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He hoped Rusty and Chief McCarthy were watching, and he signaled with his right arm to keep the lights away from the eastern side of the jail. Then he ordered the grappling irons in place, and he and his men climbed softly down into the jail yard, right between the single-cell block and the guardhouse, which had no windows on this side.

The wait was 24 seconds, but it seemed like four hours. Finally the two Chinese guards began to walk up the front of the single-cell block and as they reached the end, big Fred Jones and Syd Thomas suddenly appeared, bang in front of them. Each SAS man clamped his hand over the guard’s mouth and dragged him into the dark space between buildings, permanently dark now, because the lights were not sweeping that far.

The killing was classic SAS, a deep thrust with a big fighting knife straight into the heart, cleaving it in half. Fred and Syd kept their hands rammed tight over the guards’ mouths until the men died, a matter of a few seconds. Charlie Murphy slipped silently out of the shadows and helped drag the men to the deep darkness beneath the main wall.

By now, the other two were on their way along the main cell block, and Fred Jones knew they would realize something was amiss when they did not pass their colleagues at the halfway point. This was a critical point in the mission. And Fred could not afford a mistake. If the guards turned and ran from the courtyard back to the guardroom, the three SAS men might find themselves surrounded and outnumbered. By now he knew there were three more SEALs on top of the eastern wall, and that they would probably survive a firefight.

But he did not want a firefight. And suddenly he knew they would have to go after the two guards right now. And he ordered Charlie Murphy to draw his light machine gun and cover them while he and Syd raced silently along the wall and took them out. He heard three more SEALs clear the wall with the satchel bombs for the guardhouse, and then they set off.

They made the end of the single cells and swung left along the dark front of the main cell block. Up ahead the two guards were coming right at them, but they were talking and looking at each other. That little conversation bought the SAS men three more seconds. And they would not need much more.

“GO, SYD, GO!” hissed Fred, and now they ran flat-out, straight at the two guards, whose weapons were still shouldered. There was a 15-foot gap between them, and one suddenly saw two fearsome, blacked-up monsters right in front. He had time to say, not shout, in Chinese, “What the…?” But it was not loud enough, there was no one near, and Syd Thomas was on him, a full frontal assault. He slammed the butt of his fist hard into the man’s nose, grabbed his hair, jerked back his head and sliced his throat wide open.

The other guard turned to look, in total amazement, and he never really saw Fred Jones clearly as the Dorset sergeant crashed into him, driving his knife right between his ribs, killing him instantly. The guard was dead before he hit the floor with Fred’s right hand rammed across his mouth.

“Leave ’em, and get back between the buildings,” he snapped. And both men ran back along the shadows, to regroup with Charlie and the three newly arrived SEALs.

Fred Jones now decided it looked a bit different from down here, and that it was impossible to take out the main gate guards quietly with knives. The whole area along the front of the prison was bright, light flooding out from the guardroom and from the building on the right. They’d never get across there without being seen.

“That means we bomb the guardroom and shoot the sentries at the same time?”

“Better yet,” said Syd, “let’s just shoot the sentries and send in Charlie here with the det-cord to blow the gates. As soon as he gets to the gates, we blow the guardroom.”

“Don’t be a prick, Syd, we’d also blow Charlie. Sorry, lads, it’s guardroom, sentries, gates in that order. Right now. I’ve got H plus seven.”

Two SEALs prepared the blasting caps on the Mk 138 satchel bombs. Then they slipped around the corner, pulled the pins and hurled one through the lower window and one through the upper, diving back with the others flat on the ground, in the shadow of the single-cell block wall.

The detonation was savage. It blew the building to bits with deafening impact. The entire front wall caved in, and so did the roof. All that was left was a pile of smoking rubble. From the guards inside there was not a sound, since there were no survivors. As the dust and smoke cleared, the two gate guards could be seen running toward the obliterated building, but not for long. Fred Jones shot them both in their tracks. Another SEAL ran in behind Charlie Murphy and hurled a hand grenade into the lighted window in the mystery building to the right of the gates. Both SEALs flattened themselves to the ground as it exploded, killing all six of the Chinese interrogators, who were sitting drinking tea in the room to the left of the front door.

Instantly, Charlie Murphy reached the gates and wrapped three lengths of det-cord around the big jutting hinges and the central locking system. Then he retreated fast, playing out the det-cord behind him. He lit it at a range of 40 yards and blew the huge gates 10 feet into the air. At this point the SEALs had control of the interior of the prison. It was outside where the action now was.

As soon as the guardhouse was blown, Rick Hunter hit the GO button on Dan Conway’s wavelength. The young lieutenant from Connecticut snapped, “GO!” and Petty Officers Catfish Jones and Steve Whipple charged around the corner and hurled two 40-pound satchel bombs straight into the upper and lower windows of the commandant’s HQ and the main communications room above it. As with the guardroom, the impact was staggering; all four walls of the building were blown out and the roof just collapsed. Debris was flung everywhere, and it rained in through the trees, some of it close to where the SEALs were standing.

Rick Hunter put his head up into the dust cloud and tried to see something, but the dust was choking and the smoke made vision impossible. However, Rocky Lamb, Hank and Al were racing through it, Rocky’s gun firing round after round through the doorway of the accommodation block, driving back the guards who were fighting to get out, pulling on coats, grabbing their rifles.

Lieutenant Conway came in right behind them, and he hurled three hand grenades one after another into the hallway. The one thing the ex-catcher could do was throw, real hard and dead straight. And the entrance hall was now a mass of fire, dust and bodies. Around the back of the building Hank and Al were priming their smoke bombs, which contained poisonous but not lethal gas that would knock out anyone for 24 hours and leave him very sick, with a shocking headache, but not dead.

They flung in two each, on both levels. The idea not to kill civilians had been Frank Hart’s. But no matter what, no one was walking out of the dormitory right now, and those guards who had tried were no longer alive.

Simultaneously, the lights were flickering on the radios of Ray Schaeffer and Olaf Davidson. And it was Ray who moved first. In the last half minute he had heard the succession of explosions, and now he whispered to Garrett Atkins, “Okay, buddy. Right now…”

And both men squeezed the triggers of their antitank launchers, and the two armor-piercing canisters came rocketing down the tubes, past their ears, and straight out into the night, straight at the Chinese patrol boat.

Garrett’s slammed in and exploded bang in the middle of the superstructure, blasting the radio room to pieces. Ray’s shell hit the guided missile launchers at the stern, which blew the ship apart with a thunderous explosion. Down by the gangway, the armed SEALs waited for any Chinese crew to show themselves. But there was nothing. Rusty Bennett had estimated there would only be three men, four at the most, and they probably had not survived. If one of them had, he would not be making radio contact with anyone.