The Crimson Conspiracy

by David Singh

Kaushik returned in his heavy voice. 'During operation Vijay I had killed several Pak sponsored mujahid pigs and didn't count, remembering them is out of question.'

  Nissar's eyes turned into raging inferno and face as hard as stone. He grabbed Kaushik by his uniform lapels and hauled him up. Ignoring Kaushik's agonized moan he growled, voice spiked with menace. 'Mujahid pigs…..hmm? You didn't count while killing? Indian dog! I will make you count every man that we'll kill now. The carnage you have seen so far is just the beginning of the bloodshed on the way.'

  Kaushik's stare didn't waver a least bit. The demon was speaking. 'You think your luck has kept you alive. No, I shot you in the back so that you fell down. All your men are dead. Turtuk is our's and, with your help, soon we shall accomplish what we had been planning, practicing, rehearsing for tirelessly in past several months.'

  'My help?' Kaushik mocked with a look of scorn. 'What circus you jugglers are up to with your bunch of buffoons this time?' Malik released his grip and smiled. 'Don't you worry. I will not butcher you until you witness how my men realize the plan. To begin with, first I will give you the background of our mission.'

  ? Samarjeet's tight slap on Ibrahim's face spilled blood from his swollen mouth. His bruised face had a black eye and the jaw turning blue. Before he could regain some grip over himself, Samarjeet grabbed him and hissed, piercing into his teary eyes, 'Ibrahim! You illiterate fanatic! I will hack you into as many pieces as my brothers and innocent villagers have died. Your masters from across border have pulled off a suicidal mission and I will make it the same for them and….I will begin with you.'

  Ibrahim broke into tears. 'I have committed a grave sin janab. Please forgive me. I will help you any which way is possible.'

  Slowly, Samarjeet released him but his incredulous narrow gaze did not leave Ibrahim's face. He addressed Vijay, pointing towards the lying bodies, 'search them, and check for the IDs.'

  Vijay Kumar began with the nearest one. First he collected all assault rifles and kit bags and piled them up. Samarjeet ordered Ibrahim, 'join him.'

  Ibrahim did. To help them, Samarjeet joined in too but his one eye never left Ibrahim.

  After five minutes Vijay turned towards Samarjeet. 'No IDs sir!'

  'Same here,' Samarjeet seconded Vijay, 'that means they are not Pak soldiers. They all seem to be insurgents. Their families will never know where they…...'

  Samarjeet had to stop since one of the walkie talkies collected from the corpses was stuttering. 'Bilal.'

  They all strained their ears.

  'Bilal. What is the sitrep? Hello. Bilal! Come in!'

  They all exchanged the nervous glances. Samarjeet had to take an instant decision. He picked up the multiband intra team radio, and pressed PTT (push to talk) button. 'Bilal janab!'

  The howling wind aided in preventing the caller tell the difference between real and fake voice but still, accent was something Samarjeet had to take a risk for.

  'Bilal! Where are you? All done your side?'

  'Yes janab, but four of our brothers are martyred.'

  'What is the position now?' A remorseless response did not

  surprise them.

  'We too are inflicted badly.'

  'Who?'

  Samarjeet fell silent in a fix. He didn't know any names. There

  was no way he could stall this. But there was no alternative. He replied. 'Ibrahim.'

  'Ibrahim is wounded? That useless pig? You have not killed him yet? Shoot that bastard!' Ibrahim, who was all ears to the conversation, stood still in his place with an incredulous and defeated expression. Samarjeet gave him an eloquent, 'did-you-hear-that?' smirk.

  'Janab,' Samarjeet replied and raised his armed hand. Ibrahim's eyes widened and lower jaw fell open liberating a petrified scream, 'nooo!!'

  Samarjeet pulled the trigger thrice. Ibrahim fell on the ground. Blood gushed through his fingers over the profusely bleeding laceration. First of the three bullets had grazed his left ear lobe while the other two went astray.

  Samarjeet signaled a shaken Ibrahim to keep quiet. Ibrahim, clamping his lips, suppressed the whimper.

  Samarjeet spoke into the radio. 'Ibrahim is dead, janab.'

  'Yeah, I heard. Report to the nest without any further delay. We have captured wounded Kaushik.'

  'We will be there in no time.' Samarjeet depressed the PTT button and turned to Ibrahim.

  Ibrahim grabbed Samarjeet's feet. 'I will remain your slave for life, janab. Please give me a chance to redeem my mistake. I will help you in every way possible.' He began sobbing and sniffing akin to a small child.

  Samarjeet hauled him up on his feet and asked, 'where is their base station?'

  Ibrahim opened his mouth when Samarjeet held up his hand signaling him to hold on. They all strained their heads towards the sound of a helicopter taking off in the distance.

  'This is our carrier chopper sir.' Shinde said.

  Then they saw the chopper in far distance in the skies - a huge gray silhouette on propellers in the snowy drizzle. They all watched in awe as it disappeared into the far mountains with subsiding noise of the engines.

  'Their base station is in those mountains, no?' Samarjeet asked Ibrahim.

  'Yes,' he answered, 'behind the mountains is a huge valley. The vast flat ground on the other side and adjacent to the valley is their base station.'

  'How couldn't we notice it?' Samarjeet muttered in distress.

  'There are caves on that side of mountains. I think they have been moving in their stuff and man power for past many months using those caves as shelter and possibly base station is erected in past few hours, may be last night only.' Vijay's tone turned grave. 'It is our blunder to presume that no one could scale the perilous steep heights from that side. This time our enemy seems to have outsmarted us.'

  'We have no transmitter……mobile phones are out of question here, there is no way we can alert our Post 9.' Shinde counted the woes.

  Samarjeet turned towards Ibrahim. 'How many of them are there?'

  'In village there is a platoon of nearly fifty men, fully armed…. at base station, there must be at least twenty men. Nissar Malik, the AlQaeda commander, is leading them.'

  'Nissar Malik.' Samarjeet murmured then asked, thoughtfully. 'Do you have any weapons at your place or somewhere else in the village?'

  'I have a small arsenal stashed up there in the caves of this side of mountains, my personal small collection for any emergency in case a deadly war broke out.'

  'How very smart! What are the contents?'

  'One telescopic rifle…. twenty rounds.' Ibrahim tried recalling, 'about half a dozen grenades…one AK 56 with two magazines and an additional box of rounds may be……and….one semi automatic S&W'

  All the three soldiers shared impressed looks.

  'How shall we get them?'

  'A twenty minutes brisk walk across the periphery of the village will bring us to the foot hills. Then another fifteen minutes' comfortable climb.'

  'Where have they taken our helicopter? It is just a carrier. Harmless. Unarmed.'

  'This I have no idea about.' Ibrahim said earnestly, 'they never shared the whole plan with me but they intend to capture Thoise air base and then attack Kargil from Batalik side in coming days. On their side of Kargil, their troops are waiting to charge. Pakistan Air Force Jets are waiting to soar up high on the signal and carpet bomb entire Batalik region. It will be a two way attack with your unsuspecting force mouse trapped in between. Except command level, none of them is Pak army. All are trained militants with no IDs. They've been training in Peshawar and Karachi for past several months by the best of ISI trainers. Pak army and PAF jets will move in only when they capture Thoise successfully. They all are suicide operatives but they will die only after incapacitating Ladakh, Khalsar and Batalik region.'

  None of the three could believe their ears.

  'Are they fools!?' Samarjeet blurted, 'our fighter jets from Leh can approach pretty faster than PAF jets. They have no i
dea of our improved fire power and our communication network. Their foolish mission will only take an unnecessary huge toll of lives on both sides. Frustrated bunch of desperates!'

  Ibrahim had nothing to say.

  Vijay added. 'And sir, Thoise is just a stopover of our planes. Only a handful of men can try and may succeed in capturing Thoise but what is the use? Why Thoise?'

  Samarjeet's mind was racing full throttle. 'Thoise's capture will give them a make shift air base where PAF fighter jets can land and move further inside Ladakh and Batalik region. Post 9 between us and Thoise is just a sitting duck for them. Then more will come. They intend to out run our air force in reaching Batalik region during actual attack. The only conundrum is that how do they plan to reach Thoise? How?......how?........'

  'Our chopper.' Shinde hit the nail.

  Samarjeet looked at Shinde, squinted thoughtfully and echoed him, 'our chopper?'

  'Yes sir. I strongly guess so. It can ferry a dozen men, heavily armed, enough to create havoc at Thoise and no one will suspect the familiar bird approaching.'

  'What about the flight plan and communication codes?' Samarjeet asked and then looked at Ibrahim in rage, 'dammit, you have already given away the codes. Post 9 has already been fooled into thinking that Pakistan did the usual shelling and …..and oh yess…….they're going to use Kaushik sahib as their cover.'

  'Sir,' Vijay said, 'we need a miracle in this short span of time.'

  'Miracle. Yes. We are Indian soldiers Vijay. We are meant for miracles only. When everything fails, we act. We have to act on our instincts.' Samarjeet boosted his men's morale then murmured to himself. 'If we were them, where would we keep the chopper?'

  No one had the answer.

  Then his tone turned business like: Captain speaking. 'Well my dear friends. Here is the plan assuming that chopper is somewhere near their base camp. Shinde you are wounded. You better not climb with us.'

  'Sir, I can even climb the Everest right now. I just can't sit and watch.'

  'No Shinde, listen. Ibrahim will take us to his small arsenal. You hide somewhere here and wait for Ibrahim to return. Once he is back, with his help you try to capture a transmitter from the village post under siege. We try to destroy the helicopter and rescue Kaushik sahib. How? Only God knows right now. But, remember, prime thing is that we all stay alive. Is that clear?'

  'Sir, I'll transmit SOS message to Ladakh and Thoise Air base. And….' His voice turned as cold as a stone. '….I wouldn't die before doing this sir.'

  Samarjeet could manage just an appreciative smile for Shinde's courage of steel. 'Well,' he said, 'Shinde keep one radio with you. If they talk to us you can overhear.'

  Vijay handed over one radio captured from the dead enemy to Shinde.

  Samarjeet continued. 'Ibrahim doesn't need any radio since he will be joining you back. Now, these are enemy's radios and they will listen what we say. First rule, none of us will speak until the given task is accomplished. Any questions?'

  'None sir.' Shinde and Vijay replied in unison.

  'C'mon let's give the bastards some hell.' Samarjeet said.

  Shinde saluted Samarjeet. Samarjeet embraced him tightly and whispered in his ear, 'Bharat Mata Ki Jai. (Hail Mother India)'. Shinde repeated the same, voice shaking with passion and emotion. Vijay hugged him too. Ibrahim tried to hug him but Shinde pushed him away. With tears in his eyes and repentance written all over his face, Ibrahim turned away.

  ?

  CHAPTER THREE

  Meetha, Jaffri, Sheikh, Mohtashim, Rashid, Naeem, Asad and Mashkoor constituted the team of eight commandos who were ready to move to Thoise airbase in a while to execute the second phase of Pakistan's highly ambitious and so far successful operation against India. Meetha, senior most of the lot, was commanding the second phase and was reporting to Malik directly in this operation.

  Faroukh Meetha and Rizwan Jaffri belonged to 19th Baloch Company in Pakistan's Special Services Group. Both had served for past sixteen years in Mountain specialization group. They had also participated in Special Activities Unit of CIA of US in various operations.

  The other two, Sheikh Ahmed and Mohtashim Shareef had served three years each in Britain's SAS trained Musa Company's Combat Divers Unit of SSG and were qualified from class 79 of Seals of US.

  Rashid Shafeeq, Mohamed Naeem and Asad Hussain were two years old in SSG. To their credit was the key role they played in Operation Lal Masjid in Rawalpindi.

  Youngest of them all, Mashkoor Bilal, had just completed his training in SSG – Navy unit. This was his first mission. Bilal was not there. He was already out on his first assignment he got after reaching Turtuk. The task was to liquidate Ibrahim, the Indian double agent who had provided them all the intelligence required for this operation. He was long gone leading a group of insurgents trained by Pakistan. At the moment Bilal was very much dead lying freezing in the snow near fishery pond along with six insurgents.

  Rest seven commandos, oblivious to this fact, were ready with their Kalashnikovs, preferred over M-16 due to its reliability in harsh weather and low maintenance requirement.

  Asad Hussain was busy talking on his radio. Finally he looked at Meetha. 'It will take another half hour to inspect the chopper to ensure that it is good to go.'

  'I am afraid this drizzle is likely to turn into heavy snow fall. Then it would be impossible to fly in dark.' Meetha expressed the concern. That moment Nisssar Malik entered the tent they were sitting in around a small heater. All of them sprang up to their feet to greet him when he waived them to settle down back.

  'Biradaran (bros),' he said, 'I am informed that you all are set to move anytime now?' 'We are but, janab', Meetha said, 'chopper needs another half hour to get a go ahead and Bilal has not returned yet.'

  'Chopper may take some time but Bilal is long gone.'

  'Last I spoke to him, he had told me that they are only three left and someone is wounded too. Perhaps that has slowed them down and snowing has resumed.'

  'You contact Bilal again and tell him to return alone. Let the other men report to the Turtuk Post. This is quarter to five now. I want all of you airbourne to Thoise by five thirty, with or without Bilal. No matter if one man is less. These young, inexperienced lads are so unreliable. Five thirty, sharp.' Malik didn't wait for any reply, turned and left.

  Meetha spoke in his radio. 'Bilal…'

  ? They could see the chopper at a distance of around 200 meters resting in the centre of the valley. They had reached the small hill top avoiding the wooden bridge that divided the village into two. They had followed the periphery of the village to avoid any encounter with the enemy.

  Both Samarjeet and Vijay Kumar pulled out their binoculars. After sweeping the entire scenery in front in a long slow arc for a few times, Samarjeet said, 'Vijay, do you notice the traces of white tent tops over there across the valley on that high ground?'

  'Faint outline, hard to notice at first glance but yes sir, I can figure them out.' 'Ibrahim,' Samarjeet said, 'show us what you have got.' Ibrahim led them to the cave at a little distance.

  Ibrahim cracked open the wooden casket – the container of the

  small arsenal. Samarjeet and Vijay Kumar looked at the assortment of weapons. Samarjeet picked up the telescopic rifle. His eyes spread in a pleasant surprise, 'hey bhagwaan (My God)! This is Accuracy International bolt action with Schmidt and Bender telescopic sight. This gun is the first good news for us. Where have you got your hands on this from, Ibrahim?'

  'In ISI's training camps I was once deputed for weapons inventory. I stole it from there.'

  Samarjeet handed over the rifle to Vijay and said, 'You take this and a few grenades. I will grab this AK 56 and rest of the grenades. You take a detour around this valley and skip the high ground. Stay close to the river and lay low. Climb one of the small hills on north-east side and take your position from where you can see the chopper.'

  'That will be a good three-four hundred meters from the chopper,' a puzzled Vijay said.


  'Right. I want you to wait there. They can board the chopper any time. You try to shoot anyone who approaches the chopper from the enemy camp side.'

  'Shoot across four hundred meters, in this drizzle and sweeping wind with a rifle I have never used in my life? Bullets will stray off like pebbles, sir ji!'

  'I said try to shoot. I will crawl down this hill into the valley towards the chopper from this side.'

  Vijay Kumar and Ibrahim looked at the crazy Captain in disbelief. Crawling in snow drizzle over the snowbed at minus ten for two hundred meters was no joke even in the protective suit.

  'Get going now.'

  'Sir, from that distance I can't distinguish between you and enemy. Our suits are same. My bullets can kill you.'

  'I will occasionally fire twice in quick succession in the air. That will give you my location. Okay?'

  Vijay was clearly not convinced. This was a suicidal plan, but far better than nothing.

  'Ibrahim, take this S&W but load it on the way back. You may still return back to your Paki brothers in the village but beware of Shinde.'

  Ibrahim got the retort. He tucked the revolver in his jacket and left in silence. Vijay, a little surprised on Ibrahim's reaction and strange silence, collected his share of arsenal and left after Ibrahim. Samarjeet came to the edge of the hill and while he was contemplating over the rugged pathway down to the valley, the radio crackled, 'Bilal…'

  Samarjeet played bluff with a thumping heart, 'Janaab?' 'Where are you? Why is it taking so long?'

  'Janab, we were collecting weapons from a cave, piled up by Ibrahim. Before dying he had told us about them.'

  'Tell your men to turn back and report to the village post and you report here ASAP. We are boarding in thirty minutes.'

  Thirty minutes! Vijay needs another forty minutes to take his position.

  'As you say janab.' Apparently he replied.

  The radio fell silent.

  They are now convinced that I am Bilal. Good.

  Samarjeet knew that the conversation was heard by both Vijay and Shinde.

  ?

  'Something is wrong.' Meetha whispered as he finished the conversation.