Just Another Day At The Office

The second part of my three part series of writing on special operations carried out worldwide by military forces...

 

In the days since 9/11, the man hunting skills of the American intelligence services had grown by leaps and bounds.  It was not something they got a lot of credit for, but that was okay.  These people do not work for such things, but for results.  And so when the results came in, nobody celebrated.  They just put things in motion.

 

It had started in Italy, with information passed to a CIA Case Officer. That had been confirmed by MASINT and ELINT. Targeted surveillance of a "person of interest" had revealed new channels of communication that before had been undiscovered, and wire taps and intercepts quickly revealed a new trove of information.

It was for this reason that a Global Hawk had arrived on station, and began its surveillance of the suspected terrorist hideout. It had taken three days of continuous UAV surveillance, but finally a complete picture had emerged, combining with a variety of other sources to give decision makers an idea of what was happening.

It was time to brief the National Command Authority. A very serious man, a man who had spent time in both uniform and in the civilian world of doing the dirty, who now carried the coveted National Intelligence Officer Card prepared a Top Secret PowerPoint presentation, and the man who got to decide upon such things saw it the next day. Questions were asked and answered, and a decision was made.

The phone rang in a compound that nobody talks about. If you drive around Ft Bragg you will come across it eventually, but it is not officially there, and the United States Government will not admit to its existence. It is home to a unit often referred to as the Dreaded D, its members known as D-Boys. Special Forces Operational Detachment - Delta was ready when the call came. But then again, it always is.

A Predator had replaced the Global Hawk by now, just in case nobody could get there in time, and the Hellfire missile mounted underneath the fuselage was needed. Another very special, but not as secret unit, the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment could only fly their charges into the zone at night, and if the tangos made a move before then, all this was for naught.

But they did not. Bad people like the cover of night, even if it exposes them to worse people that hunt them. And so helicopters that cost more then the GNP of some third world countries lifted off the deck of a large gray ship in the med, and sliced through the air heading into foreign airspace.

There was a flight of F-18D's pulling race track patterns at 55'000, loaded for bear, but not knowing why. If the choppers ran into trouble they could not handle, the navy would come to rescue them. Tonight there was no need for that service, everything went smooth.

And so it was set. The road ran almost perfectly east-west, flat and smooth in the way that roads in the Middle East often are because they are built by men who have money from oil and think they impress somebody with it. On each side, rolling hills rose off to obscure what little vegetation and population there was.

The D-Boys had actually come across a small farm house that nobody had mentioned to tell them about. Somehow it had either avoided detection, or the a*****e S-2 (Intelligence) Staff Officer didn't think it important enough to mention it. The inhabitants, a couple with three children in their early teens woke to find themselves flexi-cuffed, and hooded. The soldiers would not harm them, but they could not risk them raising the alarm, either.

A security element was set 1 klick in each direction up the road, and the command element had communications with the Predator downlink station. The assault element and the snatch element where in place, with the security guys chomping at the bit for playing second fiddle in this high-speed, low drag op.

There was nothing to do but wait. For men who had dedicated their lives to being the best at the military art, it was a skill they had acquired long ago. They lay without motion in their positions, sipping water from their canteens and camelbaks, and remaining alert.

The convoy was thirty minutes late, but that was figured into the plan. The Predator saw it first, so the security element to the east was alerted, and they sent back word that the intel was dead on.

It was a bit more then they had expected. One of the Toyota pickups that made the middle east go round, full of AK47 toting security goons, followed by three new looking trucks, another security truck, a beat up Mercedes, two old vans, and two more security trucks. Ten vehicles in all, still manageable.

It was not part of the plan, but that was ok. Everybody here was a veteran, and they did not have to speak to adjust to the new situation. They were all well aware of their Squadron Commanders Intent, and adjusted to it.

When an ambush is sprung it is the most violent thing in the world. Extreme action is the norm, as you expel as much metal and lead as humanly possible, trying to annihilate everything in your kill zone, move in and finish those that survive by major miracle, and then make like Lola and run. In this case, violence was refined by skill.

The first truck simply disappeared, as rockets and grenades struck. The same fate befell the tail end charlie vehicle. Those lucky enough to be second to last got the pleasure of a M60E machine gun opening up on them, tracers setting the tank on fire, and sending another fireball sky ward. But by then, they were all dead, anyway.

But the tangos had practiced convoy escort drills, and the trucks gunned it to get out of the kill zone, at the same time as men jumped off the vehicles, AK's at the ready, rounds going downrange.

If there had been ten for every one, it would not have made a difference. The Americans had it all, from better training, more experience, up to night vision goggles that turned the darkness into clarity, and laser designators that made nice dots on the foreheads of the men they killed right before bullets smashed through the third eye. It took less then three minutes for the security trucks to be destroyed, and the trucks stopped, tires flattened and engines shot out.

The Mercedes was also stopped, tires perforated, and driver dead. The two passengers in the back had taken cover instantly, awaiting the same fate, but when it did not come, they reached for their own guns to fight back.

That was a mistake. The snatch team was already moving forward at a low crouch, two snakes of men with hostile intentions, covered by their fellow shooters and looters.

The two vans had come to a halt as well, but all their passengers were dead, having died of lead poisoning and massive hemorrhaging. One crew of snatchers checked anyway, just incase somebody could be hauled away.

The second surrounded the Mercedes, trained their weapons on the compartment, and yanked open the doors. The two inside were overpowered, flexi-cuffed, hooded, and dragged off, even as they protested and struggled.

Five minutes had elapsed, and a third column of six men was now moving down the line of vehicles, attaching explosive charges to the frames of everything that had once carried a internal combustion engine.

The trucks were quickly searched, two wounded drivers recovered. Placed on stretchers, they too would be carried out as intelligence.

But it was their trucks that were the reason for the Americans for being here, and a quick cursory searched revealed that two held potential.

Infra red strobes were placed, and using super secret sat phones, helicopters were called. The MH-53J's arrived overhead within seven minutes, and the two trucks were quickly attached to slings dangling underneath. Three more landed just off the road, and after the trucks left terra firma, the men piled aboard, carrying their precious cargo with them.

The sun rose three hours later, revealing to those that came down the road a carnage of mangled bodies and destroyed vehicles. The charges had gone off as planned, igniting the remaining fuel and ammunition, and wrecking what was not already gone. It did not take long for word to get to those that had owned those vehicles, and they realized immediately what had happened.

To the men of Special Forces Operational Detachment - Delta it was nothing special. They landed back on the deck of the American LHA, handed off their prisoners for shipment to an undisclosed location, and waited for a flight back to Bragg. Just another day at the office.