Overkill (50 page)

Abbas thought carefully before relaying the new information to Sadoun Khamil, and his message, when he had composed it, was much longer than usual. As well as the purely factual data provided by
Trushenko, Abbas also included a proposal that he had discussed previously with Khamil but without reaching a decision. There was, Abbas reasoned, no reason to wait any longer. The Gibraltar device
could now be detonated at any time and, though the positioning of the London weapon was crucial to the Russian operation, it made very little difference to the hidden agenda formulated by al-Qaeda.
Therefore, Abbas concluded, there was no reason why they shouldn’t initiate the detonation sequences immediately.

He pressed ‘Send’ and checked to make sure the message was successfully transmitted. Then he shut down the computer, shut and locked the bedroom door and walked down the stairs to
prepare a meal. It would, he knew, be at least two hours before Khamil would reply.

French Ministry of the Interior, rue des Saussaies, Paris

Dekker took out a pen and prepared to write.

‘French Customs stopped the lorry and the escorting cars, purely for a routine documents check,’ Lacomte said. ‘There are two young men in the cab of the lorry, which is, as we
guessed, an articulated unit. There are three escorting cars, all Mercedes and all, in the opinion of the Strasbourg Gendarmes, armoured.’

‘Personnel?’ Colin Dekker asked.

‘The two saloons each contain a driver and three passengers, all young men, all with diplomatic passports.’

‘Those will be the
Spetsnaz
escort,’ Richter said. ‘What about the third car?’

‘The third,’ replied Lacomte, ‘is a long-wheel-base Mercedes limousine, containing a driver and escort in front of the partition and two passengers behind it. The Gendarmes
report that one is a gentlemen of about sixty, and the other a man of about forty-five to fifty years old. As with the others, all four are carrying Russian diplomatic passports.’

‘Do we have an ID on that car – a registration number?’ Richter asked.

Lacomte looked back at the sheet of paper. ‘Yes,’ he replied, ‘but you can easily identify it – the two saloons are light blue in colour, but the limousine is
black.’

‘What are you thinking?’ Colin Dekker asked.

‘Those two passengers obviously aren’t
Spetsnaz
,’ Richter said. ‘My guess is that they’re ranking SVR or GRU officers, along for the ride and to see the
device positioned correctly. Those two, I really would like to talk to.’

‘I’m sure we can arrange that,’ said Dekker.

With the strength of the opposition known, Lacomte turned to the assault plan. Immobilization of the truck would be carried out as suggested by Trooper Jones, using plastic explosive. The
Mercedes saloons were a different problem. There was no point in immobilizing them and it would, in fact, suit their purposes very well if they drove off at the first sign of trouble, but nobody
seriously expected that to happen.

‘The thing about an armoured car,’ said Colin Dekker, reflectively, ‘is that in most cases it’s designed only to protect the occupants against their attackers. What
isn’t generally realized is that it also protects the attackers from the occupants.’ He glanced round at a number of puzzled faces. ‘What I mean is, if the
Spetsnaz
troopers want to shoot at us, they’ll have to wind down a window, and if they do that the vehicle is no longer secure. I understand that your speciality,’ he said, turning to Erulin,
‘is accurate shot placement.’

‘Yes,’ Erulin nodded. ‘All our personnel have to score a minimum of ninety-three per cent on a two-hundred-metre range.’

‘And at, say, twenty to thirty metres?’

Erulin smiled somewhat grudgingly. ‘I would personally discharge any GIGN NCO who failed to achieve a perfect result.’

‘OK,’ said Colin Dekker. ‘So what I suggest is this. We bow to the wishes of the French Minister of the Interior, and my team hits the convoy. There are only four of us, and
four vehicles to be attended to. Under normal circumstances, those would not be unreasonable odds, but these are not normal circumstances. I’m worried about crossfire, and about opposition
personnel getting out of their vehicles on our blind side. We also don’t know what order the vehicles will be in. My guess would be Mercedes saloon, truck, limousine, second saloon, but that
might not be the case if they sense trouble. They’ll certainly be linked by radio, and they might send both saloons ahead and let the limo drop back. It’s still all rather vague.

‘What I propose, therefore, is that Trooper Jones plants his plastic on the truck drive-shaft, lights the blue touch-paper and then retires a safe distance. It’s just conceivable
that he might be able to do that unseen, especially if both saloons have gone on ahead, but I wouldn’t count on it. He will then cover the truck cab with his weapon. That’s Phase One,
if you like. Phase Two starts when the plastic cuts the drive-shaft. Troopers Smith and Brown will lob CS gas grenades at the two Mercedes saloons, aiming to lodge them under the engine
compartments of the cars.’

‘How will that help, against an armoured vehicle?’ asked Lacomte.

‘Simple. The bodywork is armoured, but the air-conditioning system takes in air from outside the vehicle. It’s a hot day, and the cars will almost certainly have the systems running.
Even if the driver switches it off immediately, the interior should get a good dose of gas, and that should hopefully be that.’ Colin Dekker looked round. ‘However, let’s assume
that it doesn’t. The grenade rolls too far, or the occupants have anti-gas respirators in the car and manage to get them on, or something else goes wrong. We will be carrying Hocklers –
Heckler & Koch MP5 sub-machineguns – which are highly efficient weapons against personnel outside their vehicles, but of no use against an armour-plated Mercedes. Mr Beatty –’
he gestured at Richter ‘– would prefer the opposition to walk, rather than be carried, away from the scene, and so would I, so I don’t want to use armour-piercing rounds or
anything heavier than the Hockler.’

‘So what do you propose?’ asked Lacomte.

‘One CS gas grenade for each car, shoot out both tyres on the side facing us, plus a demand for immediate surrender. If they don’t surrender, that’s where Lieutenant
Erulin’s GIGN are going to carry the day. If any window opens on any of the vehicles, except the limo, I want a stream of bullets going in before anything nasty can come out. The Hockler
isn’t accurate enough for that, but your team –’ he turned to Erulin ‘– shouldn’t have any trouble.’

‘None at all,’ the Frenchman confirmed.

‘And the truck?’ Richter asked.

‘That should be the easiest of the lot,’ Colin Dekker said. ‘As soon as the charge detonates, Jones will fire two rounds from his Arwen up into the cab.’

‘Arwen? What’s an Arwen?’ Herron asked.

‘It’s a nasty-looking piece of work,’ Richter said. ‘Like a short-barrelled twelve-bore shotgun, but with a five-shot magazine like a revolver. It’s basically
designed for anti-riot work, but it can handle an interesting cocktail of ammunition, lethal and non-lethal. My guess is that the first round will be armour piercing and the second a CS gas
grenade. Colin?’

‘Exactly.’

The brief silence was broken by Lacomte. ‘Has anybody any better ideas? No?’ He turned to Dekker. ‘What about personnel disposition – where do you want the
Gigènes
to be?’

Dekker shook his head. ‘At the moment,’ he said, ‘I don’t know. I’m sure Lieutenant Erulin would agree with me that force dispositions are better sorted out on the
spot.’ Erulin nodded agreement.

‘I must be getting old,’ Richter said. ‘I’ve been so tied up working out how to stop the convoy, I’ve forgotten the other essential. We also have to stop the convoy
personnel contacting Moscow as soon as they meet trouble.’

Lacomte looked puzzled. ‘Do you think they’ll have a radio link to Moscow from one of the vehicles?’ he asked.

‘No,’ Richter said. ‘There are good reasons why they won’t be using long-range radio, although as Captain Colin said earlier they’ll probably be using short-range
walkie-talkies for contact between the vehicles. But what they will have is a lot simpler and more effective. They’ll have a mobile telephone – or more likely several mobile
telephones.’

‘Of course,’ Lacomte nodded. ‘Digital mobile phones will work almost anywhere along the autoroute, and they could actually talk to Moscow in clear with one, because of the
digital transmission system – it works almost like a scrambler.’

Dekker nodded. ‘Quite right,’ he said, ‘but easy to fix.’ Lacomte raised his eyebrows in enquiry. ‘It’s simple,’ Dekker said. ‘You just knock out
the local cells serving that section of the autoroute. No operative cells, no calls. With the authority you’ve got,’ he added to Lacomte, ‘that should be no problem at
all.’

The Frenchman nodded slowly, then smiled. ‘No, no problem at all,’ he said. ‘Leave it to me.’ As Lacomte reached for the telephone, it rang. He picked up the receiver and
held a brief conversation. Then he replaced it on its rest and looked up. ‘The clock,’ he said, ‘is running. The convoy left Strasbourg at eleven fifty this morning.’

Wednesday
Autoroute A26, vicinity of Couvron-et-Aumencourt, France

Richter, Dekker and Trooper Smith were sitting in a British Embassy car and heading east out of Paris fifteen minutes later, with Westwood and Tony Herron following in a
second car. Dekker was muttering quietly into his personal radio, briefing the troopers at Davy Crockett Ranch that the group was en route and organizing weapons and equipment for the operation. He
also told them to buy sandwiches and drinks, something Richter hadn’t thought of. ‘Why not?’ Dekker said. ‘This could turn out to be another very long day.’

At the Ranch they disembarked from the cars, which Herron sent back to Paris. Dekker and Trooper Smith went into their cabin to get changed; Jones and Brown were ready and waiting, dressed in
camouflage clothing, not the jet-black combat suits normally worn by the SAS on operations. Herron, Westwood and Richter waited and watched as Brown made a final check of the equipment. Dekker and
Smith emerged from the cabin and trotted over to the Ford. ‘Right,’ Dekker said, climbing aboard. ‘Reims, go.’

Jones slid the Transit into first and drove out of the Cherokee Trail and down the road out of the Ranch. He turned right on to autoroute A4, and held the Transit at a steady one hundred
kilometres an hour, heading east. The run to Reims, about ninety kilometres, took just under an hour, and when they turned north onto the A26 Richter knew they had time in hand. As the Transit
approached the Vallée de l’Aisne junction, Richter noticed three yellow autoroute maintenance vans clustered together on the hard shoulder, with a group of men sorting out cones and
‘
Route Barrée
’ signs. Lacomte’s diversion plan was under way.

The rendezvous was at thirteen forty at the parking area just east of Laon, in the Forêt de Samoussy, and they pulled in five minutes early. Jones found a quiet spot at the rear of the
area and parked. At thirteen forty a dark blue Renault Trafic van with ‘
Gendarmerie Nationale
’ signs pulled in next to them. Erulin was the front-seat passenger, and he got out
and walked round to the Transit’s rear door. ‘Ready, Captain?’ he asked Dekker, who nodded. ‘Right,’ Erulin continued. ‘We’ll go on to the ambush site.
I’ll lead, you follow. When I pull over, you stop just in front of me, so that it will look as if I’ve stopped you for a motoring offence.’

They followed the Trafic along the autoroute for about another ten kilometres, past junction thirteen. When the Trafic’s indicator began to flash the Ford overtook it, pulling off on to
the hard shoulder just beyond the Renault. Colin Dekker hopped out and went back to the Trafic to consult with Erulin. Richter looked up and down the autoroute. It wasn’t an ideal place for
an ambush, as it was almost dead straight, but he hoped the ‘accident’ would give them the edge they needed.

There was some cover to the north of the auto-route, where men could be concealed, and the central reservation had established shrubs, which would act as a shield between the two carriageways.
Dekker returned to the Transit and looked inside. ‘Right,’ he said, ‘this is it. The two artics will be positioned about two hundred yards in front of us.’

‘Where are they now?’ Richter asked.

‘Patience,’ Colin Dekker said. ‘According to Erulin, they’re on their way to the parking area we used for our rendezvous. They’ll wait there until we know the
convoy is a bit closer.’

Dekker called the troopers out of the Transit and stood with them by the side of the autoroute, shielded from the view of passing traffic by the van. By his gestures Richter knew he was trying
to decide on force disposition and arcs of fire for his men, and probably also for the Gigènes snipers. Richter looked back at the Trafic van, where a group of a dozen men in camouflage
clothing were standing. He could see two were carrying 7.62mm FR–F1 sniper rifles fitted with flash suppressors and laser sights – the standard GIGN weapon.

‘Nervous, Paul?’ John Westwood asked.

‘Of course I’m nervous,’ Richter said. ‘I don’t ambush armed Russian convoys carrying nuclear weapons every day. There’s a hell of a lot riding on
this.’

‘Granted. What do you think of the site?’

‘It’s not perfect. I would have preferred a sharp bend immediately before it, but you don’t get sharp bends on French autoroutes.’ Richter looked at the passing traffic
and then at the terrain to the north. ‘Once the traffic stops, it should be quiet enough. No houses in view, no awkward farmers ploughing fields. It should do. In fact,’ he added,
‘it will have to do.’

Oval Office, White House,
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D.C.

News of the crisis had, of necessity, spread. Key congressmen had been summoned to either the Pentagon or the White House and been briefed on the situation. The Secretary
of Defense was still flitting between the White House and the Gold Room at the Pentagon. They had adequate communications between the two establishments, but the President preferred face-to-face
discussions. You can’t, he often said, tell what a man is thinking if you can’t see his face.