ambassador. ‘Mr Warat, I am afraid I cannot allow this plan to go ahead. Your government must call its planes back.’
‘I am afraid they will not do that, Admiral. Under any circumstances. My government is convinced that we face annihilation as a people if we do not act immediately.’
‘You will be annihilated if you
The Israeli nodded glumly. ‘Anything is possible these days, Admiral.’
Ritchie’s heart was still thundering in his chest, but his head was at last clearing of the shock and disorientation. He took a deep breath and leaned back in his chair.
‘Sir, I am afraid I must inform you that I will direct US forces in theatre to interdict this strike and stop it by any means possible. I will further contact our Coalition partners and request any and all cooperation they might provide. And, I will immediately inform the governments of the targeted nations that your strike is inbound and that I will assist them in whatever way possible to repel it.’
Warat received the rebuke with stoic reserve. Behind him, through the wide glass windows, life went on. Not normally. But it did go on. Some traffic moved through the streets. Children would be playing in suburban back yards as parents did their best to insulate them from the horror of a world collapsing in on itself. High above the idyllic panorama, Ritchie saw the sun glint on the wings of a commercial airliner, outbound. For where, he had no idea, but it was undoubtedly full. The Israeli envoy sighed and quickly recovered his composure.
‘My government expected you might react in this fashion, Admiral,’ he said. ‘It would be the honourable thing for you. However, I must point out that your own forces have degraded the air defence nets of Iran and Iraq to the point where they cannot deny our air force. And the IAF has done the same to the Syrian Air Force over the last week of fighting. By warning them, you will do no more than condemn millions to spend their last hours in abject fear.’
Ritchie slammed an open hand down on the desk with a thunderous crash. ‘Goddamn you, will you
Warat’s chin moved up and down like a bobble-headed doll on a dashboard. His shoulders twitched and when he spoke he did not look Ritchie in the eye. ‘My government has prepared for such an eventuality, Admiral. The weapons packages will be delivered with an escort of IAF fighters. They will engage
‘My God,’ breathed Ritchie. ‘You’ll kill us all. If you do this, how long do you imagine it will be before some maniac in New Delhi or Islamabad decides they need to get the drop on their nemesis? How long will it be before Russia and China decide things will be a lot simpler with us, here in Hawaii, out of the picture?’
‘I cannot answer these questions, Admiral, as you well know. But I can tell you that if we do not act, the Jewish people and their state will be wiped out in a second Holocaust. And you
Ritchie dropped his head into his hands and rubbed at eyes that burned with a lack of sleep. ‘Get out,’ he said quietly.
30
HATZERIM ISRAELI AIR FORCE RASE, BEERSHEBA
The envoy had lied. Or rather, he had not told the whole truth because he did not know it. The target list that Asher Warat supplied Ritchie with was incomplete, as were other details of the attack, including the fact that many of the warheads would be delivered by Jericho II missiles, not piloted aircraft. In addition to the cities and military facilities on the list, the Israeli Cabinet had added a further thirty-eight sites. Suspected Iranian nuclear centres in Natanz, Ardekan, Saghand, Gashin, Bushehr, Aral and Lashkar A’bad were all slated for destruction, along with the cities of Tabriz, Qazvin, Shiraz, Yazd, Kerman, Qom, Ahwaz and Kermanshah. Five of the nuclear-tipped missiles were inbound on Libya as the ambassador had sat down with Admiral Ritchie, while another three were headed for military bases near heavily populated Egyptian cities. But one mission, the last to depart, had a very different target. The Aswan High Dam.
Colonel Rudi Molenz sat quietly in the cockpit of his F-15I Ra’am at the end of the main runway of Hatzerim Air Base in the Negev desert. Tel Aviv and his family lay fifty miles to the north, but the bejewelled cluster of lights would be dimmed tonight, as the city hid itself in the dark. He would not be able to glance back over his shoulder after take-off and smile at the thought of his two little children safely in bed, somewhere in that mass of glowing pearls, surrounded by soft toys and dreaming of Daddy’s return. Because there was no guarantee that Daddy would ever be coming home. And worse than that, no certainty that home itself would survive the night or the next day. Behind him, his weapons system officer, Lieutenant Ephron, hummed tunelessly, irritating Molenz, who said nothing. Ephron was nervous and the flat, atonal droning was his release valve. It was the same before all of their missions. When they finally had a release from the control tower, the little putz would shut the fuck up and do his job flawlessly. He always had before.
A brief crackle sounded in the earphones of his bulbous DASH helmet. ‘Attention Reach One Ninety, please stand by…’
Molenz felt his balls shrivel and became acutely aware of silence in the back of the cockpit.
The voice crackled in his Display and Sight Helmet again. ‘You have clearance to execute Plan Magenta. Preliminary release codes: Echo Kilo Four Niner Three Niner Foxtrot.’
Molenz had burned the one-use code into his memory but checked the mission pad velcroed to his leg anyway. ‘Release confirmed,’ he replied. ‘Reach One Ninety away.’
The enormous power of the aircraft’s two F-100 Pratt amp; Whitney engines came roaring up like an angry leviathan as the pilot’s heads-up display blinked into life. The caged fury of the jet fighter completely enfolded him and as always he felt the deep-body thrill of having so much potential power in his hands. Beneath the old familiar sensation, however, lay a dread that ran deeper than anything he had experienced in all the years he had been flying combat missions. It was not the fear of his own death, but of becoming Death itself, because attached to the underside of his Strike Eagle was a thirty-kiloton nuclear warhead in a specially hardened penetrator casing. It was designed to slam into the base of the Aswan High Dam, drilling down through ten metres of concrete, before birthing a small supernova to atomise much of the dam’s solid mass, releasing the superheated waters behind to
