Vince Flynn - Protect And Defend

“That may well be the case. I am just telling you, the hard-liners will want something more concrete than the possibility that American banks might invest in our country.”

“American financial institutions will follow the U.S. government. That is why the president is prepared to offer you a billion dollars in guaranteed loans.”

Ashani was surprised. “What is the catch?”

“The money must go toward building new refineries. The loans will be interest-free for the first three years, and after that they will be locked in at five percent.”

“The money has to be used to build refineries?”

“The president feels it is the only way he can get a majority of the Congress to back it.”

“You want us to renounce our nuclear program?”

“No.” She shook her head. “Not publicly.”

“But privately.”

“It would help.”

Ashani winced. “There are those in my country who are obsessed with becoming a nuclear power.”

Kennedy leaned in and whispered, “Your economy is close to collapsing. You are on the verge of another revolution, only this time, you guys are going to be the ones thrown out of power. This is a chance for you to stave off disaster.”

Ashani scratched his beard, looked past Kennedy and the dusty front door. With just his limited view he counted five men in urban combat gear holding their weapons at the ready. This could be Tehran in a year or two if economic stability wasn’t reached. One thing bothered him, though. Ashani looked carefully into Kennedy’s eyes and asked, “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why are you offering to help us?”

Kennedy nodded. Despite Ashani’s relatively open mind, there was no getting over the fact the he had spent all of his adult life in a country that blamed America for virtually every woe. “Because we feel,” Kennedy started out slowly, “that there are enough people like you, Azad, decent people who want to put an end to the hatred and violence. Who knows what type of government might take over after a second revolution? Who’s to say it won’t be more fundamentalist and anti-Western than the current government?” Kennedy shook her head. “We have learned the hard way that economic instability in Middle East is not in the best interest of the United States. The lack of opportunity makes it all too easy for the clerics to preach their hatred. We want to see a resurgence in Persian pride. We want you to take control of your own destiny. We want to see you make advances in science and health. We want to see you succeed, if for no other reason than we stop getting blamed for your failures.”

Ashani had a look of intense concentration on his face. Everything she had just said was true, but selling it to men whose entire power base was dependent on a hatred of America would be exceedingly difficult.

Kennedy knew what he was thinking. “I know this is risky. That is why I am here and not Secretary of State Wicka. My president sent me because he knows you and I have proven that our two countries can work together.”

“That is true, but this is a big step.”

“What is your alternative, Azad?” Kennedy put her arms out and motioned in each direction. “Is this what you want? Car bombs and sectarian violence, kidnappings and bloodletting? We both know your country is closer to this than the mullahs would ever admit.”

With downcast eyes, Ashani slowly nodded.

“Then what is your answer?”

In Ashani’s mind there was no doubt this was the right thing to do, but selling it to the Supreme Council would be extremely difficult. His mind kept returning to Amatullah. The Peacock President would hate this with every fiber of his body. Still, there was a chance that the Supreme Leader would see it as an opportunity for his people to avoid years of pain and suffering. Finally, Ashani looked at Kennedy and said, “It is my sincere hope that this will be recorded as the moment our two countries forged a new and lasting friendship. I must warn you, though, that this is going to be very hard for me to sell to the Supreme Council.”

“I know it will, but I hope for the sake of both our countries you succeed.”

Captain Pete Halberg was a prime candidate for an ulcer. The forty-five-year-old graduate of Annapolis never lost his temper. Not with his wife, not with his six kids, and never with his crew. He internalized stress by shoving it down into the pit of his stomach, where he fed it with black coffee. Usually ten cups a day or more. His only saving grace was the twenty minutes he put in on the heavy bag in the bowels of his sub’s engine room. That and the bottle of Tums antacid tablets that he went through every week. On this particular morning the pucker factor on the bridge was running high.

Command of any submarine was an intensely stressful, yet rewarding job. Commanding one of America ’s newest fast attack submarines was in a league all by itself. The United States Navy had entrusted Halberg with the two-billion-dollar technological marvel and given him 134 submariners to lead. The cruise had been fairly routine up until two days prior when they’d received a flash message from Submarine Task Force Commander or CTF 54. Their orders were to leave the Dwight D. Eisenhower Strike Group, which was on patrol in the Persian Gulf, and proceed to the Gulf of Oman, where Halberg and his crew were to locate and track one of Iran ’s three Kilo-class subs that had left port in a hurry.

Shortly after midnight they’d followed a Liberian supertanker filled with crude through the Strait of Hormuz and entered the deeper waters of the Gulf of Oman. At 377 feet the U.S.S. Virginia was seventeen feet longer than the depth of the main shipping channel. There wasn’t a sub in the world, other than her sister ships, that could come even close to her capabilities, but she had her limits. Halberg and his entire crew had breathed a collective sigh of relief when they reached the deeper water of the Gulf of Oman. The Virginia ’s strength lay in her stealth, firepower, and speed. To use those, however, she needed room to maneuver. If the Persian Gulf was a six-lane divided highway on a dry sunny day, the Strait of Hormuz was a narrow dark alley on a dark rainy night. Twenty-seven miles at the narrowest point, it was dotted with islands and packed with shipping traffic. Most of its supertankers were nearly 1,000 feet long. The currents were quick and once outside the main shipping channel there were countless uncharted wrecks.

Based on the information provided by CTF 54, Halberg and his executive officer, Dennis Strilzuk, agreed on the most likely location of the Kilo. They set up a patrol grid and then Halberg turned over the command duty officer watch to the exec so he could grab a few hours of sleep. Four hours later he woke up refreshed and returned to the bridge. Traveling at five knots on an easterly heading, the lightweight wide-aperture array picked up the Kilo running at the same speed in the opposite direction, parallel to the Iranian coast.

It was a predictable maneuver that they had seen the Iranians use dozens of times. They would run their subs out of their base in Bandar Abbas in broad daylight for all the world to see and then transit through the strait on the surface. Once clear of the shipping channel they’d dive and then put the pedal to the metal. Usually, just north of Muscat, Oman, they would decrease speed to five knots and begin a series of lazy figure eights to make sure no American subs were trailing them. Then they would slowly work their way north and skirt the Iranian coastline just inside territorial waters, looking for an American warship they could fall in behind and tail back through the strait.