Free Direct Action by Keith Douglass Page B

free time to plant charges. And if we can’t place the charges in the right spots, we’ve got to pack in a lot more explosives. Which is even more trouble.”
    “You know what this really looks like,” said DeWitt. “A destruction raid mission for a whole Ranger battalion.”
    “I already brought that up,” said Murdock. “It didn’t fly.”
    At that point Murdock called a lunch break, which for oneand all meant throwing on shorts and a T-shirt and trying to get rid of their frustrations with a solid hour-and-a-half workout.
    When they got back to the planning room, Murdock said to MacKenzie, “Okay, Master Chief, you were wearing that happy face all during PT, and it wasn’t just the extra atomic sit-ups you made Ed do for missing the count. What did you come up with?”
    “We have to do a pseudo operation,” said MacKenzie.
    “Meaning?” asked Ed DeWitt.
    “Meaning we dress up like the bad guys and drive right up to the front door. Like how the Israelis drove a duplicate of Idi Amin’s Mercedes right up to the terminal at Entebbe. Like the Vietnam SEALs dressed their point men in black pajamas, coolie hats, and AK-47’s to give them a little edge.”
    “By George,” exclaimed Kos Kosciuszko. “I think he’s got it.”
    “So we dress up like Syrian commandos?” asked DeWitt. “Or Hezbollah?”
    “Neither,” said Murdock, really warming to the idea. “You don’t dress like someone they’re going to want to stop and chitchat with. You dress like someone who makes them shit their pants and wave you right through.”
    “Syrian Presidential Guard,” said Kos Kosciuszko.
    “A big limo,” DeWitt burst out. “And a couple of vehicles filled with Presidential Guards. Jeeps, land rovers, Russian Zils, whatever they use. Something we can fly in by helo.”
    “Tinted windows on the limo,” said Kosciuszko. “Syrian flags on the bumpers. You don’t know who’s inside, but it’s got to be someone you don’t want to fuck with. That’s the great thing about dictatorships.”
    Once the initial excitement passed, Razor Roselli, the wet blanket, weighed in. “That might get us into town without compromise,” he conceded. “But we’ve still got to set charges and get out. And the problem with dressing up like Syrians and then having to deal with Syrians is like the Germans during theBattle of the Bulge in World War II. They dressed up like Americans and caused a lot of confusion, but they nearly all got bagged because at close range they couldn’t pass.”
    Razor Roselli had never yet failed to amaze Murdock.
    “It’s like North Korean Special Forces dressing up in South Korean uniforms and slipping over the DMZ,” Roselli went on. “They get caught as soon as they open their mouths, because every Korean can tell the difference between a Northerner and a Southerner.”
    “Which means,” Kos translated, “that the uniforms might get us all the way up to the warehouse if we showed up at night. But even if the CIA gave us someone who could speak fluent Syrian Arabic, we ain’t getting invited inside without a lot of shooting.”
    That brought them back to earth. Then DeWitt suggested, “Maybe if we bring along something to shoot our way into the warehouse? Like a Russian BRDM scout car. The armor will stop small arms, and they pack a big-ass 14.5mm machine gun. We could ram our way right through the security.”
    “I’m sure the CIA could come up with one or two for us,” said MacKenzie, giving DeWitt an approving nod.
    Razor Roselli left the room and returned with the reference book
Jane’s Armor and Artillery
. He flipped open to the Russian BRDM and said flatly, “It won’t fit inside either an MH-53 Pave Low or an MH-47 Chinook. You’d have to sling-load it under the helo, and I don’t know who we’d get to do a night low-level penetration with a slung load. Especially that kind of air defense threat.”
    They all groaned, mainly because they knew he was right. Murdock gave them