The mud-wall sniper’s hide was the closest to the landing zone, so they went there first. A trooper had marked the spot with a yellow cloth tied to a stick, and the slash of bright color was stark against the bland brown surroundings. Kyle went in from one side, Sybelle from the other end, looking for booby traps, but they found nothing. Some bushes had been crushed where the sniper had lain on them, and there was a crease in the wall on which he had braced the weapon. Three hefty.50 caliber brass cartridges were scattered off to the right of the position, flipped out by the weapon during the reloads.
“Excellent field of fire,” Sybelle said, looking over the wall to the bloody crossroads, still the center of activity.
“Particularly if you have the enemy looking the other way,” said Kyle, kneeling in the dirt to study the placement of the attacker’s body. He would have had a solid base and fired with an economy of movement. Swanson reached out and touched a dirty piece of cloth that was still in front of where the rifle muzzle had been. Wet, spread there to tamp down the dust, which otherwise would have been thrown up when the weapon fired and given away the position. A thorough pro, taking care of the little things. Boot prints led away from the wall, toes deeper than heels, indicating he was moving fast but not running. Those prints vanished at the small road almost hidden by the wall. A vehicle was waiting for him.
They all walked as a group across the action zone to a destroyed building that had been marked by another yellow flag, and Kyle and Sybelle again went into the sniper’s hide. The canvas curtain had been torn down, and three more.50 caliber brass cartridges blinked in the light. Sybelle turned them over in her fingers.
“Same as the others,” she said. “One punched clean through the armored vest. My guess is it’s an M8 armor-piercing incendiary. He was going for a big wallop.”
Swanson agreed. A velocity of 3,050 feet per second and a range of 6,470 yards. It was overkill to use such a weapon from only seven hundred meters. Was the shooter trying to prove a point? There was a makeshift rest for a rifle in the middle of the room, well back from the opening in the far wall. He went closer to the odd window and looked at the sparse vegetation that had been broken and singed by the muzzle blast.
Rick Newman came into the basement hide. “What do you think, Shake? Was it Juba?”
“No doubt,” Kyle replied. “He left his shell casings behind, which he does as sort of a signature. Then, this double ambush was the work of a single professional, because not even two average shooters would be able to pull it off with perfect coordination. Three shots maximum, then move, that’s standard doctrine.”
Kyle crouched behind the table and aimed along the viewing line that the sniper had. He could almost reach out and touch the men at the crossroads. “Finally, he waited to attack the first responders who came in to help. He did the same thing in San Francisco because it’s such an immense shock to everyone else. For a while, every soldier who comes around here is going to be thinking about snipers, and that will inhibit their freedom of movement.”
“Well, we gotta go. I just had a call from Colonel Withrow. He wants to meet us back at the base pronto,” said Newman.
The three of them walked out into the light, and the entire team went back across the field to a waiting helicopter. “What are you going to tell the colonel?” asked Sybelle. “He’s not going to like sitting around and having this kind of attack on his men without fighting back.”
“But that’s exactly what we have to get him to do, Sybelle. Withrow is no fool, and he realizes that catching this terrorist is the most important mission on his list right now. This mess today was bad, bad shit, but it proves that Juba is right here in this area and is not hiding somewhere in the urban maze. We are getting closer, and the funnel is narrowing. First we tracked him across the United States to Canada, then to Syria and then into Tikrit, which meant we did not have to search the rest of Iraq. Now he is here, for sure. The bottom line is that it is still a fight between the two of us: I called, and he has answered. Now we just have to make a date.”
ARMY COLONEL NEIL WITHROW, commander of Task Force Hammer, was standing with his executive officer before a large plastic-covered grid map of the town of Hargatt. Black and red marking pens had slashed and stabbed to mark positions and events. “Two days ago, this area was quiet. Real progress had been made both politically and militarily.” He turned to face Kyle and the flinty blue eyes bore into the sniper. “Now it looks like World War III outside my front gate again.”
The XO pointed to marks on the maps. “Here’s the ambush site this morning. Since then, we’ve had two IEDs take out vehicles, with one man KIA, four wounded. An ambush by a militia organization we thought had been tamed left another two of our troopers wounded. Sectarian violence has flared in one part of the town, and a suicide bomber hit a market street. Two mortar rounds came into the camp but caused no damage. All this in broad daylight. It’s getting hot.”
The colonel ran a hand flat across his crew-cut hair, then crossed his arms. “We’re going to have to go in there and settle things down, sooner rather than later, if we want to keep a lid on. How much longer do you people think you will need?”
Kyle saw the dilemma facing the colonel. The job of catching Juba was undoing a lot of good work. “Sir, I have to ask you to hold back for two more days.”
Withrow groaned aloud. “Look, Mr. Swanson, I have followed the orders in your letter of special authorization and provided your team with maximum cooperation here. Unfortunately, you have ignited a powder keg.” He pointed toward the window of his office. “My soldiers died out there today, and morale is sinking because we have all of this power at our fingertips but are not responding. Your mission is hampering my ability to protect my force.”
“Yes, sir. I understand that completely and feel just as strongly as you about the loss of life, and that the best defense is a good offense. Unfortunately, our job still remains more important right now. The key to how he pulled off the San Francisco attack is with him, and if you throw a bunch of Abrams tanks and Bradleys into the game, Juba could just fade back into Tikrit or possibly return to Baghdad and we will lose him. I’m sorry, sir, but we need that material, and the only way we get it is to get him. We need two more days before you turn loose Task Force Hammer.”
Withrow looked back at the map. “This one asshole killed six people out there today in a matter of minutes, but he killed thousands more innocent Americans before he even got here. The most dangerous terrorist in the world is in my sandbox. Do me a big favor when you find him, Mr. Swanson: Don’t arrest him.”
“Oh, hell no, sir. I’m going to blow his fucking head off.”
The colonel exchanged glances with his XO. “Very well. We will keep the troops on a short leash for another two days. Meanwhile, what can we do to help?”
Kyle moved to the map, picked up the red marker, and drew a great circle around Hargatt. “Close it all off. Roadblocks on all major highways, secondary roads, and cowpaths, and put roving patrols in the open fields. Nobody in or out for the next day, no passes honored for any reason. Iraqi police and troops will work only within the task force perimeter. Juba is somewhere in that circle, and I want to keep him there.”
Withrow said, “You got it…for forty-eight hours, and then we have to reevaluate the battlefield. But our hand may be forced if the violence continues to increase. We may have to start kicking in doors.”