Eagle Station Part 34

Court told the listeners that "cooking off" referred to the ammunition that exploded in the heat of whatever fire Spectre had started.

"Let old Spectre know if you have any more problems. The Saigon wheels say we're to be on station just for you guys until relieved by another Spec. Copy?"

Court said he copied, then relayed the good news to Cricket.

"Roger, Eagle Station. Be advised, we have launched the pickup helicopter. Have your pa.s.sengers standing by in four zero minutes."

"Sounds good, let's move it," Mister Sam said. He got up from the table where he had been working the radio, talking to Major Hak. He stretched and yawned. "Hak says he's not having any trouble with the PL that are trying to climb the trail.

Been knocking them off like flies. Says his own casualties are very light. Looks like we've cleaned house today. Maybe now they'll leave us alone."

Thirty minutes later Court and Wolf, carrying AK-47s, escorted Powers and his wife to the helipad. There had been no sh.e.l.l impacts on Eagle Station since Spectre Two Two had reported knocking out the gun. The firing from Hak's defenders down the side of the karst had grown sporadic and finally quit.

The radar station was fully manned and back on the air. The weather had improved.

They stood in a group and heard the whop-whop of the approaching Huey UH- I B helicopter. Court estimated visibility was now up to five miles and the cloud ceiling over their heads at about 200 feet. It was growing dark. He looked at his watch.

Official sunset was in fifteen minutes, but the thick low clouds overhead prevented the last rays of the sun from reaching the top of the karst. He looked down at the approaching Air America helicopter. It flew in the clear below the level of the clouds and below the level of the helipad.

"Well, really, genil ... gentlemen," Babs Powers slurred, "I don't want you to feel I am running out on you. Unlike duckie here, I'd love to stay."

Both Court and Wolf remained silent, and Jerome Powers took a step to one side as if to distance himself from his wife.

As the helicopter came closer, Court ignited a smoke grenade and threw it by the helipad to help the pilot determine wind direction. The red smoke rose almost straight up in the still air.

The blade sound changed slightly at a half-mile distance as the helicopter pilot started the climb for the landing site. When it was at 100 feet above the helipad and 1,000 feet horizontal from the steep edge of the karst, Court could make out the forms of the pilot and copilot staring at the landing site as they prepared to touch down.

Suddenly a whoosh sounded and a small rocket trailing red fire and thick gray smoke rose from below the edge of the karst and struck the helicopter directly in the big exhaust tube that extended from the engine mounted on top. Instantly, the turbine exploded and the helicopter broke in half in a ball of flame and pieces plummeted to the ground 5,000 feet below the lip of the karst. The big overhead blades had torn loose and spun off at crazy angles. Forward momentum carried larger pieces of the helicopter smas.h.i.+ng into the top of the karst short of the helipad.

"Oh my G.o.d," Jerome Powers said, his face a twisted mask.

"Oh G.o.d, what happened? Why did it blow up? What's going to happen to us?"

Court and Wolf unslung their rifles and ran past the helipad to the edge of the karst and climbed out to an overhang to try to look down at the fallen wreckage.

"I've never seen any missiles like that," Court said in shocked but professional tones to Wolf.

"I think I know what it was," Wolf replied. "Don't get out too far, there's somebody down there that doesn't like us. We got some real problems coming up from whoever fired that rocket. I don't think they're out there just to shoot down helicopters."

They stopped near the edge of the downward-sloping rock outcropping the size of a tennis court, which was covered with loose shale and rugged bushes growing from the cracks. "Go back to the bunker," Wolf said.

"Tell them what's going on.

Take those civilians with you. Get Mister Sam to rally Hak and some men and get a perimeter set up around the Station.

Get hold of Cricket, tell 'em we got a problem and we'll tell more once we know more. Then you grab a couple p.r.i.c.k 25s plus all the ammo, grenades, and Claymores you can carry and come on back. I'll stay here and try to dope out what the force level is down there and who it is."

"Who do you think is down there?"

"Don't want to get you all upset, but I think they speak Russian."

1400 Hours LOCAL, FRIDAY 1 NOVEMBER 1968 Sub-Committee OF THE CENTRAL WAR PLANNING COMMITTEE HANoi, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF VIETNAM The Chairman spoke to the GRU man in pa.s.sable Russian. He did not know the GRU man spoke flawless Vietnamese.

"Our reports are that the attack for the capture and display of the Americans at that Eagle Station in Laos goes well. Valiant Struggle is advancing to culmination as we have planned."

"I beg to differ, Comrade Chairman," the GRU man said in brisk tones.

"My sources have just this day told me the attack on the radar site is not going well at all. They tell me that one of your pilots, instead of directing artillery, was playing at attacking the site himself. And that your men attacking the site are easily being thrown back. Is it that you are quite sure your plan will succeed?"

The Chairman stared slightly to the left of the GRU man, with expressionless eyes, and did not answer.

"I have a Spetsnaz team standing by. They await only my command to have that site securely in our hands within one hour of their arrival. This can be done easily by the time you originally desired."

The Chairman swung his head to regard the speaker with hooded eyes. "We are succeeding. There is no need for what you suggest." He turned to his aide and nodded. The aide walked to the wooden door, opened it, and beckoned to the man outside. 'Mach entered and took the one chair across the table from the committee members. With a small sound the Chairman cleared his throat and spoke.

"Comrade Thach, this is our final coordination meeting for Valiant Struggle. Everything we have planned must happen tomorrow. You a.s.sured us of a successful news conference for tomorrow. What have you to report?" The Committee Chairman quizzed 'Mach in a thin voice that cut to the marrow of Thach's confidence. The other members remained silent and frozen-faced. The GRU man sat in his place at the far end. No one was smoking.

Thach saw on the table in front of the Chairman the most dreaded article used to ensure quavering fear in the core of the most stalwart Party member. It was a worn khaki canvas pouch with four cylindrical compartments. It was worn slung over a soldier's shoulder and was used to carry four large mortar sh.e.l.ls in the field. First, as a warning, any committee member who did not uphold communist party standards or who committed any transgression would be shown the pouch. Then, if he made no improvement, he would be silently handed the pouch. The guilty one knew he was then to report to a certain section of the 559th Transportation Battalion, where he would be issued four mortar sh.e.l.ls and a pair of sandals made from old truck tires and be told to join the next supply column walking down the Ho Chi Minh Trail to deliver supplies to the communist forces in South Vietnam. Of those who had set out on the journey, none had returned.

"Comrade Chairman, today went very well."

"I heard there was confusion."

"Comrade Chairman, there was some. I am not certain he will depart with the Americans tomorrow."

The Chairman remained silent as he stared at Thach. "Then tell me exactly what will happen tomorrow." His voice was a razor blade drawn across steel.

"Comrade Chairman, the criminal Apple will read a confession in front of the cameras that he deliberately bombed innocent people and hospitals."

"He was to read the confession today and depart tomorrow."

"I realize that. He did not. But he is now in possession of information that is quite detrimental to his country and to his spirit.

He a.s.sures me he will read a confession tomorrow. He even wants to write it himself. In it he may ask for leniency."

"Is he rational? Is he unmarked? Is he ill?"

"Comrade Chairman, he is in presentable health. We have told the American delegation he has suffered injuries from his crashed aircraft."

"Do they believe you?"

"It is of little consequence. They desire to believe and that is sufficient. The cameramen are from our sister countries and realize what the situation requires."

The Chairman looked around the table. "I will attend the press conference tomorrow. I want to be present when he reads his confession.

If he asks for leniency, I want to be there to grant it to him in front of the cameras." He flicked his hand.

"You are dismissed, Comrade Thach."

As Thach walked out, a man from the War Office, wearing the red tabs of a colonel on his thin khaki uniform, entered clutching a folder to his chest. He had obviously been waiting and looked hara.s.sed and nervous.

He stared at the Chairman, who tilted his chin in signal to approach.

The colonel bent and whispered into his ear.

"It does not go well," he said.

The Chairman looked up and caught the eye of the GRU man, who did not look away in time. The Chairman saw a fleeting look of smug satisfaction on the Russian's face.

1730 Hours LOCAL, FRIDAY 1 NOVEMBER 1968 SUB-COMMITTEE OF THE CENTRAL WAR PLANNING COMMITTEE.

HANOI, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF VIETNAM.

The phone on the Chairman's desk rang once with shrill insistence. It was French-style, black and old-fas.h.i.+oned. The Chair man picked up the receiver and listened to a hurried message from the colonel in the War Office. With a hiss of exasperation he hung up, dialed the Russian Emba.s.sy, waited an interminable time to be connected, and made an immediate appointment with the GRU man. Moments later, he sat in the rear as the driver of the black Peugeot sedan threaded through the bicycle and foot traffic toward the diplomatic area of Hanoi. The afternoon sun was hidden behind clouds and the heat was not as crus.h.i.+ng as it had been earlier in the day. He had heard Americans had air conditioners in their cars but he did not believe it possible.

The units were simply too big and c.u.mbersome and required too much electricity. He sometimes wished he had one in his office, but no one else did, not even Ho Chi Minh.

They drove down the tree-lined streets, where the only villas Ek being kept up were those of the diplomats. They pulled up at the high green wall topped with barbed wire that surrounded the Russian Emba.s.sy, where the Chairman was admitted through the thick gate by an armed Russian in baggy civilian clothes.

He walked under a huge willow tree thrusting up through the gravel that covered the entire walled-in complex. He was met at the door to the villa, which was tightly shuttered, and led to a small meeting room.

They never take you to their offices, he thought to himself, but then we do not either. The room had a small table and four chairs. The man who led him in turned on the overhead light, then punched a big b.u.t.ton on a ceramic circuit breaker, and an air conditioner started to wheeze from high on the wall. It was rusty, but he recognized some letters he believed to be Czech. His intelligence specialists had told him the Russians were not authorized air conditioners but got them by trading cases of vodka with members of the Eastern Bloc emba.s.sies.

The GRU man made him wait five minutes before he walked in with the air of a hara.s.sed official forced to deal with petty problems. It hadn't always been this way. This was only the second time the Chairman had had to visit the Emba.s.sy, and how different this time was from the first. Then they had wanted a mutual treaty signed and he had been given all honors. Now he was treated like an unwelcome supplicant.

These Russians were like all foreigners; no, they were worse. They were over bearing and ponderously arrogant, as if only they had all the answers.

"You are here because of the attack on the American radar station," the GRU man began. "There is little to be gained talking about it, comrade.

Your forces were not up to the task.

Mine are. As you probably now know, I instructed my Spetsnaz to finish the task. What did you wish to see me about?"

The Chairman steeled himself not to get up and walk out. "I must have your a.s.surance that your men are instructed not only to capture as many Americans alive as possible, but to bring them here immediately."

The GRU man regarded the Vietnamese with barely concealed dislike. Alive and in Hanoi, he thought to himself.

Now. that is a joke. Bring them here, then someone from the other side who knows Spetsnaz was in there will be exhibited to journalists, maybe even Western journalists. This cannot be allowed to happen. Once our men have the Klystron tube, they will kill all survivors and depart. If they decide one is an engineer and knows the electronics of the tube, and if all goes well, they will take him alive, but certainly not deliver him to Hanoi and these monkeys. He will be taken to that special camp in Siberia where the other engineers are. He leaned forward and tried to a.s.sume an earnest expression as he recited his lie'.

"Of course we will bring them here. It is what was agreed for your forces to accomplish. We are proud to help our allies in their struggle." Allies, hah. Inscrutable savages.

The Vietnamese had no expression. "Tell me, what went wrongs We had carefully conditioned two men from the other side. Were they found out?" It was a question the Chairman preferred not to ask, but he had to have this man's response for the Committee. It would be interesting to see how it compared with what his informers had told him.

The GRU man almost laughed. What went wrong, he said to himself, was exactly what we planned to go wrong. Those Bunth and Touby idiots did just what we knew they would do just as we had programmed them to do.

They were not fighters, they were grasping dope peddlers who paid allegiance only to themselves. "We have no reports as yet," he replied solemnly.

"Yes," the Chairman said. "I understand." I understand you have lied to me, the Chairman thought. He arose and they went through the departure amenities.

The GRU man watched him go. We will have our Klystron tube, he said to himself as he returned to his tiny cubicle of an office, and no one will be the wiser. At least we left them their dope production and delivery channels.

He tapped his tooth as he thought about the possible capture of a radar engineer from the site. The GRU man was well versed on American POWs.

And detainees-as they called the hundreds of World War II American airmen who had crash-landed in Soviet territory. Those men were held incommunicado in Kazakhstan until the end of the war. These days, because Kazakhstan was too well known, the special POWs from Korea and Vietnam were in a highly secure camp in Siberia where they could be exploited at leisure. Unlike the detainees, the POWs would never be released. But they had to be highly skilled before, being selected for the camp. Merely piloting an airplane was not enough. A candidate had to have had special electronic warfare or nuclear delivery and targeting experience.

Too bad the Strategic Air Command B-52s only fly over South Vietnam, where we cannot get at them, he thought. They have special crewmen who would be highly useful to the technicians in the Siberian camp. He nodded to himself. Few within the USSR government even knew such a place existed. The GRU man felt content. His plan was working.

The Chairman's driver opened the door of the ancient French sedan for him. He climbed in, barely aware of the surroundings as he thought of the conversation he had just had. Those fools do not lie well. We have accomplished our goals. The radar site is shut down, we will soon have three captured Americans, our poppy production is untouched The Soviets will now be blamed if anything goes wrong, and we have photographs oj'

Soviet men in uniform in Laos. Clandestine release of those pictures to the Western press would cause great condemnation to fall upon the Russians. Unless they agree to providing us with better weaponry for our struggle."

2015 Hours LOCAL, FRIDAY 1 NOVEMBER 1968 EAGLE STATION AT LIMA SITE 85.

ROYALTY OF LAOS.

Court Bannister climbed back to where Jerome and Babs Powers were huddled next to Mister Sam's wooden operations shack.

This was ground combat, something he wasn't trained for, but he knew he had the best man in the business running the show, and he would do anything Wolf told him.

"What's going on?" Powers yelled. "Why didn't you stay here with us? We don't have any guns."

"Get a move on," Court said. "Back to the bunker."

"But what about our helicopter?" Powers said, on the verge of hysteria.

"We're supposed to leave. Maybe there's another."

"Maybe," Court said, "but not for a while. Let's go now."

"Come on, Jer. Do like the man says," Babs Powers said and walked to where Court stood in the gathering darkness. Slowly, as if reluctant to leave a place of known safety, Jerome Powers joined them. Court urged them into a trot up to the bunker.

"What is going on?" Mister Sam said as they entered.

Quickly Court briefed him on what had happened, then grabbed the microphone and, using his Phantom call sign, called Cricket, who answered on the first call, and they went secure-voice.

"Cricket, we got a big problem down here. An unknown force is on the south face of the karst. They just shot down the Air America helicopter with some kind of a surface-to-air missile.

No survivors. One of our guys is down there now trying to get a line on who's doing the shooting. He thinks they're Russian.

We need Spectre ASAP and have the Phantom FACs standing by for cover tonight. Copy?"

Cricket said they copied and asked Court for the eight-digit map coordinates of the enemy force. Court read off the numbers, then asked what the weather report for the night was.

"Not too good, Phantom. We've got buildups to 35,000 feet, scattered thunderstorms, ceiling running about 5 to 6,000 feet, visibility zip when it's dark." Although the ceiling was a mile above the jungle surrounding the karst, Eagle Station once again jutted into the low clouds.

"We can give you some Skyspot birds," Cricket said over the loudspeaker, "if you can keep your radar on the air. And we just got word from 7th we can give you Spectre coverage all night."

"Sounds good," Court transmitted.