Into the Storm Read Free

out of ammunition and explosives hadn’t been a mystery for a while. It came in over the border with remarkable ease.
    But this ballsy gathering was troubling. It was a show of power—a clear message to the people of this region. It was a clear shout out that the insurgents no longer considered the Americans to be a threat.
    Izzy kept moving, heading back toward Jacquette. It was obvious, to him, what needed to be done. They had to report to the lieutenant, who would call in an airstrike while the supplies were still at these coordinates.
    If they let it disperse into the mountainous countryside, it would come back at the Americans one bullet and mortar at a time.
    But calling in an airstrike was a major problem, and not
just
because lately air support had to be reserved days in advance. Jenk stopped Izzy.
    “How’re you feeling about the eight against two-sixty odds?” he asked the taller man. The equipment he’d seen in the enemy camp wasn’t limited to weapons and ammo. “They’ve got DF equipment—state of the art.”
    Jenk had used similar radio detection-finding equipment in a training op, and the bad news was that it worked. Extremely well. Technology tended to play leapfrog. It wouldn’t be long before the whiz kids in the lab came up with a radio that wouldn’t be detectable by this latest round of equipment, but they hadn’t done it yet.
    Bottom line, if Jacquette broke radio silence, it would be like announcing their presence—and location—to the enemy over a loudspeaker.
    Combined with that artillery Jenk had glimpsed in the flickering firelight…No, that was not a good idea.
    “So we clear out,” Izzy said. “Get out of mortar range, and then call in the airstrike.”
    “They’re blocking our route down the mountain,” Jenk pointed out.
    “So we go over the mountains and through the fucking woods if we have to. There’s more than one way to get to Grandmother’s house.”
    Unlike Izzy, Jenk knew this area well. “That’ll take us over the border.” At Izzy’s expression of exasperation, he added, “Look,
I
don’t have a problem with it. The weapons came from over the border. Fucking Osama’s probably over there, too, being treated like royalty. But I can tell you right now, that as soon as we give him this information, the lieutenant is going to start muttering about not wanting to cause an…”
             
    “…international incident,” Lieutenant Jacquette said grimly, just as Mark Jenkins had predicted. It was hardwired into all officers in the U.S. military. But unlike many of the top brass, Jacquette had studied under the best commanding officer of all time, Lieutenant Commander—now retired, which was a real shame—Tom Paoletti. “Other options?”
    Like Tommy Paoletti, Jazz Jacquette believed in brainstorming with his men, in a give-and-take of ideas. He actually thought it was a good idea to make full use of all the thousands of hours of training his enlisted SEALs had had in thinking outside of the box.
    Izzy scratched his nose as he tried now to do just that. They had to blow up those weapons and explosives, and not die doing it. This was a real Apollo 13 scenario. The SEALs were restricted extensively by the impassable mountain terrain, and the equipment, weaponry, and supplies they carried were limited.
    “We could just walk right through their camp,” Izzy suggested. “Collect a few head scarves, cover our faces, and boot-scoot down the trail. Call in the airstrike when we’re out of range.”
    “Like no one would notice us,” Silverman scoffed.
    “Maybe they wouldn’t,” Izzy said. But if they did, the SEALs were all dead.
    “They’d still pick up our radio signal,” Jenkins pointed out. “They’ll know we’re calling in an airstrike and be out of here in minutes.”
    They had to figure out a way to keep the insurgents here until the bombs started falling.
And
not die in the process. Sheesh. It was easy to do one or the other. It was