The Somali Doctrine

by James Grenton

  ‘That’s George Stephens, UA’s Director for East Africa,’ Jerome said. ‘An imbecile.’

  The TV’s sound was switched off, but Jim could imagine the garbage that was coming out of George’s mouth. The caption read: ‘Famine and massacres in Somaliland. Millions at risk. UA calls for armed response.’

  ‘It’s going to happen soon,’ Sarah said, turning back to the other two.

  ‘What is?’ Jerome asked.

  ‘The invasion of Somaliland by Universal Action.’

  Part III

  Invasion

  Chapter 36

  London, UK

  26 September 2003

  Harry switched off the TV, finished his whiskey in one gulp and slammed the glass back onto the coffee table.

  ‘The messaging’s there,’ he said, turning to Jenny, who was sitting in an armchair facing the TV. ‘The logo was prominent and George managed to keep to script. Great shots of dying kids. That always works. What are the audience surveys saying?’

  Jenny leafed through her documents. ‘Yesterday’s quantitative research showed an increase from 45 per cent to 62 per cent in the public’s desire to see military intervention to save the people of Somaliland. There was an increase from 51 per cent to 71 per cent in positive responses to the question, “International agencies such as Universal Action should be allowed to carry out military intervention to protect local population and aid delivery.” After this media push, we should see the figures rise even higher.’

  She pulled out another sheet of paper. ‘Donations are up: $114m in the past 24 hours. That’s a record.’

  Jenny was wearing a tight green outfit, which hugged her figure and emphasised her curves. Did she change clothes several times a day? Harry’s eyes kept straying to her cleavage, which was suitably revealed by an open v-top. He couldn’t believe his luck that Edward has asked her to join him on this mission to London.

  She flashed him a frown.

  ‘What about the politicians?’ Harry said.

  Jenny looked through another pile of papers. ‘That was Monday’s survey: 67 per cent of Congress are convinced that the United Nations cannot cope with the worsening humanitarian situation in Africa. Just a few more, 69 per cent, believe that independent agencies such as Universal Action should be allowed to take on more responsibility.’

  ‘More responsibility? Bit vague. Ask them to tighten up the language for the next survey. Focus on support for military intervention by UA.’ He leaned back into his armchair. ‘Still, those are pretty good results.’

  It was only in the past few months that he’d moved into media relations. Yet he’d discovered that he had an extraordinary skill for manipulating journalists. Was Jenny aware of how good he was at this?

  ‘You see, Jenny, the knack with the press is to give them what they want,’ he said.

  She looked up at him, pencilled eyebrows raised.

  ‘Journalists are lazy,’ he continued. ‘They don’t like to check facts. They’re under pressure, deadlines, editors screaming, column inches to fill. They need sensationalist stories to overcome the public’s compassion fatigue. That’s where we come in. D’you see what I mean?’

  ‘I think what you’re doing is excellent.’

  Was she genuinely interested or just feigning interest?

  ‘It’s all about giving them sob stories,’ he said. ‘Whether it’s true is irrelevant. The wonderful thing about the media is that they never admit to a mistake. You can feed them all kinds of bullshit. They lap it up, like dogs.’

  He laughed.

  Jenny frowned. ‘What if they find out what’s really going on?’

  ‘Don’t you worry your pretty little head. We decide what to show them. We’ve got the major channels and papers visiting the camps, as well as A-list celebs, maybe even the American vice-president. The whole media circus. Great stuff for promoting that gig of yours. The real headache is this French journo and Interpol. But we’ll sort them out soon.’ He glanced at his phone. There was a message from Patrick. ‘Speaking of which…’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘They’ve tracked them down. Just leaving a pub near Leicester Square.’

  Harry grinned. He’d picked up Jerome’s trail thanks to intel from Gérard Dechamps, Paris’s head of police. He had a feeling that Jerome would lead him to Jim and Sarah. He’d been right, again.

  Jenny was still looking at him expectantly, but he ignored her. He needed to strategise. He’d underestimated Jim Galespi. The Interpol agent was tenacious and resourceful. Harry’s face still bore the bruises from his fight with him. He should have ordered the guards to kill him in prison. This time, he’d kill all three of them.

  His gaze strayed to Jenny’s long, shapely legs. He got up and placed his hand on her shoulder. She flinched. He stroked her soft, slender neck.

  ‘Harry, I don’t think this is a good idea.’

  His fingers slipped beneath her top.

  She tried to rise. ‘I said no.’

  He’d never heard her speak with such passion. He liked that. He pushed her back into her armchair. She struggled. A smile eased across Harry’s face. This was going to be fun.

  His phone rang. He snatched it from the desk.

  ‘Patrick, what the fuck is it?’

  ‘They’ve split,’ Patrick said. ‘Jerome’s in a cab. The others are heading for the tube.’

  ‘Then split your team. I want them all dead.’

  ‘What about you?’

  Harry let go of Jenny. She raced out of the room, the door slamming shut behind her. He’d deal with her later. He scratched his beard. Where could Jim and Sarah be going?

  ‘Harry?’ Patrick said.

  Then it hit him. ‘They’re heading for DFID. Victor wants to talk. It’s the only explanation.’

  ‘What you going to do?’

  ‘I’ll deal with Victor.’ Harry picked up the guitar case containing the sniper rifle, which was leaning against the wall.

  ‘What about the Interpol agents?’

  ‘Didn’t you hear what I just said? Kill them.’

  Chapter 37

  London, UK

  26 September 2003

  It was the scar down the left side of his face that made Jim spot him. He’d jumped on at the same tube stop, Leicester Square, and was standing further down, holding onto a passenger handgrip. The man never glanced at them. He didn’t even seem to notice them. But Jim immediately knew that the man was following them. The way he was turned away, sideways, allowing him to see them out of the corner of his eye. The way he was reading a book without turning the pages. The way he looked like he was ready to pounce.

  Then Jim saw the others. The young thin guy with the blue baseball cap. The sexy woman with long blonde hair, dark glasses and the red rucksack. Both of them standing on the other side of the carriage. They kept glancing at him. Amateurs. Still, better not to underestimate them. They’d set themselves up with Scarface so as to catch Jim and Sarah in a pincer movement.

  Jim pretended to laugh and turned to Sarah, as though sharing a joke.

  ‘Don’t move,’ he said. ‘They’re onto us. At the next stop, we run for it.’

  ‘Who? Where?’

  ‘Green Park,’ announced the recorded voice as the tube slowed down. The doors opened.

  ‘Terrorists!’ Jim screamed, pointing at the red rucksack. ‘A bomb. In her bag.’

  There was a second of silence. Then shrieks. Someone pulled the alarm. Passengers surged out of the door into the crowd amassed on the platform.

  Jim grabbed Sarah’s hand and made his way through the mass of people. He glanced over his shoulder. He couldn’t see the woman and man. He elbowed his way through the panicked crowd towards the bottom of the escalator, which was packed. Jim looked over his shoulder again.

  There he was. Scarface. About 10 metres behind them, shoving his way through the writhing mass. Jim yanked Sarah’s hand and pushed through the people ahead of them on the escalator. A young boy tripped over.
His mother cried out, trying to pull him from under the mob. She was thrust forward, inexorably, and lost her grip.

  Jim glanced back.

  Scarface was five metres away, gaining ground.

  Jim pushed a large man away from him. He bent over to pick up the child, who’d passed out. He flung him over his shoulder and grabbed Sarah’s hand.

  He looked round.

  Scarface was three metres away.

  After what seemed like an eternity, they reached the top. The mother was standing in a corner, screaming. Hordes of people rushed passed her. The child stirred on Jim’s shoulder. He handed him back to his mother. She sobbed and hugged her son.

  ‘Jim!’

  It was Sarah’s voice. Scarface was clutching her, one arm round her neck, the other hand in his pocket.

  ‘Jim, go!’ Sarah shouted above the din.

  She twisted so that she was blocking Scarface’s view of him. Jim dived towards her. A large man in a red football shirt stumbled into his way. Jim thrust him aside. He caught sight of them again and shoved his way through the crowd. Scarface was dragging Sarah towards a wall. She was fighting back, biting his arm, trying to break free. She swung her elbow into Scarface’s jaw. She twisted free and leapt away.

  A group of young people surged up the escalator and moved her right back into Scarface’s grip. Jim felt himself being dragged in the opposite direction. His gaze caught Sarah’s for a fraction of a second. There was a gunshot. Her body shuddered. A trickle of blood appeared at the corner of her mouth. She dropped out of sight.

  People screamed. A woman next to him passed out and was trampled. Jim got caught in another surge, which pulled him towards the exit, like the strong current of a river. He glanced back. Scarface was looking around like a trapped predator seeking an escape route. He caught Jim’s eye. Jim ducked. There was another crowd movement, this time up the stairs, into the daylight.

  Jim rubbed his eyes. He stepped out of the tube. The road behind him was full of police cars, ambulances and fire engines with their lights flashing and their sirens blaring. Ahead of him was a trail leading through Green Park. He tucked his shirt into his trousers. He followed the crowd down the path, his legs trembling.

  Interpol had dropped him.

  Nasir was dead.

  Sarah was dead.

  Maxine had been captured.

  Jerome was an unknown quantity.

  He was on his own.

  Chapter 38

  London, UK

  26 September 2003

  ‘Jim Galespi, good to meet you.’ Victor held out his hand and gave Jim a firm handshake as they introduced themselves. They were on the fifth floor of the Department for International Development’s headquarters. Jim followed him past rows of open plan desks with staff working at them into an office.

  Jim sat down in the leather chair across from Victor’s desk. On the walls were posters portraying DFID’s self-declared fight against global poverty. Young African men drinking from water pumps. Smiling women weighing their babies before a stern white doctor. African children in front of a school, waving at the camera, with a 4x4 truck harbouring the DFID logo in the background. All had slogans saying ‘Fight Global Poverty with DFID’ or similar propaganda. They reminded Jim of the posters in the Universal Action office in Somaliland.

  Victor looked like a gnome in his high-backed executive chair. He was a small, fat man, his balding head and thick glasses giving him the gentle expression of a university professor. He had his back to a large window that gave onto Palace Street and a row of tall buildings. He laid his arms on the table and frowned.

  Jim began to talk, but Victor cut him off by raising his hand. ‘Where’s Sarah?’

  ‘Couldn’t make it.’

  ‘I thought she said she’d come along.’

  ‘She got held up.’

  ‘I see.’ Victor eyed Jim. ‘Can I trust you?’

  ‘I could ask the same question.’

  Victor bit his top lip. Jim stared back at him.

  Eventually, Victor spoke. ‘I don’t have much choice. I’ll have to take the plunge and hope I don’t drown.’

  Jim gripped the armrest. The nervous energy of the escape and the shock of seeing Sarah murdered made his head spin.

  ‘You okay?’ Victor said.

  ‘Fine.’

  The feeling passed. He’d deal with the emotional aftermath later.

  ‘Let me explain the situation,’ Victor said, taking on a professorial tone. ‘You’re probably aware of the unfortunate history of peacekeeping missions. Most of them fail. Take Operation Restore Hope, when the US invaded Somalia in the early 1990s to stop millions dying of starvation. An utter disaster. The Americans never managed to negotiate their way through the conflicting clans, sub-clans and warlords.’

  ‘Sure,’ Jim said, nodding.

  ‘And then that US helicopter got shot down and they dragged the corpse of that American soldier through Mogadishu. Do you remember those images of the jeering mobs?’

  ‘Vividly.’

  ‘Made great TV.’ Victor grinned. ‘Remember that American TV presenter, Dan what’s-his-name…’

  ‘Dan Rather.’

  ‘That’s the one. Those pictures of him in his open shirt, calling it a “descent into hell”? What a show!’

  ‘I guess so.’ Jim shifted in his chair. He hadn’t come here for a lecture.

  ‘That was when the Somali Doctrine was born,’ Victor said.

  ‘The what?’

  ‘The Somali Doctrine. A bit like the Vietnam Syndrome. Because of the fiasco in Somalia, American policy makers argued that the US should only get involved in remote crises directly if its own security was in danger. That’s why the past 15 years have seen a privatisation of war. Governments are less willing to risk their own troops. So they hire mercenary firms like Blackwater.’

  ‘Or MainShield.’

  ‘I was going to come to that. But you understand my argument?’

  ‘Doesn’t make it right though.’

  ‘Right or wrong don’t come into it.’ Victor steepled his fingers. ‘It’s about what’s practical. What the electorate will put up with. But that’s not my point.’

  ‘What is it then?’

  ‘My point is that there is no hope for failed states such as Somalia, the DRC, Liberia and others unless we develop a new form of intervention. One that will lead to development.’ Victor paused, for emphasis. ‘And who better to do that but the large NGOs?’

  Jim interrupted him. ‘Look, Sarah said you had something to tell me.’

  ‘I do. I’ll get there.’ Victor leaned forward and whispered. ‘Universal Action asked me to convince the British ambassador to lobby the Security Council. They want a resolution to allow them to have their own army.’

  ‘I’m aware of that.’

  ‘Passing a UN resolution’s not easy.’ Victor opened his eyes wide. ‘But by pulling the right strings, especially with the support of the foreign minister, it can be done. The key point of contention is whether our case is a Chapter VI or a Chapter VII.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Chapter VI resolutions are about the pacific settlement of disputes. They’re not legally binding. Chapter VII resolutions are actions with respect to threats of the peace. These are legally binding.’

  ‘Doesn’t sound like Universal Action wants a pacific resolution,’ Jim said.

  ‘That’s exactly why I’ve been pushing for a Chapter VII. It’s always better if it is legally binding. Gives it more force.’

  ‘So what are you telling me? That you’ve been working for Universal Action to lobby the UN?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘I already know that.’ Jim rose from his chair. ‘You’re wasting my time.’

  ‘Wait.’ Victor leaned forward and reached for Jim, but the desk was too wide for his short, pudgy arms. ‘There’s more.’

  Jim sat back in his chair. For the first time, there was fear in Victor’s eyes.

  ‘I’m
a pragmatist,’ Victor said. ‘But in this instance, UA’s gone too far. I’ve seen the plan for what they have in mind. I was at their meeting in Nairobi. It’s insane. They want to re-colonise Africa.’

  He stopped, as though a thought had just struck him. Jim leaned forward.

  ‘Do you realise who Harry really is?’ Victor asked at last. ‘Do you know anything about his past? What he’s done? Who he’s been involved with?’

  ‘Not much. But tell me more.’

  ‘He used to be in the army. Then they had to—’

  The window cracked. Victor’s body shook and toppled forward, face first onto the desk. A pool of dark blood leaked out of him. Then he slid sideways out of his chair, like a puppet in slow motion, revealing a bullet-sized hole in the window behind him.

  Jim dived behind the desk. The bullet had gone through Victor and missed him by inches. There was a sharp whooshing sound and bits of plaster exploded from the wall behind him.

  The sniper was in the building across the road. Probably one of Harry’s men. They must have heard of Victor’s doubts and been observing him for days. Jim turning up may have been the signal that had confirmed it all for them.

  Jim patted the top of the desk with his hand, searching for the phone. If he could alert security, he’d have a chance of getting out of here. He found the phone and yanked it towards him. The window shattered and the phone leapt from Jim’s grasp. It tumbled to the floor, destroyed by a bullet.

  The sniper was a pro.

  Jim ducked lower, nearly lying on the floor. Last thing he wanted was for the sniper to shoot through the top of the desk into his head. If only he could crawl to the door, pry it open without having to reach for the handle, and slip through. But there was at least three metres of open space, and the desk wasn’t high enough to hide him.