Strike Force

Buzhazi was silent for a long moment, then said woodenly, “I gave orders to my Pasdaran units that probably resulted in thousands of such street executions, Mansour. The more so-called ‘insurgents’ and ‘infidels’ we killed, the more the clerics congratulated us.” He shook his head. “So went the ‘religion of peace.’ I’m sorry for giving those orders. I thought that’s what I was expected to do to support my government.”

“You were following orders.”

“The authorities are supposed to protect the weak. I was a soldier, a commander. I knew what my responsibility was — to protect the people, protect the weak, and defend the constitution, not give in to the bloody mobs.” He paused, then lowered the binoculars, thinking back to that time twenty-five years ago. “That was a crazy time, Mansour. One million rioters in the streets of Tehran. One million. A thousand people a day, mostly children, died just from being suffocated by the crowds. The rioters were like wild animals — completely out of control. The Pasdaran tapped into that fervor and convinced millions of them to sacrifice their lives on the battlefield against the Iraqis.”

“You changed all that by transforming the Basij into a real fighting force.”

“But that’s never going to erase the blood from my hands, Mansour — never.” Buzhazi motioned to the east. “There’s a lot of open territory around those farms along the Qareh River.”

“Yes, sir, but our scouts say there is a lot of irrigation equipment — pipes, pump houses, farm implements, that sort of thing — through those fields that might provide a few barriers to smaller armored vehicles until they are cleared away. That will slow them down.”

“For a short time,” Buzhazi said. He walked around the catwalk and peered north. “The Saveh Mountains are damned close, Mansour — we’ll only have a few seconds of warning when the attack planes crest those ridgelines.”

“I still don’t think they’d bomb the compound, sir,” Sattari insisted. “An infantry assault — definitely. A helicopter assault — yes, to cover the ground troops, perhaps to breach the walls, but not to shoot up the library grounds. That will give us an advantage — they’ll be reluctant to lay down a lot of heavy cover fire.”

“The Pasdaran likes helicopters,” Buzhazi mused in a quiet voice. “The common person can’t relate to a jet screaming overhead at a thousand kilometers an hour no matter how sophisticated it is — but even a small helicopter is a weapon of terror and confusion to everyone.” Just then, Buzhazi’s radio crackled to life, and he listened. “Our scouts in Qom report several armored vehicles destroyed by our booby-traps on the Ali Khani and Masumah bridges in central Qom. The Ali Khani Bridge is heavily damaged and passable by units on foot only; the Masumah Bridge is intact and passable.”

“I’m surprised they decided to use the bridges in the first place — they could have just rolled right across the Musa Sadr,” Sattari said. The city of Qom was bisected by a river that was so dry that large parts of it had been paved over and turned into open space for bazaars, playgrounds, parking lots, and campgrounds for pilgrims visiting the holy sites. “That’ll slow them down a bit while they look for more booby traps, but they won’t be so sloppy around the other bridges.”

“Every little wound, no matter how small, weakens the most fearsome enemy,” Buzhazi said. “Get the lookouts up here and have them feed us constant updates — we have less than an hour before they’ll be in attack range. Let’s get to the map room, build a picture of the Pasdaran’s deployments, and…”

“Warning! Helicopters inbound from the north!” Buzhazi’s radio blared.

“Hopefully just scouts, using low-light TV or infrared to take a look as the main force moves in,” Buzhazi said. He and Sattari quickly scanned the skies. “Two Mi-35 attack helicopters,” he announced. “Staying pretty high. Get out the Strelas and let’s see if we can…” At that moment he saw two bright flashes of light from one of the helicopters. “Get out! Get out!” he screamed, then jumped through the doorway leading to the spiral staircase that threaded down the inside of the minaret. He never let his boots touch the steps, but half-slid, half-tumbled down the stairs as fast as he could. He was being pushed along by someone cascading down the steps even faster than he…

…and seconds later, the darkness was split open by a thunderous explosion, a wave of searing heat, and the force of a thousand pieces of stone being propelled in all directions. Whoever was above Buzhazi was now on top of him, and they cartwheeled down the stairs together until they reached a landing about seven meters from the top.

The minaret was wobbling and shuddering, threatening to shatter apart at any moment, so as soon as he could, Buzhazi grabbed whoever had fallen on top of him and began hauling him down the steps. The tower somehow held as they emerged into the sanctuary adjacent to the mosque.