“If they were both blown at the same time, it would wreak havoc. Imagine the situation after the Samarra dam had gone, massive flooding right down to Baghdad, and then another vast volume of water cascading out of the Darband mountains…to meet the mainstream of the Tigris just below the center of the city.”
“Doesn’t sound great,” agreed Admiral Morgan. “How long do you estimate it would keep Iraq out of action?”
“I’d say ten years. At least that’s what they thought might happen when the Iranians threatened Darband back in 1988.”
“How far will the missiles have to travel to the dams, Bill?”
“Well, that’s the problem…the eternal problem for weapons officers. Bigger the target, bigger the warhead. Otherwise, you end up kicking away at an iceberg with a toothpick. And unless you want to end up with a missile the size of the Washington Monument, you always have to sacrifice range…what I’m really saying is you can send a minor warhead 1,500 miles, but the same missile will carry a big warhead only, say, 500 miles. The size of the missile is finite. You either carry fuel or explosive. Every time you increase one, you have to cut back on the other. We’ll have to make significant adjustments in design.”
“Billy, you’re not saying we can’t do it, are you?”
“No, Arnie, ’course not. But I am just cautioning everyone we do have to trade a lot of range for a lot of extra bang. When I last looked at this sort of trade-off, range was
“Back in ’91, we were taking a very serious look at those Iraqi dams, and for a while we thought we could knock ’em down with modified Tomahawk missiles. We were looking at two launch-area options: one at the eastern end of the Med, one at the northern end of the Gulf.
“We knew we would need a ton of missiles per dam, which meant we had to fire half of ’em from the Med. But that option required the missiles to fly at least 600 miles. And that gave us a
Bill Baldridge stood up, paced the room, and drank some coffee. “I do seem to remember that Hughes went right ahead with the project. They completed operational trials, but no one ever told me how they came out. By the time they were ready, the goddamned war was over. But I did once hear they made a few. Shouldn’t be difficult to find out what happened to ’em.”
Ben Adnam nodded, already a comfortable member of the team. “It’s about 600 miles from the Mediterranean to the more easterly dam, Admiral,” he said. “But I have a problem with that routing, simply because it cuts down so drastically on our ability to optimize the actual route. We just don’t have enough gas for a lot of ducking and diving. The bird will have to fly on a steady course almost all the way, quite possibly through heavy Iraqi radar and antiaircraft defense. That has major implications for the survivability of the weapon in transit. And it has implications all of its own — if we want to get 6 home, and we are calculating a possible loss of 2, we need to fire 9. Basically that’s why I hate to launch from the Med.”
The admiral looked up and nodded, a kind of rueful half smile on his face. He just said, “Uh-huh.” But to himself he was thinking,
“How many of these missiles do you think we got, Bill?”
“Dunno. Hughes may have bagged ’em, for all I know. I’ll check it out right away. Even if we pull it off, we’ll still need two launch vehicles.”
“That better not be a problem either,” growled Arnold Morgan. “Because if it is, someone’s in deep shit.”
Bill Baldridge continued. “Look, we might get this thing done at short notice. But I have to check out, for a start, the status of those missiles. Then how many ships we have modified to launch these birds…and where they are…who’s nearest our launch areas. I ought to get through with that today…the main routing stuff gets done by the targeting-computer team…and before their machine spits out all our options, we need to feed in every scrap of information…the topography…every hill and valley…every intelligence report detailing Iraqi defensive positions along the way…right up-to-date, which it always is. But I shall want to talk to Ben. He might have some input.
“The computer guys will understand right away that our 600-mile maximum flight path is the critical factor. They’ll come up with options for us. Then we can start to make a few hard decisions, about the launch area and the vehicles that will fire the missiles.”
“Okay, Bill. Sounds like you two are on top of this. But remember, this thing is not simply a high-tech problem. We have to give real consideration to the political side as well. We have to find a way to make some serious evasions in-flight; otherwise, these bastards may leave a trail that goes straight back to the Pentagon. We gotta try the best we can to keep ’em right off the Iraqi radar…we gotta try every twist and turn to stop anyone from finding out where they came from.”
“And we don’t want to make it too obvious where they’re headed
“Right,” said Morgan. “That’s the thinking. Anyway, I’m outta here, so I’m leaving it to you two. Get the computer whizzes to do their thing, and let’s take a look at the routing options ASAP. Also let’s get ahold of a real good hard-copy map, so we can take a careful look and choose the right options. Second-guessing a computer is a dangerous business, but we have to get this dead right. You get any trouble with the goddamned eggheads and their fucking software…you know the kind of thing…resentment at a couple of outsiders like you and Ben…just use my name, and use it hard.”
“You sure it might not be better for you to pave the way yourself, Admiral…one quick phone call before you go.”
“You’re right,” he snapped, picked up a phone, and they heard him in action. Ben Adnam smiled a smile of pure admiration. Bill grinned wistfully, memories drifting back of stressful nights in Fort Meade with the Big Man.
“Right. Admiral Morgan, that’s me. Yup, that’s it…Iraq…all the way north from Basra to the Turkish border… right…take in Syria out to the west…right…that’s it…same thing for the Gulf. And lemme have a chart of the Gulf itself…right…from the Strait of Oman right up to the northern end. Right.
The admiral banged down the phone, as usual, without missing a beat. “Okay, I guess you got about an hour before he arrives. Meanwhile, work on the details — and then make SUBLANT’s Black Ops cell your headquarters. We’ll probably want one of their boats anyway. The thing is we want this done with a high degree of secrecy, but we need to be fast and efficient. The cell has all the facilities. Get to it…I’ll be at SUBLANT at 1600.” And with that, Arnold Morgan was gone, like a Texas tornado, sweeping all before him, frightening the life out of everyone who stood in his way.
The day passed in a whirlwind of helicopter flights, harassed computer technicians, phone calls, checks and rechecks, satellite communications to the CVBG in the Gulf of Iran, clearances, and the development of a cold- blooded plan to attack the two great dams that keep Iraq alive as a world economic power.
At 1600, both Bill Baldridge and the Iraqi Naval officer were unsurprised when the door to the Black Ops cell burst open and Admiral Arnold Morgan marched in.
“Just tell me we’re on,” he barked. “No bullshit. No major snags.”
“We’re on,” said Bill. “No bullshit.”
“Beautiful.”
“The best news first,” said Bill. “We have a good choice of launch platforms. We can fire from surface ships or submarines, and we can position adequate assets in the northern Gulf or the Med, or both, without any trouble. We got two cruisers in the Med, both available at short notice. And we got two SSNs plus another cruiser out in the Indian Ocean with the Battle Group. The whole lot of ’em can fire these weapons.
“The main drawback in firing from the Med is we have to fly the weapons out there. We’d probably have to
