They listened, taking notes, keeping elaborate charts and time lines trying to reconstruct the event in painstaking detail. It was even clear they had interviewed other participants of the Kham Due battle.
They forced him to no conclusions: instead, they seemed his partner in a journey to understanding.
"Now, Colonel," the team leader asked, a small, ratty man who smoked Marlboros, "based on what we've learned, I wonder if you'd venture a guess as to what happened. What is the significance of the flares, particularly given their location vis-a-vis the angle of most of the fire directed at you?"
"Clearly, there was another man. These American Marine sniper teams, they are almost always two-men operations."
"Yes," the team leader said.
"Yes, that is what we think also. And interestingly enough, the ballistics bear you out. Some men were killed by 173-grain bullets, which is the American match target ammunition, which is the sniper's round. But we also recovered bodies with 150-grain slugs, which is the standard combat load of the M14.
So clearly, one of the rifles was the Remington bolt action and the other the M14. Of course, that's different than the men killed by the forty-five-caliber submachine gun.
We believe that was the sniper's secondary weapon."
The colonel was astounded: they had torn into this as if it were an autopsy, as if its last secrets must be exhumed.
It was so important to them, as if their most precious asset were somehow at risk, and now they were committed totally to the destruction of the threat.
"Do you wish to know about these men?"
The colonel did, yes. But his own ego had to be conquered, for to learn about the men who had destroyed his battalion and his reputation and his future would be to further personalize the event and make it private, an obsession, an extension of his own life, as if its significance were him and not the cause.
"No, I think not. I care nothing for personality."
"Well spoken. But alas, it is now a necessity. It is part of your new assignment."
Well, wasn't this interesting? A new assignment under Russian sponsorship. What possibly could it mean?
And so it was that he learned of his primary antagonist, a man called Swagger, a sergeant, who had once won a great shooting championship and had done much damage to the cause of the Fatherland in his three tours in Vietnam and was even now prowling the glades in hunt of yet more victims.
They had a picture of him from something called Leatherneck magazine, and what he saw was what he expected.
He knew Americans from Paris and from his time in Saigon with the puppets. This one was a type, perhaps exaggerated, but familiar. Thin, hard, resilient, braver even than the French, brave as any Germans in the Legion.
Cunning, with that specially devious quality of mind that let him instinctively understand weakness and move decisively against it. Disciplined in a way the Americans almost never were. He would have made a brilliant party official, so tight and focused was his mind.
The picture simply showed a slit-eyed young man with prominent cheekbones, his leathery face lit with a grin.
He held some ludicrous trophy thing in his arms, next to him was an older version of the same man, same slit eyes, close-cropped hair but with more vanity on his chest.
"Sergeant Swagger accepts the congratulations of the Commandant after winning at Camp Perry," read the caption, translated into the Vietnamese. It was warrior's glee, the colonel knew, and he saw in those slit eyes the deaths of so many, and the remorseless ness that had driven their executioner.
"For this one," he said, "the war is not a cause. It is merely an excuse."
"Possibly," said the Russian intelligence chief.
"Perhaps even the war releases him to find his greatness. But do you not think he has a certain discipline? He is not profligate, he is not one of their criminals, like the Calleys and the Medinas. He has never raped or murdered in combat. He has no sexual weaknesses, a pathology associated with psychopathy."
"He is not a psychopath," Huu Co said.
"He is a hero, though the line between them is thin, possibly fragile. He needs a cause to find his true self, that is what I mean. He is the sort who must have a cause to live. He needs something to humble himself in front of. Take that from him and you take everything."
"Very good. Here, here is more, here is what we have."
It was more on Swagger, culled from various American public resources. The package included, unbelievably, Marine records, obviously from a very sensitive source.
"Yes."
"Study this man. Study him well. Learn him. He is your new responsibility."
"Yes, of course. I accept. And what is the ultimate arrival of this project?"
"Why ... his death, of course. His death and the death of the other one, too. They both must die."
He slept Swagger, he dreamed Swagger, he read Swagger, he ate Swagger. Swagger engaged and caused the rebirth of the Western part of his mind: he struggled to grasp principles like pride and honor and courage and how their existence sustained a corrupt bourgeoisie state.
For such a state could not exist without the pure fire of such centurions as Swagger standing watch, ready to die, on the Rhines of its empires.
"Why me?" he asked the Russian.
"Why not one of your own analysts?"
"What can our analysts know? You have been fighting these people since
1964."
"You have been fighting them since 1917."
"But ours is a distant fight, a theoretical fight. Yours is up close, close enough to smell blood and shit and piss.
That's experience hard bought and much respected."
Then another day brought another surprise: reconnaissance photos, taken from a high-flying vehicle of some sort, of what appeared to be a Marine post in the jungles of some province of his own country.
"I Corps," said the Russian.
"About forty kilometers from Kham Due. One of the last American combat posts left in the zone. They call it Firebase Dodge City. A Marine installation. It is from here the American Swagger and his spotter mount their missions."
"Yes?"
"Yes, well, if we're to take him, it'll be on his territory.
He'll always have the advantage, unless, of course, we can learn the terrain as well as he knows it."
"Surely local cadre .. ."
"Well, now, isn't that an interesting situation? Local cadre have been extremely inactive in that region for some months. This man Swagger terrifies them. They call him, in your language, quan toi."
"The Nailer."
"The Nailer. Like a carpenter. The nailer. He nails them. At any rate, at the local cadre level, most combat operations have ceased. That is why Firebase Dodge City still exists, when so many other Marines have been shipped home. Because the Nailer has nailed so many people that nobody likes to operate in his area. What is the point? The war will be over soon, he will be recalled, that will be that. But we cannot let that be that, can we?"
But try as he might, Huu Co could not hate the American.
It seemed pointless. The man was no architect of war, no policy designer, he clearly had no sadistic side to him, no tendency toward atrocity: he was merely an excellent professional soldier, of the sort all armies have relied upon for thousands of years. He had some extra gene for aggression, some extra gene for shooting ability, and that was it. He was a believer--or maybe not. The colonel remembered, from his other life, the Frenchman Camus, who said, "When men of action cease to believe in a cause, they believe only in action."
It didn't matter. Nor did it matter that he wondered what the delay was. Why were they not moving now, if this was so important? Why were they waiting, what were they waiting for? He applied himself to the problem, and set out to master the terrain in and around Firebase Dodge City.
It was situated on a hill, and the Americans had deforested for a thousand yards all around it with their Agent Orange. The camp was typical: he'd seen h
undreds in his long years of war. Its tactical problems were typical, too.
In many respects it was similar to the un fallen A-Camp Arizona. The doctrine was primitive, but usually effective: approach at night, rally in the dark, send in sappers to blow the wire, attack in strength. But for the killing of one sniper team, that was a different tactical problem. The team would probably exit at night, that is, if they weren't helicopter extracted. The trick would then be understanding from which point from the perimeter they would leave, and what would be their typical passage across the open zone. One could therefore hope to intercept them if one knew the terrain and the way Swagger's mind worked.
Studying the photos, Huu Co saw three natural paths away from the camp, through gulches, enfilades, natural depressions in the land, where men would travel to avoid being spotted. One would set an ambush at such points, yes. It would be possibly effective, a long stalk, luck playing the most likely role. But if for some reason, the Americans could be induced to leaving during the day, right, say, at first dawn, a good shooter might have a chance to hit them from a hill not quite fifteen hundred yards out.
Oh, it was a long shot, a desperately long shot, but the right man might bring it off, much more effectively, say, than an ambush team, who's luck might be on or off.
But where would such a man be found? He knew the North Vietnamese certainly didn't have such a man. In fact, such a man, such a specialist might not exist, at least not effectively. Huu Co said nothing about his the Russians did not ask him. And then one night, he was awakened roughly by SPETSNAZ troopers and informed that they had a journey to make.
He climbed into a shiny black Zil limousine in his dress uniform, among four or five Russians, all talking and laughing boisterously among themselves. They ignored him.
They drove into Hanoi, through darkened streets, down the broad but now empty boulevards, and by the ceremonial plazas where the American Phantoms were displayed. Banners napped mightily in the wind: onward TO VICTORY, BROTHERS and LONG LIVE THE FATHERLAND and LET US EMBRACE THE REVOLUTIONARY FUTURE. The Russians paid them no mind, and laughed, and talked of women and alcohol and smoked American cigarettes, they were like Americans in many ways, not an observant or respectful people, but men who took their own destiny so much for granted that they could be annoying.
After a time, Huu Co realized where they were going: unmistakably, they headed for the People's Revolutionary Airfield, north of Hanoi, passed through its wire defenses and guard posts with the wave of passes of the highest clearance, and sped not to the main building but to an out-of-the-way compound, which was heavily guarded by white men with automatic weapons, in the combat uniforms of SPETSNAZ, the hotshots who got all the sexy assignments and handled training for NVA cadre on certain dark, arcane secret arts.
The Zil parked, debarking its men, who escorted Huu Co inside, to discover an extremely comfortable little chunk of Russia, complete with televisions, a bar, elaborate Western furniture and the like. Also, many Playboy magazines lay about, and empty beer bottles, and the walls were festooned with pictures of blond women with large, gravity-defying breasts and no pubic hair.
Russians, thought Huu Co.
After a time, the little party went out to the tarmac, parked at the obscure end of a runway and awaited the arrival of someone designated Solaratov, whether a real name or a trade name, Huu Co was not informed. No rank, either, no first name. Just Solaratov, as if the name itself conveyed quite enough information, thank you.
Again, it was chilly, though no rain. The hot season was hard on them, but it had not arrived yet. In the emerging gray light, Huu Co stood a little apart from the crowd of bawdy, laughing Russian intelligence and SPETSNAZ people, himself the solitary man, not a part of their camaraderie and unsure why his presence was required.
Yet clearly, they wanted him here: he was seeing things possibly no North Vietnamese below the Politburo level had seen. Why? What was the meaning of it all?
The sound of a jet airplane asserted itself, low but insistent, coming in from the east, out of the sun. The plane flashed overhead, glinting in the rising light, revealing itself to be a Tupolev Tu-16, code-named by the Americans "Badger," a twin-engine, three-man bombing craft with a bubble canopy and sparkle of plastic at the nose. It wore combat drab, and its red stars stood out boldly against green camouflage. Its flaps were down and it peeled to the west, found a landing vector and set down on the main runway. It taxied for a distance, then began to head over toward the little party standing by itself on the runway.
The plane halted and its jet engines screamed a final time, then died, a hatch door opened beneath the nose, just behind the forward tire of the tricycle landing gear, and almost immediately two aviators descended, waved to the crowd, then got aboard a little car that had come for them, while Russian ground crew attended to the airplane.
"Oh, he'll make us wait, of course," one of the Russians said.
"The bastard. Nobody hurries him. He'd make the party secretary wait if it suited his fucking purpose!"
There was some laughter, but after a while, another figure descended from the aircraft, climbing slowly down, then landing on the tarmac. He wore an aviator's black jumpsuit, but he was no aviator. He carried with him something awkward, a long, flat case, a musical instrument or something?
He turned to look at the greeters and his face instantly silenced them.
He was a wintry little man, late thirties, with a stubble of gray hair and a thick, short bull neck. His eyes were blue beads in a leather mask that was his grim face. He had immense hands and Huu Co saw that he was quite muscular for so short a fellow, with a broad chest and a spring of power to his movements.
No salutes were offered, no exchange of military courtesies.
If he knew any of the Russians, he hid the information.
There seemed nothing emotional about him at all, no sense of ceremony.
A man rushed to him to take the package he carried.
The little fellow silenced him with a vicious glare and made it apparent that he would carry the case, the severity of his response driving the man back into humiliated confusion.
"Solaratov," said the Russian intelligence chief, "how was the flight?"
"Cramped," said Solaratov.
"I should tell them I only fly first class."
There was nervous laughter.
Solaratov walked by the colonel without noticing him, surrounded by sycophants and boot lickers He actually reminded Huu Co of a figure that had been pointed out to him back in the late forties, in Paris, another man of glacial isolation whose glare quieted the masses, who nevertheless--or perhaps for that reason, indeed--attracted sycophants in the legions but who paid them no attention at all, whose reputation was like the cloud of blue ice that seemed to surround him. That one was named Sartre.
CHAPTER eighteen.
Vietnam leaped up at him as if out of a dream: green, endless, crusted with mountains, voluptuous, violent, ugly, beautiful all at once. The Land of Bad Things. But also, in some way, the Land of Good Things.
Where I went to war, Donny thought. Where I fought with Bob Lee Swagger.
It wasn't a dream, it never had been. It was the real McCoy, as glimpsed through the dirty plastic of an aircraft dipping toward that destination from Okinawa, where grunts headed to the "Nam touched down on the way back from R&R. Monkey Mountain loomed ahead on the crazed peninsula above China Beach, and beyond that, like downtown Dayton, the multi service base and airstrip at Da Nang displayed itself in a checkerboard of buildings, streets and airstrips. Hills 364, 268 and
327 stood like dusty warts beyond it.
The C-130 oriented itself off the coastline, dropped through the low clouds and slid through tropic haze until it touched down at the ghost town that had once been one of the most populous cities of the world, the capital of the Marine country of I Corps, home of the ruling body of the Marine war, the III Marine Amphibious Force.
The palms still blew in the breeze, and
around it the mountains still rose in green tropic splendor, but the place was largely empty now, its ma inside structure shrunken to a few tempo buildings, an empty or at least Vietnamized metropolis. A few offices were still staffed, a few barracks still lived in, but the techies and the staffs and the experts who'd run the war in Vietnam were home safe except for the odd laggard unit, like the boys of Firebase Dodge City and a few others in the haphazard distribution of late-leavers across I Corps.
The plane finally stopped taxiing. Its four props ended their mission with a turbine-powered whine as their fuel was cut off. The plane shuddered mightily, paused like a giant beast and went still. In seconds the rear door descended, and Donny and the cargo of twenty-odd short-timers and reluctant warriors felt the furnace blast of heat and the stench of burning shit that announced they were back.
He stepped into the radiance, felt it slam him.
"This fuckin' place will git me yet," said a black old salt, with a dozen or so stripes on his sleeve, and enough wound ribbons to have bled out a platoon.
"Ain't you short?" someone asked.
"I ain't as short as the lance corporal," he said, winking at Donny, with whom he'd struck up a bantering relationship on the flight over from Kadena Air Force Base on Okie.
"If I was as short as him, I'd twist an ankle and head straight for sick bay."
"He's a hero," the other lifer said.
"He ain't going in no sick bay."
The old black sarge pulled him aside.
"Don't you be takin' no bad-ass chances in the bush, you hear?" the man said.
"Two and days, Fenn? Shit, don't git busted up. It ain't worth it. This shit-hole place ain't worth a thing if you ain't a career sucker gittin' the ticket punched one more time. Don't let the Man git you."
"I copy."
"Now git over to reception and git your grunt ass squared away."
"Peace," said Donny, flashing the sign.
The sergeant looked around, saw no one close enough to overhear or overlook, and flashed the sign back.
"Peace and freedom and all that good shit, bro," he said with a wink.
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