Warning:
Cyber personalities have been pretty freely borrowed from members of this board. Feel free to join in, or to let me know that you don't appreciate the borrowing.















CtSF-12

Counterterror Strike Force 12.


PROLOGUE:

It is late afternoon in the High Desert and the elderly Dog snaps to attention at his master's ankle and utters a quiet “voof!' and pads to the trailer door at High Alert. There is a knock at the door and Synap, wearing a look of consternation, goes to the door and peers through the window, to see 2 uniforms, both of which he has intimate familiarity with. On the left, blue dress utilities, with the unmistakable Budweiser of the SEAL Teams over the left breast pocket. On the right, green dress utilities, with a Combat Infantry Badge, Jump Wings, and several campaign ribbons over the left breast pocket. Stooping a bit to see their faces, he sees that they are not folks he knows and he opens the door and asks if he can help them.

After some very intriguing preliminaries, he invites them in, clears 3 projects off the couch and 2 off a chair, they sit, and over the next hour and a half tell him the most unbelievable story he has been asked to believe in years.

At the same time, across the country, an Air Force PJ and an Air Force Special Forces officer knock on Baywater Ross's door, get invited in, and spend the same time, telling the same story.

In Cleveland, an FBI Intelligence Analyst, and a former Force Recon Marine knock on Night-Driver and RELIC's door. Since these are both known to them they are invited in, and they tell the same story.


Chapter 1.
After an intense but not destructive six week physical reconditioning course the new experimental CounterTerror Team is getting settled into their Executive Suites apartments, all complaining of several aches and pains as a result of the reconditioning they went through. The reconditioning course was carefully tailored to their individual needs and disabilities. Not for the first time one of the team members comments that this is the strangest combat team he has EVER seen.

To start with, it is co-ed, with members who are MARRIED to EACH OTHER. Some (or rather all) of them have at least one physical disability, and several have several. Of the thirteen members of the “A” team, only 2 are in what might be considered combat trim, and even THEY aren't happy with their condition. The collection of specialties is somewhat mind boggling. There are medical, electronic, computer, avionics, chemical, explosive, transportation, logistics, and linguistics specialties represented in the main living room of the suite. Synap (Med, Chem, Com) is having a spirited discussion with RELIC (Logistics, Medical), Night-Driver (Transportation, Medical, Strategy and Tactics, Logistics), Bill (Medical, transport, Logistics), and Baywater (Air Assets, Transport, Systems) about the best theoretical way to insert a team into North Korea in order to degrade the C3 assets in country. OddOne (electronics, comp systems), eXe (software, Com), DocOutlands (combat, weapons), Brock (combat), Kip (Combat), Troke (Strategy and Tactics, travel), INVAR (Weapons, combat) are having an indepth discussion od what SOUNDS like the application of Star Wars Weaponry to Desert Storm II.

All of which gives ME a headache. When they took me out of deep insurgency ops in SoAm and offered me the chance (they claimed “OPPORTUNITY”) to lead this motley crew they told me it was going to be an unconventional team, but they didn't tell me HOW unconventional. Actually they didn't pull me out, they more accurately didn't send me BACK after I recovered from the claymore I collected. Don't get me wrong. I actually like ALL of them, one on one. But there has never been a greater collection of ego's in one room since the writing of the Declaration of Independence.

My name is Michael, and my job is to weld these folks, and their “B” team into a cohesive and coherent unit. I don't think that cohesive is going to be a problem as they have bonded pretty well already, what with their common avocation (some Computer BBS or other), and their having gone through the rehab reconditioning program together. COHERENT is probably only going to be a faint hope for them though.

They are here at the Executive Suites just off MacDill AFB to be integrated with the 26 members of their “B Team”, which is the combat support team. The “B” team consists of two sub-teams of 13 each. The sub-teams are literal duplicates of each other, with the ability to operate independently, as support to their “A” team, or as a combined support team to the “A” team.

The concept of the complete team, written by a group of 5 folks whose names I was NOT given with the express reason that I not seek them out and strangle them in their sleep (something I didn't understand at the time but now do quite well) is of a sharp point for the War on Terrorism Spear. A light, fast, multi-capability, highly agile force, much reminiscent of the original SEAL Team 6. The operative breakdown in the “B” teams is based on the Templar ORBAT of a knight, 3 sergeants, and 3 arms-men per sergeant. I am convinced that the “A” team is never going to be anything other than an amorphous glob, forming and reforming based on the needs and realities of the situation.

Over the past six weeks I have seen already that the married couple have one of the strangest arrangements I have EVER seen. Put them on a task, and one of them takes charge. For about 2 minutes, then the other one is in charge, and back and forth, with NO friction. Put them on a TEAM and they lead it equally, pretty much. I watched the rest of this team adapt to that dynamic over about a week. It was fun toi watch as one guy finally stood up in the middle of an exercise and said “Which one of you came to THAT decision!?!” when they gave a set of marching orders. Both said “I did.” And the protesting team member said “That is my point. NEITHER of you is in charge because you BOTH are. HOW are we supposed to know what to do when you tell us something?” To which ND asked, “Have we ever said for you to do something DIFFERENT between us??” I had already concluded that they thought with one brain, but it was interesting to see the team trying to get their arms around the possibility that they thought so much alike that it might as well BE they are thinking with one brain. They then made it QUITE clear that RELIC said no let's ask ND wasn't going to fly at ALL.....

At any rate, the concept was invented by the five people I referred to above (and I have it on good authority that at least ONE of the team members sat on the committee that gave birth to this). This team of nominally 39 but more likely 42-45 people when we get our briefers for the situations embedded, will be the ACTION arm of a part of the War on Terror. We will be the sharp point of the spear, going into specific countries and doing what the military does best, breaking things. We may also go into countries like Iraq and build things, which is why we have a political science person on board. Often times the War on terror means winning the hearts and minds of a group so that they don't donate their bodies or their skills to the other side. From what I understand, we aren't going to get a lot of time ot integrate the A and B teams. I have seen copies of orders cut sending us to Syria...