The Cardinal of the Kremlin - Tom Clancy [222]
"No, but it's the best we got," Gus Werner admitted. "There's three of them. We know for sure that two of them are there. They wouldn't leave one man guarding the hostage while they were someplace else-that's unprofessional."
"It all makes sense, Gus," Paulson agreed. "But we don't know. We go with this, then." That part wasn't a question.
"Yeah, and fast."
"Okay." Paulson turned and looked at the wall. They were using a pilot's ready room. The cork on the walls, put there for sound-absorption, was also perfect for hanging maps and photos. The trailer, they all saw, was a cheap-o. Only a few windows, and of the two original doors, one had been boarded over. They assumed that the room near the remaining door was occupied by the "bad guys" while the other held the hostage. The one good thing about the case was that their opponents were professionals, and therefore somewhat predictable. They'd do the sensible thing in most cases, unlike common criminals, who only did things that occurred to them at the time.
Paulson switched his gaze to a different photo, then to the topographical map, and started picking his approach route. The high-resolution photographs were a godsend. They showed one man outside, and he was watching the road, the most likely route of approach. He'd walk around some, Paulson thought, but mostly he'd watch the road. So, the observer/sniper team would approach overland from the other side.
"You think they're city folks?" he asked Werner.
"Probably."
"I'll come in this way. Marty and I can approach to within four hundred yards or so behind this ridge, then come down along here parallel to the trailer."
"Where's your spot?"
"There." Paulson tapped the best of the photos. "I'd say we should bring the machine gun in with us." He explained why, and everyone nodded.
"One more change," Werner announced. "We have new Rules of Engagement. If anybody even thinks that the hostage might be in danger, the bad guys go down. Paulson, if there's one near him when we make the move, you take him down with the first shot, whether he's got a weapon out or not."
"Hold it, Gus," Paulson objected. "There's sure as hell going to be-"
"The hostage is important, and there is reason to suspect that any attempt to rescue him will result in his death-"
"Somebody's been watching too many movies," another team member observed.
"Who?" Paulson asked both quietly and pointedly.
"The President. Director Jacobs was on the phone, too, He's got it in writing."
"I don't like it," the rifleman said. "They will have somebody in there baby-sitting him, and you want me to blow him away whether he is threatening the hostage or not."
"That's exactly right," Werner agreed. "If you can't do it, tell me now."
"I have to know why, Gus."
"The President called him a priceless national asset. He's the key man in a project important enough that he briefed the President himself. That's why they kidnapped him, and the thinking is that if they see that they can't have him, they won't want us to have him either. Look at what they've done already," the team leader concluded.
Paulson weighed this for a moment and nodded agreement. He turned to his backup man, Marty, who did the same.
"Okay. We have to go through a window. It's a two-rifle job."
Werner moved to a blackboard and sketched out the assault plan in as much detail as he could. The interior arrangement of the trailer was unknown, and much would depend on last-minute intelligence to be gathered on the scene by Paulson's ten-power gunsight. The details of the plan were no different from a military assault. First of all, Werner established the chain of command-everyone knew it, but it was precisely defined anyway. Next came the composition of the assault teams and their parts of the mission. Doctors and ambulances would be standing by, as would an evidence team. They spent an hour, and still the plan was not as complete as any of them would like,