CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Wednesday, October 11th
Iraq
The team had pushed hard and was ready and assembled less than two hours after the go order arrived. It was close to 0100, and two army Black Hawks arrived to carry the team to the target area, and they were flying without seats because there were about fifty men total.
On his team, he had Bryce, Seth, Jason, Martin, and Ace. A solid group of operators that he would take anywhere in the world.
Standing next to the bird, he and Shane watched the assault element load and then climbed aboard and sat in the doorway. Frisco strapped himself in by a lanyard so any sudden maneuvers wouldn’t pitch him overboard. Once he was secure, he looked across the tarmac and saw Josh and his assault team load into the second UH-60. They were a vital part of the mission because they were tasked with external security, and on this op, that was going to be supremely important because landing on the X required precision, speed, and supreme force. The helicopters were going to be heard for miles, and those inside the target building would know they were coming for them long before they arrived.
The only chance they had was to get inside fast, so they told the pilot to put them down directly outside the compound’s open gate. The breacher and initial entry team sat on the left side of the door of the bird, and the pilots were going to drop them down facing the door of the main building. He and Shane were on the right side and would go in next.
The bird roared through the desert, and he saw Karmah sprawling out in front of them, with only a few lights visible in the town. The helos stayed low, skimming the earth at max power to make it difficult for anyone on the ground to take a shot, and so far, no one had tried. Which gave them a small victory, and to be successful tonight, they had to keep stacking them up.
The target came into sight. Their bird was leading the formation and landed first with the other flying to the left, so they could deposit the rear security team and the second assault element. Taking a long breath, he prepared himself as the pilot swung toward the compound.
The Black Hawk’s wheels had barely touched the ground before he was out and racing toward the door with the rest of the team pouring out of the helo behind him. As they reached the door, he knew he and his men were prepared to face the maelstrom.
Yanking the door open, he stepped forward, flashbang in hand as the rest of the team stacked up behind him. With one fluid movement, he activated it and threw it beyond the threshold. A second later, its thundering detonation shook the building.
Bryce glided through the door in his assault crouch, and the rest of the men flowed behind him. Frisco moved in the opposite direction and braced himself for the weapons fire and bullets.
Nothing.
Standing in shock, he and his team stood inside a large room that was empty as the second assault team entered, swept in, and cleared the rest of the building.
“What the fuck?” he said to himself. Tapping the button on his mic, he called Shane. “Target secure. There’s nothing here.” Looking around, Frisco cursed silently because they’d stormed a dry hole.
Was it bad intel or were they just too late?
The adrenaline drained away, and he and his assault team gathered on the main building’s front porch as the other teams cleared and searched the rest of the compound. In the courtyard, they’d found several buried weapons caches, including RPG launchers and ammo stashed in the compound’s main outer wall. The interpreter brought over some leaflets that he’d found inside and translated them. Anti-American jihadist propaganda, which was no surprise. The whole town was probably one big al-Qaeda fan club.
As the ammunition and weapons the second assault team found began to stack up in the courtyard, they realized there was no way to carry it out. The EOD team decided to stuff it all into the trunk of a vehicle and detonate it in place.
Shane came up and rubbed his hands together. “Good news. We’ve got movement about a hundred meters north. The AC-130 gunship circling overhead saw seven or eight men bolt from a nearby house. They ran into an overgrown thicket at the crest of a small hill and went to ground.”
“We may have a hope of salvaging this evening after all,” Frisco said. “Let’s get those squirters and round ’em up.”
Shane nodded. “You want to take your team and go walk these guys down?”
“Absolutely.” He gave the order to his team, and within a minute, they were formed up and began patrolling toward the thicket. They moved north and soon were standing in front of a dense thicket that was about a hundred yards wide. He’d been in constant contact with the coms on the gunship and asked for directions. “Lead us in.”
“Go straight; the guys are in there. At least five or six that we can tell.”
“Roger that.” The men got in line with about five yards between them, and he gave the command to move forward. They traveled north through the thicket, and the farther they got, the denser it became, which spelled trouble because the dead leaves and branches that carpeted the ground made every step they took noisy. They might as well have a light shining down on them for all the ruckus they were making.
Pushing a few more meters, they encountered a tangle of trees, vines, and bushes. Their night vision was completely negated, and they couldn’t see more than a couple of feet in front of them, which made Frisco have second thoughts. “Sitrep?” he asked the AC-130 crew.
“You’re twenty yards from them.”
The foliage in front of them formed a solid wall, and he had no idea how they were going to find these guys safely. It was a bad spot to be in because they were essentially sitting ducks.
The gunship relayed again. “You need to turn to the northeast. If you keep going straight, you’re going to miss them.”
Feeling the hair on the back of his neck stand up, he asked, “Can you see any weapons?”
“Negative. They’re lying there not moving.”
“Moving northeast,” he said into his mic. He started to push forward, each step cracking twigs and crushing dead leaves.
“You’re right on top of them. Less than ten feet,” the gunship said into his coms.
Feeling his heart pound, he stepped to the left, and the night grew still as an empty field opened up to them.
Shit.
They were in the kill zone.
“Fuck,” Jason said into his mic.
“I second that,” Martin replied.
Frisco surveyed the area and had to come to a quick decision about whether the men hiding were worth risking his men’s lives. If he had to guess, he’d say Hamza was long gone and all they had were the security detail. They could take them in and pray they could get intel, but it was a risk, and the last ten years had taught him that this might not be worth it.
This was a long game and wasn’t about getting one guy and the whole jihadist movement falling apart. They were playing whack-a-mole, and the best they could hope for was that they outlasted the sons of bitches.
Keying the handset below his left shoulder, he gave the order to retreat. No way was he putting his men’s lives on the line for some low-level grunts of al-Qaeda. Prisons across the world were filled with them, and all it had done was create a profitable business for the private prison corporations.
The team moved on his command, and as they turned right, Seth saw an enemy fighter lying at their feet. Raising his weapon, he promptly killed him.
With shots fired, all hell broke loose, and forty-five feet away, the rest of the squirters opened up on them with PKM machine guns they’d somehow concealed from the AC-130 overhead.
These assholes were not squirters; they had to be the backbone of Hamza’s personal security detail. They must’ve dug fighting positions in the thicket in preparation of the meeting. Seems it was never meant to happen in the compound, and the house that these men had run from was the meeting spot after all.
Pivoting, Bryce and Martin dropped to one knee and began shooting into the thicket at the other side of the open field.
Fearing a blue-on-blue incident with the rear-assault team, he shouted, “Cease fire.” When they continued to take heavy fire, he realized that was no longer an option. Speaking into his mic, he instructed the other teams to hold their positions. Hearing confirmation from the EOD team leader, he breathed a little easier. They had no idea what they were shooting at, and losing an American life was unacceptable.
Bullets sprayed around them, and they were trapped in the kill zone of the open field The only way to win the fight was to kill the enemy before they killed them. Firepower was the key, and he leveled his rifle at the muzzle flash closest to him and pulled the trigger.
Martin cried out that he’d been hit in the leg. “Fuckers.”
Hell was erupting around them, and he kept pulling the trigger because the situation was desperate and all they could do was fight back and pray. Bullets smacked the ground around him, kicking up bits of dirt and rock that pinged off his gear. Hitting his mic, he shouted, “Troops in contact. We need an immediate fire mission.”
The PKM gunner continued to stitch the ground around them and hit Seth with three bullets. Frisco had enough of the shit as the terrorist’s machine guns continued to blaze, as they walked their barrels right and left, crisscrossing their position.
The enemy was firing blind because they had no NVGs, and that was the only thing saving the team. During a lull in the fire, he rose and Bryce laid down cover fire as he moved toward the man with the PKM. Bullets cracked and whined around him, and he finally hit the son of a bitch.
One second of quiet, and then, seconds later, the fire picked up again and didn’t slacken. Crouching next to Martin, he worked on a tourniquet for his leg as he directed the AC-130s incoming. American firepower lit up the sky, and the enemy’s firepower was finally suppressed.
The medivac bird arrived a few minutes later. The team loaded Martin and Seth into it and then fell back, joining the rest of the teams at the compound to wait for extract.
But the fight wasn’t over, because the gunship detected more movement in the thicket. Enough was enough. Shane called in 105mm howitzer fire from the AC-130 and turned the thicket into a smoking crater.
Watching the blaze, Frisco wondered why in the hell the supposed leader of al-Qaeda was such a piece of shit that he left his men to fight a battle he had no stomach for. Those men in the thicket were the loyal ten percenters, and they died in a fight that was never going to be won.
Resting his hand on his Colt M4, Frisco looked at the men gathered and knew they had done everything they could.
Tonight wasn’t their night, but they didn’t lose any men, and for that, he was grateful. Martin’s and Seth’s injuries were not life-threatening, and so for him and his team, it was a win.
Live to fight another day—in the end, that was what mattered.