“Right,” Steve agreed. “If they have doubts, the next chopper will have troops,”
“Now comes the hard part,” Ali said, “We’re going to navigate with night goggles. We can’t travel with our headlights anymore.”
They pulled their bikes from hiding, and Ali briefed Steve using the bikes’ GPS maps to coordinate their route. They all drank water from their plastic bottles and lowered their goggles over their eyes. Then they left the security of the grove with Mike hanging on to Steve.
65. Persian Gulf: U.S.S. Dulles
In the big ship’s Combat Information Center, Lieutenant Wayne Duncan again checked the weather.
He had been almost permanently stationed in the Dulles CIC since the time he left Navarre’s briefing. The winds had been unusually strong. Given a choice, he would delay the operation twenty-four hours. Conditions were expected to improve the next day. Unfortunately, the timing was out of his hands and wholly determined by the operational situation in Iran. There was no alternative to making the pickup as scheduled. His Rigid Inflatable Boat was fast, fifty knots on smooth water. However, high waves robbed the RIB of its superior speed.
If they could only wait a few hours. The pickup had to be at night for the safety of the exfiltrees and the success of the operation.
He checked again, and the waves measured eight feet, the wind thirty knots; a bit lower than his boat could handle, but not a comfortable or safe ride. The good news was that the wind would keep Iran’s fast boats in port. The bad news was that the Iran Navy could substitute those small fast boats with heavier vessels. If faced by larger boats that could sustain heavy weather, Duncan’s RIB would be a sitting duck. The other bad news was that the second half of the mission, leaving Iranian waters with the CIA operatives, would take place at day break.
He contacted Task Force 160, better known as the Night Stalkers. Originally out of Fort Campbell, Kentucky, the unit, officially called the Special Operations Aviation Regiment, had been created after the disastrous attempt in 1980 to free the American hostages held in the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. The Night Stalkers, an elite unit that specialized in night operations in support of Special Operations Forces, normally worked with the Army Rangers. However, they had also supported SEAL operations. To his question whether the high seas and winds were show stoppers, their confident answer was, “Not a problem.”
On schedule, Duncan and his crew separated from the Dulles mother ship, which didn’t stop or slow down or deviate from its course toward the Strait of Hormuz. Duncan and his men were sixty miles from their objective. Powered by twin 470 HP diesels, the RIB would take them to the Iranian coast in about an hour and forty-five minutes if nature was their only adversary.
The RIB’s glass reinforced plastic hull was designed to lower the boat’s electronic signature, but there were no guarantees. Technology and speed could improve their odds but could never counter completely the element of chance.
As his coxswain, an eye on his Furuno 841 radar, steered the boat toward the Nayband Coastal Maritime National Park, Lieutenant Wayne Duncan peered through the dark.
* **
After a few miles, Steve felt more comfortable driving the powerful and sophisticated bike, although his concentration on the basic controls made reading the GPS map a challenge that he relegated to a lower priority. He trusted Ali and followed him. Ali found enough hard dirt paths and portions of isolated roads that they made fairly good time. The helicopter came within hearing distance twice but didn’t give any indication that the two bikes had been discovered.
A few miles from the coast, Ali and Steve got onto the SEAL frequency and established contact. When Ali informed Lieutenant Wayne Duncan that there would be two extra passengers to bring out, there was a pause. Then Duncan said, “Not a problem for us, sir. I’ll alert the chopper.” Ali understood that the chopper might not be able to extract two more people from the boat.
The only obstacle remaining was a road that went through the town of Nayband paralleling the coast. It was the place where Iranian security would be most likely to set up their barriers. Ali and Steve expected the road to be heavily patrolled. They had to cross it. Their only advantage was that they had the initiative. The route hugged the coast for about seventy miles, and without advance information, the Iranians would have no idea where their quarry planned to cross. Unless they detected the SEAL boat.
Ali stayed distant from the town. He spotted a path that would lead them close to the water. Although the actual pick up point was still nearly a mile away, Ali decided to gamble that there would be enough of a beach along the water where they could ride.
When they were still a couple of hundred yards from the road, Steve said to Ali over their bike-to-bike channel, “Let’s stop right here. I want to do a foot recon of the road before we announce our presence with the bikes.” Although they had been adjusted to make little noise, actual silence from an 1170 cc machine was not possible.
“I’ll take this side,” Steve said pointing to the right. Looking at Kella he said, “You take the other side. Check about fifty yards out.”
Steve jogged to get closer to the road and then slowed his pace. It was still dark, but the dawn would be breaking soon, and it was already more difficult to stay concealed. Suddenly, he heard the distinct sound of a walky-talky or of police radio. He stopped and tried to locate the direction of the sound. Staying as low as he could, he walked carefully in the direction of the radio until he could make out what looked like a jeep. It was
