Many of the events, though changed sufficiently to protect the privacy of those involved, are based on actual happenings. There have been penetrations of Saudi air space, including the defection of an Iranian pilot who reached the massive oil complex at Ras Tanura. Covert support by the U.S. government of illegal arms sales has happened and will happen again. The introduction of Marc Jeppson, a relatively obscure educator from a small town in Utah, into the heady world of business, finance, and high technology in the culture of Southern California represents actual happenings in the lives of real people.
To insure the accuracy and realism of Leverage Point, the authors conducted numerous interviews and pursued considerable research in such areas as Islamic culture, Saudi Arabia and her peoples, the Mossad, Israel’s intelligence agency, arms and arms sales, high-performance jet aircraft, and high-tech radar systems.
The artistic relationship between the authors has been a collaborative one. Roger Hendrix developed the original story idea, created most of the characters, and wrote the preliminary outline. Gerald Lund was responsible for plot development, more extended character definition, and the writing of the novel. Both were involved in researching, interviewing, and reviewing and editing the work.
Gerald’s wife, Lynn, made numerous suggestions about characterization and plot development that improved the novel immeasureably. Jack Adamson, currently serving as senior vice president of Bonneville International Corporation, provided encouragement and valuable advice throughout the project.
Characters in Leverage Point
Marc Jeppson, professor of Near Eastern Studies, Claremont Colleges
Brett, his eight-year-old son
Matt, his six-year-old son
Alex Barclay, president of Barclay Enterprises; arms dealer and entrepreneur
Ardith, his wife
Mary Robertson, widow; Marc Jeppson’s housekeeper
Valerie, her twenty-six-year-old daughter; computer programmer
Jacqueline Ashby, executive secretary to Alex Barclay
Quinn Gerritt, president of Gerritt Industries, a high-tech conglomerate
Jessica, his wife
Derek Parkin, lawyer; associate in Barclay Enterprises
Lyman Perotti, financier; reputed crime boss in Southern California
Arthur Hadlow, representative for Lyman Perotti
Russell Whitaker, Undersecretary of State, United States State Department
Taylor Canning, General, United States Air Force
Jonathan Taggart, engineer, Gerritt Industries; VSM-430 radar system designer
Mildred, his wife
Charlene, his seventeen-year-old daughter
Michael Shurtliff, Senior Vice President, Gerritt Industries
Theodore Wuthrich, Controller, Gerritt Industries
Harvey Edwards, owner, Edwards Automotive
John Talbot, Colonel, United States Air Force; senior test pilot
Israelis
Yaacov Shoshani, philosophy professor, Hebrew University; civilian advisor to the Mossad, Israel’s equivalent to the CIA
Esther, his wife
Nathan, his son; Mossad operative; team leader for Los Angeles operations
Moshe Gondor, control officer, Mossad
Eli Weissman, Deputy Director in Charge of Special Operations, Mossad
Yehuda Gor, nicknamed Udi; Mossad operative
Yossi Kettleman, Mossad operative
Yitzhak ben Tsur, Mossad operative
Saudis
King Abdul Aziz, also called Ibn-Saud; founder of modern Saudi Arabia; died 1953
The King, current head of the royal family and ruler of Saudi Arabia
The Crown Prince, next in line for the throne; close advisor to the king
Prince Feisal, brother to the king; Minister of Defense, Saudi Arabia
Prince Khalid, brother to the king; Commanding General, Royal Saudi Air Force
Prince Abdullah, half brother to the king; Minister of Finance, Saudi Arabia
Sayeed Amani, General, Royal Saudi Air Force
Sheik Ahmed al-Hazzan, vice-Minister of Defense, Saudi Arabia
Prologue
It was barely past noon. The air temperature stood at an even fifty degrees Celsius—one-hundred-twenty-two degrees Farenheit—making the air shimmer so violently that only the first hundred yards or so of the twelve-thousand-foot runway was visible. The control tower, off in the distance, seemed like some sinuous serpent weaving to the sound of an unheard reed flute.
With a howling shriek, two McDonnel Douglas F-15s touched down, leaving bursts of blue-white smoke as the tires hit the hot concrete. Almost instantly the needle-nosed, twin-tailed craft disappeared into the superheated air, only to reappear a few moments later off to the left, one behind the other, taxiing toward the row of hardened shelters. On the ground, they looked awkward, almost grotesque, belying the incredible destructive power each craft carried within its bowels. Just below the cockpits, in sharp contrast to the gleaming aluminum skin, was a circular emblem—a palm tree with crossed swords beneath it. Next to the emblem, the inscription “Royal Saudi Air Force” was neatly stenciled in English and flowing Arabic.
To a thousand generations of Bedouins and village dwellers in the Arabian peninsula, the date palm had meant life and survival. The crossed swords, always unsheathed, represented strength through faith in Allah. It was that faith and the naked sword that had brought some of the world’s most formidible landscape—covering an area roughly the size of the United States east of the Mississippi—under the control of the Royal House of Saud.
The whims of some geologic genie had long ago placed beneath that blistering sand a black ocean of staggering magnitude. Allah had indeed smiled kindly on the Saudis. Twenty-six percent of all the world’s known oil reserves lay pooled below the desert kingdom. The Ghawar field, the largest onshore oil field in the world, contains more petroleum reserves than all the oil fields of the United States put together. Thirty-two of the nearly fifty other fields are capped, awaiting future need. Even with less than half their fields in current use, the Saudis still pump about ten million barrels of oil a day. The crude sells for somewhere around thirty dollars a barrel. It costs the Saudis fifty cents a barrel to extract, refine, ship, and market their oil. The arithmetic is simple but staggering. A profit of just under three hundred million dollars per day pours into the Saudi treasury.
It was that simple but staggering arithmetic that made the Thirteenth Fighter Interceptor Squadron of the Royal Saudi Air Force possible. It was that simple but staggering flow of oil that made the King Abdul Aziz Air Base outside of Dhahran not only possible but necessary. For while the blessings of Allah had left the kingdom of Saudi Arabia very, very rich, they had also left it very, very vulnerable.
At that moment, just past noon of August twenty-third, ten billion dollars of detection, command, and control systems failed. The Boeing E-3A Airborne Warning and Controls Systems (AWACS), one of the most expensive pieces of hardware in the world, was on the far end of its patrol duty station. An Air India 737, on its way to Riyadh, strayed a hundred miles off course. A squadron of Northrup F5-E Tigers, flying routine patrol, were vectored south to check it out. In the brief flurry of activity associated with all that, a tiny blip on one of the screens was missed.
In the pilot’s lounge there was only one American, a colonel from North Carolina who served as the Commander of the Technical Assistance Team sent over by the United States Air Force to work with the Saudi squadron. He was tanned almost as deeply as his Saudi counterparts. He sat in a chair, feet up, sipping a Coke, eyes half shut, listening to the low chatter of the pilots around him.
The sudden blast of the Klaxon from the overhead speakers shattered the lazy somnolence that lay on the airbase. Airmen in the cafeteria leaped up, overturning drinks and food. Pilots in the ready room grabbed helmets and raced for their planes. Mechanics hit the buttons and started shelter doorways rolling upward. Radar and computer operators darted to conso
les and terminals, hands poised and ready.
The control center, deep underground in the heart of the headquarters complex, had gone into a state of hushed but frantic urgency by the time two men burst through the doors. The first was a Saudi with stars on both shoulders. He was the base commander and director of the Eastern Coast Defense Sector. He was followed closely by the American.
The director of operations, a major with a thick moustache, saluted smartly, and broke into a stream of rapid Arabic.
“Speak English!” the general snapped. English was mandatory in the Royal Saudi Air Force.
The major stopped, took a quick breath, and started again. “A bogey just crossed the Fahad line coming in low and fast, sir.”
The base commander spun around and stared at the radar screen. The Fahad line was an imaginary line running through the center of the Persian Gulf from the Iran-Iraq border on the north to the Strait of Hormuz in the south. It was the action line for the Royal Saudi Air Force. Any unidentified aircraft crossing that line was considered hostile and intercepted by fully armed Saudi fighters prepared for combat engagement.
“Aircraft identification?” the general barked at one of the airmen hunched over a console.
“F-4 Phantom, sir!”
“Iranian!” the American exclaimed. It was the most logical guess. Iran had over three hundred Phantoms in their Air Force.
The overhead speaker blared: “This is Cobra Leader to Tower. We are ready to roll.”
Another voice, heavier, touched with excitement: “Cobra Leader, you are cleared for takeoff.”
“We’re scrambling the F-15s,” the major said tersely.
“If he’s across the Fahad line, they’ll never make it.” The general whirled to stare at the situation board and the lines appearing. “Can Blue Leader intercept?”
The major’s eyes dropped. “They were vectored off to the south five minutes ago. They are three hundred miles south of the intercept point.”
“What!”
The major swallowed hard, but his eyes came up and met the other’s fury.
An airman behind them cried out, “Computers predict ninety-two percent probability intended target is Ras Tanura!”
Ras Tanura. The general felt his heart lurch. One of the largest oil refinery complexes in the world, a storage facility with nearly a hundred tanks—some holding a million-and-a-quarter barrels of crude apiece—an offshore loading facility that would have six to eight supertankers docked there, guzzling millions of barrels of oil into their holds. If they took out Ras Tanura, it would virtually destroy the Saudi economy and cripple the energy needs of the Western world for years to come.
“Range eighty-three miles, closing at Mach one point one.”
“The F-15s will never make it.” The general’s voice was a whisper as he stared at the line the target tracker was making on the situation board. The F-15 Eagle can climb at a rate of seventeen thousand feet a minute at Mach 0.9, around seven hundred miles an hour. But even with that and their head-on attack capability, they would still not close on the bogey in time. At Mach 1.1, the Iranian fighter was approaching Ras Tanura at better than one mile every second. They had less than a minute.
“Cobra Leader to Charlie One,” the speaker blared again. “We are leveling at zero five thousand feet. We have radar contact and are tracking. Missiles are armed. Missile range in zero eight seven seconds.”
From somewhere behind them a man cried, “Ground batteries have radar contact. Will commence firing in twenty seconds.”
“They’ll never touch him.” the American muttered. “Not at that speed and altitude.”
“Time to target?”
“Thirty-three seconds!”
“Ground batteries standing by.”
“General, listen to this!” The airman at a radio console had leaped to his feet and was flipping switches. The speaker instantly blared with static, then a heavily accented voice, almost incoherent with hysteria.
“Saudi Air Base! Saudi Air Base! This is Captain Mohammed Pahlavi. I am defecting to your country. Do not shoot! Do not shoot!”
Every eye had swung up to stare at the overhead speaker.
“I have approaching aircraft on my radar screen! I am unarmed! Please do not shoot!”
Another airman’s voice sang out. “Bogey is zero one eight miles from the coast. Maintaining speed and altitude. Computers reject Ras Tanura as probable target.”
The general leaped to the radio and snatched a headset. “Captain Pahlavi? Do you read me? This is the base commander.”
“Yes! Yes! I read you!” It was almost a sob. “Don’t launch your missiles. I want to surrender.”
“Turn back out to sea. Turn instantly or we will fire!”
“Target turning!” came a cry from the radar man.
A burst of relief swept the room, and the general’s shoulders sagged. Finally he straightened and lifted the mike again. “Cobra Leader, this is General Hammad. Did you copy that last transmission?”
“Roger, General,” came back the laconic voice. “We’ll bring him in.”
General Hammad handed the headset back to the airman, then turned slowly to his American advisor, who was shaking his head.
“Holy Hannah, General!” was all the man from North Carolina could think of to say.
Chapter One
As Marc Jeppson turned the yellow Volkswagen Beetle onto Bridgeport Avenue in Claremont, California, he was muttering to himself. In his mind he could hear the voice of his dean—thin and reedy, almost bordering on a whine: “Professor Jeppson, you have missed the last two meetings of the faculty grievance committee. Is there some compelling reason why?”
“Two that I can think of,” Marc answered aloud, wishing he had had the nerve then to say them. “First, I hate that assignment. I mean, come on! The current crisis is that no one is changing the filters in the coffee percolator in the faculty lounge.”
He slowed and pulled into his driveway. “Second, I am enrolled in UCLA’s MBA program because I am bored absolutely out of my gourd with my life right now, and tonight happens to be my first test in my marketing class, and I also have a ten-page paper due, and the last thing I need is to spend time worrying about coffee percolators.”
He turned off the engine, grabbed his briefcase, and got out of the car. The sixteen-year-old who lived next door was bouncing a basketball in front of his garage. He grinned. “Talking to yourself again, Mr. Jeppson?”
“Yeah, I don’t know if it comes from being a parent or a teacher.”
“Probably from being a parent. My dad does it all the time.”
Marc laughed, waved, and walked quickly into the house. He dropped his briefcase on the couch, took off his sports jacket, and let it follow. “Mary,” he called. “I’m home.”
There was no answer. He turned to the lamp table where his housekeeper always put the mail. There was none. “Mary?” he shouted again, more loudly now.
Puzzled, he stuck his head in the family room. The television was on with no sound, but the room was empty. He walked over, flipped off the TV, turned back, and stopped dead. The carpet on the far side of the room was crisscrossed with dozens of white tracks that came from the kitchen, looped around the couch, and then headed for the hall. He crossed the room, still staring, bent down, and put his finger to one of the tracks. It looked and felt like flour. He raised it and touched his tongue. It was flour, with a taste of sugar to it. And the marks looked suspiciously like tricycle tracks.
With a sinking feeling he straightened and followed the tracks into the kitchen. He stopped in midstride, his jaw dropping. Five of the eight cupboard doors were open. The sugar cannister was tipped over near the blender, its contents over the edge and on the floor. A can of honey was also on its side, spreading an amber coat over a three-foot area of the counter. He watched a long drip break loose and hit the puddle of honey on the floor. Tracks marred this smaller pool and led off to the grand masterpiece. In the very center of the linoleum, s
omeone or something had taken the flour cannister—still visible near the dinette—and carefully covered a five-by-five square of the floor. This had been the primary palette for the mobile artist. Two dozen tracks led through the flour, to the sugar and honey and then out onto the carpet canvas of the halls and family room. The avant-garde artists at the college would have been inspired by the results.
“Mary!” This time he bellowed it with desperation. A slight noise from the garage caught his ear. Stepping gingerly so as to stay in the clearer spots, he crossed the kitchen and opened the door that led to the garage. The four-year-old heard the sound, jerked up, and stopped his tricycle dead. No question about it. This was the artist, and this was his brush. The tricycle’s back tires were a gummy white, and a floury paste was caked around the fender of the front wheel. Nor had the young artist escaped fully unscathed—only by the closest of examination could one tell the tee shirt and jeans were blue.
“Matthew David Jeppson! What are you doing?”
The large green eyes lowered, half hidden by long dark lashes. “Hullo, Daddy.”
The doorbell rang, and Marc looked up from spooning the honey off the counter. “Wonderful!” he muttered. He looked around to where his eight-year-old son was working on the floor. “Brett, get the door.”
Brett was up and off like a shot, grateful for any reprieve. A moment or two later he was back. “Dad, it’s some lady.”
He turned with a quick frown. “Who?”
Brett shrugged. “She wants you.”
Marc set the spoon down, washed his hands quickly, and with his sleeve wiped at the sheen of sweat on his forehead, leaving a smear of flour across his cheek. As he started for the living room, he looked down, saw that he was leaving white tracks of his own, and quickly removed his shoes.
He stopped short as he came around the hallway and into the living room. “Lady” in Marc’s mind suggested a grandmotherly forty or fiftyish. But the woman standing at the door was no more than twenty-five, possibly less, and very definitely not a grandmother. She was maybe five five or six, with short dark hair that framed her face. White cotton pants and a knit top with bold red and white horizontal stripes emphasized the slenderness of her figure. He was suddenly conscious of his stocking feet and floursmeared sweatshirt.