Special thanks to the Imperial Iranian Air Force, Metal Viscount, and Cheah's correction of my Chinese sentence. I'll throw it back out there.
"A Canadian citizen with U.S. nationality came to Iraq. ... He might have benefited Iraq, I don't know. They say the Iraq intelligence service is spread over Europe. But nobody spoke of human rights of the Canadian citizen of U.S. nationality. After he came to Iraq, they killed him."
-Saddam Hussein, addressing the world after Dr. Gerald Bull's murder in 1990
"I am a United States Navy Flyer. My countrymen built the best airplane in the world and entrusted it to me. They trained me to fly it. I will use it to the absolute limit of my power. With my fellow pilots, aircrews, and deck crews, my plane and I will do anything necessary to carry out our tremendous responsibilities. I will always remember that we are part of an unbeatable combat team-the United States Navy. When the going is fast and rough, I will not falter. I will be uncompromising in every blow I strike. I will be humble in victory. I am a United States Navy Flyer. I have dedicated myself to my country, with its many millions of all races, colors and creeds. They and their way of life are worthy of my greatest protection effort. I ask the help of God in making that effort great enough."
-US Navy Flyers' Creed
Camp William Eaton
"Heck , where the drillers are from, the United States or Western Europe, fresh water's as free and plentiful as forests- another resource the Middle-East doesn't have."
He soaked his wafers in coffee, just like any day in San Jose, or Washington, or wherever. This wasn't your usual wherever.
"But water's more difficult to acquire here, but now an ocean's worth is actually trapped above the oil. We've taken some older, supposedly useless drills from the energy giants in the region. It's a cheap venture, in fact, in comparison to, say, satellite communications. And in our strategic location, Geraldo, we can sell hear in Iraq, south to Kuwait, south-west to Saudi Arabia, and if relations are fixed anytime soon- with Iran, all without stretching our pipelines more than a hundred miles."
There was more space before it happened. What was said?
"So what you're saying is you've averted a major regional war over water, created a new industry, and basically, you saved the world. And here I am, right smack dab in the middle. This world can be a funny place." The Puerto Rican reporter shook his disbelieving head.
The Sheik's son looked like he'd tried communicating with telepathy, or explode Gordian's head with telekinesis. Why?
POP!
"You bet. Ladies and gentlemen, we are in danger, but we will gallantly report the news as it's happening-"
There it was, the well cap had burst open. Play back the sound. Something arched at it, fast.
Roger Gordian remembered the events, check, and proceeded to find his bearings. First, get off your butt-
"Stay down, Sir, the attack isn't over!"
Right. He felt behind his hips, to discover what his back lay against. Flat panels, grooved, sanded, polished, coated. It was wood. Gently knock... It was hard wood. He recalled the scene. Behind his lawn chair had been something Peter Nimec had imported, out of nostalgia. It was a high-end Brunswick billiards table, the kind he liked to hustle with. The Navy pilot turned his head right, seeing the table's owner, crouched behind a replica jukebox, one shattered by shrapnel. He had the futuristic gun, the XM8 carbine, ready, a potential source of vicious reciprocity.
Nimec, an ex US Army Ranger, caught the boss' image from the aged corner of his eye.
"The artillery seems really distant. I can't hear the shots being fired." He figuratively kept his ear to the ground.
"The rate of fire is an arthritic snail. We're being hit ballpark four rounds a minute."
Roger tried catching his voice.
"Pardon?"
"A lone gunman?"
"Yeah. We aren't under attack from anything else. Find-"
Another shell rumbled over the razor wire, wrecking Nimec's concentration.
Rog wrung water from his shirt, wadded up more cloth, and tried again.
"The first shell fell close. It's a miracle we're still alive," he shouted, running for the situations room door.
"Not so," Nimec puffed, "when they hit the well cap, it sprang enough hydraulic pressure..."
"I understand. It punted the shrapnel away."
"Affirmative. Water has some awesome properties, as Bruce Lee would remind us."
They ran through a fine mist, a dissipating mist, because the automatic valve was turning.
Nimec bolted in reverse, pivoted, yelled.
"News crew, follow me!"
Gordo stopped cold.
"Oh yeah, I forgot about them. Well, see you!"
They formed rays in opposing directions. Nigel Braun, the Afrikaner, windmill-waved people through the door.
"Kom om Baas! Kom om Baas Gordian!"
The Wisconsin industrialist followed his orders, tumbling through, followed by Nimec.
The reporter persisted in pointing at the danger, the danger around him, giving narration to the scene.
"Kom die hel om!"
"Try switching languages," Nimec suggested dryly. Braun did, sounding practically the same with anglicized speech. It did the trick; Geraldo Gutierrez rushed through the door, followed by Braun and another shell impact.
"Well, I'm pumped. We are all facing extraordinary danger here, pummeled by murderous shells-"
"Shut up!" Nimec snapped. "Stop telling us we're 'one hair-breadth from death,' stop saying we're 'living on borrowed time,' just cut it out!"
"Ladies and gentlemen, as you can see, the outpouring of death has provoked these men to the threshold..."
Braun had enough.
"I've had enough," he said, exposing a pistol, "Mister Gordian, I'd like permission to detain the journalist to his living quarters."
Roger curtly approved.
"Granted. I believe he needs a short timeout."
The boss faced the reporter.
"I'm sorry, but you're being a pest."
Geraldo tried protesting.
"But I was only expressing the danger you folks go through regularly. The people have a right to know!"
"We appreciate your enthusiasm, but this is our work, and you're distracting us."
The Situations Room
Nigel trotted in as Roger received a distracted briefing from Paul Evens. The marine stared at the pane of a monitor that displayed the graphic feedback from the UAV, which, in its current configuration, should be called a UCAV (Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle), but the general public, and the service using it, for that matter, had barely absorbed the old term when this drone came out.
Evens recounted fire-finding radar results, that the incoming shells were indeed falling from the other side of the Iraq-Iran border.
UpLink's founder collapsed in a chair.
"Please, continue."
"Sure thing. It's well out of reach of our own guns, so I've taken up the duty of destroying it from the air. I'm on a heading for it right now."
Pokey Oskaboose sat at a workstation beside Evens. He diverged from his flying long enough to display the radar image of the coming shells.
"See that? They arc nearly twenty miles into the air. At our speed, it will take a few minutes to silence the gun. Evens, what's our ETA?"
The marine pilot didn't look over.
"They managed to catch us on the extreme north-south points of our orbit. We're both fifty miles out. With a true airspeed of 150 MPH, we're a whole twenty minutes out in a neutral wind. Lucky for me, I'm in still air, but Pokey's facing an 8 MPH breeze."
Ahead lay a tripwire, for sure. Everyone in the room expected a consequence, but few paid a care.
Across the Iranian Border
The ducting phenomenon is a term used to describe when radar signal propagates along the boundary of two dissimilar air masses. The radar ranges with ducted propagation are greatly extended; holes can also appear in the coverage. Ducting occurs when the upper air is exceptionally warm and dry in comparison with the air at the surface. In air defense applications, these "radar skips" can create phantom targets that can show up or disappear
instantly.
During normal operation, ground-based radars build up a "clutter map" of the surroundings so that fixed objects, mountains, towers can be canceled out of the results. Thus only transient objects, rainclouds, aircraft, geese, are displayed. However, when anomalous returns occur from terrain much more distant, the radar subtracts the close-in clutter map and, naturally, comes up with lots of transient objects displayed as phantom returns.
The duct phenomenon doesn't affect airborne radar units, but too bad for Iran, because they had no AWACS platforms.
Uplink's backdoor into a Coalition E-3 datalink alerted Evens and Pokey that two Dassault Aviation Mirage F1 jets had taken off from the Dezful airbase.
There "noses were cold," meaning their radars were off. Modern active airborne radars by necessity have to be powerful enough to burn through chaff and other countermeasures, or else they must have the computing power to overcome those measures. Most have gone ahead with the brute force method, even though they are now a hazard to living organisms. An E767 has a radar output that could most likely kill a small child, and for these reasons, they are kept off while the jets are on the ground.
Evens and Pokey weren't sure what the safety guidelines were in Iran, but both hoped the jets needed a large layer between them and the ground. They wouldn't have a fighting chance against modern air tactical fighters.
Somewhere around 16,000 feet, Evens' own electronic sniffing package whiffed the emissions of one of the Cyrano IVM radars. He hedged that they couldn't maintain the second one, and said so. When you're sitting at a computer desk, no one minds unnecessary chatter. The datalink was also something not to worry about. To anyone monitoring, the control of the UCAVS looked like a satellite phone conversation. Signals go up to an UpLink bird, then back down to base. They just happened to pass through the drone on the way.
A sudden Doppler change from the radio effects indicated the French jets had changed heading north. The piggybacked AWACS feed confirmed it. The men of the situations room took that to mean they weren't observed.
"The airstrip was hit," droned someone, "it was the little UAV strip."
The crew didn't pay attention.
"That strip was new; a single lousy pothole won't make a difference."
A few miles from target, Evens began making sharp turns, mindful to keep the drone in tiny "clutter pockets" he could see by imposing a semi-transparent "clutter map" on his Heads-Up Display.
"You're wasting time," Nimec said pointedly, nervously tapping a tabletop.
"We have plenty of things standing here, but we only have two drones in the air. The UCAVS are more precious than what we have on the surface."
"What we have on the surface are a few good men backing up the sentries," argued Pete Nimec, unmasking his temper.
"So bring them in. The sentry guns can do the job for them." Nimec never expected to hear such from a marine, but this marine is typical, he reminded himself.
"I can't. The robotic rifles shorted under the water leak. Evidently, The police forces they were meant for didn't run them through the proving measures the military does."
"And why should they?" Richard Thibodoux interjected. "They aren't called upon to go into military conditions, so they can't justifiably absorb the proving cost."
Evens muttered something about grammar or weight grams. All ignored him.
"I've found the target. It looks like an Iraqi Al Fao artillery piece, except with a second tube welded on. The muzzle just flashed. I'm arming Radar Hellfire. The radar is hot, I'm
getting a solid tone... Fox Two."
On the UpLink UCAV, Fox One was rocket fire, Fox Two was the Hellfire missile, and Fox Three was a suicide plow. The craft had no cannon. The missile took roughly six seconds to finish its arc. Paul reeled in some steady footage for impact.
"The cannon's dead, and I see no point in strafing those guys with rockets."
He peeled out, catching enough lift to escape small arms. For the thrill of the news crew,
the victorious pilot audibly counted from one to fifteen. When nothing exploded, he concluded:
"That confirms the kill."
The Captain's Quarters
"We may have gotten off easy. First, that first shell must have been guided in. It temporarily gashed open our water well. Whoever marked the target didn't know much about wells, to not know about the cutoff valve.
"Second, that shell must have been called in to do double on us- kill the leadership, you and me, and sabotage the well. The person that called the strike knew where we were, and where the well cap was. That's enough to convince me we've been infiltrated.. no shock, really." Gordian did hire locals, a well-meaning move to improve the team's image with the people.
"I see more digits."
Nimec arched both eyebrows.
"On your hand."
"Right. Something bugs me about them using one cannon to kill us off."
"They only had one cannon, and they used it like an assassin's bullet."
The ex-Ranger tried to fight to his point.
"I know that, but what if the aim wasn't an assassination plot, or a sabotage of the water drilling process, or either? What I'm saying is, they shorted the robotic rifles, right?"
Roger stirred white cream in his mug.
"Go on."
"Is that non-dairy?"
"The creamer?"
"The creamer."
Gordian sighed.
"Ashley's having a mad cow scare. I tell her neurons can't inter the milk- unless a sadist does it- and we all know the world has them in stock, but she doesn't know who to believe. No, this isn't dairy, even anorexic skim. Help yourself."
He did, though begrudgingly.
"I can't even get real food in the Fertile Crescent. Please continue."
He found his place and sipped from a mug.
"Well, the way this base is located, Tangos can't really move close to us, unless they're looking for a close relationship with God immediately."
"Nice euphemism, but I miss your point."
"OK, they have to keep their distance and shoot from an extreme standoff range, one we can't reach-"
"Which they tried, and failed, to do."
"Yes, they did. Or they can infiltrate the base-"
"Which they did, except their man, it seems, couldn't smuggle in a weapon."
"Or they could approach unnoticed."
"Which they can't do, because our electro-optical sensors would spot them."
"Yes, but if a thick liquid shroud masked their approach-"
"The UAVS would spot them... O Lord!"
Nimec sat on Roger's desk, arms folded.
"That's right. The sensors couldn't see through the water spout, and the UAVS rushed straight for Iran's border. There was a window in which someone could have made an approach, and they may be hiding outside. I'll have Ricci lead a team to take a look."
Iran-Iraq Border
Operation: Qiyama
Most were Chechen, some were from Azerbaijan, some from Kazakhstan, and one was Georgian, but all were from former Soviet states, and all were practitioners of Islam, and servants to Vladimir Plenkanov, an officer no longer under suspicion from the west, not after his deed concerning the satellites. The Russian posted the following message on a weblog entry:
"Abhik was here. Now he's somewhere else, nowhere in particular."
The corps arrived together on a tug in the Caspian Sea. Although unnecessary, their leader shouted a roll call after disembarking:
"Bashayer, Elham, Nasser, Fatma, Hanouf, Shahad, Eyad, Shaheen,Jibreel,Mika'il,
Israfil,Malik-ul-Maut,Ridhwan,Malik,Munkar, Nakir, Zakariya, Ya'qub, andKufr."
All were present and prepared to cast their mutual enemy deep into Jahannam. Satisfied, the leader ordered that the Jihadists board the blue bus for a place only known to them as Jinnistan, a base where they planned to redeem the Russian Jinns that had taken flight from Mesopotamia to Persia twelve years before. Through cunning, the healers, codenamed collectively as "Abhik," restored the Jinns from decay, ready to be ridden to paradise.
The men, all twenty, including the instructor, had acquired the skills for riding the Jinns with their brothers in the north, where Vladimir, a redeemed infidel, had parted with the working knowledge of the Jinns, and discoursed over what was to pass.
They were to become Qubth-ut-Allah- the Fist of God.
Camp William Eaton
It is said (by Warren Buffet) that the market is like the lord in that it helps those whom help themselves, but is unlike the lord in that it does not forgive those whom don't know what they're doing.
Many Private Military Companies (PMC), as they are called, generally hire former Special Forces Officers for grunt work in Iraq. All these men are college-trained, elite, and a money-drain. Roger Gordian followed the same trend at first, but in 2002, Alex Nordstrum and Vince Scull collaborated on a report that suggested UpLink's Private Military Company, Sword, leave the elitist trend, and pickup the "undesirable" noncoms retiring from service. Thomas Ricci gave his endorsement, signing a bold signature, and underlining it. He then scribbled a smiling emoticon.
Soon after, Peter Nimec and Rollie Thibodoux shopped around for Warrant Officers from the Army, and Gunnery Sergeants from the Marine Corps. They'd quickly discovered a splurge of perfectly suitable, perfectly able men, and the odd woman, capable of small-unit leadership equal to that of the elites. Many of them, especially the helicopter crewmen, happened to have all the technical skills previously thought to only be known to commissioned officers. Some appeared to be savants, others were working on picking up degrees, and most accepted Roger Gordian's pay.
All they needed were directions from a close leadership, so the former Phantom pilot decided to move all the brains from San Jose desks to Camp William Eaton. It was like the Pentagon on the front lines. Perhaps most talented of the NCOs was a marine named Paul Evens, an instructor of Super Cobras, and a freelance linguist. He was a veteran, he'd fought, and he'd killed. He could be counted on, and so could Robin Molina, a Special Forces radioman overlooked because of his prosthetic. He'd be in wheeled or tracked vehicles most of the time, so they'd looked beyond the artificial part of him, and didn't look at him as somehow invalid.
Nigel Braun was just an old Africaner. When the government of South Africa banned it's citizens from joining mercenary units in 1999, he'd gone home to the Transvald, and bought a lakeside property where poachers abandoned sick monkeys. He'd sharpened his craft interdicting the smugglers. By 2001, bush meat had reached a record high price in Africa, but researchers couldn't deduce why.
Nordstrum and Scull did, and had visited him. The old Boer accepted their offer, and when asked why he'd gone along with the ban, announced he'd still be in the market if he'd kept his contacts, but had somehow disappeared.
Fraser Singe had just walked in, once he figured out what was happening in Sword.
AA
At 1200, Nigel Braun supervised some non-military contractors at installing some backup automated guns, some simple networked platforms modeled on John Underwood's Live-shot webcam rifles fit to tilt/pan servos. Though also not field-tested to military extremes, all parts survived the trials of the market and were off-the-shelf.
A forklift armored against small-arms motored on above the military crest (above would mean the actual crest) of a berm bisecting an open range. Nigel's supervision came on foot, a good two meters behind the machine. He held an XM8 in a sling, and a straw Stetson cocked on the cranium. Some smoldering pyres still reeked of the fragrance of cordite. From where, he couldn't see. Visibility was obscure at that hour.
An AN/PVS-7B image-intensifying goggle dangled loosely below his stubble-covered chin, waiting for the sun to disappear. Twilight doesn't last long here, it shouldn't take long.
The Bobcat forklift operator deposited the palleted cheap automated weapon, and reversed to the orchestration of the African's hand.
Even without supporting sensory data, Nigel Braun intuitively knew danger stood seconds away.
Inside the barracks
"Ni you mei you bing dong pi jiu, Onna!"
Push, nudge. Peter Nimec shouted and shoved.
"Snap out of it, Ricci, you're dreaming!"
"...Pi jiu, Onna!"
"You're mixing Firefly fanfiction Mandarin with Anime fanfiction Japanese," pronounced Gordian's right hand, seeing life flicker in Ricci's eye, "but this is real life, not some recreational fantasy posted on the Internet! Come on."
