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another.
    The helicopter settled heavily onto a makeshift landing pad set up near the office building he’d selected as the Defense Ministry’s temporary quarters. Several staff officers were visible through the swirling dust, anxiously awaiting his return.
    As soon as the rotors slowed, Taleh was out, favoring his leg but moving as quickly as he could. The Defense Council meeting was still four days off, but there were preparations to make.
    Somewhere in the air over Tehran, he’d made his decision. This waste and destruction must never be allowed to happen again.
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    FEBRUARY 10
    Tehran.
    General Mansur Rafizaden sat in the back of his speeding black Mercedes sedan, angrily contemplating the upcoming meeting. By rights the Supreme Defense Council should have been gathering at his headquarters, not at those of the Army. He scowled. That cunning fox Amir Taleh was growing bolder in his efforts to steal power away from the Islamic Republic’s true and tested guardians.
    For more than a decade, Rafizaden had led the Basij, the People’s Militia. He and his officers had mobilized tens of thousands of teenagers into hastily trained battalions for service in the war with Iraq. Many had died in that service, but since their deaths assured them all a place in Paradise, he was sure they had gone gladly.
    Now he found himself suddenly thrust into command of the whole Pasdaran, a promotion earned when American warheads decimated the upper ranks of the Revolutionary Guards. Though new to his post, he took his responsibilities most seriously and he had no intention of surrendering his organization’s hard-won powers to Taleh or any other tainted soldier.
    Rafizaden began considering plans to humble his rivals. A guardian of the Revolution had to be energetic. He couldn’t wait for threats to appear. He had to find those who were dangerous and crush them long before they could become a threat. Well, Taleh and his fellows were clearly dangerous.
    While he sat deep in thought, his black Mercedes sedan raced through northern Tehran, escorted by two jeeps one leading, the other trailing. Each jeep was filled with teenage Basijsoldiers carrying a collection of assault rifles and submachine guns. During the more violent days of the Revolution, and during the war with Iraq, such escorts had been a necessity. Now they were viewed as almost a formality, and positions in the jeeps were given out as honors to favored soldiers.
    The ambush took them all by surprise.
    Just as the Pasdaran convoy passed one intersection, an Army truck suddenly roared out onto the street behind them. Before the men in the rear jeep could react, the truck braked hard and turned sideways, blocking the street to any other traffic.. At the same instant a panel van pulled out across the convoy’s path. The van’s driver scrambled out of his vehicle on the passenger side, diving out of sight.
    Even as the surprised Basij troopers readied their weapons, rifle and machine-gun fire rained down on the two jeeps from several second-story windows. Hundreds of rounds ricocheted off pavement and metal and tore the guards to pieces in seconds.
    Both escort jeeps, their drivers killed by the fusillade, spun out of control and crashed into the buildings lining the street. The Mercedes, armored against small-arms fire, tried to steer around the abandoned panel van, bouncing up and over the curb in a desperate bid to escape the trap.
    An antitank rocket slammed into the sedan’s windshield and exploded, spewing white-hot glass and metal fragments across the driver and a bodyguard in the front seat. Rafizaden and an aide in the back ducked down and were spared the worst of the blast. The move bought them only moments of life.
    A second rocket ripped the Mercedes’ roof open, showering both the Pasdaran commander and the younger officer with lethal splinters. Then the first RPG gunner, hurriedly reloading, fired again. This third warhead streaked downward and exploded deep