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  Then they moved to the fence, one man using wire cutters cut a slit into the fence, two men pulled the fence apart so one could enter, the repeated this until they were all in, they used a black zip ties to secure the fence. They hoped the guards wouldn’t notice and keep on moving by on their next round, assuming they weren’t back by then.

  The warehouse wasn’t far from the fence, there was a door at the back of the building, and they moved to the door, a man on each side of the door while one knelt in front of it and began to pick the lock. One of the other men reached over and turned the knob, the door opened. The man that was picking the lock looked up at the man saying with his eyes, “smart ass!”

  They moved into the building in a stack formation, quickly taking cover behind a large filing cabinet, from there they proceed to clear the rest of the rooms except for the main bay. Each man positioned himself to get the best tactical view of the bay they could, they each looked for a sign of life. They didn’t see one anyone running around or moving within the bay, they moved out to the bay and behind the nearest truck.

  With two men providing security Captain Clayton pulled back the curtain on the truck, sitting on the bed of the truck was a large crate. Captain Clayton entered the back of the truck; the bay itself was lighted so it wasn’t completely dark in the back. He felt around the crate looking for a way into it, but it was nailed shut on each side.

  On a hunch he pulled out the portable Geiger counter they carried, he ran it against the side of the crate, it was reading over one hundred rads. This caused the Captain to pull back quickly, he got out of the back of the truck fast, they moved to the next truck and repeated the same exercise, there too, the crate when measured with the Geiger counter measured over a hundred rad.

  That was it; there was nothing more they could do, even if they could get the crates open they didn’t have the NBC (nuclear, biological, chemical) gear to deal with the high level of radiation being given off by each crate.

  They needed to get off the compound quickly and get this information back to their handler, two crates with high levels of radiation meant a couple of things, but it was best to get that information back to the head shed. Prior to leaving they copied down information for both vehicles and attached satellite tracking devices to the underside carriages.

  They maneuvered back to the door they had entered, as they got closer the door opened, one of the Middle Eastern men entered the warehouse, he was by himself. The three men felt this was their lucky day, Captain Clayton whispering softly, “Let’s get this guy and get the hell out of dodge”. The man moved passed the three Soldiers who carried as part of their TO&E (table of organization and equipment) a drug that could easily be stuck into an individual that would cause unconscious and paralysis for up to two hours.

  Captain Clayton hit the man with the dart who fell immediately unconscious; they quickly bagged and tagged him, now the trick was getting him out of the compound alive with the rest of them. Thankfully, the guards hadn’t discovered there slit in the fence, they cut the black zip tie, passed the unconscious man through, once through they zip tied the fence again.

  They moved back to their original observation point, once there they sat for ten minutes listening and waiting to see if any alarm was going to be sound, there was nothing. They moved out, they traded off carrying the man, he was a lot of dead weight, but they managed. At two hours they administered more of the drug to keep him unconscious, they kept moving after that.

  They arrived back at the hide at 0300 hours with the package, the team doc checked the package to make sure he was ok, and then he gave him more drugs to keep him out.

  They had accomplished their mission, it was now time to move to the extraction point, and they didn’t want to wait around when the compound below realized that one of their friends was missing. They hoped to be long gone by then, they expected all hell to break lose, if that were the case they did expect their hide to be compromised.

  They could be at the extraction point within hours, set up security and wait for the chopper to pick them up, the freedom bird to take them back to the world. They kept the package wrapped up tight and sedated; he would remain that way the rest of the trip. Yes, it would slow them down a bit as they had to switch off duties carrying him, but it was the mission.

  Hopefully the man could give the handler more information regarding the crates and the high radiation readings. Another day break, another extraction point, they had all made it so far, now they needed to find a place to hold up until 1500 hours when there ride arrived.

  After relatively quick search of the area they moved to some ground half a kilometer away, into some dense brush that would give them excellent cover, security was set up. Let’s hope that when they discovered the man missing they wouldn’t push out this far or direction looking for him. The hours passed slowly and were extremely boring; they had to be careful now because boring kills people. They had to remain alert.

  At 1500 hours they heard a helicopter they moved quickly to the extraction point, once there they popped green smoke which was the signal to the pilot they were there and waiting. A couple of minutes passed and the black hawk came over the hill, pulled up sharply, hovering a foot off the ground. The team leader gives the signal for all of them to load onto the helicopter while he and one other man pulled security, once everyone was loaded, including the package, the last two mean got on.

  The black hawk pulled up and away, they were on the ground less than 45 seconds and were gone. Successful mission under their belt it was now time to go home and hit the beach and grab a few beers.

  Chapter Two

  Their CIA handler debriefed each man on the team separately. This was also the normal process after completing a mission, they generally found that each man had a different perspective and insight into the mission and usually gave additional feedback that added to the bigger picture.

  The handler told them not to venture to far as there might be a follow on mission the contents of the boxes scared those in Washington. The only explanation that seemed rational, especially dealing with the people who had them, was that it was either a nuclear weapon or material for a dirty bomb. They had just started to interrogate the man they brought back with them who was one of the ISIS members. The CIA was sure they would know more soon, these guys didn’t last long.

  The SFOD-D operators didn’t care one way or another whether there was a follow on mission or not. They did care about getting some rack time, get some hot chow, a couple of beers and maybe a game of pool or two, gotta have your priorities. In fact because of the high Geiger readings and the fact that they were drug cartel members (coupled with ISIS) that were involved they were all positive there was going to be a follow on mission. It was a matter of time and place; it was the job they had all signed up to do.

  A couple of days later Captain Clayton and the team Sergeant, Master Sergeant Anzio Dognillo, were called into the CIA handlers office. Not one of the operators liked the CIA or trusted them for that matter, for an intelligence agency their Intel wasn’t always that great, they missed a lot of things. Their handler was a man in his late forty’s, Stan Ranch, he had been a Navy Intel Officer for about five years then made the jump over to Langley and became a Field Officer. Stan was no worse or better than any of the other CIA guys they had worked with some had even gone out into the field with them, but not Stan he recognized his own weaknesses and abilities and left it up to the team to execute Washington’s biddings, which wasn’t a bad thing he kept out-of-the-way at least.

  They arrived at his office and barged right in and grabbed a couple of seats and not being ones for small talk, “What’s up?” asked Dognillio.

  Stan looking back and forth at them, that’s what he liked about them, no non-sense, right to the point, “New mission for you.” Stan said. “The rag head you guys snatched, well after a couple of hours he spilled it all.”

  “Imagine that.” Sarcastically said by Captain Clayton.

  “Yeah
, imagine that.” Stan giving the Captain the stink eye. “Your buddy said that there were two dirty bombs in those crates and they had been smuggled into Mexico and will make their way into the US.”

  “Color me shocked.” said Dognillo. “How are they getting them there from here?”

  “According to him they will be smuggled, that’s what we’re calling it these days, they came into Mexico from Iran on a Panamanian Freighter. Looks like from there to Puerto Vallarta Mexico, he didn’t know which border crossing, but it’s in Texas. The two you found are not ready for prime time and they are sending more from Iran.

  “Why can’t six do it or another SEAL Team while there on the boat?” asked the Captain.

  “Over committed right now, I asked the same thing.” Stan tapping his fingers on the desk looking at both men.

  Captain Clayton fairly unhappy at this time, “Do we know the route they are taking from Iran? Do we know the Ship name? Ship transponder code? Anything?”

  “We believe so, yes, and we think so.” To answer your questions said Stan. “From what the captive said they plan on taking this road in,” Stan had laid out a map and was drawing his finger along a road. “We do have a couple of reliable sources that might be able to verify. My suggestion would be to hit them while they are on the road, some place isolated.”

  “The whole fucking place is isolated.” said Master Sergeant Dognillo.

  Stan looking at the Sergeant, “Great then you should have no problem, right?”

  Dognillo sat there returning his stare. Captain Clayton spoke up, “ETA??”

  Stan broke Dognillo’s gaze and looked at the Captain, “We expect them to attempt to cross into Iran at 0500 tomorrow.”

  “Oh great, just fucking great.” Dognillo raising his voice.

  Captain Clayton looked at Master Sergeant Dognillo, “Calm down Dog we have been through crap like this before, no big deal, right?”

  Dognillo looked at the Captain, “Yes Sir, right.”

  “Alright boys, work out a plan in the next few hours and give me a brief back no later than 0030 that ok?”

  Both men nodded and headed back to the team room to coordinate with the rest of the team and come up with a plan.

  Stan hollered at the men to stop for a moment, “By-the-way Captain your promotion to Major came through today, congratulations.” Major Clayton nodded and shook Stan’s hand then they turned and left.

  Chapter Three

  They returned to the team room with what was expected news, no real surprise, although they thought they would have more time to plan and then hit it. Trying to hurry these things generally resulted with someone outside of the team screwing up something or because it’s rushed and in some cases the Intel was be wrong. At this time they had no confirmation of the Intel other than the camel jockey they had captured, not very reassuring, odds are they got the Intel under torture and a lot of times the victim being tortured will tell you want you want to hear to get you to stop.

  Guess is didn’t really matter though they had their orders and those orders right now were to come up with a plan then give brief back in a few hours. They had the maps of the area and each man looked them over and formulated their own plan, they would do a sort of round robin with everyone given a turn to talk about how they see it unfolding, normally this brainstorming session had worked for them in the past, different teams did things different ways.

  The flight to just about any given point on the road was about a forty minute flight by fixed wing aircraft from their current location. They all agreed that they would need to infiltrate the area by HALO (high altitude low open) and land a couple of klicks (kilometers) away from the road. They also all agreed that they would need to exfiltrate by helicopter that means that the choppers must be in place close in order to extract quickly. The road that the Intel claimed they were taking was a secondary back road that crosses the border, doesn’t have much traffic.

  There were all sorts of ideas thrown out, even a one or two James Bond or Rambo scenarios. What was finally decided upon was the map showed a sharp turn in the road what looked like was in between some high ground which wouldn’t allow them to pull off the road quickly. So if they were able to block the road and make it look somewhat natural they could stop the two trucks. They needed to be onsite no-later-than 0400 to set up and prepare for the ambush. They continued to work out the specific details of the operation for the next hour, then telephoned Stan and told him they were ready for the brief back.

  Stan would have to go to the team room for the briefing, typically each man on the team had an assignment and as part of the brief back they each had to regurgitate their responsibility in the op. Stan arrived about twenty minutes later. Outside of some smartass remarks by team members during the briefing it only took an hour to do. Stan liked it and gave his go ahead to it, wheels up in thirty minutes if they wanted to keep to their time line.

  Flight bags were always packed and ready to go at a moment’s notice, the team picked up their gear and headed for their ride out. There was a C-130 waiting for them and just them, big empty plane to take out an eight man team and dump them in the middle of no place at some un-godly hour. They loaded up, got strapped in. Major Clayton shut his eyes and relaxed thinking back about how he got here…..

  Chapter Four

  John Clayton graduated from Penn State with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Computer Science; he wasn’t athletic in High School, never played in any sports, it wasn’t until College that he actually started to jog some and that was mostly stress relief. He found that he enjoyed running and it gave him the opportunity to think about things. Eventually his runs became longer and longer running up to fifteen miles at a time.

  There were always all sorts of Military Recruiters on Campus and he never thought much about them until he got closer to graduation. He had gotten to a point where he wanted to break out of the computer nerd persona he had since High School and really wanted to reinvent himself. One day he stopped by the US Army recruiting booth and had a talk with a couple of guys there. He liked the idea of being a Soldier but his family wouldn’t be happy. No one in his family had ever been in the military that he knew of. He had gone back several more times to speak to the recruiters before making a decision, everything they told him made it sound so good.

  One day, thirty days from graduation, he decided that he would sign up and he did. After graduation he would head to Fort Benning Georgia for Officer Candidate School (OCS), he would start OCS the day after his twenty-first birthday. It was a twelve week course that would teach him everything he would need to know as a brand new 2nd Lieutenant, so he thought.

  He arrived at Ft. Benning with a crowd of other potential OCS candidates they were ushered into a large building told to take seats then all hell broke loose. Drill Sergeant’s started running around barking orders at them, do this, do that and do it now! Candidates were running all over the place it was chaos. It seems like it went on the entire twelve weeks and then off to Infantry Basic Officer Leadership Course (IBOLC) also at Benning. After he completed that it was off to jump school and then pathfinder school also at Benning.

  While going through pathfinder he was convinced by the cadre and others that he should attend Ranger School while he’s at it, he figured what the hell, he applied and was accepted. The school was also located at Benning; this by and large would the hardest training he would go through to date. He felt he was in the best shape in his life and was ready. Once he graduated from pathfinder, all of three weeks, he moved over to the Ranger School at Camp Rodgers. It was now going to be nine more weeks of hell and hopefully complete it.

  He unlike many actually enjoyed the challenges that Ranger School at Camp Rogers, well in and around Camp Rogers, brought him. Of course there were times he thought he wasn’t going to make it, which is for the most part a death warrant to most Officers if they do, but he dug down deep and got it done. He looked forward to each phase and pushed himself harder and harder to get through
them feeling as an Officer he should be setting the example.

  He graduated from Ranger school and was assigned to the 75th Ranger Regiment, 2nd Battalion at Fort Lewis Washington as a platoon leader. At first he loved it there and loved the job, he really learned a lot about Soldiering and he really cared for his Soldiers. His Platoon Sergeant First Class (SFC) Rodrigo Aliso was Ranger through and through, out of fifteen years in the Army it’s all he knew and ever was. As a brand new butter bar to the regiment SFC Aliso took him under his wing and taught him what it was to be a leader and helped hone his skills.

  His first combat tour was to Afghanistan for six months then came back to Ft. Lewis for about three months and they were deployed this time to Iraq for six months. By the time he finished his second combat tour he had worked with a lot of Special Forces Soldiers and liked their missions, in many cases the SF guys were the spear of the action where the Rangers picked up after them. As a Second Lieutenant he wouldn’t have been allowed to go to the Q-course (Special Forces Qualification Course). At the end of his tour in Iraq he would be a First Lieutenant and would be able to go if the regiment let him.

  Once back in the States he applied and was granted permission to attend the selection course, so off to Fort Bragg and Camp Mackall he went. The selection course was roughly three months long, three long months ending up with the final exercise, Robin sage, pass that and for the most part you get your long tab and green beret. In his mind he felt the Q-course was no tougher then Ranger School, but it was at the same time harder, they were just different with a different set of expectations. After graduation from the Q-course it was off to language school, SERE, and others, once he completed those he would be wrap it up with 18A Detachment Commander School. This was additional months and months of schools in addition, to the selection course. Once he completed everything he had been promoted to Captain and was assigned to 5th Special Forces Group, 4th Battalion at Fort Campbell Kentucky. Once there he became a Detachment Commander for an A-Team, but was there a short time before being sent off to the Free Fall School at Yuma Proving Grounds in Arizona. After that he returned to the team and was sent for his first of several tours in Iraq, from his previous tours overseas and working with SF units as Ranger he had an idea of what to expect so it wasn’t totally foreign to him.