Strike Force

When artillery barrages failed to break down the defenses around Fish Lake, the Pasdaran decided to send in the Basij. Over a quarter-million men, women, and children were marched forward against Fish Lake’s defenses with little more than a rifle and one clip of ammunition, and the Iraqis ruthlessly cut them down. The casualties were so staggeringly high that it was believed that the sheer mass of corpses in Fish Lake would allow the Iranian Revolutionary Guards to simply walk across without getting their feet wet.

The Battle of Fish Lake was still re-enacted every year in Iran and the participants celebrated as heroes, but the foreman could never understand what could drive a man to march against machine guns, artillery, and barbed-wire fences like that. “Yes, sir, and I fought proudly and may I say, sir, like a lion,” the old man said. “I firmly believe that the apostate Saddam was assisted by the Americans and the Zionists to destroy the Islamic republic, and it was completely necessary to send in the citizens of Iran en masse to win a great victory.” In fact, Operation Karbala-5 was a tremendous failure — Iran withdrew from Iraq and sued for peace just a few months later. “So you may place your complete trust in me and call upon me any time for any purpose whatsoever, sir.”

“I see that some of the men follow you,” the foreman said. “Are you their leader?”

“I suppose I am, sir,” the old man said, “since I appear to be the senior officer of this particular group of proud and able veterans, but I assure you, sir, that I had no intention of taking command or control of these men from yourself, sir.”

“Of course not — I assumed you all might be veterans or served together, and it is quite natural for old ties to hold,” the foreman said. He winced at the word “able” to describe them — none of them looked capable of carrying anything heavier than a hammer. “You can be a great help to me by organizing your men into three groups for the three sections of wall where we must install the cables, then further dividing them into threes for each segment of the wall. Do you understand?”

The old man looked as if the foreman had just told him that he was about to meet his seventy virgins promised to him in Heaven. “Why, I…I am honored, sir!” the old man squealed. “I will do as you wish immediately, sir! To whom should the details report when they are formed, sir?” The foreman pointed out the team chiefs, who were supervising as large spools of cable were being unloaded and brought to the site, and the old man hobbled off on battered thin legs, croaking orders in a battle- and cigarette-scarred voice. The others, some in even worse shape than he, at first did not appear to believe that the old man was their new supervisor, but after pointing and gesturing at the foreman and snapping orders, he quickly made the others get in a ragged line and started splitting them up.

To the foreman’s surprise, the three little details of old and battered-looking men were in a rough but presentable formation in short order, and the old man had them marching off to report to their team leaders. They then began hauling the big spools of wiring and cables into the headquarters building. Not bad, the foreman thought. They looked like they might work out well after all. He might even consider hiring the old guy for…

“Excuse me, sir.” The foreman jumped. The old man was beside him, standing almost at attention on unsteady legs.

“What is it?” the foreman asked impatiently. God, he thought, the old man moved like a cat despite his rickety appearance.

“There appears to be a problem with the detail’s security clearance. The guards are not allowing the men to enter the security center of the building without your authorization.”

“They have all been properly cleared,” the foreman groused. “Are you all wearing your new badges? I’ll straighten this out.” The foreman strode into the temporary doorway to the headquarters building. Even though the security center was the most secretive room being rebuilt, sometimes the guards got a little too…

…and then the foreman realized that the old man was right beside him, matching his gait step for step. At first he didn’t think anything of it…until he wondered how the old man knew that they were working on the new security center? The guards would not have told him which room they were working in — they just would have prohibited them from going inside. And why was the old man walking right behind him like…?

Suddenly the foreman was pushed inside the room, and his site radio was taken away from him. “What is going on h—?” He was pushed against several men sitting on the floor, gagged, their hands and feet secured — and only then did he realize that they were the building’s Pasdaran security guards. “What do you think you’re doing here?”