Separation of Power

chapter FORTY-TWO
Saudi Arabia, Monday night

Oasis One was a flurry of anxious activity as helicopters were prepped and equipment was checked. The briefings were all completed and the team was ready to go. Rapp emerged from the command trailer wearing his Special Republican Guard uniform and took in the scene before him. The air was stifling inside from all the cigarette smoke. Colonel Gray and his staff were listening intently to the status reports from the mission's advance element. An MH-53J Pave Low helicopter from the air force's 20th Special Operation Squadron was already across the border and on its way to Scorpion I. The big helicopter was carrying a twelve member air force STS team made up of combat controllers and para rescue personnel. The team specialized in securing landing sites and evacuating wounded and downed aviators. They were a crucial part of the mission, especially if things went wrong. To bolster their effectiveness, Colonel Gray had sent along four of his best Delta snipers.

The desert sky was bright with stars. Rapp looked up in search of the moon only to find a sliver of white. For his part of the mission he would have preferred cloud cover, but he knew the fly-boys dropping their paveway guided bombs from above 10,000 feet would appreciate the clear skies. Rapp scratched the thick stubble on his face. He'd trimmed it up along the neckline and cheeks, just like Uday Hussein did. The red and gold epaulets on his green uniform bore the rank of general. Rapp found it comical that Uday, who was only thirty-seven, had already reached such a high rank. Welcome to the crazy world of dictators. He had a black leather belt strapped to his waist with two holsters. Uday fashioned himself a bit of a cowboy and was known to carry two Colt .45 caliber nickel-plated pistols. To complete the outfit he was wearing a black beret with the insignia of the SRG on the front and a bright red cravat that conveniently concealed his throat mike. For two reasons Rapp had opted not to wear an American uniform under the Iraqi one. The first was that Rapp was a good twenty pounds heavier than Uday, and putting an extra layer of clothes on under the SRG uniform would have only made the disparity more obvious. The second reason was more fatalistic. If they were caught, they would be tortured and killed no matter what uniform they were wearing. He was also wearing a Kevlar vest and an encrypted radio with a throat mike and an earpiece. Each member of the team was wearing the same radio. This would allow them to stay in communication throughout the operation.

Rapp looked out at the scene before him. Oasis One was a comforting site. It showed a lot of initiative by the military, something they weren't always known for. The rock formation rose out of the desert floor approximately 100 feet and was bowl shaped, with a slight opening at the southwestern end. The bowl was over 500 feet across at its center. The interior of the bowl was covered by desert camouflage netting. More than 100 yards of it was stretched tightly from one side to the other. Underneath the netting sat four highly advanced MH-47E Chinook helicopters with ground crews climbing over the airframes checking every inch of the complicated birds to make sure they were in perfect condition. The twin rotor behemoth was the new workhorse for the army's 160th SOAR.

The 160th SOAR, based out of Fort Campbell, Kentucky, is widely regarded as home to the best helicopter pilots in the world. The only other aviators who can give them a run for their money are the men from the Air Force's 1st Special Operations Wing, and they too would be involved in tonight's operation. Both units owed their current peak performance to a tragedy that had occurred more than twenty years earlier. On April 24, 1980, the United States Special Forces community suffered their greatest defeat in an operation code-named Eagle Claw.

Eagle Claw would painfully reveal the inadequacies and shortcomings created by decades of inter-service rivalries and a general reluctance on the part of military leaders to properly fund the Special Forces. The mission on that fateful night was to rescue the fifty-three hostages held at the American embassy in Teheran. The Ayatollah Khomeini and his Revolutionary Guard had seized the embassy and its personnel some six months earlier. Time had run out on President Carter, and if he wanted to spend four more years at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the hostages had to be brought home.

The operation would be the first time the army's super secret Delta counterterrorism force would see action. On that cold April evening, five C-130 transport and refueling planes were to rendezvous with eight RH-53D Sea Stallion helicopters at a sight known as Desert I. The Sea Stallions were then to refuel and take on the Delta operators for the trip to a site in the mountains outside Teheran. Unfortunately, the mission was scrubbed after two of the eight Sea Stallions got lost enroute to Desert I, and a third suffered mechanical difficulties. There were not enough helicopters left to get the job done, so the plug was pulled. That was when a bad situation got worse, drastically worse.

As one of the Sea Stallions maneuvered into position for refueling, its main rotor hit an EC-130E, and both the helicopter and plane burst into flames. With fire shooting into the night sky, the team had to make an emergency departure leaving behind all the helicopters and the burning plane.

In the wake of the disaster the military formed a review group that was aimed at pacifying critics in the media and on the Hill. Admiral James Holloway chaired the group, and fortunately for the Special Forces, the admiral didn't pull any punches. The group produced a document that eventually became known as the Holloway Report. It laid bare the inadequacies of operation Eagle Claw. At the top of the list was the subject of helicopters. The report stated that if future covert missions were to stand a chance, the military had to greatly improve its helicopter operations.

The result was the formation of a covert aviation unit named Task Force 160. Forty highly qualified candidates were selected to make up the task force. Of those original forty pilots more than half a dozen perished in training accidents as they pushed their flying machines to the limit in the worst of weather conditions. It was during this time that they became known as the "Night Stalkers." By the early nineties the force had grown to approximately 400 aviators. This was also when they took on their official name, the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, or SOAR. The aviators and airmen of SOAR train constantly, in the worst of conditions, and do so while hugging the earth at speeds of over 120 mph. This is why they are the best helicopter pilots in the world.

Rapp had put his life in their hands on many occasions, and although they'd brought him to the brink of vomiting on at least three occasions, there was no other group of aviators he trusted more. He watched the flight crews work on their helicopters under red filter lights. The scene before him looked like something out of a futuristic sci-fi movie. He could see the pilots sitting in the cockpits of the big MH-47E Chinooks. They too were working under the faint glow of red filter lights. Because they would be flying with night vision they could not expose their expert eyes to bright light for at least an hour prior to takeoff. There would be no Desert I disasters with these guys.

Rapp knew they were going through their extensive preflight checklist. The advanced Chinooks came at a price tag of $35 million apiece. Each bird was capable of carrying thirty troops or a variety of other payloads. They were equipped with the Enhanced Navigation Systems, or ENS. Using twenty separate systems such as Doppler navigation, automatic direction finders, attitude director indicators, GPS, and a bevy of compasses and gyroscopes, the ENS tells the pilots exactly where they are at all times. They were also equipped with highly advanced terrain-following/terrain-avoidance radar and forward-looking infrared imagers or FLIR. This integrated system allowed the aviators to fly deep penetration missions while skimming the surface, in the worst of weather conditions, and land exactly on a target within seconds of their stated extraction or infiltration time.

Three of the four Chinooks were loaded with the white Mercedes sedans. The team would split up and ride with their vehicles--four Delta operators in each chopper plus Rapp in the middle helicopter. The fourth Chinook was there as a backup in case something went wrong with any of the others.

His detached solitude was broken by the door to the command trailer opening and Colonel Gray's gruff voice loudly barking out orders. A second later Major Berg, the commander of the assault team, appeared at Rapp's side.

In Arabic the major asked, "Are you ready, Uday Hussein?"

Rapp grinned. Looking at the choppers he replied in Arabic, "Yep. Let's go win one for the Gipper, rah rah, sisboomba." Major Berg smiled, showing a bright set of white teeth accented by a thick black mustache. "The advance team is halfway there. No problems so far."

"I suppose it's time to saddle up?"

"Yep. Dust off in five minutes." Berg stood silent for a moment and then added, "Last chance to back out."

"You couldn't pay me enough to miss this one."

The door to the command trailer flew open and Colonel Gray appeared in the doorway. "Major Berg, get your men and load 'em up!" The colonel approached Rapp and stuck out his hand. "Good luck, Mitch. I wish I was going with you."

Rapp knew he meant it. He took Gray's hand, and over the roar of the big Chinooks engines coming to life, he thought about giving the colonel a message for Anna in case something went wrong. After a moment of hesitation he decided against it. He thanked the colonel and then headed off to grab the rest of his equipment.

Situation Room, Monday afternoon

Kennedy went straight from Capitol Hill to the White House. Her testimony had ended so abruptly that it had caught the media off guard. They'd settled in for the afternoon expecting hours of cantankerous questions and evasive testimony. When she'd left the Hart Senate Office Building just thirty minutes after she'd arrived, the majority of the cameras out in front of the building were unmanned. There were still a number of photographers who tried to hold her up as she left the building, jumping in front of her bodyguards as they escorted her to the director's limousine. The beefy security detail pushed the photographers aside like blockers on a kick return. Kennedy was safely tucked away in her limo twenty seconds after walking out on the committee.

When she arrived at the White House her blockers stayed outside with the vehicles, which was unfortunate because, between the entrance on West Executive Avenue and the Situation Room, she was practically tackled by Michelle Bernard, the President's press secretary.

"Irene, would you mind telling me what in the hell that was all about?" Bernard had one of the most stressful jobs in Washington.

Kennedy sidestepped her and motioned for Bernard to follow. Kennedy liked her, and didn't envy the position she was in. "What has the President told you?"

"Nothing," she half snapped. "That's the problem." Bernard looked over both shoulders to make sure no one from the press was within earshot. "The jackals are all over me, and I look like an idiot. I can't confirm or deny a thing. I look like I'm completely out of the loop."

"That's not such a bad spot to be in, Michelle."

Bernard ignored the advice and asked, "How bad is it?"

As they rounded the corner, Kennedy waited for two White House staffers to pass and then said, "Get ready for a long night."

"It's that bad?"

"I didn't say that, I just said it's going to be a long night."

Bernard gave her a wary glance, and then asked, "How the hell can you be so calm? I mean for Christ's sake, Irene, they're getting ready to burn you at the stake."

Stopping at the outer door to the Situation Room, Kennedy punched her code into the cipher lock and said, "Don't worry, no one's going to be burned at the stake." Kennedy pulled open the heavy door and said, "I promise I'll be able to tell you something by tonight. And trust me, until then it's better that you don't know what's going on." Kennedy let the door close behind her and opened the first door on her left.

The secure conference room was packed. General Flood was there with four of his aides, Secretary of Defense Culbertson was present, Casey Byrne, the deputy secretary of state, was there as well as Michael Haik, the NSA. The President was at the head of the table in his usual spot. He looked over his shoulder to see who had entered the room. When he saw it was Kennedy he immediately stood.

"Irene, great job. You handled Jetland like a pro."

"Thank you, sir. We've bought ourselves a little time, but I'm afraid not much. What's the status on the operation?"

"Take a seat here." The President grabbed a chair and wheeled it over to the corner of the table. They both sat. Kennedy was seated between General Flood and the President. Flood had a phone in each hand, one to his left ear and the other poised to be held against his right.

The President pointed to one of three large screens on the wall. "That's a live image from an AWACS patrolling over northern Saudi Arabia." The screen showed most of Iraq, Kuwait, the northern part of the Persian Gulf and the northern and eastern part of Saudi Arabia. The image was being fed via satellite from an E-3 Sentry Airborne Warning and Control System. These were the air force's big Boeing 707's with the large rotodomes mounted above the fuselage. "The advance element is on the ground." Hayes pointed at the screen. "See the blue triangle just south of Baghdad?"

Kennedy squinted to make sense of the jumble of electronic markings on the screen. After a moment she located the site just west of the Tigris River. "Yes."

"They arrived less than five minutes ago. They've secured the area, and we've given the green light for the assault team to go in."

"That's the assault team there?" Kennedy pointed to four blue triangles closely grouped about halfway between Baghdad and the Saudi border.

"Correct."

"Have any of our allies called to ask what's going on?"

"I just got off the phone with the British PM. I called him. I didn't tell him about the nukes, but I said something serious was up. I'm going to call King Fahd just before it starts, as well as the Russian President, then after that it's a long list."

"So no leaks so far?"

"No. "The President rapped his knuckles on the table twice.

The secrecy involving the operation had been amazing, thanks to two factors. The first was the short time period between receiving the information and launching the operation. The entire thing had been put together in just six days' time, a true testament to the readiness of the military. The second factor was entirely unintended. Thanks to Congressman Rudin's appearance on Meet the Press, Washington and much of the world was focused on the scandal. The President had cleared his schedule and spent the entire day in the Situation Room, an action that would normally set off warning bells in capitals all over the world. But today the foreign intelligence officers who normally paid attention to such things assumed President Hayes had dropped everything to try to salvage the Kennedy nomination.

Kennedy's eyes drifted beyond the airspace around Baghdad and noticed the massive air armada that was forming up over northern Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf. She knew the battle plan by heart. They'd gone over it from top to bottom this morning. The blue triangles that were massing on the Iraqi borders were U. S. jets that were suckling up to big KC-135 tankers and topping off their tanks. Closer to the border were formations of ah-64 Apache attack helicopters that would be led into battle by air force MH-53J Pave Lows. Air force JSTAR ground surveillance radar planes had given them pinpoint locations of surface to-air missile sites that the Iraqis had hidden throughout the desolate terrain south and west of Baghdad.

In the northern Persian Gulf the Independence Battle Group was on station twenty-five miles off the Kuwaiti coast. The carrier's planes were in the air and were bolstered by two squadrons of Marine Corps F/A-18 Hornets flying out of Kuwait. In the opening salvo of the operation the battle group's surface ships would launch more than 100 cruise missiles. In addition, a flight of B-52's out of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean were forty minutes away from being in position to launch a payload of eighty-four cruise missiles.

With so many planes in the air questions were bound to be asked, so in an effort to keep a lid on things, earlier in the day, U. S. military attaches in embassies around the Persian Gulf informed their host countries that the U. S. would be holding a surprise readiness exercise commencing at 1900 local time. The Pentagon ran readiness exercises like this several times a year to keep the troops sharp and to keep Saddam guessing. General Flood hung up both phones and said, "Mr. President, the flight off-111's are airborne, refueled, and can be over the target twenty minutes after you give the word."

The military planners had decided that eight F-111's would create enough redundancy to ensure the destruction of the target. They were confident that they could achieve total destruction with just two planes and were hoping to use the remaining six to visit some other targets that they had carefully chosen. The eight F-111's were all carrying a single Deep Throat, GBU-28/B super penetrator bomb. If Rapp and the Delta Team failed, the hospital would be leveled.

The President didn't want to think of that option right now. "What's the status on the ground team?"

"Everything looks good so far. They're proceeding without incident, and the advance element has reported the area secure."

The President looked over at the center screen for a moment. "Give me the time frame again."

"They should touch down in," Flood looked at the screen, "approximately seven minutes. It takes them a minute or two to unload the cars, and then it's almost a mile to the main gate of the facility. From there it's three miles to reach Route 144, the main road between Karbala and Baghdad. After that it's a straight shot, thirty-two and a half miles to the hospital. If they don't run into any trouble, it's supposed to take them twenty-six minutes to get to the hospital from the time they reach Route 144."

"They should be at the hospital in about forty minutes," Kennedy offered.

"And they want the bombs to start falling just after they get to the hospital?" asked a skeptical President.

Yes. That's Mitch's idea."

"Why?"

"I don't know, but he said he can handle it either way, he'd just prefer if the bombs started falling about a minute after they've arrived."

The President was having difficulty understanding the reasoning behind Rapps rationale. The entire thing was looking more and more complicated to him. He was sticking his neck out further than he'd ever intended. If Rapp and the Delta team failed, he was done. The combination of the Kennedy scandal and dead American troops would be his death knell.

Sensing his apprehension, Kennedy grabbed his arm and said with sincere confidence, "Don't worry, sir. Mitch will not fail."

Slowly the President nodded. "I hope you're right."