eastern Libya last night. They were first classified as oil derrick fires. But their location was right over a small Libyan military base called Jaghbub, mostly used as a border security outpost and a security base for one of the Libyan president's retreats-sort of Libya's answer to Camp David.'
'I'm familiar with Jaghbub, General,' Goff said. 'What happened there?'
'We got some overhead shots of the area, and analysts say there was an air strike against that base,' Morgan responded. 'Precision guided attacks against air defense sites, communications, security, and even pinpoint attacks against armor.'
'Interesting.'
'This is even more interesting-the Libyan president, Zuwayy, was there at the time.'
'Really? Did they get him?'
'Doesn't appear so,' Morgan said. 'We have been tracking aircraft coming and going from there ever since the attack, and we think we tracked a helicopter convoy leave there for Tripoli shortly after the attack. Shortly thereafter, Libyan state television announces a terrorist attack on Jaghbub, accusing the Egyptians and Israelis of attacking a Muslim holy place. The reports claim Zuwayy is safe, but we haven't seen him yet. Our guess is he got out but may be injured.'
Goff shook his head, then nodded to Venti. ''Bell him what your boys found, Richard.'
'About an hour after those fires broke out,' Venti said, 'a Navy Hawkeye over the Med is tracking a flight that took off from Athens bound for Shannon, Ireland. Pretty routine stuff, except the plane's not exactly on course for Shannon-he's flying basically westbound, over the Med, instead of getting a clearance direct. But he's following his filed international flight plan, he's on time and on courseno problem. The Navy is watching him. Soon, he's slowing down-way down. He's lost about a hundred knots. We call up the guy and ask if there's a problem, and he says no, they're just doing some engine performance data checks where they have to retard throttles. It's weird, doing stuff like that over water far from home-the aircraft is based in North Las Vegas, Nevada-but it's no big deal.
'We happened to have a couple Tomcats on patrol nearby, so we vector them over and do a silent join-up on the guy to make sure he's okay. They got a picture of the plane with the F-14's telescopic FLIR.' Venti opened another briefing folder and showed it to Morgan.
It was a very fine, detailed picture of an EB-52 Megafortress bomber being refueled behind a DC-10 aircraft.
'Oh, shit,' Morgan muttered. 'Is that one of Sky Masters Inc.'s modified B-52s?'
'That's it,' Venti said. 'And we checked the N-number of the DC-10-it's a Sky Masters launch aircraft also, modified for aerial refueling.' He handed Morgan another photo, this one an even more extreme close-up. 'Look under the wings.'
'Weapon pylons?'
Venti handed him a magnifying glass. 'What else do you see?'
Morgan studied the photo, then whistled. 'Missiles on rails on the sides of the pylons.' He studied another photograph, shaking his head. 'One missing on the right pylon.'
'Presumably expended,' Secretary Goff said perturbedly. 'Libya claims in its broadcast that some of their aircraft were shot down during the attack too.'
'Were your Navy guys able to track that bomber?'
'They lost it,' Venti said. 'When the bomber was done refueling, they must have fired up their radar again, spotted the fighters, and evaded them. We have no idea where they went. With the stealth capabilities of that aircraft, they could fly right over Washington, D.C., and we'd never know it.'
'Pretty circumstantial evidence,' Morgan pointed out. 'We don't have any actual evidence that the Megafortress bombed Libya, or that the Night Stalkers had anything to do with it.'
'This isn't a court of law-yet,' Goff said angrily. 'But I don't need a warrant to search a Sky Masters installationthey're federal contractors working on classified government programs, which means we can walk in on them anytime.'
'Let me play devil's advocate,' Morgan said with a smile, 'and ask-why not let these guys do their thing? They obviously uncovered something in Libya with that attack on Samah — Libya was definitely storing weapons of mass destruction there, and was probably getting ready to use them-and they probably uncovered something in Jaghbub, too. The U.S. government is not in any way involved in this, and that's for real: We're not avowing any knowledge of the Night Stalkers or their activities-we're not directing them in any way, shape, or fashion. They're terrorists as far as we know, but we have no legal reason to pursue them.'
'I am not going to let a bunch of Lone Rangers fly an intercontinental bomber from American shores and bomb another country with explosives big enough to show up on a satellite as a nuclear explosion and let them get away with it,' Secretary Goff said angrily. 'They're going to start a war in north Africa before this is over, and I don't care how deniable they are, we're responsible if we don't try to stop them.'
'You going to run this by the boss first?'
'Sky Masters is a Department of Defense contractorthat means I'm responsible for their activities,' Otoff said.
'I'm going to start my investigation, and I'm going to use all my enforcement authority to find out what they're up to. In addition, the Night Stalkers are under federal indictment as well-if we uncover evidence that Sky Masters is aiding them, I can and I will shut them down.' He looked at General Venti. 'Any way we can find that bomber again?'
'We know the tanker's profile,' Venti said. 'Basically, the Night Stalkers are doing an en route air refueling rendezvous, with the tanker flying a long, slow anchor route-they're obviously very well coordinated and in constant secure contact. They'll probably stay over the Med, although they can certainly do the refueling over Europe-they'd be worried about being spotted visually. We just intercept any aircraft matching that refueling profile. It'll keep our Navy guys hopping, but I think we can do it.'
'Can you find the bomber before it links up with the tanker?'
'That'll be tougher,' Venti said. 'The Megafortress is pretty stealthy-we'd have to get in pretty close before the fighters' radar will be able to lock on, well inside the bomber's laser radar detection range. If they see us hanging around, they'll just bug out.'
'That's what I want, then,' Goff said resolutely after a few moments' thought. 'If the tanker guys are in such good contact with the bomber, they'll tell the bomber to get out as soon as we intercept the tanker. I assume McLanahan has some kind of contingency plan in place, an alternate landing location somewhere in the region- they'll have to abort then- attack run and head right for it. They'll be out of the fight.'
Venti looked at Morgan quizzically, then nodded. 'I'll give the order, sir,' he said.
'I'll ask you one more time, Bob-you sure you want to chase McLanahan and his boys out of there?' Intelligence Director Morgan asked. 'They may be cowboys, but at least they're fighting on our side.'
'They're not cowboys-they're wild dogs,' Goff said. 'They need to be put away in cages.'
Traffic at the As-Sallum border crossing between Egypt and Libya was always busy, both because of the number of persons crossing the border-thousands of Libyans flocked to Egypt every week on three-day visas to go shopping, buy food, enjoy Egypt's superior beach resorts, or to get better medical treatment-and because of the tight security. Even before the current conflict with Libya, Egypt maintained strict security at the border crossing- today, it was even tighter. Every vehicle was searched, every person was photographed and questioned, every truck was unloaded and thoroughly searched.
That's why it was so unusual to see an unmarked limousine, three buses, and a refrigerated truck being waved through the crossing without so much as one customs officer peeking inside.
The convoy was met by an Egyptian army escort and driven off at very high speed another two hundred kilometers east to Mersa Matruh Joint Military Base. The vehicles were driven inside a government warehouse facility, where over a hundred soldiers, clerks, doctors, translators, and medical examiners were waiting. A military officer went on board the buses and explained to those inside what was about to happen.
One by one, the individuals on board the buses were taken off. Most were suffering from a variety of injuries, mostly burns to the upper half of the body and head injuries of all kinds-the result of trying to swim through or surfacing through spilled-oil fires on the Mediterranean Sea. Many had to be helped off; about two dozen were taken off the third bus by stretcher, some unconscious. Clerks, nurses, and doctors with interpreters were on hand, steering the men and women to interview examination cubicles.
