the devil was the rocket?
Dragan's force had been halted several times by officious Cuban militia who'd questioned his need to go towards the liberated base. On most occasions Dragan had bluffed his way through, but one time he'd been forced to wipe out a militia squad and hide their bodies, hoping that, if somehow found, their deaths would be blamed on American planes. After all, he'd earlier lost one truck full of regular Red Army soldiers because they'd done a poor job of hiding themselves. Dragan accepted full blame for that action. He was in charge.