evidence of that.”
One of Davis’s finely sculptured eyebrows rose skeptically. “No plan? Then how do you explain the wave of terror that’s been spreading across this whole country for the last three weeks? Is this all just a terrible coincidence?”
Flynn refused to rise to the bait. “I’m not prepared to discuss details of our investigations at this time, Ms. Davis. But I will say that an organized, nationwide conspiracy seems unlikely. Historically, none of these radical groups have trusted each other enough to work effectively together.”
“And you have no other explanation?” prompted the reporter.
“The best way to get answers is to find and arrest the men responsible.”
“And just how close are you to doing that?”
Flynn looked grim. “I can’t comment on that. We’re making some progress.” The tall FBI man turned away with a final, curt “That’s all I have time for, Ms. Davis.”
The camera followed him striding back into the building, surrounded by security men and aides, and then cut back to Davis. She addressed the studio-based anchorwoman. “Well, Fran, there you have it. Despite an intense effort, the FBI seems no nearer to stopping this deadly terrorist campaign than they were at the very beginning. This is Rita Davis, reporting live from the Hoover Building.”
Captain Farhad Kazemi felt the C-130 Hercules transport plane bank sharply, beginning its descent over the blue waters of the Persian Gulf. They were on final approach to Bushehr’s tiny airport.
He glanced forward toward where General Amir Taleh sat reading deep in one of the unit readiness reports that consumed so much of the general’s time these days. Nearly sixty heavily armed soldiers wearing the green beret of Iran’s Special Forces filled the rest of the C-130’s troop compartment. Perhaps too many, Kazemi thought, but his near-raw nerves demanded that he take every measure imaginable to ensure his commander’s security.
When Kazemi was a young officer candidate, Taleh had saved him from execution by a Revolutionary tribunal, and ever since he had dedicated himself to keeping the general alive. That was getting harder to do.
The commander of Iran’s armed forces was playing a dangerous double game. His real plans were still a closely guarded secret. But opposition to his publicly stated policies was on the rise among Iran’s religious fanatics, some in the bureaucracy, and the survivors of the discredited Pasdaran. Taleh’s military and political reforms had wrecked many careers, most with good cause, but they had also left behind many angry men without much to lose. Such men were dangerous.
Kazemi felt himself pressed back into his seat as the Hercules bounced once and then braked sharply before taxiing toward one of the hangars at the airfield’s far end. They were down.
The Special Forces troops trotted down the C-130’s rear ramp and fanned out across the airfield, securing the small terminal building and the closest hangars before Kazemi allowed the general to emerge.
As a further precaution, Taleh would ride into town in one of three identical staff cars. The captain also dispatched a squad to scout the route ahead. Bushehr’s sunlit streets might make a pleasant change from Tehran’s crowded, polluted, frigid avenues, but they could prove just as hazardous.
Even though this was an unannounced inspection tour, Kazemi had no intention of taking unnecessary chances. Arranging some of Taleh’s own “incidents” had taught him just how vulnerable they were outside the well-defended precincts of their Tehran headquarters.
The sleepy little town of Bushehr jutted out into the Persian Gulf at the end of a narrow, waterlogged peninsula. Sand colored mud-brick houses with balconies, latticed windows, and flat roofs lined the old city’s narrow, winding alleys and waterfront. Street urchins played leisurely, seemingly endless games of soccer, sticking to the cooler shadows wherever possible, dodging in and around brightly clad women out on their own slow, daily errands.
During the 1700s the town had been the country’s principal port. But when it was bypassed by the trans- Iranian railroad in the 1930s, it had fallen steadily in importance and value. Exposed to repeated air and missile attacks during the war with Iraq, Bushehr had sunk further as a viable commercial harbor.
Now the port’s main business came from the Iranian Navy. During the war, Pasdaran Boghammer speedboats had used Bushehr as a base for raids on Iraqi and Kuwaiti shipping with some success. Since then, the Regular Navy had begun moving some of its activities northward from its crowded main base at Bandar-e Abbas.
Kazemi felt himself start to relax only when their wellarmed convoy of staff cars and troop carriers passed through the military checkpoint marking the logistics base perimeter. This was now friendly ground.
One week before, contingents of Iranian Army troops had occupied the old warehouse district adjoining the Bushehr naval base. They’d repaired and erected fences and barbedwire entanglements around the area, boarded up warehouse windows, and set up a ring of bristling sentry posts to keep the curious out and some of Taleh’s secrets in.
Military equipment and supplies of all kinds were pouring into Bushehr. Convoys of trucks piled high with tank, artillery, and small-arms ammunition had begun arriving from the north mostly at night and always under heavy guard. Other materiel arrived at the airfield, flown directly from overseas arms dealers.
Taleh had handpicked a trusted officer, one renowned as a master logistician, to manage the all-important buildup here. Now it was time to see if he was doing his job properly.
Surrounded by a small cluster of his own aides, General Shahrough Akhavi was waiting for Taleh in front of the headquarters building, an old commercial shipping office taken over by the Army. He was a short, solidly built man, but his wire-rimmed glasses and full beard gave him a bookish air, like a university professor or a bookstore proprietor. He wasn’t one of Taleh’s inner circle, but the general had marked him as a fine officer, another man with Western training who had suffered at the hands of the Revolutionary Guards.
Taleh emerged from the car, and the two generals greeted each other warmly. Kazemi ignored them and concentrated instead on rechecking his security arrangements. What he saw pleased him. The Special Forces detachments were in place, ubiquitous but unobtrusive. There were no signs of trouble in any of the surrounding buildings. Good.
The captain turned back to his superiors.
Akhavi was introducing his staff to Taleh. As each man stepped up and saluted, Kazemi studied them closely. He always found it interesting to watch the faces of junior officers when they first met the Chief of Staff of their nation’s armed forces. Fear was common, as was awe, and sometimes open admiration. He was possessive enough about his commander to take something of a proprietary interest in their reactions.
One man, a tall, scarred major, seemed to keep his emotions very carefully under control when he met Taleh. But as he turned away, a flash of some strong emotion rippled across his features. He looked as though he’d smelled something bad or seen something disgusting. The expression was gone as quickly as it had come, but seeing it raised the hairs on the back of Kazemi’s neck.
A bad attitude like that was not conducive to a smoothly running operation, and this was too important a post to let the matter pass. The captain resolved to discuss Akhavi’s staff with Taleh at the next available opportunity.
The group, led by the two generals, started up the steps into the headquarters building. Kazemi hung back as was his habit, to make sure the security people were keeping up.
There was the tall major again, he noticed, moving quickly, maneuvering through the crowd of officers to approach Taleh from behind. The man’s right hand was held tight and flat over his pistol holster, slowly lifting the flap.
For an instant, Kazemi froze. The major was not simply a disgruntled staff officer. He was an assassin.
The captain started moving, racing up the steps without calling out. The security detail was too far away and the would-be assassin too close for an outcry to do Taleh any good. He could see the man’s pistol slowly coming clear of the holster. No!
Desperate now, Kazemi shoved a fat colonel out of his way and lunged up the last few steps. Still moving full tilt, he crashed into the assassin from behind, knocking him to the ground in a tangle of flailing arms and kicking legs. The pistol skittered away, unfired.
