Soldier D: The Colombian Cocaine War

by David Monnery

  ‘What if it fails?’ Estrada said. ‘I know these SAS men are supposed to be supermen, but they must fuck up sometimes. What if they fuck up here? We’ll have a pile of English bodies that we can’t explain away. Everyone will know that the Government must have been involved, and the cartels will be screaming that I am just a foreign stooge and they are the only true Colombians.’ He looked coldly at Quintana, unaware that the opening credits for Knot’s Landing were rolling silently across the screen behind him.

  Quintana repressed a smile. ‘If by any chance it should fail – I still think the odds must be heavily on success, but just supposing it does fail – things will not be that bad. Muñoz will presumably be dead, which would be a plus, particularly since it would be obvious to everyone what lengths you were prepared to go to try and save him.’

  Estrada was impressed despite himself. ‘Perhaps,’ he admitted. ‘In any case it’s too late to change our plans now.’ He turned to glance at the screen, and turned back to Quintana. ‘Just one more thing. The negotiations for the ransom – how are they proceeding?’

  ‘They have given us until Wednesday to agree the terms.’ He shrugged. ‘If the English mean what they say it will probably be all over by then.’

  ‘Good. Thank you, Luis.’

  It was a dismissal. Quintana was only halfway to the door when the TV sound boomed back on.

  He walked down the stairs which led from Estrada’s private quarters to the Presidential offices, going back over what he had just said to reassure Estrada. It had been half true, he thought, but only half. Certainly Muñoz would be gone, but would Estrada receive the benefit? The President was probably right in thinking he would be damaged by the revelation of British involvement – after all, the Malvinas War was still fresh in many minds, and gringos were gringos.

  Reaching his own office, Quintana sat thinking by his window for several minutes. With both Muñoz and Estrada out of the running he could not think of anyone with a better prospect of succeeding the latter than himself.

  Somewhere in the distance a bell chimed nine o’clock. Eddie and Chris were slowly working their way round Popayán’s Plaza de Armas, looking out for a large tousle-headed Welshman. It was their second circuit; on the first they had passed the Dame sitting on one of the benches, deep in conversation with two young women whose rucksacks bore Australian flag badges.

  ‘Finds sisters wherever he goes,’ Chris observed.

  ‘It’s obscene,’ Eddie agreed.

  The three of them had arrived in the Popayán bus station soon after dark, found a middling hotel courtesy of the handbook, and had found time to shower and change before coming out to keep their appointment with Wynwood. Popayán itself, insofar as they could tell by night, was exactly what the handbook said it was: an attractive old colonial town full of narrow streets, white buildings and university students.

  ‘Here comes Ivor the Engine,’ Eddie murmured.

  Wynwood was strolling across the square towards them. ‘Eddie, Chris!’ he almost shouted in his sing-song voice.

  ‘Hello b …’ Chris bit off the word ‘boss’.

  ‘Hiya, Taff,’ Eddie said brazenly, offering Wynwood a hand to shake. ‘And what brings you to sunny Popayán?’

  Wynwood grinned. ‘Same as you, I expect – the peaceful climate. Have you two eaten?’ he asked. ‘I’m starving, and there’s a place just down there …’ He pointed across the square. ‘Where’s your friend, by the way?’ he asked Chris.

  ‘He’s watching us now,’ Chris said quietly. ‘Just lead off and he’ll follow.’

  ‘Right.’ Wynwood led them across the square and a few yards up Calle 5 to a restaurant named La Plazuela.

  The Dame arrived at their table a few moments later.

  Wynwood examined his three new partners. With his own mass of dark curls, Eddie’s unruly blonde mop, Chris’s shock of spikes and the Dame’s near-skinhead cut, the four of them did not stand out as an obvious team. Which was not only good, but a marked improvement on the early eighties, when so many SAS men had adopted unruly long hair for undercover work that it had become like a new uniform.

  Clothes-wise the differences were few. Chris was wearing a shirt and jeans, the rest of them T-shirts and jeans. All wore some sort of windcheater and boots. Too bad, Wynwood thought – travellers were not known for their originality of dress.

  They ordered food and kept the conversation to impressions of Colombia and what was going on back home. After paying the bill they found a store selling beer and took the bottles back to Wynwood’s room at the nearby Hotel Acapulco. It was somewhat swisher than their own hotel.

  ‘I thought it was important that we weren’t all staying in the same squalor,’ Wynwood explained.

  ‘It’s being so old,’ Eddie explained to the Dame. ‘He needs his comforts more.’

  The Dame smiled and opened a bottle of beer. ‘Not bad,’ he reckoned, after a first taste. ‘Not Newcastle Brown, but not bad.’

  ‘OK,’ Wynwood said, sitting himself down on the floor with his back to the wall. ‘To business. How did Man U do on Boxing Day?’

  ‘Lost 7-0 to City,’ Eddie offered.

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘They drew 1-1 with Everton,’ the Dame said.

  ‘That sounds better. You lot didn’t have any trouble getting here?’ he asked Chris.

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘There were the twins on the plane,’ the Dame suggested. ‘We had to hose Eddie down after the flight.’

  ‘And then we had to spend a week in Quito looking for some bird-watching book,’ Eddie added.

  ‘Well, I did have a minor problem or two,’ Wynwood said, and told them the story of the car that had trailed him from Bogotá.

  They listened in silence, jokes forgotten.

  ‘So who knows?’ Wynwood concluded. ‘The operation may be blown. I’ll call Bogotá tonight, pass on the information, then wait and see if Hereford or London have any news or suggestions.’

  ‘OK, boss,’ Chris agreed. Each SAS patrol tended to operate much of the time as a group of equals regardless of rank, but in this case there was no doubt in anyone’s mind who was boss. Apart from anything else, Wynwood knew the territory.

  ‘What do we do in the meantime?’ Eddie asked.

  ‘Tomorrow I want to get a look at Totoro – that’s the name of the estate or ranch or whatever it is where we think Andy and Muñoz are being held. Chris can drop me off a few kilometres out and pick me up later. You two can just amuse yourselves. Separately would be best. Get rested up, get used to the altitude. I have the distinct feeling this one is not going to be a picnic.’

  ‘There’s just one other thing, boss,’ Eddie asked deadpan.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Did you give Bobbie one?’

  Wynwood eyed him tolerantly. ‘Let’s just say she’s been given a standard by which to judge other men.’

  ‘Maybe she wanted more than an evening paper, boss.’

  Chapter 6

  ‘Are there are any people in Belize?’ Blackie asked.

  ‘Doesn’t look like it, does it?’ Bonnie agreed. They were walking across the strip of tarmac which separated the barrack from the HQ building. To their right two Hercules C-130 transport planes were being busied over by ground staff, and beyond them a quartet of Harriers were parked in line. And that was about it. In every direction the airfield seemed to end in a wall of jungle. The sky was a uniform blue-white, the air thick and humid. They were in the tropics all right, but if they had not been told where they would have had no way of knowing. It didn’t feel any different to Brunei.

  They were on their way to the morning briefing, along with the other thirty members of C Squadron’s Mountain and Air Troops. Judging by the eyes turned their way as they entered the briefing room they were the last ones there.

  ‘Sorry to drag you away from your pleasures,’ Major Bourne greeted them sarcastically. ‘I’ll try and make sure this doesn’t take too long.’

  ‘They
were only tossing each other off,’ a voice said.

  ‘Some of us have heard of women,’ Blackie said.

  Bourne waited as the laughter subsided. Sometimes he wished that he could get through just one briefing, just one, without a parallel seminar in sexual innuendo. But when all was said and done, it was just a way of releasing tension. As the actress said to the bishop, he thought to himself.

  Thirty pairs of eyes were watching him.

  ‘I thought you might all like some clear idea of what you’re doing here,’ he began. ‘As things stand at the moment, one of our number – Sergeant Anderson of the Training Wing staff – I’m sure you all remember him from Basic Training …’

  There were several groans.

  ‘Sergeant Anderson is being held for ransom by a Colombian criminal organization – one of the cocaine cartels. A well-known Colombian politician is being held with him, for the same reason …’

  ‘I bet they want more for him than Andy Anderson,’ someone remarked.

  ‘Twice as much,’ Bourne replied. ‘The villains in question are the Amarales family. They have a fortified estate just outside Popayán, which, for all you geographic illiterates’ – he turned to the large-scale map of Colombia behind him – ‘is here in the southern mountains.’ He turned back to face them. ‘Negotiations are under way,’ he went on, ‘between the two Governments and the villains, but that needn’t concern us. We’re going in to get Andy back. And the local politician too while we’re at it.’

  ‘Boss, what happens if our politicians pull the plug on us at the last moment?’

  ‘I don’t think there’s much chance of that. Of course, if it happens, it happens. No matter what you and I might think of our politicians, we’re here to carry out their decisions, not question them.’

  There were more groans, this time of resignation.

  Bourne smiled. ‘Stop getting your knickers in a twist,’ he advised them. ‘I think this is a Go, and you might as well believe likewise until you hear otherwise. Now’ – he took hold of the map and flipped it over to reveal a blown-up satellite photograph of Totoro – ‘you’ve each got a copy of this in front of you as part of the briefing pack. I want you to take it away and memorize the layout. And of course everything else in the pack. Someone’s working on a model as I speak, and tomorrow we should be able to start some detailed planning. By then we may have additional information from our surveillance patrol. Most of you probably know the men concerned – Joss Wynwood from Training Wing and Chris Martinson, Eddie Wilshaw and Damien Robson from B Squadron’s Mountain Troop.’

  ‘Not B Squadron, boss!’

  ‘I’m afraid it was the best we could come up with at short notice, Trooper. The four of them should be in situ sometime tonight.’

  ‘Do we have a date yet, boss?’

  ‘If today is Dl, we want to be ready to go by the evening of D3. That’s all I can tell you, at present. And we haven’t yet decided between HAHO and HALO for insertion. Nor has it been decided whether we need to send in two Troops or just the one.’

  Some heartfelt groans were heard.

  ‘I know you’d all love to go,’ Bourne said. ‘We’ll see. For the moment, go through the briefing packs, and spend some time considering the advantages and disadvantages of each insertion method in these circumstances. Right, any questions?’

  ‘How are we getting home, boss?’

  ‘That’s a remarkably pertinent question, Trooper. Since it’s only approximately two hundred kilometres across this 4000-metre mountain range to the Ecuadorian border we considered turning the whole business into an endurance exercise. However, it was felt that that would be unfair to the Colombian politician. So you’re being lifted out by our allies.’

  ‘Not the Yanks, boss? They couldn’t even lift their own men out of Iran.’

  ‘This is a rather easier proposition for them, Trooper. This time we have the cooperation of the local Government.’

  ‘But do the local military always listen to their Government?’ someone wanted to know.

  It was an intelligent question, and Bourne could not help feeling a little proud of the questioner, even though he had been put on the spot. ‘No, not always,’ he admitted. He would not insult the men in front of him by telling them anything less than the truth as he understood it. ‘We’re not expecting any trouble from that direction,’ he went on, ‘and we’ll take all steps to make it even more unlikely, but we won’t be ignoring the possibility either.’ He waited for a follow-up but none came. ‘Any more?’ he asked.

  There were no more questions.

  ‘OK, get all the information we have packed in among your brain cells – I’m sure there’s plenty of spare space. And I know it’s New Year’s Eve, but try not to wash away everything you’ve learned on a tide of beer tonight. Enjoy yourselves, but remember, we may be in action the day after tomorrow. If any of you have ever tried free-falling with a hang-over you’ll know what I mean.’

  There were a couple of assenting murmurs.

  Bourne left the room. In the back row Blackie and Bonnie looked at each other. ‘Hey-ho,’ Blackie sighed.

  ‘Or hey-lo,’ Bonnie said. ‘I don’t know which is worse – floating around next to the moon getting frostbite, or plummeting down at about a hundred miles an hour hoping the bastard who made your parachute had his mind on the job that day.’

  ‘You’re an inspiration, you are,’ Blackie said.

  ‘I always thought Colombia was a record label,’ Bonnie said sourly.

  Wynwood and Chris got an early start, driving out of the city soon after eight. It was a beautiful day, the sun rising through an almost clear blue sky. In the far distance mere wisps of cloud sat on the shoulders of the mountains. They followed the main highway to Cali for the first few kilometres, then turned off onto the lesser road Wynwood had traversed from Neiva the previous morning. Chris was driving, Wynwood examining Oliver’s large-scale maps as he applied camouflage cream to his face and neck.

  After another few kilometres they crossed a bridge over the energetic waters of the upper Cauca, and turned right again, up the river valley. The road was paved, but seemed little used. Cocaine money, Wynwood guessed.

  Ten minutes later he told Chris to pull over. They were in a relatively narrow section of the valley, where the Cauca and the road shared most of the flat ground and forested slopes rose quite steeply on either side towards invisible heights.

  ‘Totoro is about two kilometres further up the valley,’ Wynwood said, ‘and since this road doesn’t seem quite as busy as the M25, I think it would be better if you went back the way we came rather than drive past the entrance.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Eight forty-seven,’ he said. Chris checked his and nodded. ‘Eight hours should do it,’ Wynwood reckoned. ‘So let’s say here at 17.00. If I don’t show, two-hour intervals until I do. Or until Man U win the League.’

  ‘Christ, we’re not hanging around that long.’

  Wynwood smiled, checked the binoculars and the Browning in his cross-draw.

  ‘Do you want to take this?’ Chris asked, offering him the bird book.

  ‘The book to spot ’em, the Browning to shoot ’em? I don’t think so, Chris. You go and sit on a mountain with it.’ He reached for the door. ‘I’ll see you at two.’

  The sound of the car receded as he started climbing the eastern slope of the valley. There was little undergrowth beneath the trees, so the going was not particularly hard, and he had to remind himself to stop every few minutes because of the altitude. After about half an hour he found himself on a kind of shelf and, reckoning he was now high enough, started following it southwards. So far he had seen no sign of human life – no path, cigarette ends, litter, traps. The forest seemed as virgin as the day it was born.

  He climbed in and out of two valleys cut by streams running down to join the Cauca. It was in the third such valley, he judged from his map, that he would find Totoro. He consciously slowed his pace, eyes and ears straining for any sign of dange
r.

  Another kilometre went by. He was too far east, he judged. He would have to do some tree-climbing, which was not an activity he took much pleasure in. It was worth it though. Swaying in the top of a thirty-metre tree he could see a thin line of smoke rising into the western sky. He was too far to the east.

  He took a compass bearing, clambered down and started off again. Twenty minutes later he found himself about to emerge from the trees at the head of a broad valley. The source of the smoke was laid out below him, no more than a kilometre away. Totoro.

  It took him almost half an hour to find a good viewing position where an old landslide had created a gap in the screen of trees. Laid out behind tufts of grass he could bring his binoculars to bear on the whole complex.

  The valley below was almost rectangular, only narrowing to a sudden point just beneath his position. The stream which had made it clung to the foot of the eastern slope – to the left as Wynwood looked. Both slopes were steep, rearing up at something close to forty-five degrees. They were tree-covered, with the notable exception of the lowest hundred metres or so, which had been stripped, presumably for security reasons.

  The two lines of trees faced each other across a valley floor some five hundred metres wide. From where Wynwood lay to the confluence of the stream with the north-south-flowing Cauca it was about three times as far. Beyond the Cauca another steep, tree-covered slope blocked the natural horizon.

  Man’s work in the valley was not quite so tidy. The road ran alongside the river, crossing it just before disappearing away to the north. A paved entrance road left it amid a copse of trees and curved up towards the ranch, passing between gates set in a high wire fence after a hundred metres, and more gates set in a high stone wall four hundred metres farther on, before ending in a wide circular parking space at the heart of the inner compound.

  The outer compound, that area surrounded by the high wire fence, took up more than half the valley floor, ending at the tree-line to the right and just beyond the stream to the left. It had been largely denuded of trees. Wynwood could see two horses standing together away near the main gate.