It was not difficult to guess why. Beyond the walls of the harbor-side building, the continuing cackle of automatic weapons fire and the thud of explosions could clearly be heard.
An NCO pushed through the door from an adjoining office, illuminating his way with a flashlight beam. With the city power down, the detachment’s Honda emergency generator was barely adequate to maintain the radios.
“Were you able to get through to the Defense Ministry on the landlines?” the officer demanded.
“No, Major, but I was able to reach Lieutenant Sirhi at Gambir Station. There’s no Defense Ministry left. It’s been destroyed.”
“What?”
“Yes sir.” The Sergeant mopped at his sweat-slick brow with his sleeve. “American precision-guided bombs. The building has been leveled and the Merdeka
Square command post destroyed.”
“Are they sure it’s the Americans?”
“It must be. Damned if we have anything like this.” The noncom waved out at the darkness. “They’re hitting us with a complete Baghdad package. That means Brigade must have been
taken out. The Americans must be coming for their people at their embassy and
they have already made a landing somewhere in the area.”
“Why do you say that?” the major demanded.
“Mortar fire, sir. You can hear it outside. They’re using heavy mortars on targets in the city.”
“The motor patrol in Dreamland Park is not reporting, sir,” the radio operator interjected. “We might not be hearing their calls over the jamming – but it could be something else.”
“In Muhammad’s name,” the Major groaned. “What next?”
He was answered with a spray of shattered glass as the picture windows looking out across Jakarta harbor imploded under multiple bullet impacts.
The officer, the sergeant and the private hit the floor as a fifty-caliber slug sent the field radio flying.
A pair of RIB Raiders lay a hundred yards off the harbor patrol headquarters, systematically riddling the building, its finger piers and the moored patrol boats, with machine gun and grenade launcher fire. The SEALs and Special Boat men were engaged in one of the first Naval Special Forces missions, “beach jumping,” the spreading of chaos and confusion from the sea amid the ranks of a land-bound enemy.
The raiders maintained their barrage until the fires blazed ashore with an adequate brightness. Then their crews kicked a few smoke and flare floats over the side and roared off in search of more trouble to make. Jakarta had a long stretch of waterfront and the possibilities were numerous.
*
The Sky Island flight went feet dry over the city, buzzing in above the shadow-filled streets. Trusting in the nylon webbing of his monkey harness, Stone Quillain leaned out of the open side of the Army AH-6, scanning ahead through his night vision visor.
The only ground illumination came from the occasional set of racing headlights and a few distant burning structures. Sporadic shell bursts flamed greenly in the night and tracer snakes crawled through the darkness.
None crawled in the direction of the Little Birds, however. The multitude of diversions was working, permitting the small helicopters to slip through unengaged. But they would have to build on that even further before they could risk bringing the Osprey lift ships in to the embassy.
That was what the Sky Island mission was all about. The legendary Chinese
General Sun Tsu had once written in the first textbook on military strategy and
tactics that, “You must take the high ground or you shall most certainly perish in the valley.”
That rule was as applicable in the heart of a great city as anywhere else. Ahead of the Little Birds, Jakarta’s high ground loomed. Four huge hi-rise resort hotels rose above Merdeka Square, overlooking the embassy compound and its approaches: the Sriwijaya to the north, the Transaera to the east, the Aryaduta Hyatte to the southeast and the Metropolitan to the southwest. Blacked out and abandoned, the travelers and tourists they had served were gone, but this night they would serve a different kind of sightseer.
Stone reached up one-handed and called up the air command channel on his
Leprechaun transceiver. “Sea Demon Six to Strike Lead!” he yelled over the rotor roar. “All Sky Island elements positioned to insert!”
“Roger that, Sea Demon,” Vince Arkady’s relaxed reply came back through Stone’s headset. “Strike elements – Baker, Charley, Dog, Echo – stand by for sterilization passes on Sky Islands. Roll in … now!”
Stone’s helicopter bobbed for an instant as two larger, sleeker, chunks of darkness blasted past overhead. Looking up through the NiteBrite visor, Stone caught a belly view of a pair of SPEED Cobras, weapons pods studding their underwing hardpoints. Fangs out, they were diving on Stone’s future command post, the roof of the Hotel Sriwijaya.
It had to be assumed that the Indonesians read Sun Tzu as well.
Again, Stone leaned outboard to watch events develop. This was going to be interesting.
Someone hostile was in residence on the hotel roof. Clearly visible through the photomultipliers, small arms fire sparkled from the balustrade, aimed at the approaching gunships.
The lead Cobra replied with what looked like a glowing green death ray that swept along the edge of the hotel roof, wiping away the flyspecks of rifle fire. Stone could recognize the tracer stream of a 20mm “Vulcan Lite” Gatling gun when he saw one. He could also appreciate good shooting.
He had a little more trouble with what he observed next. The sterilizing SPEED Cobra pitched up steeply, bled speed and flared into a side skid. At first, Quillain thought that the compound helo had been hit, but then he realized that the Navy gunship was still under precise, deliberate control.
As the wingman climbed and circled, the flight leader jinked around the top of the hotel, in an odd, sidling dance, edging closer, side slipping a few feet to one side or another, climbing slightly or dipping its nose.
Then it hit Quillain. He’d seen this kind of thing before, back home on his father’s farm. Ol’ Rebel, their venerable gray barn cat, would lay moves like this on a mouse he was chasing. The helo pilot had missed someone on his first firing pass, and now he was hunting the fugitive through the maze of ventilator stacks and elevator heads on the hotel roof, trying to line up a finishing shot.
Blooded veteran or not, Quillain felt a cold shiver ripple through him. He lifted a hand to the Leprechaun keypad clipped to his chest harness and tapped into the designated Talk-Between-Pilots channel.
“You need a hand down there, Lieutenant?” the Cobra wingman inquired
“Negative, negative, this guy is just being a pain,” an annoyed feminine voice replied. “Where’d he go, dammit? Just a sec … Okay, got him cornered. Going to grenade. Gotcha!”
The rotor-winged mouser pounced. A single shell belched from an underwing
gunpod, a fireball blossoming on the roof. Then the SPEED Cobra was wheeling
clear and climbing away. “Sea Demon Six, this is Strike Flight Bravo. The LZ is clean and we’re out of here. Your sheets are turned down and the mint is on the pillow.”
“This is Sea Demon Six. ’Preciate ya, Bravo. We are in.”
With a droning whine, the AH-6 settled onto the roof of the hotel and its handful of passengers disembarked with an explosive rush.
The Sky Island force consisted of the three four-man diamonds of the Green Beret A-Team and the Sniper/Designator element of the Marine Force Recon Platoon. As a gesture of jointness, Stone had attached himself to one of the Army Special Forces sections – but, with the camouflage patterns of their uniforms washed out by his night vision system, it was impossible to tell the difference between Dogface and Leatherneck this night.
Once more, Stone slapped the key pad of his transceiver. “Star Child, Star Child, this is Sea Demon Six at Sky Island Alpha. We are down and operating.”
