Tyranny in the Ashes, page 11
Strunk grabbed his AK-47 and led the way down the jungle path, following the tire marks of Garza’s caravan. Valdez strolled at his side, a short-barreled shotgun in his arms loaded with 00-buckshot.
They’d traveled only two miles when they saw the remains of the convoy. The jeeps were sideways in the trail, crippled by hundreds of bullet holes, motors still smoking and sending up steam.
“Mary Mother of God,” Paco whispered, and unconsciously crossed himself at the sight of the bodies of Garza and his men.
Sergeant Felipe Garza had been scalped and was sitting spread-eagled with his arms tied outstretched to a tree. His abdomen was sliced open and his entrails were in a circle around him.
Corporal Beto was tied down over an army-ant bed and was systematically being eaten by the hungry insects—his eyes and most of his face already gone.
Another man was strung upside down from a tree, his head only inches above a bed of coals, which was cooking his brains.
Several of the soldiers with Strunk and Valdez bent over on the trail and vomited on their boots; others just turned their heads, mumbling quiet prayers to themselves as they stared into the surrounding jungle with fear in their eyes, gripping their weapons so hard their knuckles were white.
“Who would do such a thing?” Valdez asked.
Strunk gave a lopsided grin of admiration. “Someone who wants to put fear into our troops . . . someone very smart. I’ve done the same thing a time or two, back in Africa when I was with the SAS. It’s very effective if done right.”
“I will inform the men they are not to discuss what they have seen here,” Valdez said.
Strunk gave a short laugh. “You can tell ’em anything you want, Paco. They’re still gonna talk about this.”
“At least they weren’t smart enough to destroy the aircraft fuel,” Paco said.
Strunk’s face became troubled. “Yeah, that was a mistake.” He shook his head. “I don’t understand why they didn’t . . .”
“You men,” Paco interrupted, pointing at a group of men standing near the jeeps. “Start unloading the drums of fuel. I will radio for additional trucks to come haul it away while you stand guard.”
As two of the men walked to the nearest jeep and took hold of a drum, Strunk suddenly said, “Hold it! It’s a trap!”
He was too late. The men tipped the drum up on one edge to roll it off the jeep, and a hand grenade that had been wedged beneath it popped free, its pin already removed.
Strunk grabbed Valdez and dived to the ground behind a large banyan tree just as the grenade exploded, igniting the fuel drums in a giant fireball.
Trees were leveled for a hundred yards and every one of Valdez’s squad was incinerated into ash in a split second of intense heat.
Strunk woke up a half hour later, blood streaming from both ears and his nose. It took him another twenty minutes to free his legs from the banyan tree trunk where it’d fallen on him and Valdez.
Paco Valdez was conscious but incoherent, and both men were still deaf from the explosion. By the time they got back to the helicopter, it was almost dark.
“Loco is going to be very angry,” Paco said in a loud voice so Strunk could hear him.
Strunk nodded. “We’d better come up with a good explanation for why we didn’t check the fuel drums for booby traps before we tried to move them.”
“But Senor Strunk, we didn’t try to move the drums,” Paco said with a sly grin as he sleeved blood off his face. “We were about to examine them when one of my clumsy men stumbled over a trip wire and set the explosion off.” He spread his hands, an innocent look on his face. “There was nothing more we could have done.”
Strunk nodded. “Yeah, that’s the way I remember it, too, Paco.”
They climbed into the helicopter and the pilot started the engines.
“I believe I will radio the comandante and tell him the bad news over the air,” Paco said, reaching for the microphone. “I am very much afraid if I tell him in person, he will shoot me before I can make my excuses.”
“Good idea, Paco. That way he’ll have plenty of time to calm down before we get back to camp.”
“You, my friend, had better use the time to come up with a plan for capturing these americanos before they do more damage to our forces, or no matter what excuses we come up with, Loco will have our heads.”
Sixteen
Ben and his team looked like something out of a space movie as they gathered near the door of the C-130 transport plane. They were dressed all in black, with faces enclosed in Plexiglas helmets to give them oxygen until they fell far enough to be able to breathe on their own. Harley had said they would be at terminal velocity, 120 miles per hour, for several minutes prior to their chutes opening.
“It’s almost impossible to breathe at that speed, so leave your helmets hooked up until your chute opens. After that, if the shock of the sudden deceleration doesn’t knock you out, you can jettison your helmets and get your weapons ready to fire. We don’t know what we’re gonna find when we land.”
“What if we get hung up in the jungle canopy too far to drop from our chutes?” Ben asked.
Harley pointed to Ben’s chest. “That’s what that nylon cord on the front of your HALO suit is for. Just attach it to your harness, hit the release button, and climb down the rope to the ground.”
“And if the rope doesn’t reach the ground?” Corrie asked.
“Then you’re SOL,” Harley replied with a grin.
“SOL?” she asked.
“Shit outta luck,” he replied, and turned to watch the lights at the front of the transport, waiting for the jump light to turn from red to green.
Perro Loco paced the main room of his hacienda cursing and asking God why He had forsaken him on his glorious quest to save the poor working peasants from the overlords of capitalism. Paco Valdez and Jim Strunk sat across the room watching him. Both were thinking the same thing. Horseshit!
Finally, when Perro had exhausted his vocabulary of curse words, he stalked over and sat at his desk. He pulled a Cuban cigar out of a humidor, lit it, and he leaned back with his feet on the corner of the desk.
Pointing the cigar like a pistol, he asked Valdez, “Paco, have you got our commanders in Nicaragua and Costa Rica moving toward Mexico?”
“Sí, mi comandante,” Valdez answered. “All of our battalions are massing on the border as we speak. The Mexican presidente has protested strongly to the United Nations, but we have told them it is merely military exercises.”
“By the time the Secretary General of the U.N., Jean-François Chapelle, gathers the courage to act, we will be well on our way to Mexico City,” Strunk said, grinning.
“And have you figured out a plausible excuse for the attack on Mexico?” asked Valdez, peering at them through blue clouds of aromatic cigar smoke.
Strunk laughed out loud. “That’s the best part. One of our squads has stolen a Mexican Army helicopter. When you give the order, we’ll have one of our own men pilot it and attack the Presidential Palace in Nicaragua, giving us the perfect reason to join the oppressed people of Nicaragua when they arise and retaliate against the Mexican aggressors.”
Perro Loco nodded, smiling for the first time since he heard about the loss of the aircraft fuel. “Good. Very good. And one of the first orders of business for our troops will be to capture the fuel dumps south of Mexico City. Without that aircraft fuel, our attack will be short-lived. We need our attack helicopters to lead the way to Mexico City.”
Valdez cleared his throat and leaned forward in his chair. “Comandante, I know the United Nations will fail to act— they always do—but what about this Ben Raines of the SUSA? When he hears we are advancing on Mexico City, he will surely come to their aid.”
“That is why I am going to accept Osterman’s offer of an alliance. She says she can keep Raines busy by resuming an attack on the SUSA from the north while I move from the south.” He shrugged. “Even if she only delays his actions a few weeks, it will be enough. We will be in Mexico City and will have declared ourselves the rightful government by the time he finishes her off and turns his attention to us.”
“And once we have Mexico, it is but a short step to the United States,” Strunk added, rubbing his hands together.
“Sí. Now, bring me the americano who has the scrambler codes in his head. I wish to speak to Presidente Osterman at once.”
Seventeen
“Goddamnit, Harlan, quit sniveling,” Claire growled at Harlan Millard as she finished her twenty-fifth situp. She was proud of her “new body” and in her enthusiasm for fitness, had decreed that all of her new cabinet members would also get in shape.
Harlan, after only ten situps, was holding his groin and moaning. “I swear, Claire, I have a hernia and this exercise is aggravating it,” he cried.
Herb Knoff, in the other corner, was doing pushup after pushup and barely working up a sweat. Claire noticed the way his arm muscles were bulging, and had to force her mind back to business and off his magnificent body, and the things he did to her with it.
Claire grabbed a towel off the counter and sat behind her desk. “All right, gentlemen, let’s have a status report.”
Harlan breathed a silent sigh of relief and crawled to his feet, wincing as he stretched muscles tight and sore from the exercise. He collapsed into a chair across from Claire and Herb sat next to him.
“Mr. Secretary of State,” she said to Harlan, “what progress are we making in our negotiations with the U.N.?”
“Jean-Francois Chapelle has agreed to take the matter up with the Security Council, but he did state that he felt the answer would be not to interfere in the governmental process of a sovereign nation.”
“That’s bullshit!” Claire said, slamming her hand down on her desk. “Those bastards tried to assassinate me and then they took over my country.”
Harlan nodded. “You’re right, of course, Madame President, but if we can’t get Chapelle to push it for us, we stand little chance of any help from the U.N.”
Claire turned angry eyes on Herb Knoff “Mr. Vice President?”
In a confident voice, Herb said, “I don’t think it’s gonna matter, Claire. We’re getting stronger every day. More and more of the old Blackshirt and FPPS squads are joining us, and even a lot of the regular troops that hate the prospect of losing their jobs with the new peace proposals.”
“What about equipment and supplies?” she asked.
“Also no problem. Every man that comes has to bring something with him to get in. We now have over ten helicopters, five battle tanks, and even a couple of older-model jet fighters.”
“Are we strong enough to go up against Otis Warner and his Army yet?”
“No, but if we can survive another month, I think it’ll be possible.”
Harlan cleared his throat. “Uh, Herb, why haven’t they tried to attack us here at our home base? They must know what we’re doing by now.”
“Oh, they know, all right, and I’ll bet it’s got them plenty worried. Their problem is they don’t know where we are. I’ve kept the original men who were stationed here on the communications gear, so as far as they know, all is well here. Warner and his crowd know we’re out here, and they know we’re actively recruiting and stealing men and equipment. They just don’t have a clue as to where we are.”
“All right, men, I think it’s time we upped the ante in this game. Herb, I want you to work with General Bradley Stevens and have him send out some teams to begin a campaign of sabotage against the bases still controlled by Warner. Nothing too severe—I don’t want to cripple too much equipment we might need when we go up against Raines and the SUSA later—but concentrate more on killing key personnel—officers and men who have shown their disloyalty to me.”
“Got you,” Herb said. “It shouldn’t be too difficult since we can forge passes for the assassination teams that will allow them to pass freely through the countryside.”
“I also want a team of your very best men to see if they can get close enough to Warner to take him or General Winter out,” she added. “If Warner were to be executed, it would make it that much easier for me to resume my previous position as head of the government.”
Herb frowned. “That’s gonna be awfully difficult. Since he’s become aware of your survival, my intel tells me he’s doubled his normal security and no one is allowed even near his quarters unless they’re known to be loyal to him.”
She nodded. “I’m well aware it won’t be easy, Herb, but see what you can do. He’s got to stick his head up sooner or later if he’s going to meet with Raines and Cecil Jeffreys to discuss the peace protocol. He’ll be most vulnerable when he’s traveling.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Before she could continue, General Stevens knocked and entered the office, a look of excitement on his face.
“Claire, Perro Loco’s on the horn, calling from Belize.”
“Is it scrambled?” she asked.
“Yes. He’s using the codes our men gave him.”
“Put him on.”
Stevens flipped a switch on the phone on Claire’s desk, putting the call on a speaker-phone.
“Perro Loco, this is President Claire Osterman speaking. How are you?”
“I am fine, Madame President. I have received your offer of an alliance and wish to discuss the terms.”
Claire was a bit surprised at how well the bandido spoke English. She had figured him for some South American clown who was barely literate, and now could barely discern an accent to his speech.
“Well, Perro Loco, the terms are simple. If you agree to attack Mexico immediately, I will agree to let you keep everything south of the Rio Grande River as your country.”
“But Madame President, I will already have that without your assistance. What are you offering to do for me?”
Claire cocked an eyebrow at Stevens. This jungle idiot was smarter than she thought. “In the first place, Perro Loco, under the present status quo, you won’t stand a chance of succeeding by yourself. If the USA and the SUSA are not at war, Ben Raines and his Army will be free to help Mexico, and with Raines on their side, Mexico will kick your butt all the way back to Nicaragua.”
There was a pause, and Claire wondered if she’d gone too far. She knew these Latin types were very proud and wouldn’t accept a slur on their macho manhood.
Finally, he came back on the line. “That may well be true. Mexico aligned with the SUSA would be a formidable opponent. Do you think you are in a strong enough position to keep that from happening, considering your . . . ah, recent problems?”
Claire had to bite her lip to keep from shouting back at the arrogant bastard. “Don’t you worry about that, Perro Loco. Even now we are in the process of planning attacks against SUSA which will stop the peace process in its tracks. Once Raines has to worry about a possible resurgence of the hostilities between the USA and the SUSA, he will be forced to keep a large portion of his troops stationed on the borders up here and won’t be able to send them against you.”
“That is comforting, Madame President. If that turns out to be the case, then I am sure we can come to a mutually agreeable arrangement later. For now, on my part, I will agree to move my troops against Mexico immediately. If you can manage to keep Ben Raines out of the fight, then we have an agreement.”
“Thank you, Perro Loco. I will be in touch.”
After General Stevens pushed the button terminating the call, Claire growled, “That arrogant bastard. Who does he think he is to give ultimatums to me?”
Stevens took a seat across from Claire. “He’s right on one point, Claire. We may not be strong enough at the present to keep Raines from helping Mexico.”
“Bullshit!” She turned to Knoff. “Herb, you said we had a couple of fighter jets?”
“Yeah.”
“I want them loaded to the gills with as much armament as possible and I want them to attack someplace in the SUSA. If they can manage to get past Raines’s defenses now that they’re not expecting an attack, it should get his attention.”
“He’s got a couple of battalions in Arkansas,” Stevens said. “They’re mostly infantry and won’t have a lot of air defenses set up now that they think peace is at hand. We might be able to do a quick hit-and-run there.”
“Then let’s do it,” she said. “It’ll serve two purposes. Raines won’t know for certain if Warner ordered it or I did, and Perro Loco will see that we can do our part to freeze Raines’s troops in their present positions.”
Stevens stood up. “I’ll get right on it, Madame President.”
“Herb,” she said, pointing her finger at him, “I want those assassination teams on their way by the end of the week. Okay?”
“You got it, Claire.”
Eighteen
Several thousand miles away, Perro Loco leaned forward and pushed the disconnect button on his phone. He took a deep drag on his Cuban cigar, blew dark smoke toward the ceiling, then looked at his companions across his desk.
“Paco, what do you think?”
Paco Valdez shrugged. “I think the lady may have some trouble doing all that she says she can. My information is that she is barely hanging on to her present position. She may sometime be able to take her government back, but not for a while yet.”
“Mr. Strunk?”
“I agree,” Jim Strunk said. “Even if she does manage to create some tensions between the SUSA and the USA, and Raines is forced to keep his troops on the border, that still leaves him with several battalions in Texas he can send against us. I think we’d better figure on having to fight both Mexico and Ben Raines.”
“What do we know about him and his tactics?” Perro asked.
Strunk leaned over and pulled a thick sheaf of papers from a briefcase on the floor. “That American you killed, the one sent by Osterman, had these in his knapsack. They’re copies of some journals kept by Raines during his African campaign, along with some article written by a newspaper correspondent who accompanied him during his fight down there. They seem to give some good insight into how he thinks and the strategy he employs in certain situations.”
