Mexico Way, page 24
NINETEEN
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1
On the day Paz Gallardo was sworn in as President of Mexico, the owner of a tire retread shop on Highway 15, a few miles south of Culiacán, left his coffee to investigate the yapping and snarling of hairless dogs in the back lot. He found the animals mauling an oversized garbage bag. When he kicked them away, he was unsure whether the body parts spilling out of the plastic were animal or human. Until he found what remained of the head.
Under normal circumstances, he would not have considered taking the matter to the police. The Judiciales were interested in quick payoffs, not lengthy investigations, and if they were in enough of a hurry, they might even arrest him. But he remembered the posters in town with the emblem of the League of Decency, promising a big reward for a woman who had been kidnapped in Acapulco, the wife of an important gringo. And the tire shop owner had a cousin in the state police in Culiacán.
Dental records confirmed that the mutilated carcass belonged to the wife of the Governor of Arizona. The Air National Guard sent a plane to bring her remains home for burial.
The discovery buried all other news from Mexico— including the presidential inauguration—in the American press. One of the weekly magazines ran a cover story, entitled "Mexico's Butchers," that dwelled on the horrific similarity between the treatment of the Governor's wife and that of Judge Renwick, whose murder remained unsolved.
At a televised press conference, President Butler was asked if he intended to meet with his Mexican counterpart any time soon. There had been talk of a ritual encounter on the border, at Ciudad Juárez or Laredo.
"I'm taking that under advisement," President Butler responded. "But when I do get together with President Paz, I can promise you that these killings of U.S. citizens will be at the top of our agenda."
"Mr. President!" Another correspondent claimed the President's attention. "Is it true that you have asked the State Department to issue a Travel Advisory, warning U.S. citizens to stay out of Mexico?"
"That's a matter for the experts," Butler replied gruffly. "I would remind you that we have a large community of American retirees living in Mexico. It's not just a question of tourists and business travelers."
"Mr. President! There are reports that the Administration has plans for a military invasion of Mexico." This came from a reporter for the Baron-Ritter chain.
"I haven't heard that report. If you're talking about contingency plans, I guess we have those for anything you can name. Including an invasion from Alpha Centauri."
This comment brought a crackle of laughter.
"I will say only," President Butler said, cutting the question period short, "that when it comes to Mexico, our options are wide open."
2
The inauguration of Mexico's new President was celebrated along the U.S. border with car-bombings, bridge-blocking, attacks on government buildings, and a new surge of refugees. "Them brown brothers is rolling over us like an old eighteen-wheeler over a bunch of bullfrogs." Bob Culbertson remarked to a friend at Billybob's saloon.
In the capital, the chief representative of the Butler Administration present at the swearing-in of the new head of state was an under-secretary from the State Department—a calculated slight that was noticed by the opposition as well as the PRI. It was not forgotten, among those who knew some Mexican history, that one of the main triggers for the revolution of 1910 had been a signal from Washington that the United States no longer supported the status quo. Paz Gallardo remembered. He requested Kreeger to call on him discreetly at Los Pinos in the late evening of Inauguration Day. He asked Kreeger to press the Ambassador to confirm a personal meeting with President Butler, or to use his own channels if Childs proved unresponsive. He even suggested a time and place for the meeting. Gallardo had a long-standing invitation to speak to an international conference hosted by the Aspen Institute. Given the violence in the north of Mexico, the Colorado resort would be safer than one of the border towns where meetings between Mexican and U.S. leaders had often taken place. Kreeger promised that he would get the message to the White House. He did not tell the Mexican President about the lengths to which his adversaries had gone to try to prevent his other messages from getting through.
Raúl Carvajal remembered history too. He had studied the powder trail that had led to the explosion of 1910, and found many encouraging parallels with the situation that now prevailed in his country: widespread anger over a crude electoral fraud; hunger and suffering intensified to the point where people who lived from hand to mouth —people without leisure for politics—were ready for anything; violence flaring without warning, like bursting skyrockets; that tacit alliance of left and right, of all those opposed to a tottering regime of crooks and vain numbers-men, científicos then, técnicos today. The revolution of 1910 had not required national coordination and elaborate planning. All that had been necessary had been to raise the political temperature to the level of spontaneous combustion, and to have a man on horseback waiting to ride into the presidential palace. And, of course, to secure the neutrality—or active support—of the government of the United States.
Raúl had studied these things as a car mechanic . studies an engine manual. He intended to do better than his ancestors who had made the first revolution of the twentieth century, better than poor Madero, punched full of bullets. He meant to seize power and hold it. He would do this in the name of democracy, since democracy was in fashion, but like the PRI, he would tolerate . elections only on condition that he could determine the results. Miliano and his movement were allies of convenience for now. They would become an embarrassment, however, the day after the government fell. Raúl and his partners recognized this fact and had made contingency plans. Already there had been bloody clashes between some of Raúl's landowner friends and peasant squatters who carried the banners of the Frente National de Campesinos.
Raúl had recognized, from the beginning, that it would never be possible to control the whole of a country so vast and divided. Under any scenario, the northern states would be his redoubt. If the United States stood behind him, the north could be held and defended against all comers. He could leave the chilangos of the capital to swim in the shit from their broken sewers.
That would suit John Halliwell and the Texas crowd just fine. They did not care what happened to Mexico. They wanted the oil fields. They would help Raúl get what he wanted, and then they would leave him alone.
The current of events was flowing toward their purpose—Raúl could feel it. He was a man of his times, more North American than Mexican; a man who trusted instinct more than logic, giving him a decisive edge over a mere logician like President Paz. From the ranks of the ruling party itself, important men were leaning toward Raúl, the coming power in the land. And not just local bosses like Lobo Terrazzas of Chihuahua, an old drinking buddy of Carranza's, but national figures, military men; leaders of the Ramírez faction who had lost their jobs—or feared losing them—since the head of their camarilla had fallen. Fausto García, the chief of the secret police, had sent friendly messages, hinting at his private sympathy with Raúl's cause. Fausto's man in Monterrey had turned a blind eye to the goings-on at the ranch. Fausto had invited Shelley to dinner in the capital during one of her shopping expeditions—an invitation Raúl had urged her to accept—and told her that necessity made amusing bedfellows. Raúl did not trust Fausto, of course, or anyone from the Ramírez clan—these were his family's blood enemies—but he rejoiced in the mounting evidence that the besieged regime was crumbling from within.
Raúl waited, watching from a distance as sporadic acts of terrorism and banditry kept the government off-balance and the Americans jittery. Sometimes Colonel Sanchez, the chicano, disappeared for days at a time, and the news reports brought word of new acts of terrorism carried out by phantom groups like Los Héroes de la Pacifica, or in the name of genuine organizations that usually disclaimed responsibility. Raúl wanted to maintain his distance; he did not want to know the details of Sanchez's work.
Nor did he want to know the man. Raúl was never at ease with Sanchez, this man of silences who laughed when others did not. A darkness traveled with Sanchez, something almost palpable, a clot of blackness in the air. Carranza, however, did not share Raúl's reservations. The two men went whoring and drinking together, and Carranza and his friends in the Quintero drug family loaned Sanchez soldiers for some of those special missions that Raúl preferred not to know about.
Still, Raúl had to concede that Sanchez had his uses.
He proved that admirably when Colgate called from the United States soon after the Paz inauguration to report that a Pentagon official named General Gilly wanted to make a confidential tour of northern Mexico. The general had been charged, inter alia, with U.S. contingency plans for military operations across the border.
"I know this general," Colgate told Raúl. "Two Jacks Gilly is a stand-up guy. One thousand percent on our side. I think it would help our case a lot if you people were able to demonstrate to him that you have serious capabilities down there."
Rico Sanchez volunteered to handle everything. "I've been handling guys like Gilly all my life," he explained to Raúl. "I know their mind-set. I know how to stroke them. You leave it to me. I'll give the general a tour he won't forget."
3
Two Jacks Gilly arrived at night, flying in from Houston on a private plane. Traveling out of uniform, he wore a brown turtleneck and a houndstooth check coat, tight about the armpits. Neither he nor his outfit looked comfortable.
Twenty men in camouflage fatigues snapped to attention as General Gilly climbed out of the Learjet. Two Jacks inspected his honor guard with appreciation, though he was supposed to be traveling under cover.
A short, heavy man in a black jumpsuit gave Gilly a snappy salute. He had an Uzi machine pistol clipped to his belt, though most of his men were armed with standard-issue M-16s.
"Colonel Sanchez, sir. I've been assigned as your temporary aide. It's an honor to serve under you, sir."
"Colonel? You Mexican military, Sanchez?"
"U.S. Army, retired, sir."
"Hell, it's good to have you with us. Does Washington know you're down here?"
"Not officially, sir. But you can check with Admiral Enright's office."
"That's okay, Colonel." Two Jacks slapped him on the back. "I guess I heard about you when you were down in Salvador. You don't take kindly to commies, is what I heard. Guess you and me are going to get along real fine. Now what have you got to show me?"
Sanchez took his visitor in a four-wheel drive to a more remote landing strip, where Gilly watched a landing drop worthy of one of his manuals. The incoming plane was guided in by the pulsing infrared lights from devices no bigger than Two Jacks's pack of Camels. They were powered by tiny six-volt batteries; their signal could be picked up with the aid of night-vision goggles.
Then Sanchez drove Gilly to a sprawling ranch house where the security guards were wide awake— there were two different exchanges of code words—and sat him down to a five-course dinner, washed down with whiskey and tequila. After the meal, they spent an hour with a series of charts prepared by the Defense Mapping agency—charts from the ONC XXH and ONC XXJ series —and Sanchez explained how, with a few lightning strikes, it would be possible to seize and hold all vital communications in the north, in the process isolating major population centers.
In daylight, Sanchez turned the charts into reality. He put General Gilly on board a Sikorsky-76 helicopter and whirled him around a series of sites where he inspected paramilitary detachments and secured landing strips. The chopper had been used, until recently, to transport drilling crews to offshore oil rigs. General Gilly observed that it could be converted, with minimal work, into a flying gunship.
"I bet you can do a whole lot better than that, General."
Two Jacks laughed and waxed rhapsodic about the Army's new Sikorsky MH-60K, the dream weapon of low-intensity warriors, with its infrared sensors, terrain avoidance radar, laser detector, and ALQ-136 pulse radar frequency jammer.
"Shit, the Messkins would never know what hit them. And that sucker's got self-deployment up to seven hundred nautical miles. There's a lot of brass hats sitting on their asses over at the Pentagon who'd sure like another chance to see it in action."
The general's remarks gave Sanchez a theme for the rest of the day's entertainment. In a time when the U.S. defense chiefs were scrambling to find new reasons why Congress should pay for new hardware, nothing appealed to a Pentagon man like a battlefield with room for his pet toys.
Sanchez did not forget, somewhere along the way, to suggest to the general that there would be an honorable role for the famed 22nd Marine amphibious unit— which Two Jacks had once commanded—in securing the Gulf oil fields.
Gilly was in an excellent mood when they arrived for a late comida at a low-slung hacienda in the state of Chihuahua. Their host was a loud-mouthed barrel called Lobo Terrazzas.
Sanchez explained to the general on the last leg of their flight that Terrazzas was the local PRI party boss, but was privately in league with Raúl Carvajal and the northern resistance. "Lobo promised to round up some of the local military, and maybe a couple of heavy hitters from Mexico City. I think this will show you the depth of support we got here for a decisive move by the United States. These guys will jump when Uncle Sam tells them to. You'll see."
Two Jacks saw, and he was impressed, though he expressed nervousness to Sanchez, before and after, about the holes that were being ripped in his cover. He was introduced at the dinner as "Mr. White," a private consultant, but the Mexican general who drew him aside, between cocktails and came asado, addressed him as mi general
The day had brought new outbreaks of violence, including a shootout on the outskirts of the Terrazzas ranch between Lobo's pistoleros and militant campesinos attempting to reclaim lands that had been stolen from a defunct ejido.
'This Miliano Rojas is pretty far to the left, isn't he?" Gilly observed. "Talks like a communist at a time when the pundits tell us communism has gone out of style."
There was enthusiastic agreement around Lobo's table.
"I know this Miliano has got quite a following," Two Jacks pursued, "but frankly, I don't see how you guys can live with him."
"You understand the problems of Mexico very deeply, Mr. White," said Paco Carranza, who had flown in on his own plane. "We have an archaic institution in my country called the ejido, the collective farm. It failed in Russia. It should be extinct here. We need modern farming, modern equipment, a free-market approach. The Chicago philosophy. It works. When we change the government, we will change everything on the land. We will break up the ejidos and sell them to private enterprise."
"Excuse me," said General Gilly. "I'm no expert on agriculture, or Mexican politics. But isn't Miliano's movement dedicated to strengthening the ejidos?"
"My friend," Paco Carranza leaned forward and clinked glasses, "I can assure you that Miliano Rojas is no problem for us, or for you." He picked up a tortilla chip and crumbled it between his fingers.
4
The next day, General Gilly flew back to Washington to write up a gung-ho report on the depth of support inside the Mexican military establishment for a change of government and the ease with which a U.S. operation in Mexico could be mounted. That same day, Rico Sanchez volunteered to handle the problem of Miliano.
Raúl Carvajal and Paco Carranza were skeptical about his proposal. Through intermediaries, Miliano had accepted money and communications technology from the Safari group, but how could he possibly accept the services of a former U.S. Army colonel who had been employed for several months in arming and training a private army for the northern landowners?
"Don't underestimate me," Sanchez told them. "This old fox has learned a few tricks."
Art Colgate, who was consulted on the matter, endorsed Sanchez's plan, even though he had not been informed of its key element. None of them had. Carranza, who burned on a short fuse, might well have suffered apoplexy had he been told.
Miliano, as expected, received Sanchez at arm's length. Sanchez caught up with him in Michoacan, where Miliano had spoken at a series of rallies, and his supporters had occupied the municipal buildings in every town except the state capital.
"I have heard of you, Sanchez," Miliano spoke to him. Miliano was bone-tired. His feet ached. His wife, Elena, who had insisted on accompanying him on this tour, had made him soak them in a basin of hot water. She stood behind him, massaging his neck, while he talked with Sanchez. "Why do you come to me?"
"I come to you," Sanchez responded, "because only I can save you."
Sanchez took ten minutes or more to introduce himself. He spoke of his childhood in San Antonio. Of years of suffering and prejudice. Of the abuse and discrimination he and his fellow Mexican-Americans had suffered in the U.S. military. He said, "I am a warrior, a technician of warfare. But I still have a soul."
He told Miliano of the afternoon at the Terrazzas ranch, of the men who had vowed to break up the ejidos. He explained that Miliano had received money and help —perhaps without knowing it—from some of the same men who were bent on crushing his followers.
Miliano was assaulted by a migraine so fierce he swayed forward, close to fainting.
Elena gripped his shoulders. She said to Sanchez, "You must go now."
"No," Miliano gasped. "We must talk."
