Strike Force
Strike Force
-
PICK UP IN STORECheck Availability at Nearby Stores
Available within 2 business hours
Related collections and offers
Overview
When a disgraced former Iranian military chief of staff engineers an insurgency that threatens to destroy the theocratic regime in Iran, a new era appears to be dawning in the Middle East. But one must be wary of old enemies . . .
On the run from the Pasdaran, the theocrat’s terror army, and unable to count on support from his friends in the regular army, Iranian rebel leader General Hesarak al-Kan Buzhazi desperately turns to his old nemesis, U.S. Air Force Lieutenant-General Patrick McLanahan, for help. Unwilling to commit American forces in an Iranian civil war, and with time running out, the U.S. president authorizes McLanahan to utilize a new, top-secret fleet of globe-crossing spaceplanes, the XR-A9 Black Stallions, led by test pilot and astronaut Captain Hunter Noble. Within hours, McLanahan’s Air Battle Force turns the tide, possibly changing the course of history in the Middle East for generations.
The advent of almost instantaneous global reach, along with the reactivation of America’s first military space station, Silver Tower, has rekindled fears of a space arms race, and the growing insurgency in Iran is threatening to erupt into a worldwide jihad. But McLanahan finds himself embroiled in even more bitter battles at the White House, between those who support his space-based military initiative and those who are working secretly to undermine it. When McLanahan is forced to concentrate on his political and personal battles back at home, it’s left to Hunter Noble and his team of young American space engineers to keep the fires of freedom in the Middle East from exploding completely out of control.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781094161600 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | HarperCollins Publishers |
| Publication date: | 05/26/2020 |
| Series: | Patrick McLanahan Series , #13 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.20(w) x 5.70(h) x (d) |
About the Author
Dale Brown, a former US Air Force captain, is the New York Times bestselling author of more than two dozen action-adventure techno-thriller novels. He is also the co-author of the bestselling Dreamland and Puppet Master series. He is a technical consultant of the Act of War PC real-time strategy game published by Atari Interactive and the Megafortress PC flight simulator by Three-Sixty Pacific. Worldwide sales of his novels, audiobooks, e-books, and computer games exceed fifteen million copies.
Corey Snow, a full-time audiobook narrator and voice actor living in the great Pacific Northwest, has been everything from a paratrooper to a software developer. Working from his studio in Olympia, Washington, he has recorded numerous audiobooks, including Crescent
Lake by David Sakmyster and several titles in David Niall Wilson’s
DeChance Chronicles. Corey’s love of reading and storytelling shows in every word, regardless of whether he is bringing characters from a novel to life,
clearly detailing military history, or making software theory riveting.
Read an Excerpt
Strike Force
A Novel
Prologue
Orumiyeh Airport
Islamic Republic of Iran
March 2008
"Group, atten-shun!"
The group of five hundred uniformed young men and women snapped to attention, and the reviewing party marched from their waiting position in a large white tent on the edge of the tarmac. The group leader saluted the reviewing party, who returned his salute. The reviewing party turned about-face as the flags of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic, the Ministry of the Interior, and the Internal Defense Corps were marched out. The presiding officer of the reviewing party saluted, as did the entire assembly, followed by the playing of "Ey Iran," a popular inspirational and patriotic song often preferred by the military over the pro-revolutionary official national anthem "Sorood-e Melli-ye Jomhoori-ye Eslami-ye Iran." After the song concluded, the presiding officer stepped up to a podium, and the crowd of about two thousand guests and base employees were asked to be seated.
"Citizens, friends, families, and fellow warriors, I bid you welcome on this glorious and important morning here in Orumiyeh," Major-General Hesarak al-Kan Buzhazi began. "I am proud to preside over this important occasion for the Islamic Republic of Iran. On behalf of His Holiness Imam Sayyed Mostafa Shirazemi, may God bless his name; president Masoud Ahmadad; senior adviser to the Supreme Defense Council His Holiness Hassan Mohtaz, may God preserve him; the chief of staff General Hoseyn Yassini; and the commander of the Revolutionary Guards Corps Lieutenant-General Muhammad Badi, I hereby activate the First CombinedBorder Defense Battalion."
There was a short ceremony, during which Buzhazi unfurled the battalion flag and tied the combat-ready ribbon atop it, then handed the flag to its new commander and saluted him. Tall and slender, with gray hair worn slightly on the longish side and with a closely cropped gray beard and mustache, Buzhazi looked much younger than his sixty-one years. He wore a dark winter-weight fatigue jacket with no insignia on it except his general's stars on his shoulders (but they were also black and hard to see from a distance), thick black fatigue pants, tanker boots, and a black visor cap with the earflaps folded up. He clasped the commander on the shoulders, kissed him on each cheek, returned his salute, and returned to the podium to finish his speech.
"I hope you all realize the significance of this ceremony today," Buzhazi went on. His voice was deep, sharp, and clipped, and he spoke without notes. "As you know, the Supreme Leader, may God protect him, has ordained that one out of every ten citizens of Iran over the age of majority serve in the active or reserve military forces, so in case the forces of evil attack us, we can be ready. As we are a peaceful nation, maintaining a force this large is difficult and expensive, so persons not serving in the active-duty military forces are assigned to local militias, the Basij-i-mostazefin, what used to be called the 'Army of the Oppressed.' I don't know about you, my friends, but I would not have liked being assigned to an army with the term 'oppressed' in its title.
"When I resigned my post as chief of staff of the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic and accepted the post of commander of the Basij, I found a force of willing and energetic men and women of all ages who desired nothing more than to serve their country, both as hard-working citizens and as defenders. What they lacked was proper training, motivation, and purpose. My goal was to transform the best of the Basij into a true fighting force, capable of not just assisting the active-duty forces, but complementing them. Ladies and gentlemen, and especially my fellow warriors, may I present to you, the First Combined Border Defense Battalion, The Lions, of the newly designated Islamic Republic of Iran Internal Defense Force!"
Amidst a round of enthusiastic applause, a procession of vehicles moved onto the tarmac from the north hangar area, surrounded by security guards in armored vehicles. The first vehicle was a ground support vehicle towing a single engine, two-man aircraft; the second was a road-mobile surface-to-air missile vehicle; and the third was a mobile anti-aircraft artillery vehicle.
"My friends, let me introduce you to the three main weapon systems now being deployed with the First," Buzhazi went on. "The aircraft is a Swiss-made Pilatus PC-6 turboprop aircraft. Normally these aircraft are just trainers—Switzerland does not build any of its aircraft to be used for combat—but we have modified them to act as close air support, photo-intelligence, and counter-insurgency attack aircraft. They even carry heat-seeking missiles to combat enemy aircraft.
"The second is an Almaz S-300 mobile surface-to-air missile launcher. It is designed to engage and destroy aircraft at very low altitude, even stealth aircraft, helicopters, and cruise missiles—it can even detect and destroy helicopters hovering close to the ground or behind trees; it also has an excellent high-altitude engagement capability, and is effective out to fifty kilometers. It is designed to deploy to isolated field locations so as to make it more difficult for enemy aircraft to target it. It is an older air defense system, but our best military engineers have upgraded and refurbished it so it is far better than new.
"The third vehicle is a 2S6M Tunguska anti-aircraft artillery system, with two 30-millimeter radar- or infrared-guided cannons, capable of a combined firing rate of five thousand rounds per minute, plus eight 9M311M anti-aircraft missiles, capable of destroying low- to medium-altitude targets out to a range of ten kilometers."
Buzhazi applauded along with the audience as the three weapon systems were towed right behind the unit members. It truly made a very impressive sight. Behind them, security and maintenance vehicles cruised slowly along the taxiway. "These weapons represent the first time a reserve force has been given such advanced weapon systems," Buzhazi went on. "I am proud to award this unit the combat-ready ribbon, which represents this unit's high marks in field exercises, testing, and inspections. I am pleased to present to you the officers and senior non-commissioned officers of each regiment. They are the most important element of this new, vital defense force that will ensure the security of our great nation. They have undergone a rigorous and intensive training program, trained not just to use these weapon systems but in how to best deploy them in case of national emergency, to counter whatever threat exists to our great land and defeat them. They are some of the best I have ever had the pleasure of commanding, and I am proud of each and every one of them."
As Buzhazi read the names and watched as the men came forward, he sensed a slight disturbance somewhere distant from the audience. He turned to look over his left shoulder but saw nothing out of the ordinary—plenty of security on hand to keep any curious onlookers from straying too close to the hardware.
He read off a few more names, but still that feeling persisted, and so this time he turned fully around and studied the area. A security vehicle with blue flashing lights on the roof was escorting what appeared to be a technical maintenance vehicle, basically a medium-sized eight-ton truck with a small crane on the front to load and unload missiles and ammunition. Both were common sights—why was he feeling so uneasy? Everything looked completely . . .
. . . and at that instant, the two vehicles quickly accelerated and headed straight for the ceremony area—and now Buzhazi could see a line of security cars and armored vehicles racing out of the hangar area toward them, lights and sirens on, pursuing the two vehicles!
"Get out!" Buzhazi shouted into the microphone. "Get out of here, now!" The crowd stood still, heads excitedly turning back and forth, but no one was moving. "I said, run! Everyone run!" He turned to a couple of guards who were standing about thirty meters away, AK-47 rifles slung on their shoulders. "You! Guards! Stop those vehicles!"
But it was too late. Buzhazi had enough time to run away from the podium toward the base operations building, wildly motioning for the crowd to follow him, when the truck plowed into the S-300 surface-to-air missile launcher. There was a small explosion, perhaps from a bit of gasoline ignited by a spark . . . and then seconds later the thousand kilos of high explosives packed into the rear of the truck detonated. Buzhazi felt himself picked off his feet by a red-hot wave of energy, along with pieces of concrete, burning fuel and metal, and body parts, and flung through the air.
Strike ForceA Novel. Copyright © by Dale Brown. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.