Damascus Countdown (46 page)

That was it, though. David had no more RPGs. The back doors of the APCs were opening. Dozens of Syrian troops were about to emerge, and David had no way to stop them. Nevertheless, he ditched the rocket launcher, took the AK-47 off his shoulder, and raced forward to Fox’s side.

“Go get Nick; I’ll be fine,” Fox groaned.

“Forget it,” David replied. “Where are you hit?”

“My left leg,” said Fox. “I think it’s shattered.”

“All right, listen,” said David. “I’m going to pick you up, fireman’s carry. It’s going to hurt, but stay with me.”

Fox nodded. David first slung both machine guns over his right shoulder. He was lifting Fox and putting him over his left shoulder when he heard an intense, high-pitched whistling sound. He looked up and saw two contrails streaking down from the sky. Assuming they were air-to-ground missiles from a Syrian MiG-29 or equivalent fighter jet, David began to run as fast as he could toward the ambulance and away from the pharmacy. He stumbled twice but finally got to the side of the bullet-strewn vehicle just as the missiles hit their marks. But they did not hit the pharmacy, nor the spot where he and Fox had just been. Instead, the missiles scored direct hits on the two armored personnel carriers, destroying both with a deafening roar and two searing fireballs.

David’s heart leaped. Stunned, he looked up at the sky. The Americans had arrived. Zalinsky had come through. Langley was watching their backs after all, and David could hardly believe it. He wanted to smile. He wanted to laugh. But they weren’t out of the woods yet. He propped Fox up against one side of the ambulance and gave him back the MP5.

“Shoot anyone you don’t recognize—you got it?”

“Got it, boss.”

“I’ll be right back,” David promised, then took his AK-47 and raced to find Crenshaw.

“Nick!” he shouted as he ran through the flames and smoke and toward the pickup. “Nick? It’s me, David. Are you there?”

“Yeah, I’m here,” Crenshaw shouted back. “Is that really you?”

“Yes, it’s me, Nick,” David replied. “Don’t shoot. I’m coming around.”

He was glad to hear Crenshaw’s voice, but when he got to his colleague’s side, all the color drained from his face. The man had been shot multiple times. David counted two bullet holes in his chest and several more to the legs.

David groaned and bit back a curse. “What happened?”

“I’m fine,” Crenshaw lied. “I’ll be fine.”

“You’re not fine,” David replied. “We need to get you out of here.”

“Did you see those missiles?” Crenshaw asked. “Those were Hellfires. I thought we were toast for sure when those reinforcements arrived. But somebody up there is taking care of us, eh?”

“They certainly are,” David said, but he was worried his friend was slipping into shock. Crenshaw’s voice was actually quite strong. But he was losing blood quickly and didn’t seem to be focusing on the issue at hand: survival.

“I’m going to pick you up now,” David said. “Steve is over by the ambulance. We need to get you over to him. Now hold on tight. Let’s go.”

As David picked up Crenshaw, the man began writhing in pain. For a moment, David doubted the wisdom of moving him at all, but he had no choice. His only shot at disabling the warhead was keeping the team together. He hoped Crenshaw could hold a weapon for a few more minutes and provide at least some covering fire, as more reinforcements were sure to arrive at any moment.

Despite Crenshaw’s shrieks of pain, David heaved him over his shoulder and ran him to the ambulance as well, shouting ahead to Fox to let him know they were friendlies. Fortunately Fox heard them and held his fire.

David lowered Crenshaw down on the other side of the ambulance and gave both men orders to watch his back. This was it. He needed five minutes. No more, but no less either. Despite their severe injuries, both men gave their word.

Once again David and his team could hear the distinctive, high-pitched whine of an incoming Hellfire missile. All of them pressed themselves to the ground and covered their heads and faces and felt the ground shake violently as another massive explosion erupted a few hundred yards to the north. As David looked up, he could see that Zalinsky had struck again, this time taking out the Syrian special police unit that was just about to overrun them.

Still, there was no time to breathe easier. David asked Crenshaw and Fox if either of them still had their satphones with them. Fox had his and handed it over. David speed-dialed the Global Operations Center at Langley.

“Don’t say thanks,” Zalinsky said when he came on the line. “There isn’t time.”

“I know,” David said. “But thanks anyway.”

“You’ve got more special forces units rolling from the air base. You need to get this warhead disabled and then get your men out of there.”

“I’m with you on that,” David said.

He tried to open the back of the ambulance, but it was stuck. He tried to pry it open, but to no avail. Then he used the butt of his machine gun to smash what was left of the rear window and tried to jimmy the door open, but it still wouldn’t work. Abandoning that approach, he entered through the front door and crawled into the back, opened the protective steel case, and found himself staring at an actual, viable, fully armed Iranian atomic warhead. He used a Swiss Army knife to carefully
unscrew a plate on the side and within seconds was looking inside the heart of the weapon.

The problem, however, was that there was no angle by which the cameras on the Predator could see what he could see. Thus, Zalinsky and the nuclear weapons experts at his side back at Langley were at a severe disadvantage, unable to assess the weapon’s precise design or possible security features.

Zalinsky ordered David to begin describing everything he saw. David shuddered. He’d broken out in a cold sweat and his hands were shaking.

“It looks a lot like a W88,” David began, referring to the U.S.’s most advanced thermonuclear warhead.

“It can’t—Khan’s design wasn’t that advanced,” said Zalinsky, referring to the plans that A. Q. Khan, the father of the Pakistani nuclear weapons program, had sold to the Iranians several years earlier.

“Then Saddaji improved it,” David insisted.

He described to Zalinsky the key components he saw one by one, beginning with the Primary at the top, the bomb’s initial explosive trigger, designed to create an implosion that would begin to release the thermonuclear detonation.

“Is it spherical?” Zalinsky asked.

“No.”

“Two-point?”

“Yes.”

“Hollow-pit, fusion-boosted?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What about the Secondary?” Zalinsky asked, referring to the weapon’s additional explosive trigger, whose function was to accelerate and intensify the implosion and create a maximum thermonuclear blast. “Do you see that, too?”

“I do.”

“Is that one spherical?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“All-fissile, fusion-boosted?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Uranium or plutonium pit?”

“Looks like the core is plutonium-239, sir,” David replied. “But it’s got a uranium-235 spark plug and a U-235 pusher as well.”

“What about high-explosive lenses?”

“I see two of them.”

“How about in the lower left corner, down near the base of the warhead?”

“There’s a booster gas canister,” David replied. “And there’s a small metal pipe going from the canister into the heart of the Primary.”

“And the metal casing around the whole device? What shape is it?”

“I don’t know,” David said. “It’s kind of curved—like an hourglass or a peanut.”

Zalinsky cursed. “They really did it,” he sighed. “This thing could take out all of Tel Aviv.”

“Or all of New York,” David added, his heart pounding so hard he thought Zalinsky ought to be able to hear it.

“You can’t let it ever get that far,” Zalinsky ordered.

“I won’t, sir,” David replied. “I promise.”

Suddenly fresh gunfire erupted.

“What is that?” Zalinsky asked.

David frantically looked around through the windows of the ambulance but couldn’t see clearly.

“I don’t know,” he told Zalinsky. “I don’t have a visual.”

He called to Crenshaw, but Crenshaw said he didn’t see a thing. Just then, however, another burst of automatic gunfire erupted, then a second and a third.

“Steve, man, you okay?”
David shouted.

“No,”
Fox shouted back.
“I’ve got three hostiles approaching up Highway 7. And another dozen moving up the street—maybe more.”

“Can you hold them off?”

“Not for long,”
Fox shouted.
“Not without help.”

“Do your best, brother,”
David replied.
“I’ll be right with you.”

David picked up the satphone and took it off speakerphone. “I need some more help down here, Jack. We’re not going to make it more than a few minutes.”

“I see it and I’m on it,” Zalinsky replied. “You just stay focused. I’m going to walk you through this.”

Fox opened fire once again. Then, to David’s surprise, he lobbed two hand grenades at the Syrian forces coming up Rue Ash ’Sham. David hadn’t realized Fox had any grenades with him, but the successive explosions shook the ambulance violently. Seconds later, the car shook harder as another Hellfire missile streaked down from a Predator and created an even more enormous explosion at the head of the street. It likely bought them a few more minutes, but David’s hands were shaking badly now, and he wondered if any of this movement could set off the warhead.

“Steady, Zephyr, steady,” Zalinsky ordered. “Take a deep breath. Wipe your brow. Wipe off your hands, and focus. The last thing you want is sweat dripping into the interior.”

“Got it,” David said and followed his orders. “Okay, I’m ready.”

“Good. Now, you need to find the wires coming from the power source,” Zalinsky said.

“There are all kinds of wires here, sir,” David replied.

“Atom bomb makers use pure gold to make their wires because gold is most conducive for electricity,” said Zalinsky. “My experts here say the Pakistanis typically insulate these wires with yellow plastic. Do you see any yellow wires?”

“Yes, one.”

“Where does it lead?”

David carefully followed the yellow trail to a small metal cylinder in the lower right, directly across from the booster gas canister.

“It looks like a flux compression generator,” he told Zalinsky.

“That’s it,” said Zalinsky. “Okay, now, you need to cut the yellow wire.”

David wiped his brow again.

“Is there any chance this thing is rigged with security devices?” he asked.

“Like what?” Zalinsky asked.

“Like something to make the core detonate if it’s tampered with?”

“Probably not.”

“
Probably
not?”

“There would be no point to it,” Zalinsky said. “The warhead is designed to be fired at Israel—or at us—not to accidentally detonate in Iran or Syria.”

David’s eyes were still watering from the heat and smoke. His fingers quivered as he lowered his Swiss Army knife into the warhead and prepared to snip the wires.

“One thing, though,” Zalinsky suddenly added.

“What’s that?”

“I wouldn’t touch anything metal on or near the plutonium core.”

“Why not?”

“I just wouldn’t.”

David tried to swallow, but his mouth was dry. He desperately needed a drink of water but realized he hadn’t taken any of the water bottles they’d brought from the car.

“Fine, here goes,” he said. “Wish me luck.”

Zalinsky, however, didn’t say a word. David said a silent prayer, then again lowered the knife into the warhead, said a second prayer, and snipped the yellow wire. Nothing happened.
That was good, wasn’t it?
David wondered. They were still here. The bomb hadn’t gone off. But they were not done.

“Finished?” Zalinsky asked.

Fox was shooting again. Now so was Crenshaw.

“Yes.”

“Okay, you need to stuff the pit.”

“What?”

“The pit,” Zalinsky repeated. “The hollow sphere of plutonium—can you see it?”

“I can see where it is,” David replied, hearing bullets beginning to whiz by the vehicle. “But I can’t see it directly.”

“That’s fine. That’s okay. Now, there should be a small, thin tube that goes into the center of that pit.”

“To feed the tritium?”

“Exactly.”

“Okay, I see the tube.”

“Good,” said Zalinsky. “You need to clip the near end of that tube and then feed in some steel wire through the tube and into the pit.”

Bullets were now smashing into the side of the ambulance. Every muscle in David’s body tensed. But he couldn’t stop now. Fox and Crenshaw were firing short bursts in multiple directions, trying to keep their attackers at bay. They were sacrificing their own lives to protect David, so he could disable this warhead and make all that they’d been through worth it. If he failed, it would all be for naught.

He forced himself not to think about the other warhead, the one at Al-Mazzah. That one was already attached to a Scud-C ballistic missile. It was going to be fired soon, likely within the hour and maybe sooner once word got back to the Mahdi of the battle under way over this warhead. How were they going to get there in time? How were they possibly going to stop that missile from being fired? Doubt and fear kept pushing their way into David’s thoughts, but he forced them out. He couldn’t let himself get distracted. He had a job to do, and he had to finish.

Reaching into the core of the warhead once more, David tried to cut the tubing but couldn’t get enough leverage. Careful not to touch the scissors to anything but the tiny tube, he leaned in farther and again tried to snip it clean. Glass started smashing around him. More bullets were flying. The gunfight was intensifying, and now Fox was shrieking in pain. He’d been hit. The next moment, another Hellfire missile rained down from above, brutally shaking the ambulance and knocking David onto his side.

Sparks flew inside the warhead. David pulled out his hand and with it the scissors, then held his breath for a few moments. Still, the warhead did not go off. They were still alive, but they wouldn’t be for much longer. Wiping soot from his eyes, he reached back into the warhead with the knife. The scissors weren’t working. They were too small. So using the knife, he began carefully but quickly trying to saw his way through the tube. To his surprise, it was working. He was making progress. And soon he had cut clean through.

“I got it!” he shouted to Zalinsky.

“You got the tube open?”

“Yeah, I’m in; I got it,” David repeated.

“Good, now you need to find some steel wire.”

“Where?”

“I have no clue.”

The gunfire had erupted again. David frantically tried to imagine where he could find steel wire. He had no idea, and it angered him. If this was so important, why hadn’t Zalinsky told them to bring it with them? Then again, maybe he had. The last few days were a blur. David had barely slept, barely eaten. He wasn’t thinking sharply. And now he needed steel wire. He called out to Fox and Crenshaw. He told them what he needed, but not why. Neither had steel wire or any suggestion where to find some. He desperately looked around the ambulance but realized that all the medical supplies had been removed. He scrambled into the front passenger seat, wiping more sweat from his face and looking for anything he could possibly use. He found nothing.

He spotted the car’s two-way radio system and quickly ripped it out of the dashboard and smashed it open. But there were no wires to be found. It was all solid-state electronic circuit boards. He looked up through the shattered front windshield to see who Fox and Crenshaw were shooting at now, and as he did, he noticed the Chinese-made radio antenna sticking up from the side of the front hood. It was a K-28 model for two-way CB radios. He grabbed the satphone and described the relatively thin antenna to Zalinsky.

“That’s perfect,” said Zalinsky. “That’ll do. Just go quickly.”

David kicked open the side door, grabbed the antenna, snapped it off its mount, and scrambled back into the rear of the ambulance. “Now what?” he asked.

“Okay, you need to feed the antenna through the tube,” said Zalinsky.

David did as he was told.

“Done,” he said.

“No,” said Zalinsky. “You need to stuff it in. Cram as much of the antenna into that pit as you possibly can. Wiggle it around. It’s flexible, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. Then keep stuffing it in—again, as much as you can.”

David complied.

“Okay, that’s it. I did it.”

“Good,” said Zalinsky. “Now, take your scissors and snip off the end of the antenna.”

“Done,” David said when he was finished.

“Take the tip of your knife and push the last bit of the antenna into the pit so it can’t be seen, can’t be grabbed hold of, and can’t be pulled out.”

David did this as well. “Done,” he said again.

“You’re sure?” Zalinsky asked.

“I’m sure.”

“Good,” said Zalinsky. “Now the warhead is permanently disabled.”

“Permanently?” David asked.

“Yes,” Zalinsky confirmed. “At this point, even if someone could feed tritium into the pit, the implosion can’t occur. With the steel wire in there, the pit can’t be compressed enough, no matter how intense the explosives. And that’s it. No implosion, no detonation. The only way someone can use that warhead now is to cut the entire thing open, take the pit out, take the steel wire out, completely overhaul and remanufacture the plutonium, and put the whole thing back together. It would take weeks if not months.”

David couldn’t believe it. He’d done it. He started to breathe again, then asked, “Now what?”

“Get your men out of there,” Zalinsky ordered. “I’m firing two Hellfire missiles at that ambulance in ninety seconds. No one is touching that warhead. You hear me? No one.”

“Got it,” said David. “Just find me some wheels.”

“Up the street, about forty yards, there’s a white four-door Khodro Samand,” Zalinsky said, referring to an Iranian-made sedan.