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"It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents-- except at occasional intervals ... "
"Just what in the hell are you talking about?" EdwardWard said from his place in the driver's seat ofthe M998 series High Mobility MultipurposeWheeled Vehicle (HMMWV), commonly called aHumvee. The heavy military vehicle was movingslowly through the rain, hardly an unexpectedweather situation in northeast Bosnia-Herzegovina.The wide military vehicle bumped and jostled thepassengers as it passed over a rough and rutted roadthat was little more than a cart path.
There were some better roads on the northeasternslopes of the Majevica mountain range, but thesemen were intentionally avoiding them. The vehiclerolled along quietly, hidden in the dark on a pathfew other people would choose to travel even in fulldaylight.
The passengers in the wide, boxy vehicle stoodout as much as their ride did. The men had an un-earthly, alien look about them as most of them woreAN/PVS-14 night-vision devices on their faces. Thesingle large extended eye tube of the PVS-14, alongwith the frame that strapped to their faces, gavethem a bulging cyclops look.
The only one inside the vehicle who was wearinga different style of night-vision device was Ed Ward,the driver. He had a set of AN/TVS-7 night-visiongoggles on his face -- the goggles giving him excellentdepth perception. Ward had no trouble drivingthe Humvee in almost complete darkness, even withthe vehicle's headlights turned off.
"Just thinking about the beginning of a book Iheard about," Chief Ted "Grim" Reaper said fromthe front passenger seat. From the backseat of thevehicle, Titus "Bear" Parnell spoke up.
"You know, when I first got to Team Two, MikeBoynton was the master chief," Bear said. "He alwayssaid that back in Vietnam, rainy nights like thisone were great to operate in."
"That's because no one in their right mind wouldbe going out in this shit," Mike Martell, the fourthSEAL of the group, said from where he sat in theback, listening carefully to the radio over the headsethe had clamped over his left ear.
"So, that must be why we're out here," Ward said.
"Ho, ho, ho," Bear chuckled. His teammates wereused to the fact that the big SEAL actually laughedlike Santa Claus. That laugh usually drew a secondlook from anyone else who happened to be aroundwhen his deep voice boomed out. One look at Bearwould tell you where his nickname came from, andevaporate any thoughts of Saint Nick. None of the SEALs were small, but Bear looked like a beer kegwith legs and arms -- thick, muscular legs and arms.
At his place in front, ChiefTed Reaper continued tolook out of the window of the Humvee at the drivingrain of Bosnia-Herzegovina in the early spring. Thesnows were gone, but that just made the poorly kept,muddy country roads a quagmire. He and his fellowSEALs made up the Navy contingent of their detachmentfrom the Joint Special Strike Force (JSSF). Theyhad been attached to the U.N.-mandated StabilizationForce, the SFOR, that was trying to maintain stabilityin the war-torn area of the Balkans. The JSSF was putin place to react quickly to any situation. They couldrapidly evaluate a problem and either decide to dealwith it themselves or call in a greater strength forcefrom the SFOR assets scattered around the country.
The men of JSSF also conducted classic specialoperations missions: special reconnaissance operationsto locate potential rogue groups or war criminals,direct actions in the form of strikes againstdesignated sites or personnel, and civil affairs,where they tried to develop good relations amongthe civilian population of an area.
To secure maximum flexibility in conductingthese operations, the Joint Special Strike Force hadbeen put together from the Navy, Army, and AirForce special operations forces. The Air Force contingentof this JSSF detachment were two combatcontrollers, who were the best field air controllers inany of the services. The Army contingent of sixSpecial Forces troopers made up the bulk of theJSSF detachment. In overall command were twoprofessional Intelligence officers who had a great deal of experience running covert paramilitary operationsfor the CIA.
Chief Reaper was the senior noncommissioned of-ficer (NCO) of the detachment, which didn't alwayssit well with the Army guys but didn't cause any realfriction. The SEALs bumped heads and crackedjokes with the Army troopers on occasion, and bothgroups of men made fun of the Air Force contingent.The jokes came from years of traditional rivalry betweenthe services.
Underlying the gags was an unspoken respect themen had for each other. The operators were all professionalwarriors and knew the skills and capabilitieseach man brought from his branch of the service.The only real unknown factor was their commandingofficer.
There were two officers in the detachment, LieutenantMark Franklin, who was the executive officerand Captain Cary Paxtun the commanding officer.Both men had been in the Army Special Forces beforechanging their career paths and going into intelligencework. Franklin had remained in ArmyIntelligence while Paxtun had gone on to operate directlywith the CIA.
Both men had spent years working in Afghanistanand other parts of the world, Paxtun as part of theparamilitary forces of the CIA and Franklin with theArmy. Between them, they spoke seven languagesincluding Arabic, Serbo-Croat, Pushtun, Afghan,Persian, and Russian. They had both come back toSpecial Operations because that was where the actionwas now, and Reaper was of the opinion theyshould have stayed where they were ...
Excerpted from The Home Team: Undeclared War by Dennis C. Chalker, Kevin Dockery All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.
