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The two men standing before Gray were the commanders of his A and B squadrons, Lt. Colonel Hank Kleis and Lt. Colonel Pat Miller. Kleis answered, “No sweat. We’ve been locked and loaded since two; we just had to wait around for it to get dark.”
Colonel Gray nodded. “How are the men?”
“Good,” answered Kleis. “If they can’t get up for this one, I should be drummed out of the service.”
Gray looked to Miller, the quieter of the two.
Miller answered, “They’re ready.”
Nodding, Gray looked over his officers’ shoulders and watched the load masters taking equipment off the planes. “Here’s how we stand. Pat, you and B squadron are in charge of the airports. Hank, you’ve got the airborne assault on the White House. Get your communications secured ASAP, and pass the word that I want a staff meeting in thirty minutes.” Gray pointed over his shoulder. “There’s a briefing room at the rear of the hangar; we’ll meet in there. Also tell your troop leaders to bring their sergeant majors. We’re gonna get a big intel dump from Langley and the Secret Service, and I want them in on it.” Gray turned, and without his having to say anything, the two junior officers fell in astride their senior. “Training is going to be tricky for this. We don’t have time to build any mock-ups.” The colonel was referring to Hollywood-type sets that Delta used to train for real-life takedowns. The full-scale mock-ups were usually built on a remote area of the massive Eglin Air Force Base, in northern Florida, and done with blueprints provided by the CIA and satellite imagery provided by the NSA.
“General Flood tells me there is no way this thing will last for more than a week and that we could conceivably be ordered in tonight, so we need to be ready to go, pronto . Hank”—Gray pointed to the commander of his A squadron—“I want you to divide the White House into sections immediately and get your troops assigned to handle specific sectors of the building. If we get the phone call in two hours, I want to have, at the very least, a basic plan . . . . As time goes on and we get more intel, we can finetune it.”
Gray turned to his B squadron commander. “Pat, I want advance teams in place at Reagan, Dulles, and Baltimore. Prewire at least two planes at each airport for video and sound, and do it quietly . . . . We don’t want the press covering any of this. Put your people in the airlinemechanic uniforms while they’re doing it. The less attention we raise the better. Langley tells us that Aziz is using the Situation Room, so we have to assume he’s getting real-time coverage from the media. The FBI is sending us some agents to help with subpoenas.” Gray stopped abruptly and slapped both men on the back. “Now get moving. I want updates at the staff meeting in”—Gray looked at his watch—“twenty-eight minutes.”
The two squadron commanders hustled off in earnest to form up their groups, and Gray turned back toward the open hangar door. Grabbing his secure digital phone from his tactical assault vest, Gray hit the speed dial for the operations center at the Pentagon. As the colonel waited for the encryption to kick in, he noticed a string of navigation lights descending on the runway. They would be his MD-530 Little Birds, flown by the Army’s 160th Special Operations Regiment. These were the stealthy, almost silent, helicopters that would be crucial in any assault on the White House. Farther down the valley, Gray could see another string of red and green lights. Unlike the Little Birds, Gray could already hear this second flight of helicopters. Those would be his MH-60 Black Hawks. Faster, larger, and louder than the Little Birds, the Black Hawks would be used to chase Aziz if he headed for an airport.
Gray watched as the first of the Little Birds came in and touched down softly. Seven more of the small black helicopters quickly followed. Gray shook his head. Everything was happening too fast. If they went in tonight, it wouldn’t be a calculated raid; it would be a bloodbath. They would lose hostages, and he would lose men. He needed more time to get things set up.
* * *
TWO MILES NORTHWEST of the White House sat the Naval Observatory, the official residence of the vice president of the United States. The large circular estate was located off Massachusetts Avenue on Embassy Row, atop a hill. Its many gardens and rolling wooded lawn provided a serenity and seclusion that was quite absent at the Executive Mansion.
Irene Kennedy drove north in her maroon Toyota Camry on Massachusetts Avenue. Every time Kennedy drove through this area of Washington, she couldn’t help but think that this one-mile strip of asphalt had to have the single largest concentration of electronic surveillance equipment in the world. With all of the embassies spying on each other and their host country, and the FBI, the CIA, the National Security Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and the National Reconnaissance Office all spying on the embassies, it was unlikely that any conversation went unrecorded.
As Kennedy continued north, the large plantation-style home of the vice president came into view on her left, its fresh white paint bathed in floodlights. Kennedy drove past the main gate and the slew of reporters and camera crews that had besieged the compound. Not far past the main gate, she took a left onto Observatory Circle and worked her way around the north side of the estate. A small unmarked gate appeared on her left, and Kennedy turned off the city street and onto the private drive.
Four uniformed Secret Service officers and a German shepherd approached her car. The men all wore flak jackets over their white shirts. Kennedy rolled down her window and presented her credentials.
The officer looked at her ID and said, “Could you please pop your trunk, Dr. Kennedy?”
After the dog had taken two laps around the small sedan and the trunk had been thoroughly checked, Kennedy was granted admission. Two white steel retractable bollards standing three feet tall and one foot wide dropped down beneath pavement, and then the heavy black gate opened inward. Kennedy maneuvered her car up the winding driveway and passed several of the outlying buildings that were used for offices. Near the main house she saw her boss’s limousine and parked next to it. She was several minutes late for the nine-thirty P.M. meeting.
The normal complement of uniformed off
icers was bolstered by the black-clad, machine-gun-toting men of the Service’s Emergency Response Team. These heavily armed men could be seen patrolling the elevated tree line just beyond the fence. They moved ominously from shadow to shadow, determined not to allow another debacle to take place. A second line of ERT officers ringed the actual residence, and the vice presidential detail was inside the home, never more than one room away from their charge.
One of the vice president’s staffers appeared in the entrance doorway, and Kennedy was ushered into the large foyer. Director Stansfield was sitting on a couch to the right with his legs crossed. He was, as always, wearing a dark conservative suit, white shirt, and striped tie. Stansfield peered over the top of his spectacles when Kennedy entered, a questioning expression on his face.
Kennedy plopped down next to him and said, “It looks good. Mitch went over to the White House and checked out the fence line. He thinks they can get to the shaft without any problems.”
Stansfield nodded thoughtfully. “What do you think?”
Kennedy glanced up at the ceiling for a second.“We need someone in there, and he’s the best we have.”
“What about bringing Adams along?”
“I’m not crazy about the idea, but again, I have to defer to Mitch. He’s the one with the field experience.” Kennedy looked at her boss. “You seem to have some reservations.”
Stansfield pondered the comment for a second and shook his head. “No. I trust Mitch. How are you holding up?”
Kennedy rolled her eyes. “I could use a little sleep, but besides that, I’m fine.”
The sound of dress shoes clicking on the hardwood floor caught their attention, and both looked to see Dallas King coming down the hallway. The vice president’s chief of staff was dressed in a pressed French blue dress shirt and a pair of black slacks, looking dapper as always. King stopped about ten feet away and said, “The vice president is ready to see you.”
Stansfield and Kennedy followed the swaggering young chief of staff down the hallway.
Without knocking, King opened the door to Baxter’s private study, and Stansfield and Kennedy followed. Vice President Baxter sat in a large leather chair in front of the fireplace reading over the speech he was to give to the nation in a little over an hour. Upon seeing his guests, he set the speech and his pen down.
