The Command

David Poyer The Command

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Ex nihilo nihil fit. For this book I owe thanks to Bob Berkel, Steve Boyer, Ina Birch, Wayne Burch, Al Chester, Katharine Cluverius, Mike Cohen, Donald J. Davidson, Drew Davis, Bart Denny, Mona Dre-icer, Ernest Duplessis, Marie Estrada, George W Fleck, Clive Foster, Sohrab Fracis, Sloan Harris, Michael Holm, Donna Hopkins, Bill Hunteman, Chris Borroni Huxtable, Sarvar Irani, Deborah Lee James, Marty Janczak, Sean Jenkins, John Kirby, James King, Ted Koler, Shea Kornblum, A. J. Magnan, Bob Malouin, Edison McDaniels, John McE-leny, Peter Mercier, Paula Mills, Joe Navratil, Gail Nicula, Paula Paschall, Jim Pelkofski, Lin Poyer, John Pucky, Sally Richardson, Josea Salam, Scott Schwartz, Sandra Scoville, Asia Sharif-Clark, Matt Shear, Denny Shelton, Denise Strother, Terry Sutherland, Chan Swallow, Jim Tankovich, Bill Valentine, Kimberley Walz, Mark Young, and many others who preferred anonymity. Thanks also to Commander, U.S. Atlantic Fleet; Commander, Second Fleet; the Eastern Shore Public Library, the Northampton Free Library, the Joint Forces Staff College, and to the crews, goat lockers, and wardrooms of USS Deyo (DD-989) and USS George Washington (CVN-73). Thanks to USS Donald Cook for the names of her ship’s boats, and to personnel of R/V Gosport and USS Hue City for live training in boarding and search. My most grateful thanks to George Witte, editor and advisor of long standing, and to Lenore Hart, best friend and reality check. As always, all errors and deficiencies are my own.

MAP

EPIGRAPH

The single best augury is to fight for one’s country.

— Homer, The Illiad

Prologue

1992: Central Asia

The mountains were silver and cobalt and jet. They flashed like jewels in the golden rays of the declining sun. Waterfalls arched over shadowy gorges. They were pristine and stark and very beautiful, and above them, floating in the crystal air like distant planets, towered range after range of the Himalayas.

The base lay where the road ground upward from a dusty plain. For years the Soviet flag had flown above it. Its guard towers had been manned by the elite security troops of the Twelfth Department. For a while, after they left, the flagpole had been bare. Then, one night, had disappeared, leaving only a wrenched-off stub embedded in the concrete.

Now the bunkhouses stood empty. Armor, heavy trucks, self-propelled howitzers waited in forlorn rows on the dusty hardstand. The guards had been hastily organized by a newly and equivocally independent state. The tanks, the artillery tubes, the other weapons might or might not belong to that state. Like much else in the wreckage of an empire, their status was … unclear.

The base commander was eating rice and lamb shashlik by the light of a kerosene lamp when his subordinate, a captain, barged in without knocking. Neither was Russian, though they wore threadbare Soviet uniforms.

The captain explained in great distress that one of the special weapons seemed to be missing.

“When was the last inventory?” the commander asked, fingers halted halfway to his mouth. A clump of rice detached itself from the ball and fell to the floor.

“Three months ago, when you arrived.”

“But they must be counted! Every day!” the senior officer shouted, flinging his bowl down. It shattered, and rice and meat splattered the planks.

“Yes, there’s an inventory — a count — we sign for them at each guard change,” the captain stammered. “But — well, you’ll see. But you have to come!”

* * *

The jeep wouldn’t start. There was no money for parts or repairs, or even blankets for the men, and the winter nights at this altitude were cruel. Usually no one got anything on payday, either. The commander reflected he could hardly blame his troops for looting the buildings for scrap metal, gutters, wiring, furniture, doors, windows. He’d seen small arms in the marketplace in town, and prisms and sight telescopes and radios, obviously from tanks. The two officers seized rusted bicycles instead. As the captain shouted to a grizzled sergeant to sound the alarm, they cycled with soft-tired wobbly haste across the compound.

The bunker was sunk into the earth. It was surrounded by barbed wire, light towers, and a sign that warned of great danger, special security, severe penalties. But the wire hung loose, the lightbulbs had been stolen, and the guard who met them was drunk.

The captain pointed to a lock that looked impressive, but wasn’t locked. The alarm panel was dead; outside power had been sporadic for a long time, and there was no fuel for the base’s generators. The commander nodded silently, expression menacing. Sensing disaster despite his condition, the guard staggered after them, muttering and weeping, as they entered the cage and moved from weapon to weapon.