Operation Dragon Strike Read online

  “What!” The word escaped from Shikha’s lips.

  Venkat Aiyarr continued, “They have said if they don’t receive the money in seventy-two hours, they are going to delete the database.”

  “How? Wasn’t the link disconnected?” The MEIT asked.

  “The termination program must have already been installed. The hackers would have known we would disconnect the network when they struck.” Shikha watched the CEO on the video wall as he looked at someone off-screen, spoke a few words and turned towards them. “I am just informed that the password screen on the database now shows a ticking clock counting down from seventy-two hours. Their threat is true.”

  “Imbeciles,” DM Mistry spat. Shikha wasn’t sure if the epithet was pointed at the hackers or to the room at large.

  The National Security Advisor, Navnath Shah said, “Well, at least we now know that there is a decryption code that can stop the database wipe out. And obtaining it should be our first priority. I think we will have to discount a state-sponsored attack. Governments will not bother asking for money. They will try a penetration test rather than make an overt hack. They wouldn’t want us to know that our network is full of loopholes and will try to exploit as much as they can before it’s discovered.”

  PM Inamdaar shook his head, “What if they have already exploited it?”

  A chill tingled through Shikha’s spine as she heard the words. The personal information of 1.2 billion Indians already lost? The prospect was sickening.

  Inamdaar continued, “What if now that they have exploited it, they want to throw us off track by making us believe it’s a non-state ransomware attack?”

  The NSA spoke solemnly, “It could be possible, but we should be aware that the guys behind the Wannacry Ransomware attack are still at large. This could be their handiwork.”

  Shikha nodded. The Wannacry virus was a sophisticated cyberattack in 2017 that infected 250,000 computers within twenty-four hours. If the kill switch hadn’t been accidently discovered, the damage would have been around tens of millions of computers. The hackers had demanded $300 per computer in exchange for the decryption codes. What if these hackers decided to exploit a big database? Instead of asking for piecemeal money, they would get a billion dollars in one go.

  “No. It’s the Chinese government.” Inamdaar spoke in a firm tone.

  “You think they are involved, sir?” The NSA asked.

  “China has for long played a two-faced drama with us. They show they are friends with us and want to do business with us, but they push their soldiers over to our territories using their creeping land acquisition philosophy. They jail Muslims in Xinjiang for no reason but decide to protect Pakistani terrorists from UN sanctions. But this cyber attack has exposed their hand. There is no doubt the Chinese government is behind this.”

  Shikha shook her head. Inamdaar had already decided on the culprit. Why couldn’t he think through all sides of an issue? First it was the Pakistanis, and now the Chinese. She wondered if he was suffering from borderline xenophobia.

  “Will we be able to ever prove that?” The Defence Minister asked.

  PM Inamdaar looked at Shikha, “Can we prove their involvement?”

  Shikha wanted to tell PM Inamdaar that his assumption could be wrong, but she held herself back and decided to answer his question professionally, “We can only trace the source, sir. There’s no way to confirm unless…” A thought suddenly struck her.

  “Unless?” Inamdaar prompted.

  “Unless someone actually accesses the attack computer and looks at its logs.”

  “You mean someone goes to this place in Urumqi and takes a look at this computer?”

  “Uh, yes.” Shikha responded, wondering if Inamdaar was actually thinking of doing what she said.

  She saw the PM look at her boss, General Vishwajeet Singh. He was the Director General of the Defence Intelligence Agency. “Can your men do it?” Inamdaar asked.

  General Singh nodded, “Yes, I can send them to Urumqi. They will be able to find the culprits involved and may even have a chance of getting the decryption codes from them.”

  The NTRO executive, Suraj Shrivastava stood up. “This is ridiculous. We aren’t even sure if the hackers will actually be there.”

  Inamdaar was unperturbed. “Do you have a better solution?”

  Shrivastava stood speechless. He had no answers.

  The NSA interjected. “You believe it’s the Chinese government who is behind this. What if it’s an individual group who is doing this just for the money?”

  Inamdaar said, “Whoever it is, they will pay for what they have done. And if it is the Chinese government…” Inamdaar straightened, “I’ll hit them where it hurts most.”

  Inamdaar spoke with a lot of resolve. It was as if he had given it a lot of thought. Shikha wondered what Inamdaar could do against China. China was militarily superior to them in every way. There was no way Inamdaar could hit them without a response.

  “Are you referring to our new policy doctrine?” The Defence Minister was curious.

  “Yes. It’s exactly for this kind of scenario. We reserve the right to retaliate against cyberattacks with military force. This concept is not new. When Hamas hackers breached Israeli networks, Israel responded by bombing the building where the hackers lived. Crippling our cyber assets and taking them offline is the same as attacking and destroying our buildings. An online violation should not be considered any different than a violation in real life.”

  Shikha mulled over it. Cyber attacks resulted in millions of dollars in losses every year. In a borderless Internet, anyone with the skill, intention and money could cause harm to an adversary. The perpetuators could relax in an air-conditioned room safe in the knowledge that nothing could happen to them as they didn’t fall under the jurisdiction of the other country. With everything being increasingly interconnected, the day wasn’t far off, when attacking a major cyber hub could lead to cascading effects in every sphere. Shikha looked around her. Maybe the day had already arrived.

  “What kind of retaliation do you have in mind?”

  PM Inamdaar looked at the Defence Minister. “We will send a sub to the Malacca strait and we will torpedo their merchant cargo ships. The ships will be full of electronic cargo like mobiles, storage devices and laptops. Their electronics will be destroyed causing a trickle-down effect on their manufacturing businesses. Next, we will target the oil carrying supertankers. With no oil, they will face an energy crisis. And since we will be using subs, they will have no idea how it happened.”

  The Defence Minister thought for a moment. “But wouldn’t the oil spill and burn on the straits?”

  A smile curved on Inamdaar’s face as he listened, “Even better. The raging fire from the oil spill will spread across the breadth of the narrow straits. The ships won’t be able to cross and the marine traffic will block the strait itself. Forty percent of Chinese exports exit through the Malacca strait. Hundreds of supertankers ship oil to China daily by entering the Malacca Straits. Imagine a billion people without oil. No oil for power plants. No electricity. No diesel or petrol for transportation. Cars, trucks, trains and even aeroplanes will stop running. Their exports can’t go out, and their oil can’t come in. Their economy will literally screech to a halt within a week.”

  “That’s crazy.”

  “Crazy?” Inamdaar was unstoppable. “Didn’t you just hear what Venkat Aiyarr said about the ramifications of the Aadhaar cyber attack? He talked about the financial impact. But what about the social impact? Our money will instantly turn worthless. Inflation will increase a thousand-fold. Employers won’t be able to pay their employees. People won’t be able to buy food. They will go hungry. There will be anarchy on the streets. But I won’t let it happen. I’ll teach Beijing a lesson they won’t forget. An eye for an eye is not just a phrase, its equivalent justice.” He turned to the Navy Chief, Rabindra Rathod. “Get one of our subs to the Malacca straits. Once we confirm Beijing is behind this, we will
show them two can play the same game.”

  The Defence Minister just looked on blankly. The Navy Chief said, “Sir, the Malacca strait won’t completely block the Chinese ships’ transit to the Indian ocean. They can still take the longer detour south of Indonesia using the Lombok or Sunda straits.”

  “All right. Then we will send three subs. One to each strait and we will block all the passages. Send the order out. By the time the subs reach the straits, the General’s team will give us confirmation from China.”

  “Yes, PM sir.” The Navy Chief said. “And if Beijing is not involved?”

  “Then we will simply withdraw our subs. No one the wiser.”

  The UIDAI CEO said, “What about the ransom? Are we going to pay it? The self-destruct clock is ticking.”

  The PM said in a cold voice. “We don’t succumb to blackmail. There’s no guarantee they will give us the encryption codes after we pay the ransom. If we pay today, it will encourage others to carry out more such attacks. The surest way is to find the culprits and retrieve the encryption codes.”

  “Sure. Makes sense.” Venkat Aiyarr replied.

  The PM looked at Vishwajeet. “General Singh, brief your men about the situation. I want them in Urumqi ASAP.”

  CHAPTER 2

  Near Coco Islands, Myanmar, Bay of Bengal

  “Close the hatch.” Captain Mangesh Khurana gave the order.

  The junior officer complied as the last man stepped through the hatch.

  Captain Khurana looked at the MARCOS team that had just entered in the diesel-electric attack submarine INS Khanderi. They had been given a sensitive mission. The submarine had been directed to go to the Coco Islands and check if the islands were being used for covert surveillance.

  The Coco Islands were the northernmost islands of the Andaman archipelago. They were under the administration of Myanmar, but some disturbing reports had emerged that the Chinese had persuaded the Burmese to utilize the islands for their use. From the islands’ convenient location in the Bay of Bengal, they could spy upon the ballistic missile launches in Chandipur and the ISRO rocket launches in Sriharikota.

  Satellite images had revealed that an airport runway had been established on the islands and while purported for civilian use, dual-use for military transport couldn’t be ruled out. Captain Khurana had been tasked to send a team onto the island and find out if the rumours about the Chinese were true.

  He would debrief the men and get the answers soon enough. It may probably turn out to be another wild goose chase.

  “Rig the Khanderi for dive. Set depth to one hundred metres, speed ten knots and course to two-one-zero.”

  “Preparing for dive.” The XO, Dhiren Someshwar responded.

  Khurana heard the sound of water rushing into the ballast tanks. They were to return back to port after this assignment. The past few months had been a good exercise for the new submarine and its crew. Everyone had gelled well and worked as a unit. All the missions assigned to them had been completed without a hitch.

  It was time to return home. Back to his family. The deployments were long and lonely and these were the moments he looked forward to. The knowledge that he would be back in wide open fields in his hometown after being confined for months inside a narrow metal enclosure brought a smile to his face. At home, he could fully stretch his body on his king-sized bed and sleep straight for eight hours or more without anyone disturbing him. A break like this was sorely needed.

  “Priority message coming through.” The voice of the Comms technician intruded on his thoughts.

  “Bring it over.” Captain Khurana said.

  The Comms technician brought the message over and Khurana read it. They were to chart a course to a given coordinate. Further instructions would be provided on arrival.

  Khurana pursed his lips. While changes in routes and missions happened occasionally, it was unheard of it happening near the end of a deployment. Also, the communication was quite vague in terms of its objectives.

  Looks like my homecoming will have to wait.

  Khurana wasn’t perturbed due to the delay. He was a professional and knew things could change at the last moment. He hoped it would be some mission they could do on the way back to port.

  Khurana handed over the message to his Navigator and told him to plot the location. The Navigator plotted the coordinates on a map and then pointed at their destination. It was smack in between Indira Point on Nicobar Islands and Phuket, Thailand lying right on the entrance to the Malacca Strait.

  Khurana looked at the spot and frowned.

  It’s in the middle of nowhere. What does HQ have in mind?

  CHAPTER 3

  Route 93, Sistan-Baluchestan province, Eastern Iran

  Bang!

  Armaan jerked sharply as the bullet tore through his shoulder.

  The jeep he was driving swerved and he fought to keep it straight on the winding mountain path. A fiery white-hot pain sizzled through his shoulder. He glanced down at his shoulder. Blood seeped through the open wound. He could feel the warm blood trickle down his shoulder.

  Bang!

  Another shot rang out. He felt the whoosh of air on his cheek and the bullet missed his face by inches.

  “Terrorists!” Nitin was riding alongside Armaan. He brought out his submachine gun and started firing back at the attackers. A fusillade of machine gun fire reverberated in Armaan’s ears.

  Armaan let go one hand off the steering of the jeep he was driving, and turned around to look behind him. The desolated road they were on cut a strip of grey with mountains bordered on both sides of the road. A van was fast approaching from the rear. It was full of men with guns. Their faces were masked with black cloth. Their guns were pointed at the convoy Armaan was part of. There were twenty trucks and four security jeeps in his convoy. Armaan’s jeep was at the rear end of the procession.

  “Speed up!” Armaan yelled at the truck driver next to him.

  The truck driver was already doing that. He had accelerated as soon as the first gunshots had been fired. Armaan also accelerated his jeep and came parallel to the truck. He would obstruct the road so that the terrorists wouldn’t be able to overtake them and run away. There were no incoming vehicles ahead as far as he could see. He would thwart their attempt to sabotage the convoy right here.

  “These terrorists will pay.” Armaan grunted.

  “Will pay? With cash or credit?” Nitin smirked as he let out another barrage of shots.

  “With their lives.” Armaan gritted his teeth has he approached a bend in the road.

  Another flurry of bullets riddled the jeep and smashed a side view mirror. The terrorists’ van was gaining upon them. They were now shooting at the truck. Their intentions were unmistakable.

  Armaan and Nitin had been assigned to protect a convoy of wheat from India bound for Afghanistan via Iran. An Indian ship had docked at the Chabahar port in the southern coast of Iran. The wheat had been loaded onto the trucks; then Armaan and Nitin had accompanied the trucks as they ventured on the long nine hundred kilometre journey from Chabahar to the Afghan border town of Zaranj. The roads they were travelling on were close to the porous border of Pakistan and they had been worried that their convoy could be a juicy target for terrorists.

  Now with the terrorists shooting at them, their premonition had turned true. Armaan looked ahead at the kilometre-long convoy. The winding mountain road blocked his view beyond a few trucks. He couldn’t see the other security jeeps that were part of the convoy. Maybe they had driven far ahead and hadn’t heard the terrorists approach.

  “You think they are the Jaish ul-Adl?” Armaan yelled so that he could be heard over the gunfire, referring to one of the terrorist groups that were based in Pakistan and were known to carry terror attacks in Iran.

  Nitin rattled off three shots in rapid order. All three missed. “What’s in a name? A terrorist by any other name will die just as soon.” He looked at the patch of blood on Armaan’s shirt. “You okay?”

&n
bsp; “Don’t worry about me. Pray for those leeches in the van that they get a quick death.”

  Nitin let loose another barrage of rounds. Spent shells ejected in a clattering steel rain. Armaan saw the van’s windshield shatter and the terrorist next to the driver slump back in his seat as one of the bullets found its mark. But the van kept on coming. Its occupants hell-bent on shooting at the truck.

  Bam!

  The sound echoed through the desolate mountain pass. A bullet had punctured a tyre of the truck next to their jeep. Armaan watched in disbelief as the truck swerved violently; the driver twisting the steering wheel in a vain attempt. The out-of-control truck loomed high above him about to ram his jeep. He veered the jeep to the edge of the road and stomped his foot down on the accelerator. Come on. He leaned forward on the steering wheel attempting to overtake the truck before it rammed into him. After a brief moment of panic, the truck decelerated due to the wobbly tire. It slid behind and narrowly missed crashing into his jeep.

  Armaan raced past the slowing truck, but the staccato of gunfire didn’t abate. He glanced behind him. The terrorists kept shooting at the driver’s cockpit. The truck’s door shredded under the relentless hail of bullets. The driver was isolated and seconds away from death. The rest of the trucks had already moved ahead. He couldn’t let the man die. Securing the convoy was his mandate and responsibility.

  Armaan slammed on the brakes. The jeep screeched to a stop in front the truck. Nitin leapt out on the move. Armaan flung the jeep door open and flipped off the safety switch of his Glock 17 handgun. The cold steel felt good in his palm. His trigger finger stroked familiar metal. He had been itching for revenge since the moment the terrorists had shot him. Nitin raced to the now stationary truck cockpit. He took in one glance and turned to Armaan.

  “The driver’s dead.”

  Armaan swore. These terrorists were goners. He ignored the throbbing in his wounded shoulder and crouched behind the chassis of the truck. The terrorists would be going after the rest of the trucks. He had to stop them. The sound of the terrorists’ van increased as it came alongside the truck.