KEFLAVÍK AIRPORT, ICELAND,
THURSDAY 28 JANUARY, 2000 GMT
The giant C-17 US
army transport plane landed at Keflavík Airport at around 8 p.m.,
local time. It was cold, several degrees below zero, but the
forecast was for rising temperatures and snow. The massive bulk of
the jet taxied through the winter darkness to the end of runway
seven, which was reserved for the exclusive use of the NATO base on
Midnesheidi moor. It was a remote, bleak location amidst the lava
fields on the westernmost tip of the Reykjanes peninsula, lashed by
constant gale-force winds, devoid of vegetation, barely fit for
human habitation. Hangars large and small dotted the landscape,
along with barracks, shops, a cinema and administration blocks. The
naval air station had been a centre for reconnaissance flights at
the height of the Cold War but these days the base’s activities had
been greatly curtailed.
Once the aircraft had
come to a standstill, the aft door opened, releasing a stream of
personnel who immediately began the task of unloading: powerful
snowmobiles, tracked vehicles, skiing equipment, all the gear
necessary for tackling the glacier. Fifteen minutes after the plane
had touched down, the first transporter departed from Keflavík
Airport with its cargo, bound for the Reykjanes highway and the
south Iceland route to Vatnajökull.
The transporter was a
German model, a Mercedes-Benz, its only marking Icelandic licence
plates. It was no different from any other truck and trailer combo
that plied the country’s roads and as such drew no attention. In
all, four trucks of varying models had pulled up to the C-17 when
it came to a stop at the end of the runway. They departed from
Keflavík Airport at half-hour intervals, mingling seamlessly with
the civilian traffic.
Ratoff, the director
of the operation, rode in the final vehicle. He had been met at the
airport by the commander of the US military base on Midnesheidi, an
admiral by rank, who had been forewarned of Ratoff’s arrival and
ordered to provide him with transport vehicles, no questions asked.
The admiral, who had been exiled to this unpopular outpost after a
scandal involving the large-scale embezzlement of supplies from a
Florida base, had the good sense not to press for details, though
he struggled to keep his curiosity in check. He had heard rumours
about the commotion in the late sixties, and judging from the
equipment being arranged in front of him, history was repeating
itself: another glacier trip was planned.
‘Don’t you want our
helicopters?’ the admiral asked as he stood beside Ratoff, watching
the cargo being unloaded. ‘We have four new Pave Hawks in our
fleet. They can move mountains.’
Ratoff was fiftyish,
greying at the temples; a short, lean figure with Slavonic features
and small, almost black eyes, clad in thick white cold-weather
overalls and mountaineering boots. He did not so much as glance at
the admiral.
‘Just provide what we
need and keep your distance,’ he said curtly and walked
off.
In the two days that
had passed since the mark appeared on the satellite images, Carr
had not been idle. The C-17 aircraft was scheduled to wait on
standby at Keflavík Airport until the mission was accomplished, its
huge bulk protected day and night by eight armed guards. Its
passengers had included General Immanuel Wesson and a ten-man team
of Delta Force operators under his command, who were deployed to
Reykjavík with orders to assume control of the embassy. The
ambassador and his immediate staff were sent on leave without
explanation or delay.
Snow had begun to
fall in heavy, wet flakes, settling in a thick blanket over the
south and east of the country, and overwhelming the trucks’
windscreen wipers. There was a fair amount of traffic between
Reykjavík and the small towns of Hveragerdi and Selfoss, but after
that the road east was clear. The vehicles maintained a steady
distance from one another as they drove through the impenetrable
murk and falling snow, past the villages of Hella and Hvolsvöllur
in their flat farmlands, to Vík í M¥yrdal, huddled at the foot of
its glacier, and on east past the settlement of
Kirkjubaejarklaustur and over the bridges of the Skeidará sands, a
vast outwash plain crossed by glacial rivers that were subject at
times to devastating flash floods caused by eruptions under the
inland ice cap. To their left, hidden by darkness, were mountains,
glaciers and the barren interior; to their right, beyond the sands,
lay the harbourless coastline of the Atlantic.
Nobody noticed them.
Freight transport was common in the countryside where, in the
absence of railways, goods of all kinds were transported by road:
agricultural machinery, food supplies and fuel bound for Iceland’s
remote farms and villages.
Ratoff’s briefing had
included a detailed account of the military operation in 1967, the
second major expedition mounted to search for the plane on
Vatnajökull. Forced to circumnavigate the country on rough dirt
roads, heading first north, then approaching the ice cap from the
east, it had been difficult, then as now, to avoid attention. In
the end they had been obliged to resort to drastic
measures.
Ratoff’s men
travelled on under cover of darkness. In spite of the snow the
roads were perfectly passable now that they had been asphalted. One
by one they drove past the popular tourist destination of
Skaftafell, making for Hornafjördur in the east. They passed
through the lowland corridor of ÷raefi, Sudursveit and M¥yrar,
between glacier and sea, then just before the town of Höfn turned
left off the ring road, drove up into the farmlands at the foot of
the glacier and stopped at the brothers’ farm. By the time Ratoff’s
truck arrived, the soldiers were busy unloading the other
transporters and the first snowmobiles were already on their way up
to the ice cap.
The farmer stood at
his door, watching the troops at work. He had seen it all before
and though he did not know Ratoff, who now came walking towards him
through the thickly falling snow, he had met others of his type.
The farmer’s name was Jón. He had lived alone on the farm since his
brother’s death several years earlier.
‘Having another crack
at the glacier?’ he asked in Icelandic, shaking Ratoff’s hand. Jón
knew a smattering of English – he understood it better than he
could speak it – but they still had need of the interpreter
supplied by the base, a man who had been stationed in Iceland for
several years.
Ratoff smiled at Jón.
They kicked off the snow, went inside the warm, tidy house and sat
down in the sitting room, Ratoff in his white overalls, the
interpreter bundled up in a down jacket, and the farmer in a
red-checked shirt, worn jeans and woollen socks. He was nearly
eighty, his cranium completely bald, his face a mass of wrinkles,
but he was still spry and straight-backed, still mentally and
physically robust. Once the men had taken their seats he offered
them strong black coffee and a pinch of snuff taken from the back
of his wrist. Unsure what it was, Ratoff and the interpreter shook
their heads.
To Jón’s knowledge it
was the third time the army had mounted an expedition to the
glacier, if you counted Miller’s attempt at the end of the war. For
some time afterwards, though, the colonel had returned every few
years on his own, staying with the brothers for two to three weeks
at a time while he scoured the ice cap with a small metal detector,
before heading back to the States. He and the brothers were on
friendly terms, but when they asked members of the 1967 expedition
for news of Miller, they were informed that he was dead. That was
the biggest expedition Jón had seen to date. As before, the
brothers had acted as guides for the army, leading the soldiers up
through the foothills and on to the ice sheet. They learnt that
part of the wrecked aircraft had appeared on a satellite image –
the military had stopped using spy planes by then. Over the years
the brothers had sometimes been aware of the surveillance flights,
but patrols of the area had ceased abruptly after the advent of the
new technology.
The brothers had
often asked themselves why the Americans were so obsessed with the
German aircraft that they had the glacier monitored from space and
turned up at the farm in force whenever they believed the wreckage
was emerging from the ice. They had given Colonel Miller their word
that they would never reveal the true purpose of the expeditions to
their neighbours or anyone else; he had told them to dismiss the
activity as military training exercises if the locals became
curious, and they followed his advice. In private, however, they
speculated endlessly, considering ever more wildly improbable
theories: perhaps the plane was full of Jewish gold, or diamonds,
or art treasures plundered by the Nazis from all over Europe.
Perhaps there had been a high-ranking general on board, or a secret
weapon from the war. Whatever it was, the US army was extremely
keen both to lay hands on it and to do so without drawing attention
to the fact. Every time a black mark appeared on their images of
the glacier, the military authorities became very jittery indeed.
It amused the old man.
‘What did you see
this time?’ Jón asked, watching the interpreter relay his question
to Ratoff.
‘We believe we’ve
finally located it,’ the interpreter said, translating Ratoff’s
words. ‘Better satellites.’
‘Yes, better
satellites,’ Jón repeated. ‘Do you know what the plane contains?
What it is that your people are so desperate to find?’
‘No idea,’ Ratoff
replied. ‘My job is merely to accomplish a specific task. It’s
nothing to do with me what the plane contains or where it comes
from. My only concern is to follow my orders to the
letter.’
Jón inspected Ratoff,
sensing that he was a very different customer from the gentle
Miller; there was something unclean, cunning even, about his
expression; a hint of impatience, of an incalculable temper lurking
beneath his outwardly calm demeanour.
‘Well, I wouldn’t be
surprised if you found it,’ Jón went on. ‘There’s been a warm spell
since about 1960 and much of the ice in this area has
melted.’
‘According to our
images, the nose is visible above the ice,’ Ratoff told him. ‘We
have the coordinates. It shouldn’t take us long.’
‘So you know where
you’re going,’ Jón said, taking a powerful sniff of the coarse
tobacco. The snuff induced an overwhelming urge to sneeze in the
uninitiated and was dismissed as a dirty habit by many, but the
nicotine hit was every bit as strong as that from a
cigarette.
‘You don’t need a
guide any longer,’ he added. ‘Especially not a dinosaur like me.
I’m no use to anyone these days.’ He smiled.
‘We’re very familiar
with the route by now,’ Ratoff agreed, rising to his
feet.
‘Tourists use it a
lot in the summer,’ Jón said. ‘They run glacier jeep tours from
Höfn; I let them cross my land. There are more coming every year
now.’
Shortly afterwards
Ratoff emerged from the farmhouse with his interpreter. They strode
over to a small vehicle with caterpillar tracks, climbed inside and
set off without delay, past the farm in the direction of the
foothills. There was no sign of the larger trucks now. The blizzard
had grown ever more dense during the evening and visibility was
poor. Their vehicle followed the trail left by the others in the
newly fallen snow, its progress slow, crawling onwards through the
drifts, its powerful headlights illuminating the way. By the time
they reached the camp at the foot of the hills, brilliant
floodlights had been erected within a rough circle of tents. Boxes
of supplies lay scattered around and special forces soldiers in
snow camouflage were working in an orderly, methodical fashion.
Once the plane had been located, they would shift the camp on to
the ice cap.
The outline of a
large satellite dish loomed through the thick veil of snow outside
the tent that acted as telecommunications centre. Ratoff went
straight inside. Two men were busy setting up the radio
system.
‘How soon can we make
contact?’ Ratoff asked.
‘In forty minutes at
the outside, sir,’ one of the men replied.
‘Get Carr for me when
you’re done.’
Vytautas Carr was
sitting in his office in Building 312 when the phone
rang.
‘Ratoff on line one,’
his secretary announced. He pressed the button. It was 9 p.m. in
the US capital, 2 a.m. in Iceland.
‘Everything okay?’
Carr asked.
‘We’re on schedule,
sir. We’ll head up to the glacier at first light tomorrow. It’s
snowing fairly heavily but nothing that will hold us up. As long as
the coordinates are correct, it won’t matter if the plane’s been
covered by drifts.’
‘What about the
locals?’
‘Unsuspecting, and we
plan to keep it that way, sir.’
‘They keep a close
eye on our military manoeuvres. We’ll need to proceed with
caution.’
‘They’ll keep their
mouths shut as long as they’re making money out of
us.’
Carr ignored this.
‘Is there any other traffic on the glacier?’
‘We know about a
rescue team on a training exercise but it’s in a different sector
and shouldn’t cause us any problems, sir.’
‘Fine. Get in touch
when you find the plane.’