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“If you were to meet us halfway and agree that it is time for our two nations to bury old wounds and forge a lasting peace that respects both Islam and freedom, we would restore relations on a level that would encourage American investment in your country.”
“There are many in my country,” Ashani said, “who think you were behind the destruction of the Isfahan facility.”
Ke
“That may well be the case. I am just telling you, the hard-liners will want something more concrete than the possibility that American banks might invest in our country.”
“American financial institutions will follow the U.S. government. That is why the president is prepared to offer you a billion dollars in guaranteed loans.”
Ashani was surprised. “What is the catch?”
“The money must go toward building new refineries. The loans will be interest-free for the first three years, and after that they will be locked in at five percent.”
“The money has to be used to build refineries?”
“The president feels it is the only way he can get a majority of the Congress to back it.”
“You want us to renounce our nuclear program?”
“No.” She shook her head. “Not publicly.”
“But privately.”
“It would help.”
Ashani winced. “There are those in my country who are obsessed with becoming a nuclear power.”
Ke
Ashani scratched his beard, looked past Ke
“Why what?”
“Why are you offering to help us?”
Ke
Ashani had a look of intense concentration on his face. Everything she had just said was true, but selling it to men whose entire power base was dependent on a hatred of America would be exceedingly difficult.
Ke
“That is true, but this is a big step.”
“What is your alternative, Azad?” Ke
With downcast eyes, Ashani slowly nodded.
“Then what is your answer?”
In Ashani’s mind there was no doubt this was the right thing to do, but selling it to the Supreme Council would be extremely difficult. His mind kept returning to Amatullah. The Peacock President would hate this with every fiber of his body. Still, there was a chance that the Supreme Leader would see it as an opportunity for his people to avoid years of pain and suffering. Finally, Ashani looked at Ke
“I know it will, but I hope for the sake of both our countries you succeed.”
33
Captain Pete Halberg was a prime candidate for an ulcer. The forty-five-year-old graduate of A
Command of any submarine was an intensely stressful, yet rewarding job. Commanding one of America ’s newest fast attack submarines was in a league all by itself. The United States Navy had entrusted Halberg with the two-billion-dollar technological marvel and given him 134 submariners to lead. The cruise had been fairly routine up until two days prior when they’d received a flash message from Submarine Task Force Commander or CTF 54. Their orders were to leave the Dwight D. Eisenhower Strike Group, which was on patrol in the Persian Gulf, and proceed to the Gulf of Oman, where Halberg and his crew were to locate and track one of Iran ’s three Kilo-class subs that had left port in a hurry.
Shortly after midnight they’d followed a Liberian supertanker filled with crude through the Strait of Hormuz and entered the deeper waters of the Gulf of Oman. At 377 feet the U.S.S. Virginia was seventeen feet longer than the depth of the main shipping cha
Based on the information provided by CTF 54, Halberg and his executive officer, De
It was a predictable maneuver that they had seen the Iranians use dozens of times. They would run their subs out of their base in Bandar Abbas in broad daylight for all the world to see and then transit through the strait on the surface. Once clear of the shipping cha