Wilco- Lone Wolf 18

by Geoff Wolak

  ‘Warn your men, no one goes anywhere alone, because once in the wadi there’s no one else around, so if a man walks north or south and gets lost he stays lost. And look out for Mi8 helos coming in to attack you, don’t shoot at Lynx and Pumas or US Navy helicopters.

  ‘Here on the map we have the locations of fighters marked from the aerial photos from the US Navy, but there will be others, small groups, and … fuck knows where they are; it’s a big old area. My plan, Stage One, is to check and clear this area, between us and their main camps, and those main camps are empty right now.’

  ‘And Bomb Disposal?’ they asked.

  ‘Take them with you, yes. Might need them.’

  My phone trilled. ‘It’s Wolf Murphy, sir, and we just spotted a fella all by himself, had a rifle so we shot him. He went down, but then blew himself up, bits of the fella all over.’

  ‘Where are you?’ I puzzled.

  ‘Southwest about four miles, can see the road a mile away.’

  ‘If you can, get a blood-soaked ID and phone from the body.’

  ‘Right, sir.’

  I had a room of expectant faces. With a puzzled expression, I told them, ‘Armed man, southwest, blew himself up.’

  ‘Suicide bomber,’ Harris noted. ‘And he’s southwest, so they dropped him off on the road and he started walking.’

  ‘And how many others did they drop off?’ Hicks floated.

  ‘Why so puzzled?’ Kovsky asked me.

  ‘A lone suicide bomber? That makes no sense. It would in a city, but not in the fucking desert! They could send a thousand and they’d have no chance of getting to us.’

  Holsteder asked, ‘Do they know the layout here?’

  ‘Obviously not,’ I told him. I called in the Omani major and detailed for him what we knew.

  He told us, ‘It is their mentality, to prove themselves, a strange bravado that takes over so much that they are prepared to blow themselves up. They all compete like children to see who can dare the other boys; I am not surprised. Maybe fifty men volunteered for this, to try and walk here.’

  Hicks noted, ‘So it’s about the size of their balls, no practical gains.’

  The Omani major faced him. ‘It is, yes, difficult for outsiders to understand.’

  ‘I understand them well,’ I suggested. ‘In a city and in a town, but not in a fucking desert!’ I called Haines. ‘Listen, we have lone suicide bombers walking in, so warn your lads. Shoot first, say hello second, shake with the right hand only.’

  He laughed. ‘We use left hands for wiping arses, old rule in the RAF.’

  Later I sat with Moran and Hicks, some warm food enjoyed as we lost the light.

  ‘Embarrassing, it is,’ I told Hicks. ‘Suicide bombers, in a desert.’

  ‘Can’t apply military thinking to it,’ Hicks noted.

  ‘Sometimes the lads are embarrassed by those we shoot,’ I added. ‘Recently, I was on a job, night time, and this guy is sneaking in towards my position, big white cowboy hat on.’

  Moran laughed.

  I told Hicks, ‘I feel less professional when up against someone like that.’

  Moran told Hicks, ‘In Sierra Leone, my first mission there, we hit this camp of blacks, and after the shooting starts there’s a dozen men walking around in their underpants, stoned, trying to cock weapons. Makes a mockery of professional soldiering.’

  ‘Be glad they’re not professionals,’ Hicks began. ‘You’d be down a few more men each job.’

  I asked him, ‘You were in Somalia, ’93?’

  ‘Yeah, but in the command tent, not on the job.’

  ‘And…’ I nudged.

  ‘Everyone has an opinion on what went wrong, but at the end of the day the plan was based on the assumption that we’d drive in quickly and back out, no one spotting us – which was foolish. Every damn Somali had a rifle, even the women and the teenage boys. Ten blocks, and every damn window had someone firing down.’

  ‘I pick and choose my jobs,’ I told him. ‘And I make the plans, that way fewer screw-ups. Always a problem when someone tells you that the job has to be done today, and in a certain way, entry point and exit point. Fact is, man on the ground has to decide, because what looks good on a map is often shite on the ground.

  ‘We have a good track record because we pick and choose, not have the plans dictated for us. If we did … I’d be dead by now, team would be disbanded, a bad reputation, a list of failures.’

  Hicks noted, but not in a friendly manner, ‘Thanks to you – I’m led to believe, Admiral Jacobs has stamped his authority on this, and he makes sure that there are no rigid plans, that the man on the ground makes the choices. I guess he listened to you.’

  ‘He wants a good newspaper headline, so I explained it in no uncertain terms, same with Colonel Mathews in the E-Ring; it’s my way or not at all. I won’t have some prick behind a desk telling me how I should be running the show.’

  ‘No respect for the chain of command,’ he noted, Moran and I both looking up. ‘But that man above you was in the field once, a soldier, and he should know what he’s doing – hence the rank.’

  ‘Ha,’ I let out. ‘Men get rank from years served and the right connections.’ Hicks stiffened. ‘Above me is a brigadier, a good man, but he has no confirmed kills, none at all, never sat bleeding in a jungle or a desert, never got shot at, never had to run till his lungs burnt – men chasing him and trying to kill him, never HALO dropped behind the lines. He knows his limits.’ I waited.

  Hicks stared back. ‘If the test of a good officer is confirmed kills, then we’d have a very different military, and in peacetime we’d have no officers at all. But we have structures and procedures going back two hundred years, yours longer, and they work – they produce good officers.’

  I glanced at Moran. ‘Before I came along those good officers had no track record of successes, no good hostage rescues, a long list of screw-ups. In Iraq, during the Gulf War, an SAS officer drove up and down a sand barrier at the border for three days, not finding a way in. Later, it was shown to him that to dig the barrier down took eight men less than half an hour.

  ‘In the Falklands War, an SAS officer led a team in a Chinook to Chile, to attack air bases inside Argentina. When he landed he told the men that the mission was too difficult and dangerous so they simply walked to the nearest police station in Chile and asked for a ride home.

  ‘If the system produces good officers, I’m yet to meet many of those good officers.’ I gestured towards Moran. ‘Captain Moran here joined my team after he proved that he could run and shoot, and he’s been on every job, not sat behind a desk.

  ‘And when he does end up behind a desk he’ll do a good job of planning missions, but will always recognise that the man on the ground has the final say, and that rigid plans are a bad idea.’

  ‘Definitely,’ Moran noted. He faced Hicks. ‘This is not regular warfare, Major, this is not about moving a company of men - the right supplies and logistics, this is about small team tactics. The normal military training offered to British officers does not apply, and we’re successful because we’re unconventional. We trick the enemy, not move in predictable ways.

  ‘It’s about winning, not how we win, and sometimes we drop cement on people, sometimes we pretend to be Russian gun runners, sometimes we use local blacks to sneak in for us. We want the hostages home, gunmen dead, we don’t care how we achieve that.’

  I noted, ‘The Green Berets are tasked with unconventional warfare, are they not..?’

  ‘They are, but we also have a chain of command.’

  ‘And a White House that would not send you in because they fear a screw up, and a White House that will pull you out if men are injured or killed. But that White House has seen my record of successes, and here you are … a risk taken by the White House, a hope that it goes off well.

  ‘And despite what I said about the man on the ground being in charge, I’ll help make a loose plan for your men, and insist … that they shoot
from distance without breaking cover, fewer casualties, an eye on what the nice man in the White House may do.

  ‘The mission is to reduce al-Qaeda, so if we shoot twenty and go home – job done. If we shoot a hundred for no casualties, great, we go home and sing our own praises in the press. But if we kill four hundred of them for twenty of our men wounded and ten killed then this will be seen as a fuck-up, and it will affect future joint missions.

  ‘I’m playing politics here, and I’m playing the press, or they take our toys away, and we don’t get to rescue the hostages and take them home. They teach that at West Point?’

  He stared back, thinking about his reply. ‘No, they don’t teach manipulation of the press, or how to deal with the politicians, or dropping cement on people. And do the Omanis have a say in your planning?’

  Moran smiled. ‘The Crown Prince does whatever Wilco wants.’

  Hicks adopted a puzzled frown.

  I explained, ‘The son of the Crown Prince was murdered on my base, by rogue British Intel agents.’ Hicks’ eyes widened. ‘I helped him track them down, then I arranged for the men to be brought here in boxes, and once here they were brutally tortured before being publically hung.

  ‘I also prevented him losing a vast amount of money, and with the assistance of your CIA I helped him take revenge against those who wanted his money.’

  Moran noted, ‘Something else they don’t teach at our Sandhurst – and for good reason.’

  Later, I took Holsteder to one side. ‘Your major..?’

  He rolled his eyes. ‘Old school, by the book, but we’re not supposed to be by the book, we’re unconventional warfare – it says so in the manual. But he wants it done by the book, our unconventional warfare.’

  ‘And what do the men think of me?’

  ‘They all love you to bits; you’re the major they want above them. Hicks, he’ll be a general someday. Some of these guys were in Liberia, some at Camel Toe, and all they talk about back at Bragg is you. I guess that gets up the nose of someone like the major.’

  At 9pm the SEALs lieutenant called in. ‘Major, we’re close to the target camp, hidden in the rocks. We can see the lights, they’re not being that stealthy.’

  ‘Which way are they facing?’

  ‘They’re hidden in the rocks where the offshoot hits the main wadi, facing north, fifty cal on jeeps facing north, mortars pointing kind of northeast we think.’

  ‘How many men there?’

  ‘That’s why I’m calling; we think there’s over four hundred of them.’

  ‘So it would be more than just a scrap if you attacked,’ I teased.

  ‘It would, boys are concerned.’

  ‘How spaced out are the fighters?’

  ‘There are men well dug-in at the edge of the camp, but back down the line it narrows, rocks on the side, and they’re bunched up next to a cliff – say ten metres high, and going back a mile. We can’t see the tail end of the tents and jeeps.’

  ‘Would a strafing run do any good?’

  ‘Against the back end, yes, they’re bunched up tight.’

  ‘OK, these are your operational orders, don’t make a mistake here. Back-up slowly and walk a mile at least, get in the rocks and hide, be ready to move forwards again midday tomorrow. Got that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ll have your Navy hit the camp, then we’ll hit it with helicopters, then you open up. Stay at distance, pick them off, pairs of men, no large groups bunched up.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘And be quiet tonight, eh,’ I said with a grin.

  ‘Well I was figuring on that, yeah.’

  I went and found Kovsky as he had a quiet coffee. ‘We got a problem.’ Other officers looked our way. ‘The camp that the SEALs moved up to is way larger than we figured, or they got more men recently. I need an airstrike for 11am dead on.’

  He took out his small notebook from a shirt pocket.

  ‘Make a note. The camp runs north to south, a ten-metre cliff, men and tents and jeeps all snuggled up next to the cliff, so we need to strafe that line of tents, south to north, and several times, plus a few bombs in the northern part of the camp. Confirm the go orders for me in the morning.’

  ‘Why not hit them at midnight, when they’re in those tents?’

  ‘How good are your night sights?’

  ‘Pilots can see clear as day,’ he reported. I hesitated, which he noticed. ‘Why hit them at 11am?’ he pressed.

  ‘So that we have a predictable reaction, your men in position ready. Hit them now and they might scatter, a harder job for us. But … how many men will be in the jeeps and tents in daylight I wonder?’

  ‘In daylight they’d disperse surely.’

  I shook my head. ‘No, they’d be sat around chatting, not thinking like professional soldiers, and they’ve been there a week already. So, what would be their normal routine?’ I thought out loud.

  Franks suggested, ‘Sleeping in the day when it’s warm, ready for attack at night and at dawn. They know that western armies always attack at dawn.’

  ‘With me, please,’ I told them, and in the HQ room I found the aerial photo of the camp in question. On it was a time, 13.05. ‘So this photo was taken at 1300, and … they’re sat around, but not many men seen. I can’t see men hidden in the rocks, so … what do you reckon?’

  I showed Franks, and he used someone’s glasses to magnify the images he was examining. ‘Enough jeeps and tents for two hundred men, but I count just twenty up and moving around.’

  ‘And the rocks?’

  ‘None in the rocks laying down ready, at least not seen here. Maybe they sleep in the heat of the day, awake at night as suggested.’

  Kovsky noted, ‘So we hit them at midday. Or 2pm, when it’s hot.’

  ‘We wait,’ I firmly suggested. ‘Tomorrow, the SEALs might get eyes on and confirm a sleepy camp. I’ll have the Greenies land just as the bombing is underway, I don’t want a loud helicopter waking anyone.’

  My phone trilled. ‘It’s’ Swifty, and we killed two men, and one of the fuckers exploded, bits of him all over.’

  ‘American Wolves shot a man out by himself, and he exploded as well. Suicide bombers. Where are you?’

  ‘Couple of miles down that road, not near the border yet.’

  ‘Try and get phones and IDs, but don’t get blown up, eh. Shoot in the head first and wait.’ Off the phone, I told them, ‘More suicide bombers, down by the road southwest.’ I pointed at Kovsky. ‘Aim for midday, update Admiral Jacobs, but explain that we may be an hour early or late after the SEALs take a good look at that camp.’

  I found Holsteder in his tent. ‘Tomorrow, your Navy will hit a target camp around midday, you land by helo at about the same time, move north as the fighters run off south towards you. SEALs had a sneak peak, and they estimate four hundred men in that camp.’

  ‘A bit out-numbered,’ he noted.

  ‘Hence the bombing. And as you move up the Lynx helos here will attack, you won’t face many men, not live ones.’

  My phone trilled. ‘It’s Major Pritchard, and we can hear a helicopter. Do you have any up?’

  ‘No, so get ready and get down. Keep the reports coming. Which direction is it?’

  ‘South of us, southwest we think.’

  ‘You have Elephant Guns?’

  ‘Yeah, a few, and each jeep has a GPMG.’

  ‘That should be enough to bring down an Mi8. Aim at the cockpit glass. Update me if it’s flying east.’ Phone down, I shouted, ‘Update everyone, hostile helicopter is west of us!’

  I stepped around the ATC, the Omanis now flustered. ‘Have someone climb up onto this roof, use your ears, listen for a helicopters, have a Lynx ready to go. And turn the fucking lights out!’

  Around to the billet I had all the Elephant Guns broken out, eight men to get up on the flat roof.

  Hicks appeared out the dark with his captains. ‘We got company?’

  ‘A helicopter, one of theirs not one of ou
rs. Could be used for re-supply at night, or … it might come here and stick a rocket in a building.’

  ‘Navy is offshore,’ he pointed out.

  ‘And that helo will fly down the wadi low-level, probably using night sights. If your Navy could see it, they would have alerted me by now – they have my number. Can you ask your guys to close tent flaps and keep the lights out.’

  A Greenie captain walked back towards the tents.

  I told Hicks, ‘Your mission profile for tomorrow has changed, there are way more men in that camp that we realised. Navy will bomb them first, thin them out, then we attack two ways.’

  ‘And if we had gone in as planned?’ Hicks pressed.

  ‘You would have seen and reported a larger than expected camp, and we would have called in the same airstrike to tip the balance. It was your Navy and CIA assessment as to numbers, if you want to send a complaint up the line.’

  I walked off and left him there, back to the HQ room. As I got there the SEALs called.

  ‘Major Wilco, we can hear a helicopter. It came in from the west, landed for five minutes, out to the west.’

  ‘Same helo re-supplied a camp east of you, that’s how they’re moving around. No big deal.’

  ‘Roger that.’

  I told Harris, as Moran stepped in, ‘They’re using helos to re-supply at night, flying under the radar.’

  Moran noted, ‘So it’s not coming here.’

  ‘No,’ I confirmed. ‘Unless they have more.’ I faced Harris. ‘Have all windows blocked with paper. C’mon man, don’t you know there’s a war on!’

  Moran laughed as Harris gave me the finger, Moran grabbing the cellotape and a newspaper.

  An American Wolf called in, lone fighters shot dead, but there was no explosion. He had ID off the body, no explosive vest found, and was walking on with his team.

  I told the assembled men, ‘OK, now I’m confused. They shot a lone man, but he had no bomb.’

  Franks quipped, ‘Maybe they ran out of explosive vests.’

  I wagged a finger at him. ‘You’re not helping.’

  ‘Maybe he had a grenade instead,’ Dick put in. ‘He was from the poor side of the family.’