By Order of the President Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  I - SPRING 2005

  II

  III

  IV - WINTER 1981

  V - SPRING 2005

  WINTER 1991

  VI - SPRING 2005

  VII

  VIII

  IX

  X

  XI

  XII - SPRING 1991

  SPRING 2005

  XIII

  XIV

  WINTER 1998

  XV

  XVI

  XVII

  XVIII

  XIX

  "W.E.B. Griffin is the best chronicler of the U.S. military ever to put pen to paper—and rates among the best storytellers in any genre.”

  —The Phoenix Gazette

  Praise for RETREAT, HELL!

  "LOVERS OF MILITARY YARNS WILL GRAB THIS BOOK.” —The Columbus Dispatch

  "GRIFFIN ... STICKS MORE CLOSELY TO THE ACTION AND MOVES AHEAD WITH GALVANIZED SELF-ASSURANCE.” —Kirkus Reviews

  “ANOTHER SOLID ENTRY . . . Veterans of the series will enjoy finding old comrades caught up in fresh adventures, while new-guy readers can easily enter here and pick up the ongoing story.” —Publishers Weekly

  “THE AUTHOR HAS A KNACK FOR SMOOTHLY COMBINING FACT WITH FICTION, giving his work a realistic veneer.” —Booklist

  W.E.B. Griffin’s classic series

  THE CORPS

  The bestselling saga of the heroes we call Marines . . .

  “THE BEST CHRONICLER OF THE U.S. MILITARY EVER TO PUT PEN TO PAPER.” —The Phoenix Gazette

  “GREAT READING. A superb job of mingling fact and fiction . . . [Griffin’s] characters come to life.”

  —The Sunday Oklahoman

  “THIS MAN HAS REALLY DONE HIS HOMEWORK . . . I confess to impatiently awaiting the appearance of succeeding books in the series.” —The Washington Post

  “ACTION-PACKED . . . DIFFICULT TO PUT DOWN.”

  —Marine Corps Gazette

  HONOR BOUND

  The high drama and real heroes of World War II . . .

  “ROUSING . . . AN IMMENSELY ENTERTAINING ADVENTURE. ” —Kirkus Reviews

  “INTRICATELY PLOTTED and packed with those accurate details that fans of Griffin have come to expect.” —Booklist

  “A TAUTLY WRITTEN STORY whose twists and turns will keep readers guessing until the last page.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “A SUPERIOR WAR STORY.” —Library Journal

  BROTHERHOOD OF WAR

  The series that launched W.E.B. Griffin’s phenomenal career . . .

  “AN AMERICAN EPIC.” —Tom Clancy

  “FIRST-RATE. Griffin, a former soldier, skillfully sets the stage, melding credible characters, a good eye for detail, and colorful gritty dialogue into a readable and entertaining story.” —The Washington Post Book World

  “ABSORBING, salted-peanuts reading filled with detailed and fascinating descriptions of weapons, tactics, Green Beret training, army life, and battle.”

  —The New York Times Book Review

  “A CRACKLING GOOD STORY. It gets into the hearts and minds of those who by choice or circumstance are called upon to fight our nation’s wars.”

  —William R. Corson, Lt. Col. [Ret.], U.S.M.C., author of The Betrayal and The Armies of Ignorance

  “A MAJOR WORK . . . MAGNIFICENT . . . POWERFUL . . . If books about warriors and the women who love them were given medals for authenticity, insight, and honesty, Brotherhood of War would be covered with them.”

  —William Bradford Huie, author of The Klansman and The Execution of Private Slovik

  BADGE OF HONOR

  Griffin’s electrifying epic series of a big-city police force . . .

  "DAMN EFFECTIVE . . . He captivates you with characters the way few authors can.” —Tom Clancy

  "TOUGH, AUTHENTIC . . . POLICE DRAMA AT ITS BEST . . . Readers will feel as if they’re part of the investigation, and the true-to-life characters will soon feel like old friends. Excellent reading.” —Dale Brown

  “COLORFUL . . . GRITTY . . . TENSE.”

  —The Philadelphia Inquirer

  “A REAL WINNER.” —New York Daily News

  MEN AT WAR

  The legendary OSS—fighting a silent war of spies and assassins in the shadows of World War II . . .

  “WRITTEN WITH A SPECIAL FLAIR for the military heart and mind.” —Kansas Daily Courier

  “SHREWD, SHARP, ROUSING ENTERTAINMENT.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “CAMEOS BY SUCH HISTORICAL FIGURES as William ‘Wild Bill’ Donovan, Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr., David Niven, and Peter Ustinov lend color . . . suspenseful.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  Titles by W.E.B. Griffin

  HONOR BOUND

  HONOR BOUND

  BLOOD AND HONOR

  SECRET HONOR

  BROTHERHOOD

  OF WAR

  BOOK I: THE LIEUTENANTS

  BOOK II: THE CAPTAINS

  BOOK III: THE MAJORS

  BOOK IV: THE COLONELS

  BOOK V: THE BERETS

  BOOK VI: THE GENERALS

  BOOK VII: THE NEW BREED

  BOOK VIII: THE AVIATORS

  BOOK IX: SPECIAL OPS

  THE CORPS

  BOOK I: SEMPER

  BOOK II: CALL TO ARMS

  BOOK III: COUNTERATTACK

  BOOK IV: BATTLEGROUND

  BOOK V: LINE OF FIRE

  BOOK VI: CLOSE COMBAT

  BOOK VII: BEHIND THE LINES

  BOOK VIII: IN DANGER’S PATH

  BOOK IX: UNDER FIRE

  BOOK X: RETREAT, HELL!

  BADGE OF HONOR

  BOOK I: MEN IN BLUE

  BOOK II: SPECIAL OPERATIONS

  BOOK III: THE VICTIM

  BOOK IV: THE WITNESS

  BOOK V: THE ASSASSIN

  BOOK VI: THE MURDERERS

  BOOK VII: THE INVESTIGATORS

  BOOK VIII: FINAL JUSTICE

  MEN AT WAR

  BOOK I: THE LAST HEROES

  BOOK II: THE SECRET WARRIORS

  BOOK III: THE SOLDIER SPIES

  BOOK IV: THE FIGHTING AGENTS

  BOOK V: THE SABOTEURS

  BOOK VI: THE DOUBLE AGENTS

  PRESIDENTIAL AGENT

  BOOK I: BY ORDER OF THE PRESIDENT

  BOOK II: THE HOSTAGE

  BOOK III: THE HUNTERS

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

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  South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to
actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  BY ORDER OF THE PRESIDENT

  A Jove Book / published by arrangement with the author

  Copyright © 2004 by W.E.B. Griffin.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without

  permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the

  author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  eISBN : 978-1-4406-3031-6

  JOVE®

  Jove Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  JOVE is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

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  http://us.penguingroup.com

  26 July 1777

  “The necessity of procuring good intelligence is apparent and need not be further urged.”

  George Washington

  General and Commander in Chief

  The Continental Army

  FOR THE LATE

  WILLIAM E. COLBY

  An OSS Jedburgh first lieutenant

  who became director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

  AARON BANK

  An OSS Jedburgh first lieutenant

  who became a colonel and the Father of Special Forces.

  WILLIAM R. CORSON

  A legendary Marine intelligence officer

  who the KGB hated more than any other U.S. intelligence

  officer—and not only because he wrote the definitive

  work on them.

  FOR THE LIVING

  BILLY WAUGH

  A legendary Special Forces Command sergeant major

  who retired and then went on to hunt down the infamous

  Carlos the Jackal.

  Billy could have terminated Usama bin Laden

  in the early 1990s but could not get permission to do so.

  After fifty years in the business, Billy

  is still going after the bad guys.

  RENÉ J. DÉFOURNEAUX

  A U.S. Army OSS second lieutenant attached to the British

  SOE who jumped into Occupied France alone and later

  became a legendary U.S. Army counterintelligence officer.

  JOHN REITZELL

  An Army Special Operations officer who could have

  terminated the head terrorist of the seized cruise ship

  Achille Lauro but could not get permission to do so.

  RALPH PETERS

  An Army intelligence officer

  who has written the best analysis of our war against terrorists and of our enemy that I have ever seen.

  AND FOR THE NEW BREED

  MARC L.

  A senior intelligence officer, despite his youth,

  who reminds me of Bill Colby more and more each day.

  FRANK L.

  A legendary Defense Intelligence Agency officer

  who retired and now follows in Billy Waugh’s footsteps.

  OUR NATION OWES THESE PATRIOTS

  A DEBT BEYOND REPAYMENT.

  I

  SPRING 2005

  [ONE]

  Quatro de Fevereiro Aeroporto Internacional Luanda, Angola 1445 23 May 2005

  As he climbed the somewhat unsteady roll-up stairs and ducked his head to get through the door of Lease-Aire LA- 9021—a Boeing 727—Captain Alex MacIlhenny, who was fifty-two, ruddy-faced, had a full head of just starting to gray red hair, and was getting just a little jowly, had sort of a premonition that something was wrong—or that something bad was about to happen—but he wasn’t prepared for the dark-skinned man standing inside the fuselage against the far wall. The man was holding an Uzi submachine gun in both hands, and it was aimed at MacIlhenny’s stomach.

  Oh, shit!

  MacIlhenny stopped and held both hands up, palm outward, at shoulder level.

  “Get out of the door, Captain,” the man ordered, gesturing with the Uzi’s muzzle that he wanted MacIlhenny to enter the flight deck.

  That’s not an American accent. Or Brit, either. And this guy’s skin is dark, not black. What is he, Portuguese maybe?

  Oh come on! Portuguese don’t steal airplanes. This guy is some kind of an Arab.

  The man holding the Uzi was dressed almost exactly like MacIlhenny, in dark trousers, black shoes, and an open-collared white shirt with epaulets. There were wings pinned above one breast pocket, and the epaulets held the four-gold-stripe shoulder boards of a captain. He even had, clipped to his other breast pocket, the local Transient Air Crew identification tag issued to flight crews who had passed through customs and would be around the airport for twenty-four hours or more.

  MacIlhenny started to turn to go into the cockpit.

  “Backwards,” the man ordered. “And stand there.”

  MacIlhenny complied.

  “We don’t want anyone to see you with your hands up, do we?” the man asked, almost conversationally.

  MacIlhenny nodded but didn’t say anything.

  Something like this, I suppose, was bound to happen. The thing to do is keep my cool, do exactly what they tell me to do and nothing stupid.

  “Your aircraft has been requisitioned,” the man said, “by the Jihad Legion.”

  What the hell is the “Jihad Legion”?

  What does it matter?

  Some nutcake, rag-head Arab outfit, English-speaking and clever enough to get dressed up in a pilot’s uniform, is about to grab this airplane. Has grabbed this airplane. And me.

  MacIlhenny nodded, didn’t say anything for a moment, but then took a chance.

  “I understand, but if you’re a . . .”

  Someone behind him grabbed his hair and pulled his head back. He started to struggle—a reflex action—but then saw out of the corner of his eye what looked like a fish- filleting knife, then felt it against his Adam’s apple, and forced himself not to move.

  Jesus Christ!

  “You will speak only with permission, and you will seek that permission by raising your hand, as a child does in school. You understand?”

  MacIlhenny tried to nod, but the way his head was being pulled back and with the knife at his throat he doubted the movement he was able to make was very visible. He thought a moment and then raised his right hand slightly higher.

  “You may speak,” the man with the Uzi said.

  “Since you are a pilot, why do you need me?” he asked.

  “The first answer should be self-evident: So that you cannot report the requisitioning of your aircraft immediately. Additionally, we would prefer that when the authorities start looking for the aircraft they first start looking for you and not us. Does that answer your question?”

  MacIlhenny nodded as well as he could and said, “Yes, sir.”

  What the hell are they going to do with this airplane?

  Are they going to fly it into the American embassy here?

  With me in it?

  In Angola? That doesn’t make much sense. It’s a small embassy, and most people have never heard of Angola much less know where it is.

  What’s within range?

  South Africa, of course. It’s about fifteen hundred miles to Johannesburg, and a little more to Capetown. Where’s our embassy in South Africa?

  “As you surmised, I am a pilot qualified to fly this model Boeing,” the man said. “As is the officer behind you. Therefore, you are convenient for this operation but not essential. At any suspicion that you are not d
oing exactly as you are told, or are attempting in any way to interfere with this operation, you will be eliminated. Do you understand?”

  MacIlhenny nodded again as well as he could and said, “Yes, sir.”

  The man said something in a foreign language that MacIlhenny did not understand. The hand grasping his hair opened and he could hold his head erect.

  “You may lower your hands,” the man said, and then, conversationally, added: “You seemed to be taking a long time in your preflight walk-around. What was that all about?”

  MacIlhenny, despite the heat, felt a sudden chill and realized that he had been sweating profusely.

  Why not? With an Uzi pointing at your stomach and a knife against your throat, what did you expect?

  His mouth was dry, and he had to gather saliva and wet his lips before he tried to speak.

  “I came here to make a test flight,” MacIlhenny began. “This aircraft has not flown in over a year. I made what I call the ’MacIlhenny Final Test’ . . .”

  “Is that not the business of mechanics?”

  “I am a mechanic.”

  “You are a mechanic?” the man asked, dubiously.

  “Yes, sir. I hold both air frame and engine licenses. I supervised getting this aircraft ready to fly, signed off on the repairs, and I was making the MacIlhenny Test . . .”

  “What test is that?”

  “It’s not required; it’s just something I do. The airplane has been sitting here for more than twenty-four hours, with a full load of fuel . . . at takeoff weight, you’ll understand. I take a final look around. If anything was leaking, I would have seen it, found out where it was coming from, and fixed it before I tried to fly it.”

  The man with the Uzi considered that and nodded.

  “It is unusual for a captain to also be a mechanic, is it not?”

  “Yes, sir, I suppose it is.”

  “And did you find anything wrong on this final test?”

  “No, sir, I did not.”

  “And what were you going to do next if your final test found nothing wrong?”

  “I’ve arranged for a copilot, sir. As soon as he got here, I was going to run up the engines a final time and then make a test flight.”