Hood listened carefully. Rodgers and Coffey were coming at the problem from two directions, and neither of them was wrong. But the call was his, and he hated the fact that he was sitting here in comfort and security deciding the fate of seven people on a frozen cliff on the opposite side of the world.

He input Bugs's code on the computer, and his assistant's face appeared on the monitor.

"Yes, Paul?"

"Signal Striker on the TAC-Sat, see if Lieutenant Colonel Squires is free to come on. If not, when it's convenient."

"Will do," Bugs said, and his image winked off.

Rodgers didn't look happy. "What are you going to do, Paul?"

"Charlie's the commander in the field," Hood said. "I want his input."

"He's a professional soldier," Rodgers said. "What do you think he's going to say?"

"If he can take the call, let's find out."

"You don't do that to a soldier," Rodgers said. "That's not leadership, it's management. The only question we should be asking is, are we behind Striker or aren't we? Can we make this commitment and stick to it?"

"We can," Hood replied coolly. "But after your Korean mission, I went back and read the white papers you wrote as part of the ad hoc joint task force planning the rescue of our hostages from Khomeini's Revolutionary Guards. You were right about our forces being ready on paper and not in practice. And you were also right to be very concerned about extracting the advance party of Special Forces soldiers that would infiltrate Teheran a few days before the Eagle Claw mission. Without your prompting, the agents wouldn't have had a plan to get them out of the Mehrabad International Airport on Swiss Air if things went wrong. Why did you come up with that?"

"Because sneaking them out, one at a time, from the safe house would have given the Iranians more time to find them," Rodgers said. "It made more sense to buy commercial airline tickets and get them the hell out together."

"Who did you work that out with?" Hood asked.

"Ari Moreaux, who set up the safe house for us."

"Your man on the site," Hood said as Bugs's image reappeared. "Yes, Bugs?"

"I beeped Honda's helmet phones. We'll just have to wait."

"Thanks," said Hood. He looked at Rodgers again. "This isn't Vietnam, Mike. We're not withdrawing moral or tactical support from our personnel in the field. If Squires wants to go ahead, I'll back him and take the butt-whipping from Congress later."

"It's not your call," Rodgers quietly reminded him.

"Striker is yours to command," Hood agreed, "but going outside the parameters established by the Intelligence Committee is my call."

Bugs came back on. "Lieutenant Colonel Squires is minding the headphones, Paul. I have him on the line."

Hood punched up the volume on the phone link. "Lieutenant Colonel?"

"Yes, sir!" said Squires, his voice clear despite the crackling caused by the snowfall.