BookView Review

From the Blurb:

When American authorities learn that a nuclear missile may have been spirited away by the Castro regime during the Cuban Missile Crisis and that their enemies are planning to use it against them, the CIA calls upon Dalton Drake, a dauntless Canadian private intelligence contractor, to uncover the truth. Embarking on a perilous journey to Cuba, Drake and his elite team soon find themselves enmeshed in a web of intrigue involving Cuba, Venezuela, China, and American political radicals, who are conspiring to dismantle the very foundations of American power. Their goal is to usher in a new world order with China at the top and to vanquish US leadership. As Drake and his team race against time, their pursuit takes them on a high-stakes odyssey across Cuba, Central America, the Caribbean, Canada, and the US. With the fate of the west and also his family hanging in the balance, this is Drake’s most personal mission yet.

Read review

Varadero, Cuba

Drake had a picturesque view of the crimson Cuban sunset from his table in the resort dining room. He sat alone, enjoying the solitude that had become a rarity of late. Ignoring the laughter and noise from the other guests around him was easy as he thought about how the next steps in his operation would unfold while watching the glowing orb slip below the tranquil horizon. Sipping on a Tallinn, his trademark cocktail, he smiled as he recalled ops that he had shared with Kenton Stone and happily anticipated his arrival the following day. That boy certainly has a unique style, he thought. As much as the day around the pool was a nice break and offered some interesting sights, he was anxious to find Sorokin and get on with the mission.

After dinner, he strolled through the casino and continued on to the bar, taking a seat that offered a wide view of the room. People were wandering into the bar but were seated mainly at tables. Drake sat alone at the ornate bar, watching a sports broadcast on the local network, and didn’t notice the approach of the woman he had seen earlier by the pool. She took the stool next to Drake, strategically positioning herself to emphasize her low-cut dress, which had a slit on the side that ran up to her waist.

“Hi,” she said. “Looks like you could use some company.”

Drake looked over at her, then crossed his arms and smiled. “Come on, I just arrived. I’m off the market anyway, sugar.”

“You look like a generous guy. I thought you might want to at least buy me a drink.”

“Well, no one’s buying anything seeing this is an all-inclusive resort, but I guess ordering you a drink is not much of a commitment. What’ll you have?”

“A Tallinn, Mr. Drake,” the woman said, her tone turning serious.

Drake looked at her again, this time peering directly in her eyes. “I expected you earlier,” he whispered.

In response, the woman opened her purse, withdrew a pen and a small notebook, and began writing a note. With an exaggerated gesture, she pushed it in front of Drake.

The walls have eyes and ears. Let’s laugh and have a drink, then take a walk.

Drake motioned to the bartender and ordered a round. Once the drinks arrived, the two struck up a conversation that sounded typical for strangers meeting in a bar. The woman lit a cigarette and then burned her note in the ashtray.

“Let’s start with your name, seeing as you already know mine,” Drake said.

“Lucia Estrada, though my friends call me Lucy.”

“Well, Lucy, you certainly know how to make an entrance. It was pretty hard to miss you around the pool today.”

“That’s necessary for my line of work, honey. Maybe I’ll tell you about it sometime. Hey, I know a nice little bar not far from here. Want to take a walk?”

Drake stood up and gestured for her to do the same. “Lead the way.”

The two made their way through the lobby and out the front door. Once out of earshot from the resort entrance, Lucy turned to Drake and slipped her arm into his.

“Sorry for the introduction, Dalton, but it’s my cover. I’m a barmaid by day in downtown Havana and appear as a ‘businesswoman’ by night. That’s what the local authorities think, anyway.”

“If you ‘tend bar’ by day, how do you do your intel work?”

“Let’s just say I have an ‘understanding’ employer. It’s a small but popular café that we’ve run for several years. It’s frequented by government officials, a place where they feel comfortable to talk. We know who’s screwing whose wife and who’s on the take. Always a good source of intel and even handy for blackmail from time to time. I work it a couple of days a week.”

“You said we have run it for years. Who’s we?” Drake asked.

“The Company, although the locals think it’s owned by a Cuban guy. He has worn a white hat since his wife was killed by Castro’s goons years ago. At night, usually on weekends, I hang around the resort hotels and casinos, chatting up Russians, locals, and Western businessmen. I’m not actually a prostitute, though, so relax,” she said with a smile.

“So you’re a double agent,” Drake said.

“No, you and I wear the same jersey. The Cubans think I work for them, but I only pass them bogus or misleading intel that I’m instructed to feed them. Snippets and pieces but never enough to be useful or solve puzzles. It gets me inside the room that allows me to tap into valuable intel.”

“It sounds like a dangerous game, Lucy.”

“The trick is to know when to throw them a bone that they can chew on for a while, to appear to remain relevant to them. But enough about me. I’ve been briefed by Langley on your op and know why you’re here. I can connect you with Sorokin, but there’s been a new development with him.”

The two of them walked onto a small bar patio and took a table near the street where they could talk privately.

“What’s going on?” Drake asked.

“He was spotted again a few days ago in Caracas where he attended another meeting at their defense ministry offices. A number of high-ranking military officers arrived at the same time, including Colonel Rafael Salazar, considered a close confidante to the Venezuelan president and in his inner circle.”

She handed Drake a photo of the colonel. “After the meeting, Sorokin headed back to Havana, alone,” Lucy continued. “This is where the story takes a strange turn. Within a day of his return, our embassy was contacted by an American tourist who had been approached by a man in a Havana restaurant. He was handed an envelope and asked to deliver it to embassy staff. Though reluctant, he agreed and delivered the envelope under the guise of a passport inquiry later that day. The description the tourist gave of the man who approached fits Sorokin exactly.”

“What was in the envelope?”

“A letter for the ambassador. Sorokin said he has some classified information that he wants to share in exchange for safe passage to the US. We haven’t replied or attempted to contact him yet. Langley has requested that you take the first meeting.”

“OK, so this makes hearing what Sorokin has to say our first priority. But I also want to check out the old San Cristobal missile site near Soroa. Can you take me there?”

“Sure. But outwardly, we need to appear to become good ‘friends’ for the next few days. Only for the cameras, obviously,” she added, chuckling. “You never know who’s listening or watching in Cuba, especially here and in Havana.”

“When can we get started?” Drake asked.

“I presume you’re not referring to the friends part.” Lucy giggled playfully.

“Uh, no. I meant meeting Sorokin,” he replied, blushing.

“Langley told me one of your associates will arrive tomorrow, sometime in the afternoon. You and I can contact Sorokin in the morning. I’ll arrange for a ten o’clock rendezvous. He asked that we meet in a quiet park not far from his house. You and I can play a happy couple taking a walk, then have a brief, random encounter with an old man. As for San Cristobal, it’s about a three-hour drive from here. Let’s go there the following morning by getting an early start with your associate.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Drake said. “I have some satellite shots that Langley gave me with possible storage locations for the missile. They’re all within a few miles of the original base, so they shouldn’t be hard to find. If there’s anything to this story, you can be sure they’ll be heavily fortified and impossible to get to.”

Drake and Lucy continued strolling through the area, eventually making their way back to the resort’s front entrance. Before departing to their rooms, Lucy surprised Drake with an embrace and a kiss while standing in the middle of the lobby.

“What was that for?” Drake whispered.

“For the cameras,” she replied with a mischievous smile, then turned for the elevator.

Washington, DC

Rosemary Dutton, the newly appointed US Secretary of Defense, walked from the north entrance of the West Wing to her awaiting limousine. Accompanied by her executive secretary and Rear Admiral Conrad Hayes, commander of the US 4th Fleet, they had just completed a meeting with the president and senior national security personnel.

“Welcome to the frying pan, Madam Secretary,” Hayes joked as they climbed in the car. “This is a heck of a way to spend your first week on the job.”

“It feels more like I’ve already jumped in the fire,” she replied, laughing. “Two days into it and we already have a potential nuclear crisis on our hands.”

“Well, we don’t know that for sure yet, but at least we now have a plan for the worst-case scenario,” the admiral said. “As soon as we arrive back at the Pentagon, we’ll start the deployment plan we discussed. The first order of business will be to get the two destroyers on station off of western Cuba.”

“Any thoughts on who you’re going to send in?” Dutton asked.

“That part’s easy. The two best boat drivers and their ships I have in the fleet are at port in Florida now, USS Lassen and USS Jason Dunham. Both captains have operational and combat experience in the Middle East with ships and crew that can handle just about anything we can expect from the Cubans, including a ballistic missile intercept.”

Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, stationed in Mayport, Florida, had been chosen for the mission due to their wide array of weapons, both offensive and defensive. The destroyer’s advanced Aegis Baseline 9 combat system was integrated with cooperative engagement capability, allowing the ship to fire on targets acquired by other ships, bases, or aircraft. Baseline 9 also permitted anti-ballistic missile targeting, using the ship’s array of RIM 161 SM-3 missiles and offensive missile attacks on land targets using its Tomahawk (TLAM) land-attack cruise missiles. A potent combat ship, such a destroyer could also defend itself against missile or submarine attacks from hostile enemies using its Phalanx gatling gun and various torpedo countermeasures and decoys.

“We have HUMINT assets on the ground and will be soon arriving in the San Cristobal area to gather hard intel on the ground,” Dutton said. “The KH-12 satellite images that we have don’t give us much to go on except that the places indicated by Santiago Ortiz all appear to be where he said they would be. If we actually find a missile in storage, what are your recommendations, Admiral?”

“The go order will come from the president, but you heard him say that if a missile is found, it would be a clear and present danger to the country and our regional allies. With the added possibility of Venezuelan involvement, my recommendation is to act immediately. This is a direct violation of the deal struck by Kennedy and Khrushchev in 1962, which is legally still in effect. We’d strike with Tomahawks and neutralize the threat.”

“Will our ships and ground assets be in danger?” Dutton asked.

“Not until we attack,” Hayes replied. “The Cubans are used to our ships coming and going from Gitmo. As long as we’re well outside their twelve-mile territorial limit, they’ll keep an eye on us but won’t be alarmed. Once our missiles are flying, it’ll get a lot more exciting, for sure. Two DAAFAR bases on the west of the island, San Julien with its MiG-21s and San Antonio de los Banos with MiG-24 and MiG-29s, could scramble fighters if they were crazy enough to shoot back. We’d respond with F-35s from MacDill AFB, engaging the MiGs within a few minutes of getting the call. It would be a turkey shoot.”

“What about their navy?”

“They couldn’t react fast enough,” Hayes replied. “They have two old Soviet missile frigates and some coastal missile boats spread around the island. Their sub force consists of three North Korean miniature subs and are no match for our destroyers. For them it would be a suicide mission.”

“How could we get our ground assets off the island?” Dutton asked, now concerned with the growing scope of the operation.

“Honestly, Rosemary, that’ll be trickier, and maybe we’ll have to play that one as the mission unfolds. The ships have MH-60B Seahawk helicopters on board, which are a good choice for an extraction mission like this. They’re built primarily for ASW and search and rescue. We’ll need to plan a rendezvous point with the landing zone near the coast and far enough from the strike. If we pull them out before the attack, it may wave a red flag if we’re detected. If we wait until it’s over, it may be too late to evade and penetrate their search radars. We may have to go simultaneously. But let’s not get out over our skis on this yet.”

“Agreed, Admiral. We may have even a bigger problem with extracting American tourists and civilians stuck in Cuba if the government closes the borders or restricts exits in reprisal. Yeah, this thing could become really challenging.”

“In the lingo of the Pentagon, Madam Secretary,” Hayes said with a grimace, “a pain in the bishop’s ass.”

***