They set up a large city map on a table in the barn, and the three Americans and the young rebel girl looked it over.
Yin Yin said, “We have a confederate at the Beijing police department. He is reliable — he has given us information before when we want to target a procession.”
“Information to help you attack?”
“No. We have never attacked a government motorcade, but we sometimes hold signs off the overpass when they come by.”
“How does your guy at the police department know?”
“The Ministry of Public Security is tasked with sending motorcycle police officers to the overpasses, on-ramps, and off-ramps to hold the traffic along the routes. Our man at the police station will be on the detail, along with dozens of other police. They are only told at the very last moment, and there is a rolling system they use where they only are given their next blocking point at the time they are to go there.”
“There must be dozens of options the motorcade could take to Zhongnanhai.”
“Yes, this is true, but that is when they are already in the city. The police traffic blocks start when they hit the Sixth Ring Road, and continue on into the city. We cannot attack them before the Sixth Ring Road, because we won’t know when he is coming. We can’t wait too long after Sixth Ring Road, because then there are too many options. Even if we did know which road he was on, we would not have time to prepare an attack.”
Dom said, “So it sounds like the Sixth Ring Road is where we need to set up the hit.”
Yin Yin shook her head. “No. They will have much security there.”
Driscoll groaned. “Sounds like our options are few.”
The girl nodded. “But that is good. There are only two rational options for the motorcade to take right after passing the Sixth Ring Road. The Jingzhou Road or the G-Four. Once we know which one of these two motorways will be protected by police, we can have time to intercept them before they hit the city road network.”
“Sounds like a crapshoot.”
Chavez said, “It’s fifty-fifty. We’ll have to position directly between them and haul ass to the right ambush point.”
On Wednesday evening the three Americans, Yin Yin, and two young Chinese men went to both locations in a small van with tinted windows. They would have loved to have been able to see the lay of the land in the daylight, but they didn’t find a suitable location on the G-4 until nearly ten p.m., and it was after midnight when they came across a fair ambush point on the Jingzhou Road.
The G-4 location was the more ideal of the two. There was good cover from a tree line to the north, and a quick egress route via a road that led into open farmland and then hit a major intersection on the other side, meaning very quickly after the ambush Chavez and company and the Pathway of Liberty rebels could disperse into the city.
On Jingzhou Road, however, it was more open. Yes, there was a grassy hill that ran along the north side of the straight eight-lane thoroughfare, but the southern side was lower, just above the level of the street, and a congested mass of apartment blocks and streets behind it meant it would be difficult to race away during morning traffic.
Chavez looked over the layout of this potential ambush site and announced, “We can hit from both sides, and put a gun way over on the pedestrian overpass to the north. Someone will need to be on the highway at the rear of the convoy to keep them from backing out through traffic.”
Driscoll turned all the way around to face Ding in the darkness. “I’ve seen my fair share of L-shaped ambushes. Never have heard of an O-shaped ambush. No offense, Ding, but I think there is a reason nobody’s ever done that. It’s so everybody doesn’t shoot each other.”
Chavez said, “I know, but hear me out. We’ll be attacking from all sides, but if we watch our fire we should be okay. The guy on the overpass will be shooting down. The guy to the south on the highway will be firing from a vehicle, shooting below the level of the overpass. The Pathway of Liberty will be on the hill, shooting down into the motorcade, and I’ll be on the other side with the scoped and suppressed sniper rifle, picking off people from the window of one of these apartments.”
“How are you going to get in an apartment?”
Ding shrugged. “Details, ’
They returned to the barn to find John Clark awake and examining the weapons he brought in from Russia.
Chavez had planned to leave Clark here at the barn during the attack and not have him there at the ambush site. He had a faint worry that Clark would want to go on the operation, but he told himself that John would recognize that a man his age, with one good hand, could do only so much.
Ding walked up to John while he inspected the row of weapons stacked on their crates. He seemed to take special interest in the two anti-tank weapons.
“How you holding up, John?”
“I’m fine,” John replied as he inspected the rifles leaning against the wall, the wooden cases of grenade launchers, the cans of ammo and grenades.
“What’s on your mind, Mr. C?” Ding asked, suddenly worried Clark thought he could have some role in the action to come. As far as Chavez was concerned, that was out of the question, but he was not looking forward to pulling rank on John Clark.
“I’m wondering where you want me tomorrow morning.”
Chavez shook his head. “I’m sorry, John. But I can’t let you go with us.”
Clark looked at Chavez now, and his eyes narrowed and hardened. “Want to tell me why, son?”
But Clark kept the look on his face as he said, “Who’s going to operate the anti-tank weapons?”
Chavez shook his head. “I haven’t figured that out yet. We’d have to have a shooter a good two hundred fifty yards back at least, and that would take one of our guns out of the fight, so I—”
Clark went from a hard look to a smile. “Problem solved.”
“Come again?”
“I’ll sit back with both twenty-sixes, back up the exfil route, and I will engage on your signal. As soon as I’m done, I’ll head back to the trucks.”
“Sorry, John. The exfil route won’t give you line of sight on the road.”
Clark walked to the map. Looked it over for about ten seconds, five seconds at each of the two circled ambush points. “Well, then. This overpass gets me line of sight on everything if they hit here, and if they hit here, then this hilltop will do the trick.”
Ding saw Clark’s idea instantly, and it was damn good. He was mad at himself for not seeing it, although he suspected he was just predisposed to keeping John out of the fight.
In retrospect, he should have known there was no way Clark would just wait at the barn.
“You’re sure about this?”
Clark nodded; he was already kneeling down to look over the anti-tank weapons. “These weapons might make the difference between success and failure. You need everyone to bail out of the cars in the motorcade. Boxing them in and picking them off with sustained RPG and rifle fire might just make them hunker down and hope their armor can absorb the damage until they are rescued. But if they see a couple of vehicles blown fifteen feet into the air, you can be damn sure everyone will want to get the hell out of their cars and trucks.”
“You can fire it left-handed?”
Clark snorted a short laugh. “I’ve never even fired one right-handed. At least there is nothing to relearn.”
“What about the two Divine Sword men in the basement?” Sam Driscoll asked now.
Clark answered back with a question of his own: “What about them? You’re not getting squeamish, are you?”
“Are you joking? Those two fucks killed Granger and half the security staff. Plus five CIA officers, and they
