His men had waited years for this moment. They had practiced and rehearsed, much like the Japanese had for the Pearl Harbor invasion.
Phu Chai looked across the dingy crack house he and his men inhabited. Other members of his team lived in many dilapidated buildings throughout the slums of Houston. If the U.S. government had cared about its people, Chai figured, they would have discovered him and his plan a long time ago. But Chinese intelligence had told them it was best to melt into the inner cities because no one cared about those places. The police rarely stopped, taxis would not venture there, and there was no commerce other than drugs — all indicators of institutional neglect. To Chai, the fact that 900 soldiers had been able to enter the United States through Mexico and across the Caribbean Sea relatively intact and prepared for a military mission spoke volumes about the American system.
He held his satellite phone in his hand, awaiting the call to attack.
The Serb soldiers had waited a long time for their revenge. Able to muster nearly two thousand men and women, they had stowed away on a ship that departed from the port of Split in Croatia two months earlier. Tired of defecating in the cargo hold and sleeping right next to it, they were sufficiently fed up to attack the first thing they saw.
However, their mission was Jacksonville, Florida, and the Mayport Naval Station.
Stefan Ilic, a former colonel in the Yugoslav army, who had lost his entire family in the Kosovo air war, walked along the deck of the large container ship. She was a Liberian flagged vessel that had made frequent legitimate ports of call to the Balkan area and had always checked out.
After Sung had contacted Ilic four years earlier, it had taken him almost a year to find a ship that was not constantly monitored by American or British intelligence. With the insurgency in Macedonia, NATO intelligence had shifted its focus to the former rump country of Yugoslavia, and Ilic had ironically found a ship through Albanian contacts he had developed in Kosovo before the war.
Ilic had stockpiled thousands of AK-47s, RPK machine guns, light anti-tank weapons, and 82mm mortars along with the appropriate ammunition for each weapon system. Like the others, Ilic’s force was designed to be light and mobile.
Their objective was to seize the Mayport Naval Air Station and destroy all of the F-14 fighters to deny the U.S. military a rapid reaction to the internal threat they would soon discover they faced.
Standing atop the deck of the ship, Ilic could see the port of Jacksonville on the near horizon. Once notified to attack, it would take about two hours for the ship to move into the port and unload the personnel and cargo. He was certain they would have to fight their way off the ship.
Ilic looked at the stars and thought he could see the satellite that would deliver his message… and his freedom.
Rafael Hernandez leaned his head forward and studied the faces of his Cuban comrades as they sat in the mesh webbing of the Russian-built Anatoly aircraft. He saw determined, nervous young men who were prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice to help unlock their country from the grip of the United States. His men bounced silently in the cabin of the aircraft, parachutes on their backs, weapons tied carefully to their sides, as they taxied into position on the runway.
The Cuban soldiers would take off in fifteen cargo airplanes headed directly for New Orleans International Airport. It was a one-hour flight, and the pilots thought they would be able to avoid detection because of the short duration. Their mission was to seize the airport and use the airfield to bring in aircraft and supplies to sustain the attack. Primarily, though, their mission was to inflict as much damage and pain as they could.
Of all the participants in the mission, Rafael figured they were the ones who had the most legitimate reason for participating in the operation. For over fifty years, the United States had been ostracizing, quarantining, blockading, and embargoing their country.
Rafael looked at the load master wearing his helmet and visor. The man gave Rafael a flat palm signal, indicating the word had not come yet. He was looking for the thumbs-up sign.
Awaiting the word to attack, Rafael ran his hand down the stock of his AK-47, reassured by its presence.
His revenge would be sweet.
The African coalition soldiers had traveled by ship, much the same way their ancestors had been transported as slaves. The difference was that this was a liberating mission. While it might not liberate a single African, it would liberate the soul. They were at one with their kindred spirits, who were calling these warriors forward with ghostly, outstretched, bony fingers, seeking their revenge.
Johnny Igansola from Nigeria paced slowly among his men, all as black as the mahogany of the African forests. Their oily, sweaty faces shone up at him; their wide eyes following, questioning.
“When do we attack, Commander?” one man asked from a squatting position beneath a porthole. The brilliant starlight punched through the window above the man’s shaved head.
“This evening we should land in Port of Baltimore. We are only a few miles out and have slowed our speed considerably so that we are not too soon. We await the call.”
The Colombian insurgents were at first reluctant to risk using their intelligence networks and infiltration routes for the coalition’s purposes, yet they immediately saw the longer-range benefits of cooperating closely with the leaders of the coalition.
By allowing the alliance to use their secretive drug distribution routes, Cartagena’s cartel would benefit richly. They had readily agreed to supplying guides and route information throughout the Caribbean Basin and within the United States.
With Sue Kim seated next to him, Sung felt grand and powerful. As soon as he got word from Ballantine, or the backup caller, should Ballantine be compromised, Sung would issue the order. They all had agreed that Ballantine’s Predator attacks needed to be successful to wipe out the command and control architecture and radar warning systems to allow the airplanes and ships to arrive at their final destinations without interruption. Sung would follow the plan and await the call, as hard as that would be.
All they needed to do was get a foothold, and they could bring the economy of the most powerful nation to a dead halt. Once that objective was achieved, the Americans would have no option but to sign the international framework the Central Committee had drafted. The end result would be a redistribution of American wealth to the member nations.
Sung looked at Sue Kim. She looked across the room at Ronnie Wood, who nodded ever so slightly at her. Sue Kim turned to Sung, her almond eyes returning his gaze.
“We are ready, sir,” she said. “We await only the call from Ballantine.”
CHAPTER 51
The drink had done him some good. The Percocet was kicking in full strength, and he was feeling just fine. Ballantine looked around the communications room and noticed the many flashing lights, radios, televisions, and Internet switching devices. He was sitting in the middle of a state-of-the-art communications platform.
He had memorized his speech, but thought he might speak with emotion and stray from his prepared remarks. This would be historic, the most widely recorded event in history, he was certain. Mentally rehearsing his opening line, he watched as Admiral Chen gave him a hand signal that he could begin.