Executive Intent

Boomer checked the wrist monitor and found less than one-fourth of an atmosphere of oxygen in the suit. McCallum’s pulse and respiration were almost nonexistent. His friend would be dead within a couple minutes after all the oxygen in his brain had bubbled out. It was not a horrible way to die-the body didn’t explode or freeze, the blood didn’t boil-and he was free of the horror of loneliness and certain death that his mind had created.

Now it was Boomer’s turn to feel alone as he grasped his friend tightly, refusing to let him go again. But after a few minutes, his mind returned to the here and now. He used the last of the gas in the HMU to turn them around until they were facing Earth’s horizon, where they could see both Earth and stars. He had survived a disaster and witnessed his friend’s death…but he was alive and well, and he had an unparalleled view of his universe from which not even death itself could distract him.

A thousand things-no, a million things-could kill him at any moment, he knew-micrometeorites, radiation, electrical failure, or just plain fear, which did in his friend and fellow astronaut. But for now, he was just going to fall around planet Earth, enjoy the view, and wait for a ride home.

OFF THE COAST OF MOGADISHU, SOMALIA

AN HOUR LATER

The attack began precisely at six A.M. local time, just as day-shift workers were arriving at their posts, the markets and surrounding streets were jammed with shoppers and commuters, and weary graveyard-shift workers were heading home:

The destroyers and frigates of the People’s Liberation Army Navy began by firing a dozen Hai Ying-4 cruise missiles from fifty miles out. The subsonic cruise missiles took just four minutes to hit their targets around Mogadishu Airport, the Old Port, and the New Port areas, destroying known gang meeting places, arms storage areas, communications centers, power substations, and security checkpoints. At the same time, the first squadron of People’s Liberation Army Air Force Hongzhaji-6 bombers launched thirty-six of their own version of the HY-4 cruise missiles. The missiles had only two-hundred-pound incendiary and high-explosive warheads, but they had better than fifty-foot precision and devastated the south part of the city.

The second and third wave of H-6 bombers roared over the city at two thousand feet above the tallest buildings, dropping one-thousand-pound high-explosive and incendiary gravity bombs on main roads, highways, and intersections, including Maka al-Mukarama Road, the main highway between the capital and the airport. The strikes were organized quickly and not well planned, and several bombs hit apartment buildings, shopping centers, markets, and other businesses, but precision was not a top priority. Every building at the airport was attacked and destroyed except for the fuel storage area-the Chinese hoped it would be taken intact. The piers at both ports were left standing, although the warehouses, dry docks, and other buildings adjacent to the port that might shelter Somali fighters were flattened. Clouds of dense smoke all around the city blotted out the sun, making large parts of the city appear as twilight.

Next, three hundred Chinese marines from the naval vessels landed at Mogadishu Airport by helicopter and crew shuttle boats. Lightly armed four-man patrol squads fanned out along the perimeter of the airport. Their job was not to attack but to call in naval artillery barrages and air strikes. If even one shot was spotted coming from a nearby building, that building was quickly identified, targeted, and completely destroyed by air or naval bombardment. The bomber attacks were timed so that the destroyers and frigates were all within range of their five-inch guns by the time the bombers released all of their weapons and had to withdraw.

The combination of the devastating bombardments and the marines on the perimeter calling in more and more accurate strikes meant that the six unarmed cargo ships could safely move closer to shore, and with the help of commandeered tugboats, they quickly berthed and began to unload cargo and personnel. The original loads of humanitarian supplies and support equipment destined for Tanzania had been partially off-loaded in Karachi, Pakistan, and quickly replaced with warehoused military hardware-rifles, heavy machine guns, mortars, ammunition, communications equipment, protective devices, mines, tactical vehicles, and food and water for a battalion of Chinese soldiers for a week.