The Latakia Intercept: A Ross Brannan Thriller (The Secret Cold War Book 1) Read online

  THE

  LATAKIA

  INTERCEPT

  A ROSS BRANNAN THRILLER

  THE SECRET COLD WAR SERIES - BOOK 1

  A Novella by

  RG AINSLEE

  The Latakia Intercept: A Ross Brannan Thriller

  The Secret Cold War Series - Book 1

  Published by RG Ainslee

  All rights reserved.

  Copyright © 2018 by RG Ainslee

  Cover Image: By Leszek Komuda (Public domain)

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author/publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  The Latakia Intercept: A Ross Brannan Thriller is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, incidents, and events are products of the author's imagination. It draws from the historical record, but any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Certain institutions and agencies are mentioned, but the characters involved, depiction of the agencies' operations or sources/methods of collection/analysis presented should not be construed as factual.

  This is the first book in the Secret Cold War Series.

  For any inquiries about this book, please contact the author at rgainslee.com

  The first Electronic version: April 2018

  The Latakia Intercept is a story of Cold War Electronic Intelligence (ELINT) long hidden behind a curtain of secrecy. ELINT is intelligence derived from collecting, processing, and analyzing radar and guidance control systems.

  Soldiers, Sailors, and Airmen of the security services manned the front line of the Cold War. Assigned to isolated foreign outposts, naval vessels, or flying along the Iron Curtain, they collected signals intelligence and gave an extra layer of early warning. All too many died by accident or enemy action. The first American combat death in Vietnam was a soldier of the Army Security Agency. The Secret Cold War series is dedicated to their memory.

  Thomas Jefferson: "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance."

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1 ~ Incirlik

  Chapter 2 ~ The Detachment

  Chapter 3 ~ Complications

  Chapter 4 ~ Anya

  Chapter 5 ~ The Mission

  Chapter 6 ~ Hakim

  Chapter 7 ~ Penwell

  Chapter 8 ~ Winds of War

  Chapter 9 ~ Busted

  Chapter 10 ~ The Intercept

  Chapter 11 ~ The Tape

  Epilogue

  Glossary

  Author's Notes

  The Secret Cold War Series

  About the Author

  Excerpt from The Ethiopian Intercept: A Ross Brannan Thriller

  Chapter 1 ~ The Border

  A word from RG Ainslee

  Chapter 1 ~ Incirlik

  Thursday, 20 September 1973 — Adana, Turkey

  The way the guy examined me caught my attention right away. Don't know if it was my nerves or a paranoid reflex, but his deep-set predator eyes lingered a little too long for comfort. He stood on the tarmac at Adana's civilian airport, off to the side of the portable boarding ramp. Had that look, muscular broad shoulders, thick face with a groomed mustache. Not a thug, but a tough guy nevertheless. Perhaps a security type. One thing for sure, he wasn't with the local tourist bureau.

  I hustled down the stairs from the Turkish Airlines jet and avoided eye contact. His focus wasn't solely on me, he gave each passenger the same treatment, but the way he gave me a practiced once-over was disconcerting.

  The afternoon flight from Frankfurt had been uneventful until we touched down in Ankara. My normal sense of caution intensified when I passed through customs and immigration. Maybe I was suspicious for no reason, but they seemed to give me an unusual level of attention. The officer at the desk called his superior over. The grim official subjected my papers to a thorough examination and waved me through without comment. A scheduled one-hour layover stretched into two before a smaller jet took flight south to Adana.

  The time was 1910, an hour after sunset. I collected my baggage and headed outside. The tough-guy stood on the curb. No Air Force bus was in sight. Not wanting to hang around, I hailed a taxi. Out of the corner of my eye, I detected a flick of the man's head. A taxi moved from out of line and pulled up in front of me.

  The long-haired driver, a thin man about my age, rushed around and stashed the bags in the trunk. Told him to take me to Incirlik Air Base and I slid in the back seat. Moments later, he opened the throttle and we sped away towards the city.

  The driver tried to steer me to a local nightspot. "You go disco club, belly dancer, good raki." Assumed he got baksheesh for bringing in customers, especially unsuspecting American servicemen.

  Been there, done that. "The airbase —I want to go to Incirlik — No club."

  He gestured with his hand, trying to imitate the sensuous curves of a belly dancer. "Much good, you like," and trilled a monotonous tune replete with fake finger cymbals.

  This wasn't my first time in Adana. The place was nothing special, not exotic like Istanbul. Earlier trips to the nearby facility had been on missions from NSA, the National Security Agency, flying on Air Force SIGINT aircraft. Back in the sixties, I served a year at TUSLOG Det-4 field station in Sinop on the Black Sea. Turkey was familiar territory.

  Maybe it was my threads attracting so much attention: a yellow leisure suit more suited for a disco. My ex-girlfriend picked it out in a trendy shop in Frankfurt. First realized wearing the outfit was a mistake during the layover at Ankara airport. I stood out like a pimp at a church picnic. My travel orders had specified civilian attire and supplied a ticket on a civilian airline, not something I expected.

  The trip itself was unexpected. Yesterday, at my Army unit in Germany, I awaited the approval of my request for an early out. I was fed-up with the Army. They screwed me over, and now they could take it and stuff it where the sun don’t shine.

  I planned a six-week motorcycle tour down to the Riviera, followed by a trip home to a dream job with a civilian contractor at the Army Electronic Proving Ground at Fort Huachuca, Arizona. Years of hardship and long-hours in the Army were about to pay off.

  Unfortunately, with only three months to go on my enlistment, reality slapped me upside the head. Eleven years in the military, traveling the world collecting and analyzing critical electronic intelligence, meant nothing.

  Captain Parker's edict still rung in my ears. "Denied."

  Instead of a coveted early out, I received orders to a so-called special detachment at Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey. Seemed too spur of the moment. Something didn't add up. Little did I realize it was the first step in the inevitable journey that awaits the unlucky.

  I wasn't responding to the driver's pitch, so he offered something different. "You no like club. Go Kerhane." He raised his right hand and rubbed his thumb and forefinger together. "Is good?"

  "Hell no, I want to go to Incirlik airbase."

  The last place I wanted to go was the Kerhane, a Turkish woman's prison where the inmates could work off their jail time in the brothel compound.

  The driver continued his blather and veered off towards a seedy part of Adana. Sometimes a little voice tells you trouble is coming — an instinct, the best detector of danger. If it do
esn’t feel right, it's probably not. This didn't feel right.

  "Yes, yes, disco, raki, belly dancer, much good."

  "Wrong way —I want to go to Incirlik — hell with your club."

  Undaunted by my protestations, he cut a sharp left and slowed in the middle of a darkened side street. Three silhouettes, illuminated by his headlights, sauntered out from the curb. Appeared to be young thugs and the tallest raised a hand for the taxi to halt. The driver didn't seem surprised or concerned, but I was.

  Four to one wasn't what I considered good odds, especially in unfamiliar surroundings on a dark street. My pulse raced in anticipation. Wasn't sure if I was on the way to a robbery, beating, or kidnapping. In any case, it wouldn't end well. I'm not a violent person, but I slipped out my switchblade and held it ready with thumb on the slide. The vehicle crawled to a stop. The thugs split up to surround the taxi.

  Instinctive reactions drive the first seconds of danger: fight, flight, or freeze. In a split second, the animal instinct for survival kicked in. I decided to get the hell out of there before the thugs gained the upper hand. The driver I could deal with.

  The driver flinched and froze when he heard the unmistakable click. A half-second later, I grabbed a tuft of hair and pressed five inches of fine Solingen steel against the side of his neck. He made a slight nervous jump. His halting breath reeked of cheap cigarettes.

  I growled in fractured German, "Verstehen Sie? Incirlik — schnell."

  That caught his attention. Lots of Turks work in Germany. For added motivation, I pressed hard, breaking the skin below his right ear, hard enough to draw blood. He recoiled in a contortion of pain. In the rearview mirror, his eyes glowed electric with panic.

  The rear door opposite started to open. A silhouette appeared at the other window.

  I punctuated my command, "Airbase jetzt, schnell," with an unambiguous twist of the tip of the blade.

  He stomped the gas and burned rubber. The fender brushed against one of the thugs. The door slammed shut as he swung a U-turn and raced away towards the base. I shifted in the seat and gave a cautious peek through the rear window.

  Back on the main street, we merged into a chaotic jumble of evening traffic: cars, trucks, buses, motorcycles, pedestrians, and the occasional donkey. He slowed to keep pace. My heart continued at race speed.

  "We go straight to the airbase, you understand?" He didn't respond. I upped the volume, yelling in his bleeding ear, "Verstehen Sie, Incirlik"

  "Yes, yes, Incirlik schnell."

  A block before the bridge, traffic ground to a halt with us beside a bus. When it began to move, he unwittingly killed the engine. I squeezed his shoulder and leaned up close. The coppery smell of blood saturated the air.

  "The last thing I want to do is cut your throat. But remember this, I will if you don't get moving — schnell." Wasn't sure if he understood English, but a firm jab gave all the translation he needed.

  Desperate, he cranked the motor with no results. Horns honked, pedestrians gawked at our predicament. My body tensed as I considered my limited options. At last, the motor turned over, the cabbie popped the clutch, and we accelerated away.

  The ride to Incirlik was nerve-racking — particularly for the weasel-faced taxi driver — I held the blade behind his ear for the duration. I kept my eyes on his eyes in the rearview mirror, giving him a poke when he seemed to waver. A trickle of crimson blood oozed from the cut, staining the wide floppy collar on his already filthy paisley shirt.

  Less than an hour on the ground and already I had been given the once-over by a security type and now this. It didn't feel like a random hijack, the driver had to be in on it. A flicker of concern crept in. Experience taught me such confrontations are unpredictable. I considered myself lucky. The encounter could have easily deteriorated into a deadly fiasco. I refocused and resolved to stay calm but alert.

  The sweating driver turned towards the main entrance to the airbase. I ordered him to halt outside the gate. He hesitated, I prodded, and he skidded to a halt.

  "Who paid you to set me up?"

  He didn't answer. I could tell he was eyeing the gate.

  We had already attracted attention from two Air Force Security Police and a Turkish guard at the main gate. I didn't want to have to deal with a bunch of questions about my encounter with the thugs. That would just delay the inevitable. Knew from personal experience, the Turkish authorities would ignore the incident, besides, I didn't want to deal with the unavoidable paperwork hassle.

  "Kill the engine, get my bags, and don't try anything."

  I exited and jerked the driver's door open, my switchblade concealed from view beside my leg. He complied, opened the trunk, and set my bags on the pavement. I slipped a dollar from my pocket and flipped it on the ground in front of him.

  He glared at the bill and said, "Is more." He mumbled something in Turkish and glanced back towards the gate. Incredibly, he wasn't satisfied with a dollar.

  "Listen here you SOB, you're lucky to get that, so pick it up and get the hell out of here. Verstehen Sie?" I added a colorful Turkish insult remembered from years past.

  He understood and unleashed a stream of undecipherable Turkish invective. The car door was open, and I shoved him inside. He started the engine and left me in cloud of dust.

  I folded and pocketed the switchblade, picked up the dollar bill, collected my bags, and headed for the gate.

  "What was that all about?" asked the American sergeant.

  "We were discussing his driving."

  The sergeant examined my outfit. "Didn't know we had a disco band scheduled." He grinned and glanced back at the airman. "You heard anything?" They both laughed. The Turk, not fully understanding, joined in.

  I tried to stay calm, or at least give an impression of composure, and handed him my orders. He read them and checked a clipboard.

  He eyed me with puzzled disdain. "Never heard of it. Don't have no such unit listed."

  "Army Security Agency Special Detachment, Incirlik," I pointed. "Says so right there."

  He shook his head. "Sorry, can't help you, like I said, never heard of it."

  We were both in the same boat. I had never heard of the so-called special detachment until yesterday morning. Three minutes at the front gate of Incirlik Air Base and I was getting the run-around. My temper started to simmer. I'd had enough problems the last few days and wasn't in the mood.

  "Sergeant, I suggest you get on the horn and find out."

  "Listen, Buddy—"

  "You listen. I've had enough of this bull, you call someone pronto." I upped the volume, "Do you understand?"

  The sergeant turned to an airman and barked out an order, "Perkins, call over to squadron."

  The airman dialed the phone and asked for Lieutenant Matson. Seconds later, he said, "Sir, Sergeant Miller wants to talk to you."

  The sergeant grabbed the phone, glared at me, and spoke into the handset. "Lieutenant, we got some guy in civvies down here at the front gate with what he claims is orders to some Army special detachment. Says he's Sergeant First Class Ross Brannan, Army Security Agency." He listened for a moment and said, "Yes sir, I'll send him over right away."

  Finally, some progress. I grinned.

  "Perkins, load this guy's gear on the vehicle and run him over to squadron. Keep an eye on him, don't let him outta your sight 'till you get him inside."

  Without speaking, I tossed my duffel and B-4 bag into the back of the pickup truck. For some reason, I glanced back outside the gate. The guy from the airport stood beside a green car, smoking a cigarette, staring at me without any pretense of hiding his interest. I took a seat in front. The airman joined me, and we left the front gate.

  The tough guy's presence wasn't that unexpected. Not the first-time local security types had scrutinized my papers. My orders had United States Army Security Agency emblazoned at the top of the page. As a rule, orders to Turkey specified a TUSLOG detachment number. Mine did not. But the attempted hijacking did concern me.
I remembered how the man flicked his head to the taxi waiting out of line and wondered if the two were connected.

  Airman Perkins ushered me into the security squadron orderly room. The duty sergeant, a tall lanky man with a deep southern accent, told me to wait off to the side. He extracted a cigarette from a pack of Camels, lit up with a shiny Zippo lighter, and gave me a disparaging squint.

  "You ride in on the bus?" he asked with a gruff tone.

  "No, took a taxi."

  He twisted his lip in a contemptuous grin. "They didn't try to take you to one of the local dives?"

  "Yeah, he recommended the Kerhane."

  "You didn't jump on that?" His eyebrows rose.

  "No, the line was too long … too many Air Force types … mostly NCO's."

  The grin faded into a scowl. A young airman sitting at a nearby desk guffawed and almost choked on his cigarette.

  A young second lieutenant, with a fresh burr haircut, entered and motioned for me to take a seat beside his desk.

  His quick nervous eyes revealed a hint of skepticism. Had to be my outfit. He inspected my orders and asked, "You got any ID?"

  I handed him my green Army ID card.

  "What's this…" the lieutenant peered down at my orders, "special detachment do?" His voice had an uneasy edge, like he was unaccustomed to being in charge.

  Didn't want to tell him I didn't know either, so I resorted to an old standard. "Sorry, compartmentalized need to know. Know what I mean?"

  He nodded and replied with an unconvincing, "Understand."

  Incirlik was a hotbed of compartmentalized activity. Situated near the northeastern curve of the Mediterranean coast, the base had been the main staging point for U-2 flights over the Soviet Union. The facility typically operated at a high security level. This day was no exception.

  He started to hand back my ID, hesitated a moment to study the photo, and said, "This picture makes you look almost like Steve McQueen."

  "That's what the Fräuleins tell me." The faint resemblance proved useful with the ladies at times. Sadly, my current dismal social life proved I lacked the charismatic appeal of my near double.