Executive orders - Tom Clancy [164]
How do you say, the rats are leaving the ship?
You think so, too, sir? the chief asked, before his lieutenant could.
To Iran? the American officer asked. I know it looks that way, but it doesn't make sense, does it?
Major Sabah grimaced. Sending their air force to Iran didn't make sense either, but the Iranians kept the fighter planes and let the pilots go home. You need to learn more of the local culture, Lieutenant.
I've learned that nothing here makes much sense, she couldn't say.
What else do we have? Sabah asked the sergeant.
They talk and go quiet and then they talk some more and go quiet. There's traffic under way now, but KKMC is still trying to crack it.
RADAR surveillance reports an inbound from Mehrabad to Baghdad, coded as a business jet.
Oh? Same one as before? Sabah asked the American lieutenant.
Yes, Major.
What else? Anything? The chief master sergeant handled the answer.
Major, that's probably what the computers are cooking on right now. Maybe in thirty minutes.
Sabah lit a cigarette. PALM BOWL was technically a Kuwaiti-owned facility, and smoking was permitted, to the relief of some and the outrage of others. His relatively junior rank did not prevent him from being a fairly senior member of his country's intelligence service, all the more so that he was modest and businesslike in manner, a useful contrast with his war record, on which he'd lectured in Britain and America.
Opinions? he asked, already having formed his own.
You said it, sir. They're bugging out, the chief master sergeant replied.
Major Sabah completed the thought. In hours or days, Iraq will not have a government, and Iran is assisting in the transition to anarchy.
Not good, the chief breathed.
The word 'catastrophe' comes to mind, Sabah observed mildly. He shook his head and smiled in a grim sort of way, earning additional admiration from the American spooks.
THE GULFSTREAM LANDED in calm air after the sixty-five-minute flight in from Tehran, timed by Badrayn's watch. As punctual as Swissair, he noted. Well, that was to be expected. As soon as it stopped, the door dropped open and the five passengers deplaned, to be met with elaborately false courtesy, which they returned in kind. A small convoy of Mercedes sedans spirited them off at once to regal accommodations awaiting them in the city center, where they would, of course, be murdered if things went poorly. Scarcely had their cars pulled off when two generals, their wives, their children, and one bodyguard each emerged from the VIP terminal and walked to the aircraft. They quickly boarded the G-IV. The co-pilot lifted the door back into place, and the engines started up, all in less than ten additional minutes by Badrayn's Seiko. Just that fast, it taxied off to make the return flight to Mehrabad International. It was something too obvious for the tower personnel to miss. That was the problem with security, Badrayn knew. You really couldn't keep some things secret, at least not something like this. Better to use a commercial flight, and treat the departing generals as normal passengers on a normal trip, but there were no regular flights between the two countries,