Walking along the railway track, I had covered the five kilometres to the outskirts of Akashat in well under an hour. Although only just 1920 hours, apart from the odd sodium light, Akashat had been in relative darkness – and had been distinctly quiet. It would be a good six hours before I would make my approach, so I had looked for somewhere to hunker down and stay out of sight. On the northern side of the railway track had been a small dump; a collection of discarded vehicles and mining equipment – so I had headed there, bedding down in the cab of a wheel-less Mitsubishi truck. Pulling the warm folds of the Aba around me, doubling it up over my head, I had settled down and waited, entertaining myself with the works of Bach, Mozart and Schubert, intermingled with the short stories of Edgar Allan Poe and others.
At 0200 hours, that Saturday morning, I had finally made my way into Akashat – and the police station. Still under rudimentary construction, the police station had been situated close to the main market street of the small town, not far from the railway track and the station. A small, low level single story building, the partially constructed police station had comprised of three conjoined blocks. The central unit had been the administration block for the building; the eastern wing had been the barracks, cooking and washing facilities for the police officers; and the western wing had been the prison block.
I had the two plans – Plan ‘A’ and Plan ‘B’. Under normal circumstances, Plan ‘B’ would have been Plan ‘A’. In through the back door, or the front door if they hadn’t got a back door, eliminate the ‘Candidate’, and anyone else who had been unfortunate enough to get in the way – and out again.
‘Bish – Bash – Bosh’.
However, Sir Barry K…had been quite keen that I had been as ‘discrete’ as possible. And shooting someone to death, and possibly their captors too, could hardly have been described as being ‘discreet’. With discretion foremost in mind, studying contemporary photographs of the Police Station had given me a bit of an idea. Situated in the west wing of the building, and facing out to the west, each of the eight prison cells had a small, un-glazed barred opening; which, by rough approximation, had been set in the wall at about a hundred and eighty centimetres above the outside ground level, and had been some thirty centimetres tall and roughly sixty centimetres wide; with two thick bars, equally spaced, about twenty centimetres apart. There had been a tall wall surrounding the front of the police station, with a set of secured reinforced steel plated gates, at the front of the compound. But, like the rest of the complex, the wall had still been under construction and, at the rear, had been less than a metre high in places. After climbing the low wall, I had taken the Walther PPK from the left hand breast pocket of my tunic, screwing on to it the six inch suppressor. Taking the safety off the automatic, keeping a low crouched profile, I had moved stealthily into the compound towards the prison cell wing. My initial intention had been literally to ‘go a calling’ – stopping at each cell window, in turn, and calling out for the Junior Foreign Service Officer. But the Iraqis had saved me the chore. From the window of a cell, closest to the administration block, light had poured out into the unfinished compound. The Iraqis had obviously been endeavouring to deprive the Junior Foreign Service Officer of sleep, by keeping a powerful light on in his cell, throughout the night. The yard in front of the cell block had been filled with an assortment of discarded builder’s rubble, and it hadn’t been too difficult to find some concrete blocks to stand on. Placing them immediately underneath the barred window of the lighted cell, and getting up on them, I had quietly called out his name. Nothing at first – so I had called out again, a little louder.
“Yes,” had finally come a hoarse response.
“British Secret Service – I need you to come to the window,” I had instructed, in a loud whisper.
“Oh – thank God,” had been the cry of relief, from inside the cell.
“I need you to come to the cell window – so that you can be identified,” I had repeated my instruction.
“But the window is too high for me to reach.”
“Then pull up the bed.”
“But, I haven’t got one.”
“Then use your toilet bucket for a step.”
“But, it’s full,” had come the protestation.
“THEN – EMPTY IT!”
From outside the cell window I had caught the stench of the slop bucket as it had been emptied out on to the concrete floor. Although the Iraqis may not have supplied a bed, or bedding, I had known full well that they would have provided a toilet bucket…generally saves the floor from getting messed up – but not on this occasion.
“Hello,” the voice from inside the cell had said tentatively, a pair of hands grasping the bars as a head had come up to the window.
“I need you to bring your face closer to the widow – so that you can be identified,” I had instructed.
“But, the bars are in the way.”
“Well press your face up against them – I need to make a positive identification.”
And, bless him – that is exactly what he had done.
Reaching up slightly from my position beneath the cell window, I had extended my left hand up through the bars of the open window, clasping hold of the back of his head – forcing it tight into the bars. Pushing the nozzle of the Walther’s suppressor firmly under his chin, I had fired one round up directly into his head, while it had been trapped between the bars of the widow and my hand.
In hindsight, somewhat silly of me – I could have easily have gotten bone fragments and splinters in my left hand. But, as it was, the high velocity, heavy grained, jacketed soft nosed slug had expanded fully within the brain cavity, leaving the integrity of the skull intact.
Relaxed by death, his body had gone limp and had slipped from the grasp of my left hand, landing noiselessly on the cell floor. Even so, I had waited a couple of brief moments, to ensure that none of his Iraqis captors had been roused. Then, I had looked for the ejected brass cartridge case. With very little light from the moon, or from the sodium lights in the compound, the glare from the powerful overhead light in the cell had again come to my assistance – the spent case reflecting in its stark glow. Picking up the case, I had placed it on the right hand side of the window ledge, flicking it with the index finger of my right hand into the cell. With a satisfying metallic ring, I had heard it land and bounce once on the concrete floor, below. Next, unscrewing the suppressor from the Walther PPK and holding the small automatic in my left hand, I had reached through the window and held the gun out above the cell floor. How I dropped the Walther PPK into the cell had been important – to look like suicide it must land close to the body, but not actually on it. From experience, I had visualised how the body might have fallen and, based on that visualisation, had moved my hand slightly to the left, before letting the gun drop on to the floor with a reassuring clatter. Getting down from the window, I had returned the concrete blocks, which I had been standing on, back in amongst all the other rubble. The air had a bitter chill to it, so I had pulled the hood of the Aba up over my head for warmth.
Time to go.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
I had made my way back to the rendezvous extraction point, alongside the railway track, in plenty of time. I had fewer than ninety minutes to wait before the scheduled pick-up, at 0500 hours. The whole ‘job’ had gone smoothly – in and out, just the way I like it.
I had taken time to stop by at the vehicle dump, on my way back, depositing the gun’s suppressor, and its three spare magazine clips, into the fuel filler neck of the Mitsubishi truck. With virtually no moonlight to illuminate my footsteps, I had been grateful for the straight and true path laid out by the steel rails, which I had faithfully followed to my extraction point. My walk back had been totally uneventful. Out there, in the deserted wasteland of northeast Iraq, to all intents and purposes I could have been the only ‘being’ in existence, on the entire planet. Squatting down by the side of the track, I had settled down and waited, and waited
– and waited!
0500 hours, scheduled pick-up time had come had gone…but no Garry – and no Huey coming to my rescue. To support my cover story, I had not carried a radio or satellite phone with me and, therefore, had no means of contact with the outside world.
0530 hours – and still there had been no sign of Garry and the Huey.
By then, the Iraqis should have discovered the body of the Junior Foreign Service Officer, dead in his cell. Hopefully, they would believe that it had been a suicide, the Embassy official shooting himself with an undetected gun, which he had managed to smuggle into the prison – then, that would buy me some time. However, if the Iraqis had not fallen for the staged suicide – then I could be in a serious world of deep trouble…they would be out looking for his killer – me! I had been in a bit of a predicament. Apart from the clothes that I had stood up in, I had nothing else. No food or water…no compass or maps. Yet, I could not stay to be captured by the Iraqis.
0545 hours – Still no sign.
How far to the Syrian border?
I had tried to picture the maps of the local area. The ones that I had studied I could clearly remember – could clearly visualise and see. But I had not recalled seeing detailed maps that had included the Iraq-Syrian border – ipso facto – there had been nothing for me to remember…nothing for me to visualise. At the time, the only thing that I had in my favour had been my acute sense of direction. I knew that I had needed to walk in a north-eastern direction. I knew that I possessed the ability to maintain that direction. But had I possessed the sheer physical strength and stamina to take me that far. From my training in Morocco, all those years before, I had known perfectly well that I could easily cover at least fifty kilometres of rough barren desolate terrain, without food or water – without rest. But how far could I go? – How far did I need to go?
How far was the border?
However, and the end of the day – it had turned out to be no more that an academic question.
0549 hours – the reassuring rhythmic ‘whomp whomp’ of a Huey helicopter had floated in on the still morning air.
Coming in from the north, the Huey had been low in the sky, but nowhere near as low as it had been flown before. There had been something else different as well – the rhythmic sound made by the rotor blades had seemed to be hesitant, coarse even. Their sound had suddenly become subdued, muted, as the Huey had rapidly dropped in height, the throttles to the twin engines being brought back all the way to idle, the helicopter descending without power – by autorotation only. At a height of about twenty metres, the Huey’s nose had been suddenly brought back and the helicopter had come crashing down hard on to its skids, alongside the railway track – just a couple of meters away from where I had been standing.
“Sorry about that,” Garry had shouted out above the noise of the slowing rotor blades, as he had emerged out of the cockpit door, the strap of his helmet loose and hanging down. “Been a bit of a sod getting here – dirt in the fuel, I’m afraid.”
“Better late than never,” I had replied, gratefully. “But, if you don’t mind me saying so, I don’t think that this is the best place to park up.”
“I’m afraid we’ve got little choice in the matter. I’ve got to try and clean out the in-line fuel filters – otherwise we’ll be parked up here permanently.” he had explained, coming over to join me outside the sweep of the slowing rotor blades.
While we had waited for the rotor blades to come to a complete rest, so that he could safely clear the fuel lines, Garry had succinctly covered the problems that he had encountered getting back to the rendezvous point.
“I’m afraid the ‘rag tops’, back at the airstrip, have filled the old bird up with some contaminated fuel,” he had started to explain. “Can’t go much more than seventy – ninety klicks, at the most, before I have to put her down to clear the fuel lines. I’ve had to put her down a couple of times before I got here – that’s why I’m late.”
“Can you get us back?” I had asked.
“Oh, I reckon can. It’s all a bit of a bother, and we will probably have to put down a few times to clear the fuel lines, on the way back. Bit of a bloody sod, but I’m afraid there’s not much I can do about that.”
I had nodded. “Okidoki – see what you can do.” I had said. I’d been in worst situations.
The rotor blades of the Huey had finally come to a complete stop. “Would you mind awfully doing me a slight favour, while I clear the fuel lines?” he had asked.
“Sure, what is it?”
“I’ve taken the liberty of removing the ‘real’ N.F. W…, from his body bag. Could you possibly take off the securing straps from his body, while I clear those bloody fuel lines?” Garry had asked. Without waiting for my reply, he had gone, his head buried under an inspection cowl in the fuselage of the Huey.
Junior Technician N.F. W…had been lying on his back, close to the rear bulkhead of the cargo area, his corpse firmly strapped to the supports of the fixed bench. By the smell, Junior Technician N.F. W…had begun to thaw out from his weeks in a deep freeze. Nothing offensive, more like the smell of fresh meat, hanging in a butcher’s shop. Starting at the feet of the corpse, I had unfastened the straps that had held him securely in place. When I had gotten to the straps covering the chest, I had looked down into the face of the ‘real’ N.F. W…, but there had been very little to see, as such. Whatever the automobile crash that he had been involved in, the force of the impact had completely transfigured his face into a mess of torn flesh and cartilage – nothing that had resembled the ’real’ N.F. W…in life.
“That’s got those sods clean, again,” Garry had positively crowed as he had stuck his un-helmeted head through the sliding door of the cargo bay – the area immediately around his lips and mouth dark and glistening. “Have you unfastened our friend?”
“Yes,” I had replied. “You have something around your mouth,” I had added, pointing to his face.
Wiping the back of his hand over his lips, he had glanced down at the sticky black substance that had been transferred on to it. “Ah – I’ve had to blow the fuel lines and filters free from dirt,” he had declared. “But – still, I have had worst things to my lips!”
“Time to go?” I had asked.
“Yes,” he had replied, pulling his helmet back over his head. “Let’s see how far this old bird will take us now.”
As it so happened – not very far. Twice we had to land for the offending fuel lines and filters to be cleaned.
After we had made the turn due west, we had deposited the body of the ’real’ N.F. W…roughly where I had thrown out the parachute, according to the GPS reading – Garry banking the Huey to port; enabling the corpse to slide effortlessly along the cargo floor, leaving a slight translucent slime behind as it had disappeared out of the open door. That, regrettably, had been the only part of the return trip that had gone well. Within twenty minutes, Garry had been wrestling with the controls of the Huey. Skilfully balancing changes to the collective and cyclic pitch, as at the same time manually shifting the throttle settings between full power and idle, he had brought the descent of the Huey down in a controlled manner. Getting to within twenty metres of the ground, he had then cut the power, using the auto gyration of the rotor blades to provide minimal lift as he had pulled back the cyclic controls, setting us down with a hard bang. Each time, after waiting for the rotor blades to come to complete halt, Garry had gone out and had cleaned the fuel lines and filters. It is a true testament to his supreme flying skills that we had eventually gotten back to the airstrip, from where we had taken off that previous evening. On safely landing, I had expressed my sincere gratitude and had thanked him. Then I had been gone, whisked away in a convoy of black Range Rovers, back to Amman.
Five days later, on the 17 January 1991, the aerial bombing of Iraq had started. It had been this sensitive information that the Junior Foreign Service Officer had known about – and that is why he had to die. If the Iraqis had extracted this i
nformation from him, they would have possibly done one of two things. Firstly, their Iraqi Foreign Minister, Tariq Aziz, could have gone straight back to the very doors of the United Nations – crying ‘foul’, and posturing a whole set of diplomatic erroneous pledges and promises, purely to buy time and delay any military assault on his country. Or, secondly, and far more seriously, the Iraqis could have launched pre-emptive strikes on Israel – by air and, more importantly, by land. The Israelis could have easily countered any subsequent air strike by the Iraqis with their overwhelming superiority in air power and ground defence. However, for the Iraqis to have launched a ground attack on Israel, they would have needed to go through Jordan. This would have had far more serious connotations. The Israelis would have countered any ground offensive by the Iraqis, by invading Jordon, and attacking and defeating the Iraqi military force on Jordanian soil – Arab soil! Then, there would have been no Coalition Force, but Arab coming to the aid of Arab – to fight and defeat the ‘Kafir’…the ‘Infidel’.
Autobiography of an Assassin:: The Family Page 28