Executive orders - Tom Clancy [165]
Perhaps that was not overly important in the Great Scheme of Things. There was now no stopping the events he had helped to set in motion, but it offended Ali Badrayn in a professional sense. Better to keep everything he did secret. He shrugged as he walked back to the VIP terminal. No, it didn't matter, and through his actions he'd won the gratitude of a very powerful man in charge of a very powerful country, and for doing no more than talking, telling people what they already knew, and helping them to make a decision which could not have been avoided, whatever their efforts to the contrary. How curious life was.
SAME ONE. JEEZ, he wasn't on the ground very long. Through a little effort, the radio traffic for that particular aircraft was isolated and playing in the earphones of an Army spec-6 language expert. Though the language of international aviation was English, this aircraft was speaking in Farsi. Probably thought a security measure, it merely highlighted that aircraft, tracked by RADAR and radio-direction finders. The voice traffic was wholly ordinary except for that, and for the fact that the aircraft hadn't even been on the ground long enough to refuel. That meant the whole thing was preplanned, which was hardly a surprise under the circumstances, but enlightening even so. Aloft, over the far northwest end of the Persian Gulf, an AWACS was now tracking the aircraft as well. Interest, cued by PALM BOWL, had perked up enough to move the E-3B off its normal patrol station, now escorted by four Saudi F-15 Eagle fighters. Iranian and Iraqi electronic-intelligence troops would take note of this and know that someone was interested in what was going on-and wonder why, because they didn't know. The game was ever a fascinating one, neither side knowing all it wished, and assuming the other side-at the moment there were actually three sides in the game-knew too much, when in fact none of the three knew much of anything.
ABOARD THE G-IV, the language was Arabic. The two generals chatted quietly and nervously in the rear, their conversation masked by engine sounds. Their wives just sat, more nervous still, while the various children read books or napped. It was hardest on the bodyguards, who knew that if anything went wrong in Iran they could do nothing but die uselessly. One of these sat in the middle of the cabin and found that his seat was wet, with what he didn't know, but it was sticky and red? Tomato juice or something, probably. Annoyed, he went to the lavatory and washed his hands off, taking a towel back to wipe the seat off. He returned the towel to the lav before he reseated himself, then looked down at the mountains and wondered if he'd live to see another sunrise, not knowing that he'd just limited the number to twenty.
HERE WE GO, the chief master sergeant said. That was the vice-chief of their air force, and the commanding general of Second Iraqi Army Corps-plus families, he added. The decryption had required just over two hours from the time the scrambled signal had been copied down.
Expendables? the USAF lieutenant asked. She was learning, the other spooks thought.
Relatively so, Major Sabah agreed with a nod. We need to look for another aircraft lifting off from Mehrabad soon after this one lands.
Where to, sir?
Ah. Lieutenant, that is the question, is it not?
Sudan, the chief thought. He'd been in-country for two years, and it was his second tour at PALM BOWL.
I would not wager against you on that, Sergeant,
Sabah observed with a wink. We should confirm that through the time cycle of the flights out of Baghdad. And he really couldn't make a judgment call on the entire exercise until then, though he already had flagged