by Wolf Riedel
Mark shrugged.
“Okay. Mexican cartels 101 it is,” said Platt.
“Mexico has been a long-time channel for drug trafficking for many decades because of its position between North and South America. In the nineties we intensified our efforts in Florida to stop the inflow of Colombian cocaine. As we succeeded, more and more cocaine started to flow through Mexico where there was already a brisk trade in marijuana and heroin. The influx of that cocaine traffic created greatly increased compensation for both existing and new Mexican traffickers. As a result bigger and more powerful gangs coalesced in Mexico.
“On top of that there was a conscious effort by the cartels to divide the trafficking into various discrete distribution channels. Groups were assigned to each one. The Gulf Cartel got the eastern channels while the Sinaloas got the Pacific coast. Quinteros got the Sonora route and the Fuentes family got Ciudad Juárez.
“As is usual with these types of organizations, turf wars developed and wholesale violence started to grow exponentially in Mexico. Things got hot and heavy in 1989 then cooled off in the late 1990s but heated up again around 2000.
“The Gulf Cartel took some major steps to look after its interest in this war. One step was that they took on board a bunch of ex-Mexican special forces soldiers who called themselves Los Zetas. The Zetas built a small army for the Cartel, and incidentally started acting for themselves as well. We figure there’s about three hundred or so Zetas.
“In around 2003 the Sinaloas started contesting the Gulf Cartel’s routes. At the time, the Sinaloas had the Fuentes family’s Juárez Cartel as an ally. Recently, however, that relationship seems to be falling apart as the Sinaloas began pushing eastward.
“The violence got so heavy, especially around the region of Michoacán that the newly elected President of Mexico called up and deployed almost seven thousand federal troops there.”
Platt paused to look around the room.
“I guess what you’re wondering is: what does this mean for us? Simply put the Cartels are having a war both amongst themselves and against the army. On top of that they’re expanding their operations ever deeper into the US. That means they’re exporting their war to the US as well.” He shrugged his shoulders. “Whenever you have a war you need soldiers and you need weapons.
“We’ve recently identified two major players in the game here. The first one is a local group called MQ-27. They were originally a small time Latino Tampa street gang that has more recently become allied directly with the Gulf Cartel. They’re in so deep that the Cartel has sent one of their people here to oversee operations. As far as we can see, they’re pretty traditional in their structure and their way of operations over here—boys from the hood type of shit—but growing and ambitious.
“The second gang is known to us only anecdotally. We’ve got no direct intelligence on them, just some shit that’s oame in as rumors from other groups we’ve rousted. We don’t have a name for them yet but the stories are pretty consistent that these guys are either serving or ex US military and that they’re directly tied in with a gang in Mexico called Los Zumas which itself is part of the Juárez Cartel. The word we have is that the people here in Tampa are heavily into providing the Zumas with automatic weapons.”
Mark looked up. The link was weak at best. On the other hand, they now had a theory and it was the only one that they had.
CHAPTER 25
Bagram AF, Afghanistan
Monday 12 Mar 07 0830 hrs AFT
Kurt sat in an isolated corner of CJSOTF-A’s conference room with his head pounding. Somewhere during the last twelve hours what had been a niggling sore throat had developed into a full-blown cold, his second of that season. He blamed all the damn committee meetings that everyone in the Command—hell, everyone in every military or government organization in the world—had to attend. Machismo kept people at work when they should be staying home in bed. The result was that from January until early April, infectious idiots were spreading their various illnesses to everyone else at the meetings. Maybe the civil servants in Ottawa had it right after all. At this time of year the rate of absenteeism due to sick leave peaked at twice that of the national average. What he’d always considered goldbricking might actually be the appropriate response. Who knew?
He’d had his flu shot but there were so many different strains going around that the best you could do was keep some of them at bay. This one had hit hard. Throat, sinus congestion, headache. So far the flood of mucus was in check, he was sure it would come in time and was gathering up rolls of toilet paper to use as Kleenex when the time came. A soldier could never have enough shit house paper.
When he had arrived at the meeting, Kurt had waved off any attempts at handshakes during the introductions with the staff from 3rd SFG and had intentionally sat down some two chairs away from his nearest neighbor. He might be the virus-laden idiot at this meeting but he’d try his damnest to minimize exposing others to it. The meeting was a small one. Besides Kurt, O’Donnell and Shirazi there were the 3rd’s Commander, CSM, the S3 and the S1.
“Christ, Kurt,” said Todd. “You look like shit.”
“Feel like it too,” he replied. “Should be better in half an hour when the drugs kick in.” A quick side trip to the pharmacy at the Joint Theater Hospital had given him a selection of pills, sprays and liquids to administer. The spray had at least relieved the congestion enough to stop making him sound like a cartoon character.
“At least it’s not bird flu,” said the S3. “They’ve confirmed thirteen new cases in RC EAST and a bunch of birds with it in Kabul.”
“Small miracles,” mumbled Kurt.
“You going to be good to fly?” asked Sid Oikle, the 3rd’s CSM. “We’ve got you on a plane heading down to Kandahar this afternoon. They’ll chopper you out to LAGMAN tomorrow.”
Kurt managed a weak wave. “I’ll sit in for the first bit of this brief and then leave it to you to do the details with Colin and Cyrus while I garb some rest. I’ll be fine this afternoon.” He sounded more confident then he felt.
Oikle looked at him sceptically and rolled his eyes toward Todd. Todd gave him a reassuring nod; if Kurt said he’d be all right, he’d be all right.
“We’ll make it fast then,” said Todd and slipped a file folder toward O’Donnell who sat closer to him than Kurt. “Those are copies of the last two week’s of daily INTSUMs.”
“Things are relatively quiet,” contributed the S3. “The Brit’s are running a major op in Helmand to disrupt the Taliban’s expected summer offensive down there—Op ACHILLES is the overarching name for a bunch of smaller ops. The 3rd Marine Commando Brigade down there are set to be replaced by 12th Mechanized Brigade in a few weeks so there’s a pause coming up.
“The Canadians are enjoying some quiet time right now,” he continued. “After we gave the Taliban a shit-kicking last August and September, they followed up with Op BAAZ TSUKA which was a kinder and gentler one looking more at winning over the local population in Panjwayi. That seems to be paying some dividends but it’s too early to tell.”
“On the other hand,” interjected Todd, “what with the bombing earlier this month that wounded Mullah Naqib, we’ve now got concerns about Arghandab.”
“Say what you will about the old guy’s past,” said the S3, “he certainly helped keep the northern flank of Kandahar stable. I hope he gets back healthy from India soon.
“Anyway that leaves Kandahar’s eastern flank, Zabul.
“Regional Command SOUTH has assigned Zabul to the Romanians. The overall allied force there is called TF ZABUL. The Romanian contingent is their 812th Infantry Battalion—about six hundred troops—known as TF CARPATHIAN HAWKS whose main responsibility is patrolling and securing their sector of the Number 1 Highway and supporting the Provincial Reconstruction Team there. They’re operating out of FOB LAGMAN near Qalat. They nominally have under their command TF WARRIOR which is a company of our 1st Battalion of the 4th Infantry. The 1st of the 4th rotates companie
s through there about every six to seven months or so. The present company is BRAVO which is spread around several platoon-sized FOBs in the province.
“The ANA down there consists of the 2nd Brigade of the 205th Corps. They’re out of Qalat and have the better part of one infantry battalion and a good bit of their support battalion on line; the rest of the brigade is in recruiting and training. The ANP is a weakness. There may be up to a thousand of them but about half sit on their asses around Qalat. The border police is even worse; badly trained and equipped. There are maybe a hundred to man some sixty kilometers of border with Afghanistan. Language is a problem for them. The locals are almost exclusively Pashtun while the ANA and ANP are from various Dari speaking tribal groups; a lot of Tajiks.
“Finally there are our group’s people down there. TF 31 handles the white stuff in the south out of Kandahar and their folks are stretched real thin. The big problem with Zabul is that the majority of the conventional ISAF’s folks are covering the more populous districts along the highway leaving the more southern, more rural areas on the border thinly covered. That leaves a stretch of ground between the major border crossing at FOB SPIN BOLDAK in the south to FOB SWEENEY in Zabul that’s mostly uncovered except for sporadic patrols or special forces patrol bases. PB POWDER is one of our more permanent ones right on the most developed route from the border into the heart of Zabul. Its main task is to train the ANP and form local tribes into an active anti-Taliban militia to close off that area as an infiltration route.”
Kurt nodded politely. He knew all of this information. He’d read SOCCENT’s backgrounder on Zabul and had been attending the command’s morning ops briefs religiously for many months now. Religiously? He chuckled to himself; the American’s frequently called these briefings morning prayers.
Todd sensed Kurt’s attention wandering and slid another folder over to O’Donnell. “Here’s a summary of new things on Lesperance’s ODA since the material we sent you a few days ago,” he said and looked at Kurt. “Why don’t you bugger off to bed and get your head down while the CSM and your guys go over the admin shit?”
He’d had a solid four hours before it was time to board the Herc for Kandahar. The sleep had helped; his brain now felt like it was working at seventy-five percent, a distinct improvement over what he had figured was twenty-five at the briefing with Todd. Just prior to the flight, O’Donnell and Shirazi had back-briefed him. They had spent the morning and early afternoon productively in arranging for meetings with witnesses in Kandahar in the evening and early morning and then at LAGMAN tomorrow afternoon. At both locations they would work out further details for their visit to PB POWDER.
The steep ascent of the aircraft was now complete and they had settled down for a short level flight at altitude before they would descend in a rapid dive in to KAF. The enemy had weapons which could be used against aircraft. Tactical take-offs and landings were de rigueur in this country.
Kurt and his team were sitting on red webbed jump seats on the forward starboard side of the aircraft directly opposite from the crew door. To the rear of the aircraft were a dozen more troops in transit to KAF; down its centerline were six pallets of mixed natures of ammunition.
Kurt had read Todd’s files during the ascent and now leaned over to O’Donnell trying not to breathe on him—a hard trick considering he had to shout to be heard above the roar of the engines.
“This stuff really doesn’t help us much,” he said.
O’Donnell nodded back in agreement.
“Most of the guys that have been working in Zabul the last half year have gone home,” Kurt continued. “The Romanian’s 2nd Battalion rotated out in mid-January. CHARLIE company of the 1st of the 4th went back to Germany around the same time. That means the guys in Zabul will have only worked with Lesperance’s ODA for a month at best. The only guys that have been around the whole time are TF 31 and the local Afghan forces.”
“That’s a start, Sir,” replied O’Donnell. “And we do have some statements.”
“At best they’re anecdotal hearsay,” said Kurt. “Assuming we get enough to back them up we may have to go to Germany and maybe Romania to get first hand accounts. Quite frankly at this point I think that’s a waste of time.”
O’Donnell looked at Kurt. “You’ve got something else on your mind don’t you.”
Kurt looked down at the file folder he held on his lap and absentmindedly rubbed it with the side of the thumb of his right hand.
Tell me,” said Kurt. “What are the chances that there isn’t a faction or two within that ODA?”
O’Donnell pursed his lips. “Considering that they have some new guys and some guys that have had one or two prior tours, my guess is that there is probably some tension there. More so if there’s something dirty going on. Question is how to win them over in a little base like that.”
“Guess we should try to work out a plan to do that,” said Kurt.
“If we do, we better also have a plan to take the guys that talk the hell out of the base with us.”
Kurt nodded.
CHAPTER 26
James West Army Reserve Center, Lakeland, Florida
Monday 12 Mar 07 1100 hrs EDT
Mark leafed through the binder that Sal had set on the desk before him. He nodded at Sal.
“That looks good,” he said. Sal had spent the morning expanding the case folder with the new documentation that they had gathered the day before. Mark on the other hand had spent his time updating the case chronology summarizing their activities and outlining a tentative action plan to take the investigation to Mexico. An hour ago he’d sent the summary to the Benning CID Battalion’s operations officer WO4 Bernie Sykes for comment and approval.
“Let’s give it another hour and then pack it in for the day,” Mark said. “The Army owes us for yesterday.” Mark was a firm believer in grabbing compensatory time off as quickly as possible. If you didn’t you usually got screwed out of it. More importantly, if you didn’t do it while the lost day was still fresh in her mind, your spouse would rarely believe that you had actually gotten all your time back. Sometimes he’d carry it forward to turn the next three day long weekend into a four day one but mostly he just took the next available day. In this case a half day today and maybe the other half day next Friday.
“Sure,” said Sal. “I’ll see if I can track down the folks in Ocala and see if anything new has come up.”
Mark’s phone rang and Sal stopped. Mark pushed the speaker button.
“Winters,” he said.
“Mark! It’s Bernie,” said the voice on the phone.
“Hi Bernie. I’ve got Sal in front of me and you’re on speaker,” Mark said.
“That’s fine. Save time if I talk to you both.” Mark waved Sal to take a chair.
“Have you had a chance to read the latest report on the Lewises?” Mark asked.
“Yeah. That’s why I’m calling. This Mexican cartel shit looks weak but I gotta say it looks like that’s all you’ve got.”
“Yup. Ocala’s got nothing on the family side or any other reason someone would off the family. Marion County Sheriff’s are convinced we’re full of it and that there’s a pedophile behind this but they’ve beaten up just about every sex offender in the area that might have done the murders as part of an abduction and no one seems to fit the bill. The guns and the money are the only hinky thing in this whole case and with what we’ve got from Tampa it looks like Mexico might be our best lead.”
“You gotta go there though?” asked Sykes. “I’m only askin’ cause Marjorie’s going to be all over my ass on this one. She’ll want someone from 6 Group at Hood to go to save money.” Marjorie was the battalion’s budgeting and travel clerk and made Ebenezer Scrooge look like a spendthrift.
“What can I say, Bernie?” asked Mark. “You know as well as I do the value of face-to-face meetings between witnesses and sources and the lead investigators. Anything else is usually filtered and it would take a lot of work to read someone at Hood
into the investigation.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Bernie’s voice faded out then, after a pause, came back strong. “What the hell. In for a penny in for a pound. Listen up. You guys go but I think it might help a bit if you make a stop along the way.
“I talked to our resident agent in charge with the 90th Det up in Fort Polk,” Sykes continued. “I thought he might have something on the various cartels activities along the coast. He suggested you guys talk to the resident NCIS agent in New Orleans. Says that they’re tied in to a task force with FBI and Coast Guard agents down there that monitor and act on drugs and guns moving back-and-forth through Louisiana and the Gulf. He figures they’d like to hear from you on what you’ve got and they could probably give you better links to the folks with the Mexican federales.
“I also talked to our intel guys on this and they figure that there’s a lot in what you guys are saying about this shit spreading along the Gulf from Mexico across to Florida. You asked for a couple of extra guys to do undercover and surveillance and those guys actually volunteered. Marjorie just about shit when I told her that. I think Intel’s got a hard on for this one.”
Mark and Sal smiled. Sal held out a thumb-up.
“Sounds like a plan, Bernie,” said Mark. “Give me the relevant numbers and Sal and I’ll set it up today.”
“We still going to make it out of here by noon?” asked Sal as he walked back into Mark’s office. The round of phone calls he’d made had taken some time.
Mark put down his pen and looked at his watch; quarter to twelve. “Depends on what you’ve got to tell me,” he replied.
“I got to tell you I feel dirty every time I talk to Marjorie. I can understand that she wants to control the spending but if you suck up to her just right you get what you want or need. It’s like it’s not so much that she wants to cut costs but wants you to suck up to her and to convince her that she’s doing you an almighty fuckin’ favor. Anyway we’re booked out of here on Southwest on Wednesday. We could have gone tomorrow but it would have cost an extra three hundred bucks per and Marjorie put her foot down. More importantly though the folks in New Orleans couldn’t get together with us tomorrow anyway.