The sum of all fears - Tom Clancy [409]
Jack turned to the senior Science and Technology officer. "Who do we have up in the photo section?"
"Nobody," S&T replied. "Weekend, remember? We let NPIC handle weekend work unless we expect something hot."
"Who's the best guy?"
"Andy Davis, but he lives in Manassas. He'll never make it in."
"God damn it." Ryan picked up the phone again. "Send us the best ten photos you have," he told NPIC.
"You'll have them in two or three minutes."
"How about someone to evaluate the bomb effects?"
"I can do that," S&T said. "Ex-Air Force. I Used to work intel for SAC."
"Run with it."
The nine Abrams tanks had by now accounted for nearly thirty of the Russian T-80s. The Soviets had pulled south to find cover of their own. Their return fire had killed three more of the M1A1s, but now the odds were a lot more even. The captain commanding the tank detachment sent his Bradleys east to conduct reconnaissance. As with their first dash, there were people watching them, but for the most part they did this from windows now unlit. The street lights worried one Bradley commander, who took a rifle and began shooting them out, to the horror of Berliners who had the courage to watch.
"Was nun?' Keitel asked. What now?
"Now we get the devil away from here and disappear. Our work is done," Bock replied, turning the wheel to the left. A northerly escape route seemed best. They'd dump the car and truck, change their clothes, and vanish. They might even survive all this, Bock thought. Wouldn't that be something? But his main thought was that he'd avenged his Petra. It had been the Americans and Russians who'd brought her death about. Germans had only been the pawns of the great players, and the great players were paying now, Bock told himself, were paying now and would pay more. Revenge wasn't so cold a dish after all, was it?
"Russian staff car," the gunner said, "and a GAZ truck."
"Chain gun." The track commander took his time identifying the inbound targets. "Wait."
"I love killin' officers " The gunner centered the sight for his 25 mm cannon. "On target, sarge."
For all his experience as a terrorist, Bock was not a soldier. He took the dark, square shape two blocks away for a large truck. His plan had worked. The American alert, so perfectly timed, could only mean that Qati and Ghosn had done their job exactly as he'd envisioned five months earlier. His eyes shifted as he saw what looked like a flashbulb and a streak of light that went over his head.
"Fire, hose 'em!"
The gunner had his selector switch on rapid fire. The a 5-millimeter chain gun was wonderfully accurate, and the tracers allowed you to walk fire right into the target. The first long burst hit the truck. There might be armed soldiers in the truck, he reasoned. The initial rounds went into the engine block, shattering it into fragments, then, as the vehicle surged forward, the next burst swept through the cab and cargo area. The truck collapsed on two flattened front tires and ground to a halt, the wheel rims digging grooves in the asphalt. By that time, the gunner had shifted fire and put a short burst through the staff car. This target merely lost control and slammed into a parked BMW. Just to make sure, the gunner hit the car again, and then the truck. Someone actually got out of the truck, probably wounded already from the way he moved. Two more 25mm rounds fixed that.
The track commander moved immediately. One does not linger where one has killed. Two minutes later, they found another surveillance spot. Police cars were racing down the streets, their blue lights flashing. One of them stopped a few hundred meters from the Bradley, backed up and raced off, the track commander saw. Well, he'd always known German cops were smart.
Five minutes after the Bradley departed for another block, the first Berliner, an exceedingly courageous physician, came out his front door