“Immediately,” Linda said. “But it would be a week or so before it could potentially get carried across the Atlantic. It’s Singer’s mercenaries’ job to hold those rigs for as long as they can. If they can hold out for a couple of days we’re talking a spill a hundred times the size of the Exxon Valdez disaster.”

Juan’s eyes scanned the faces around him and said, “So then it’s going to be our job to prevent them from storming the rigs, and if we’re too late then we’re going to take the damn things back again.”

“There might be a problem with that,” Eddie said. He folded his hands on the table. “Linda, you told Max that Singer has hired Samuel Makambo to storm the oil facilities?”

“Susan Donleavy mentioned him by name as well as his Congolese Army of Revolution. It’s a straight pay-to-fight deal. Makambo has no political stake in any of this. For few million of Singer’s dollars Makambo’s willing to send in some cannon fodder.”

“Nice guy,” Linc said sarcastically. “His men follow him because of their political beliefs and he hires them out to die for someone else’s. I hate Africa.”

“I don’t blame you,” Eddie agreed. “But can you see our problem? We supplied him with enough AK-47s, RPGs, and ammunition to outfit a couple hundred men.”

Juan understood immediately. “The Oregon has the firepower to take on half the navies in the world, but it won’t do us much good against individual terrorists aboard oil rigs who are using workers as shields.”

“Precisely.” Eddie leaned forward. “Retaking the production platforms is going to require individual combat. Everyone on this crew is a capable fighter, but if Makambo takes over just five rigs and puts a hundred men on each we’re not going to take them back without losing at least two thirds to three quarters of our own people.

“And don’t think Angola’s army or police force is going to be much help,” he added. “It’ll take them a couple of days just to get organized. By that time Singer will have turned the entire Congo Delta into a stinking oil slick and sabotaged the rigs so the flow may never be shut off. If we can’t prevent him from storming the platforms then we have a day at most to take them back.”

Eddie’s sober assessment hung in the air because no one in the boardroom could refute it.