The Devil's Handshake (40 page)

“
I agree!” replied Martin in
support. The murder of Litchfield was something that could also
cause him a problem especially if the world found out he was linked
to it and as such, it was something he would be very reluctant to
do.

Privately he figured that Litchfield’s
security teams and the Russians would be more of a match for
Wasir’s boys so they would more likely than not they would get him
out quick smart during the action. That is why he didn’t bother to
use any of his men for this part of the operation and had them
focused on taking the President, something as far as he was
concerned, was far more important.

“
It is necessary, Ahmed,
that your men focus on getting hold of the mobile network,
Litchfield is the secondary objective!” offered Martin instead
towards the bodyguard who gave a nod in return.

Like Martin, he knew the Englishman would be
well protected and though he didn’t say it Ahmed agreed with the
foreigner as to what was more valuable.

“
That leaves us with the
remaining seven armored cars to take the President’s offices
something that might prove difficult as its most likely he will
have support of his local militia,” Martin continued never in a
million years believing he would have to face actually thirty
highly trained members of Zaslon and twenty Gurkhas and five former
Special Forces officers.

“
These men are vastly
experienced they won’t be pushovers!” added Wilson with individual
analysis of the target’s bodyguards.

“
Indeed, but will we have
armor and superior numbers, so as long as take out the nests we
should be able to contain the situation by herding them into the
center of the structure,” added Martin referring to the four
militia machine gun nests around the building, by pointing at
them.

Again all the men sitting around the low
table nodded.

The next thirty minutes consisted of a run
through of the secondary targets and their locations followed by an
overview of how Wasir’s should conduct himself on TV once the coup
d’état was in full flow so to established martial rule and the
changeover of power as quickly as possible from the President to
him.

Briefing finished the ex-guardsman suggested
they synchronized their watches and confirmed that the operation
would begin at 04.00 hours.

“
Excellent, so it looks as
though we are ready to go,” answered Gourgamangi when the mark was
called, playing the role of an enthusiastic Indian businessman with
limited experience.

Twenty minutes later as the four of them were
eating a light meal, their collective mood changed with the rushed
and worried entrance of Ahmed with Mohammed in tow.

“
Sharmutaada ayaa ku dhashay
was!” translated in Somali as “Fuck the whore that birthed you!”
said Wasir as Ahmed let him know that more Russians had just
arrived on a flight from Syria and were met by three of Jawari’s
advisors.

“
The Russians are here for
the President!” he said towards Gourgamangi.

Martin and Wilson quickly sat up.

“
How many?” Martin said
fearing if the number was over a hundred it would immediately tip
the scales in the favor of the President.

“
It appears there are twenty
of them.”

“
And Ahmed tells me they
were unloading heavy machines gun and some other bags of
equipment,” answered Wasir.

Navjot, though saying nothing still in line
with his cover identity trying to show he didn’t understand the
significance of the intelligence despite inwardly already
processing the news. It confirmed his worst fears—it meant the
Russians were deploying early.

“
They are definitely on to
us!” he thought fighting the urge to show his concern and knowing
he needed to take control of the situation, the SAD operative
coolly took over the conversation.

“
We still have the numerical
advantage gentleman,” as if trying to brush away the
news.

“
Yes but the operation is
harder. I recommend that we delay and evaluate what we are
potentially dealing with,” offered Martin, suddenly getting cold
feet.

Fighting Militias was one thing fighting full
trained Special Forces units was completely different.

“
It takes four hours to fly
from Syria. Assuming that they would have also likely called up
military support as well that gives us approximately maybe
twenty-four hours or so before the initial wave of support troops
arrive,” Martin’s mind quickly worked out in an attempt to assess
the chances of success of continuing because he didn’t want to give
up his bonus or share of the spoils.

“
It’s tight, but we can
still do it,” he said, greed winning through.

“
We must begin the operation
now!” cried Wasir in support, having reached the same conclusion as
Martin, but with a different agenda in mind.

“
The Russians will send more
men, and we will have missed our opportunity!” he stated excitedly
towards Martin and Wilson who were now looking towards their
employer for a final decision.

“
I agree with Wasir we have
to begin the operation now!” offered Navjot for completely
different reasons to those around him.

“
Where are the Russians
now?” asked Andrew in the general direction of Ahmed.

“
They were going to the
Cismah,” replied Ahmed.

“
That means we will need to
change our strategy,” answered Wilson thought that some of the
armored vehicles and their men would be needed to take the
satellite farm, a primary objective.

“
No, Tony I have a feeling
that once they arrive they will go with the President to Dawalaa
House de Borama,” replied Martin overruling the fears of his former
NCO.

“
So we need all the men with
us,” he continued, sealing right there and then the fate of their
operation.

Taking over in order to exert his authority
in front of Ahmed and his sons, Wasir ordered Gourgamangi to return
to his hotel for his safety.

Relieved, the Indian billionaire gratefully
nodded his agreement as it meant it would enable him to liaise with
Clara and Langley over the developments that had taken place. The
last thing he needed was to have to sit around in Wasir’s compound
throughout the coup having to rely on their basic infrastructure
for information.

With Langley having a KH-11 KENNAN satellite
tasked over Adwalland, he would get instant information from Clara
and the team as to the development of the different objectives
around the city in live time.

With that the three men departed the house
and parted ways, Martin and Wilson headed off to the camp at
Aw-Barre. Gourgamangi, courtesy of Wasir, was driven back to the
Sammo in the city.

Once they had departed his house Wasir turned
to his son and said, “Call Mr. Leo. Instruct him to start his
operation! There isn’t a moment to lose!” He knew full well it
would take the Ukrainian up to three hours at least to reach
Lughaya by road.

42

Aw-Barre

When Andrew and Tony turned up at their base
to be informed by one of the other Ukrainians that Leo had already
left they were absolutely furious.

“
Get him on the fucking
blower!” Andrew said to the Ukrainian, only to be told by one of
the other Ukrainian officers that he wasn’t answering.

“
I have a bad feeling about
this, Boss,” offered Wilson reverting back to type as an RSM
despite his years serving in the UAE Defense Force as an
officer.

“
So do I RSM,” answered
Martin. “There is no point hanging around let’s get cracking! Get
the all the Ukrainians together and let’s run through everybody’s
jobs again and then decide which ones have to step up to plug the
gap of FUCKING Buryak!” he ordered with a resigned look on his
face.

Inwardly Martin felt he knew what was
happening.

“
A bloodbath of Wasir’s
making…fucking dictators!” he swore to himself.

43

Langley

The SAD situation room at Langley is one of
the most secure rooms in America, with its numerous walls of
screens hooked up to the world’s media and U.S. spy and
communication satellites, it is a 24/7 one-stop shop of information
flow.

Pouring a black coffee before returning to
his seat, Ali began briefing the Director.

“
We ready to go, the
personnel carriers have arrived in Borama, but it does appear Ivan
is on to the operation, unfortunately,” he reported.

“
How long do we have?”
questioned Young.

Both men had taken the loss of secrecy as
part of the job and didn’t lose any sleep over it. It was one of
the reasons they had gone to so much effort in the deployment of a
false-flag operation.

“
Navjot reports that
contractors will commence the operation at dawn, at which point he
estimates that they will have approximately twenty-four hours
before reinforcements arrive in support of the Russian assets that
are guarding the President.” Ali then went on to brief the Director
as to the emergency extraction contingencies in place.

Having finished his explanation on how the
Special Operations in Djibouti would be providing the extraction
team for the SAD team if they needed to exit the country, the
Director then asked Ali about Navjot’s reasons for deploying into
the theatre. He wasn’t best pleased, to say the least, that the
officer had done so.

“
A lot of time and effort
has gone into the investment of his GS legend if this operation
fails and he gets taken a number of Agency operations in the region
would be comprised,” lectured the Director.

Ever the politician, the last thing Young
needed to do was to explain to the President at National Security
Briefing that they had just lost one of their most senior officers
during a regime change in East Africa.

“
We will use one of our
assets in Dubai if he gets taken as backup,” replied Ali before
going on to explain how the asset would be used saying that while
it was a risk they had additional contingencies in place to protect
his cover identity if necessary, without explaining
what.

He didn’t have to explain what that meant as
Young knew full well what that meant he just didn’t want to look
down that particular corridor.

“
Okay, I am satisfied with
that, keep me in the loop.” the Director said before exiting the
room. Once he did so Ali turned to one of his young, bright
analysts who had been tasked with keeping an eye on any Russian
activity being reported in terms of troop movements.

“
Nothing of any note, Sir,”
replied the smart twenty-something MIT graduate in response to Ali
question regarding activity.

“
Let me know the minute
anything enters Adwalland air space that remotely looks like a
troop deployment!” said Ali to his young charge while he took
another sip of his coffee having decided that would be the signal
to pull everybody out.

44

Borama

As the morning call to prayer started to
ripple across the city, the defensive deployment around the
President Offices was primed and ready for battle.

Arriving late last night they had quickly set
up by the placing of the President’s militia around and on the
walls of the offices while inside on the compound in front of the
steps of the building they had set up two machine-guns nests manned
by Gurkhas who had also been given two RPGs and F1 Fragmentation
grenades by the Zaslon team that had arrived from Syria.

Inside the building, loyal men from the
President’s Clan had been split into two teams of three, again
further supported by three Gurkhas in each.

The newly arrived teams of Zaslon had been
deployed to the second floor so they could defend the windows
initially then once the building had been breached, the entrance to
the President’s office.

Finally, inside the office was the last line
of defensive deployment, Thomas’s and Igor’s own teams.

The strategy created by Igor had been
designed purely to delay rather than prevent the advance of the
Viper’s men with the idea of being able to buy time and cause
additional casualties by yielding space rather than trying to
defeat them with a single line. As such, no tripwires had been set
up.

“
If we can get them to lose
momentum over a period of time, that means we can yield lightly
defended territory in an attempt to stress Viper’s logistics,” Igor
explained to the President who had asked why they are setting
themselves up in such a manner.

“
Once Viper has lost
momentum or is forced to spread out to pacify us we can then
defensively counter-attack his weak points with the aim being able
to drive him back to its original starting position,” offered
Mikhail in support of the explanation having seen the confused look
on Jawari’s face despite knowing it was a waste of time.

“
I trust you my friends,”
Jawari answered trying to look as though he understood.

Earlier when Igor had assessed strength
numbers it hadn’t gone unnoticed by him that some of Mikhail’s men
were missing.

Surprised, he asked Mikhail as to their
whereabouts. The former Israeli Special Forces officer had
explained it away as Thomas wanting to make sure there was at least
some protection provided for the personnel that made up TLH groups
many teams on the ground. Although it was something Igor accepted
without comment, he wondered privately if that were the real
reason. Either way, it meant he had to adapt the plan to reflect
the loss of numbers.