One by one, the majors and captains commanding the four Delta troops gave him the same answer. No one was very happy about cutting their planned prep time short, but no one was ready to ask for further delay now that the Iranians were poised and ready to attack.
Ordinarily, Thorn did not believe in giving pep talks especially not to men like those in this room. Most were already veterans of half a dozen special operations some of them so secret that only the barest hints had filtered out to the world beyond the Delta Force compound. Still, he wanted to impress on them his absolute conviction that NEMESIS, no matter how difficult and no matter how dangerous, was a mission with purpose a mission with a critical and achievable objective.
“One thing we know from the computer messages we’ve intercepted is that Amir Taleh is a control freak,” Thorn said firmly. “Taleh is the focus of political and military power inside Iran. He runs the Iranian armed forces pretty much as a overman show. All crucial orders pass through his headquarters. His field commanders are highly unlikely to begin an invasion without a clear directive from him personally.
“So our job is essential. If we stop Taleh, we stop this war before it starts. Everything else is secondary. Everything. Understood?”
They nodded solemnly.
“Very well, gentlemen,” Thorn said calmly. “Have your troops saddle up. We move out at 2030 hours, tonight.”
In the Persian Gulf Twenty miles outside Saudi territorial waters, an old wooden chow chugged through calm waters at a steady ten knots, relying on its auxiliary motor for power instead of its furled, lateen-rigged sails. Crates, boxes, and bales of varying sizes crowded the boat’s deck. To all outward appearances, the chow was nothing more than a simple trading vessel one of the hundreds that plied the Gulf on a daily basis. Her crew, too, appeared utterly ordinary: a mix of wiry young lads and weathered old men clad only in Tshirts and shorts against the noonday sun.
Feeling self-conscious in his unaccustomed civilian garb, Lieutenant Kazem Buramand leaned down through the chow’s forward hatch After the dazzling brightness outdoors, the hold below seemed pitch-black. It took several seconds before the Iranian naval officer’s eyes adjusted enough to make out the ten men squatting comfortably around a mound of their own equipment.
All of them wore the camouflage fatigues and green berets of Iran’s Special Forces. Besides their personal weapons, they were equipped with radios, two light machine guns, handheld SA-16 SAMs, demolition charges, directional mines modeled on the American claymore, and antitank mines.
“Is there a problem, Lieutenant?” their leader, a captain, asked softly. Scarred by Iraqi grenade fragments, his narrow face had a permanently sardonic cast that always unnerved Buramand.
“No, sir,” he stammered. “But we are two hours outside Saudi waters. I thought you would like to know.”
“Yes.” The Special Forces officer nodded politely. “Thank you. I assume we have not received any recall order.”
Buramand shook his head. “No, sir. None.”
He had been monitoring the sophisticated communications gear he had brought aboard the chow almost continuously, half expecting to hear the repeated code words that would bring this boat and the others like it scurrying back to port. Instead, he had heard nothing beyond the steady hiss and crackle of static. It was just beginning to dawn on the young naval officer that all their weeks and months of training had been in earnest.
“Very good.” The captain tipped his beret over his eyes, leaned back against his bulky pack, and said quite calmly, “Then please wake me when it gets dark. My men and I will help you prepare the Zodiac rafts for our little trip to the shore.”
The Iranian city of Bandar-e Khomeini lay at the northern end of the Persian Gulf, one hundred and fifty miles north and west of Bushehr. In peacetime it served as an oil terminus. Now its docks were crowded with valuable cargo of quite another kind.
Shrill whistles blew as another heavily loaded freight train rumbled slowly down a spur line and out onto Bandar-e Kliomeini’s largest pier. Although heavy tarpaulins muffled the massive shapes on each flatcar, Brigadier General Sayyed Malaek’s experienced eyes easily made out more of the T-80 tanks and BMP infantry fighting vehicles belonging to his 32nd Armored Brigade.
Everywhere the bearded, hawk-nosed brigadier looked, he saw signs of hurried activity. Out at the end of the long pier, working parties of his own men were busy fueling and arming the vehicles brought down from the Ahvaz Garrison by earlier trains. Dockworkers and sailors scurried among the neat rows of tanks and APCs, guiding those that were ready aboard the waiting ships.
Five vessels were moored at Bandar-e Khomeini. Three were the Navy’s Ropucha-class tank landing ships. Together, they could carry more than seventy of his tanks and six companies of infantry. Two more vessels were car ferries hastily modified to safely lift another company’s worth of the brigade’s vehicles.
Malaek checked his watch and smiled. His troops were well ahead of schedule.
Bushehr Air Base Arc lights strung around the airfield perimeter cast artificial daylight across a scene of frenzied activity.
The first echelons of the SCIMITAR strike force more than fifty advanced combat aircraft were parked in hastily constructed shelters spaced around the Bushehr base. Additional squadrons were moving to full readiness at fields ranging northward in a wide arc from Bandar-e Abbas to Aghajari and Khorramshahr.
Major Ashraf Bakhtiar stood near the revetments assigned to his Su-24 Fencer squadron, carefully overseeing the ordnance handlers fitting antiradar missiles and laser-guided bombs to his planes. Other teams were hard at work across the runway, outfitting the MiG-29s that would escort his fighter-bombers to their targets. Trolleys towing carts piled high with missiles, bombs, and decoy pods trundled to and fro around parked aircraft.
He raised his eyes to the eastern horizon, noting the hint of pale pink that signaled the coming dawn. The high, concealing clouds of yesterday and the day before were gone. A new front was moving in one that would bring clear skies and light winds for the next several days.
Bakhtiar smiled and rubbed his hands together. He and his crews would have perfect flying weather. Perfect war weather.
General Amir Taleh looked at the bustle around him with undisguised pleasure. The Khorasan Square headquarters building was a hive of purposeful activity. In every room, staff officers hunched over keyboards or spoke into telephones, urging greater speed on the field commanders. Enlisted men updated status boards or carried messages and printouts. The long, hard months of training, reorganisation, and reform were coming together perfectly. His staff was functioning like a well-oiled machine.
That was just as well. In less than twenty-four hours, he would issue the final orders setting the invasion in motion. Six hours after that, the first attack transports would depart Bushehr and Bandar-e Khomeini, bound for the Saudi coast.
At this stage, even a half-hour hiccup in the schedule would have been cause for concern.
Taleh turned as General Hashemi, his senior operations officer, approached. The older man looked worried.
“Yes, Hashemi?”
“Captain Kazemi has informed me that you intend to activate his special security plan before our final staff conference.”
Taleh nodded. “That is correct.” Hashemi hesitated and then said cautiously, “You realise, sir, that such a move may complicate our work at a critical moment? Since there is no sign of any unusual enemy activity, wouldn’t it be more prudent to wait a while longer?”