by Chris Ryan
When he’d finished, he asked if I’d like to say a few words, so I got up and went forward beside him.
‘Zikomo, Major,’ I began. The local word for ‘thank you’ was an easy one, and several of our guys were already using it to each other. ‘Just a couple of things,’ I began, talking slowly. ‘First, I repeat what Major Mvula just said about discipline. In any ambush, the most important thing is self-control. While you’re waiting, no matter how uncomfortable you are, you must keep still. Even if a scorpion’s attacking your bollocks, you don’t move. You’ve all been in the bush. You know how movement catches the eye. If an animal keeps still, you don’t see it. If it flaps one ear, you spot it. No matter how long you have to remain in position, I don’t want to see anyone flap his ears.’
I paused, and saw one or two grins spread across the intent faces.
‘The next thing is, water. Again, it’s a matter of discipline. You must make your water last. Budget for the worst. Expect to be in position all tonight, all tomorrow and most of the next night. Drink as little as possible. Apart from anything else, the less you drink, the less you need to piss.
‘The third thing is this. There’s a chance that the exercise may turn into a live operation. As far as we know, the enemy forces are a good way to the south. But we don’t have any up-to-date intelligence. It’s possible that in the last couple of days one of the Afundi units has moved north. They may have a long-range patrol out – we don’t know. They may be creeping up the very track you’ll be watching. In other words, there’s all the more reason to remain fully alert. If an enemy patrol does come into the killing zone, you want to make sure you drop every single one of them.
‘All right, then? Do your best. We’ll be watching you.’
With that, we were ready to move. We deliberately concealed the fact that the President was due to visit, as we thought it would distract the guys and spoil their concentration. The chances were that even if he did see the ambush go down, he’d arrive on the location and leave it in the dark, so that most of his subjects wouldn’t realise he was there.
The move-up went without a hitch. The column set out on foot in single file at 1730 as the sun was going down behind the trees on the horizon, a vast, blood-red ball. In that latitude, south of the Equator, the light faded fast, and by the time the ambush party reached the site we’d chosen for the final holding area and Bergen cache, at 1910, it was fully dark. The place was easy to find, even at night, because a group of fifteen or twenty tall leadwood trees stood on their own in the middle of a sea of grass. You could see them from some distance off, no matter which way you approached.
The ambush parties left their Bergens neatly set out in formation in a glade among the trees, eight to a row, each touching the next, so that if they came back at night, every man should be able to identify his own by touch. In a last-minute check Joss made sure that everyone had full water bottles, and basic rations in his belt-kit.
We left Genesis in charge of the rear cut-off group. He had four men to maintain all-round defence on the Bergen cache and make sure nobody was trying to follow us up. There was also a Kamangan signaller to man the radio link with base. The rest of us went on. I’d detailed Pavarotti to master-mind the left cut-off group, Andy to take the right, and Phil to stick with the killer group. Whinger and I were going to lurk on the Kopje, keeping behind Joss in a kind of tactical headquarters from which we could control the exercise and react if anything went wrong. With us we had Mart, who’d brought his full medical kit in case a casualty needed immediate attention. That left Chalky, Stringer and Danny back in camp, listening out for messages from Mulongwe, and ready to receive the President, if he came.
Those of us controlling the exercise up front were in touch with each other through our covert radios, but the commanders of the various groups had only comms cords with which to send messages. Once they were in position, one pull would mean ‘Enemy in sight’, two pulls, ‘Fire!’
With only a sliver of crescent moon hanging in the sky, the night was very dark, and it was difficult to move quietly. When the eight-man left cut-off group headed out, they sounded like a herd of buffalo crashing through the scrub, and after a minute or so I went on the radio to Pav.
‘Too much fucking noise,’ I said softly. ‘Tell them to slow down.’
‘I have,’ came the answer.
‘Okay.’
The other groups were no better, and when we ourselves followed them up, I had to sympathise. In long, dry grass the going was bad enough, but in the frequent patches of mopane scrub, where the ground was littered with brittle dead leaves, it was impossible to avoid crackling and crunching. I kept telling myself that if we were in the war zone, we’d be making ourselves very vulnerable, advancing noisily in this fashion, without any forward vision.
Except for the background chorus of crickets, the night was dead quiet, with only the faintest easterly breeze, and from our vantage point on top of the Kopje Whinger, Mart and I heard a good deal of rustling and scraping as the groups settled into position. Then Pavarotti’s voice came up in my earpiece: ‘Left cut-off in.’
‘Roger,’ I answered. A couple of minutes later Phil reported the killer group in. Then came Andy, from away on the right.
‘All stations, listen out,’ I said.
I wondered what the silveries were thinking. Most of them were country lads, who’d come from villages of staw huts, without electricity, so presumably they were used to the dark. But for us Brits it was still an adventure to be out in the African night. Above us the stars were bright as diamonds, far brighter than they ever shine in the northern hemisphere. Diamonds, I thought: that’s why we’re here, to help win back the diamond mines for Bakunda. But why was Whitehall supporting him? What was the Brit government’s interest in shoring up his regime? Nobody in Hereford had been too clear about that. Maybe, if the President did join us, he’d spill a few beans.
For the time being, there wasn’t much light at ground level. Through binoculars I could pick out the smooth, grey trunk of the baobab, and occasional pale-looking strips where a few yards of the sandy track were in view. But apart from them, the bush was a ragged sea of black. Provided the guys kept still, no intruder could possibly guess that thirty-odd armed men were lying in wait.
Whinger, Mart and I had agreed to share stags – two hours on, four off. I took the first, comfortably settled in a cleft between two big boulders. The floor of the little gully was about two feet wide, and the front end of it looked straight out over the killing ground – a perfect vantage point.
My time was nearly up before anything happened. The odd mozzie came whining past, but I’d smeared on a good dose of repellent, and nothing bit me. Then, out of the silence away to our left, came a deep, booming call that made the hair on my neck stir. Aoum! Aoum!
I heard a rustle in the grass behind me, and there was Whinger, crawling up the gully. ‘What the fuck was that?’ he whispered.
‘Lions.’
The call came again, closer.
‘There.’ I pointed. ‘Jesus!’ I breathed. ‘This’ll make the silveries’ bollocks shrivel.’
We lay there listening. The call sounded a third time, closer still. Then suddenly, as if the lions had summoned it, the wind got up. One moment the air was still; the next, we felt a vigorous gust. Then a loud roar came sweeping towards us through the trees from the west. The noise grew so fast that at first I thought a train or an aircraft was approaching, even though reason told me that was impossible. Next I reckoned that heavy rain must be falling and about to swamp us.
It turned out to be none of those things, only this violent, freak wind, which hit us with a cold blast. It blew for no more than three or four minutes, but the noise was so loud that it drowned out the lions, and we couldn’t tell if they were still moving our way. Then, quite quickly, the wind died, and silence returned.
The disturbance left me shuddering, not so much from cold as from the memory of the chill that had hit us at the witc
h doctor’s.
‘I bet the darkies are shitting themselves,’ I whispered.
Whinger nodded. I don’t think he was too happy himself. The sudden violence of the gust had been quite alarming. But before he could say anything, brrrrrrppppp! A burst of automatic fire ripped out from away to our right. In seconds every man in the right cut-off group was blasting off long bursts. Through the racket I heard Andy bellow ‘Fucking stop! Stop! Stop!’ And then in Nyanja, ‘Ima!’
With glasses I swept the river bank. The hail of rounds had kicked up dust in thick clouds. Apart from that, I could see nothing.
‘Green One to Green Three,’ I called on the covert radio. ‘What the hell’s going on?’
‘Something moved to the right of the killer zone,’ said Andy.
‘Those lions?’
‘Not big enough. Only one, anyway. I think it was a hyena.’
‘Get your commander to give them a bollocking.’
‘He’s at it already.’
‘Tell him to repeat: no firing until a Shamouli goes up.’
‘Will do.’
‘Make sure they all get properly stuck in. I’m resetting the ambush, as of now.’
After that little burst of excitement, everything went quiet, and the rest of the night passed without incident. Taking turns, Whinger and I got our heads down for good stretches; then, at 0515, just before first light, I left him and Mart on the Kopje and pulled back to find out what was happening about the presidential visit.
The Bergen cache was designed to be part of the exercise: the guys left in charge were supposed to challenge anyone who approached – so I was glad to find that one of them spotted me moving towards him through the half light of dawn. Correctly, he called out, ‘Two.’
‘Six,’ I replied. ‘Well done.’
I came in under the deep black shadow of the trees, found Genesis and said, ‘Any word from base?’
‘Nothing yet.’
‘Let’s get through, then.’
‘Sure.’
He led me across to where the signaller had slung his aerials. The 319 set was on listening watch, and in a couple of minutes we got a response.
The presidential visit was on.
FOUR
Bakunda’s chopper was due in to base camp at 1645. Our guys there could welcome him and bring him out to the cache on foot, but protocol demanded that I should go back to meet him there, give him a briefing, and escort him personally to the ambush location.
I spent a good deal of the day at the cache, chatting with Genesis in person and with Stringer over the Kamangan radio circuit.
‘I don’t know who he’ll have with him,’ I said. ‘There’s bound to be some aides and/or BGs. But the point is, we don’t want a shower of hangers-on up front. Tell the guy only one other can go forward with him. Okay?’
I knew I was sounding edgy – the result of too little sleep – but Stringer got the message and didn’t argue.
Once he’d told Mulongwe the score, and details were settled, I went forward again and sneaked up the back of the Kopje, taking Whinger and Mart a three-litre container of water to top up their bottles. I found them in good shape, comfortably ensconced in a tent of mozzie netting which they’d slung from some of the boulders.
‘Cushy bastards!’ I said softly. ‘It’s all right for you.’
‘And you.’ Whinger opened a flap of netting to admit me to the sanctum. ‘I’m sorry for those poor sods out there. The tsetses are fucking horrendous. Pavarotti and Andy reckon they’re being eaten alive.’
‘I expect they are. I knocked off a good few on my way in. Look at the bastards on the netting, too.’
The big grey flies were dotted all over the outside of our fragile canopy, crawling about, trying to get through, as they scented prey below.
‘How are the guys doing?’
‘Pretty well. There’s been practically no disturbance. Discipline’s good. The thing is, they’ve got a great cabaret to watch.’
‘What’s that?’
‘You know that outbreak of firing? Somebody killed a hyena. Now every vulture in Kamanga’s homing in on the body. Look through the gap in the rocks.’
I peered out through our observation channel and saw an amazing sight: on the far bank of the sand river a mass of feathered bodies was writhing and struggling, apparently all piled on top of each other in a heap. Binoculars revealed that the naked heads and necks of the vultures were shiny with blood and slime. As I watched, more heavy bodies came plummeting in to land on the outskirts of the group and hopped inwards to join the feast.
‘Jesus!’ I went. ‘Nightmare birds.’
‘Can’t be much left of the hyena,’ said Mart, matter-of-factly. ‘They only found it about an hour ago. Just two of them at first. We saw them circling, way up. Then they dropped down, and all the rest came bombing in.’
‘Sure it’s only a hyena?’ I asked. ‘Not one of the poachers?’
‘Nar,’ went Mart. ‘Before the birds arrived we could see it laid on its back with all four feet in the air, like a spotted dog, its stomach blown up like a balloon.’
‘At least it means some of the silvery spoons can shoot,’ said Whinger.
‘Even you might have hit the poor bastard at that range,’ I told him. ‘Listen. The President’s on his way. His Puma’s due into camp at 1645. They asked if we couldn’t clear an LZ for it to land nearer the ambush location, but I refused. I’m not having the exercise buggered up by some darkie rupert.’
‘How are you going to get him here, then?’ Whinger asked.
‘Stringer’ll bring him forward to the Bergen cache, which I’ve downgraded to a transit post. I’ll go back, meet him, brief him and bring him on.’
‘What time will we crack off the action?’
‘No point in keeping everyone hanging about longer than we need. The guys will have had a bellyfull of waiting by then. It’s fully dark by 1800. If old Back-Under’s here by 1830 or so, we’ll go for 1900.’
As I waited with Genesis at the cache, I didn’t know what to feel. On the one hand, it was irritating that Bakunda should muscle in on our exercise, and that I should have to make these special arrangements to deal with him. At the same time, it was flattering that he cared enough about our training task to come out and see some action. So in a way I was looking forward to his visit; after all, a president’s a president, even if his country’s third world and third rate.
The air was so still we thought we might hear the Puma coming into base camp, even though we were several kilometres away. In fact we never heard a thing, and, as dusk was falling, I’d begun to wonder whether there’d been a last-minute cancellation. Then we saw the party approaching across the low ground that fell away behind the grove. Stringer was in the lead, with five black guys following in single file. The one immediately behind him barely reached to his shoulder. That can’t be him, I thought, but a moment later I realised it was.
I slipped forward and stationed myself behind a thick trunk at the edge of the grove. When Stringer was about four feet off, I called, ‘Stringer – over here!’ As he stopped, the last guy in the file reacted so violently that he rose clear of the ground.
I stepped out into the open, and said, ‘Welcome to Mantrap.’
‘Hi, Geordie!’ Stringer grinned. ‘Can I introduce the President, General Bakunda? Mr President, this is Sergeant-Major Geordie Sharp.’
‘How d’you do, sir?’ I stepped forward and shook hands.
‘Pleased to meet you.’
In the last of the light, I couldn’t see much except a big white smile, and touches of grey or silver in a clipped moustache. There was more grey in the sideburns that came down below a dark beret, and the broad face put me in mind of that monster from the distant past, Idi Amin. Bakunda hadn’t got the height – he was knee-high to a pisspot – but he was pretty much the same width. I’d feared he might turn up in some Mickey Mouse uniform with rows of phony gongs across his chest. In fact he was wearing plain D
PMs, without any insignia, and carrying no weapon except a pistol in a belt-holster. Slung round his neck was a pair of useful-looking binoculars.
‘Good journey?’ I ventured.
‘No problem. We had a nice, smooth flight!’ The accent was very much Sandhurst officer, not bush at all.
‘Well, I can’t offer you any hospitality, I’m afraid. But before we move off I’ll brief you on what we’ve arranged. Then we’ll head on to the location.’
I led the way to a patch of sand in which I’d scratched a map of the ambush, switched on a torch and introduced Genesis. As the President pulled off his beret, revealing short, tight curls of iron-grey hair, the light glinted off beads of perspiration on his forehead. At close quarters he smelt of lavender overlying acrid sweat.
‘We’re now in the Bergen cache, two ks from the location,’ I explained. ‘Those are your guys’ packs, over there.’ I flashed the beam on to them. ‘They’ve left them here so that they can vacate the area at speed as soon as the ambush has gone down. They’ll come back here, recover their kit, and disappear into the bush. That’s all part of the exercise. Normally, this site would be a tactical one as well. That is, it would be under guard, and nobody would show a light like I’m doing now. But with your visit . . .’
Bakunda gave a high-pitched giggle. ‘You mean, I’ve wrecked your plans! That’s what they call me – the wrecker!’
‘No, no. But just imagine this place as dark and quiet as everywhere else, with guys deployed in allround defence. Anway, the plan is this.’
I took him quickly through the scenario, indicating the positions of the targets and the various groups, and telling him that I’d initiate proceedings by firing a flare. As I talked, I was eyeballing his followers. Two of them were really big young lads, well-built and athletic looking – bodyguards, for sure. The other two were older – some kind of staff officers, I guessed – and they looked hellishly uncomfortable.