The Sahara Intercept

by R G Ainslee

  We split the bread and sipped on the remaining beers as we talked over the possibility of an emergency take-off. Serge assured me it would be no problem. Another burst of AK echoed in the distance, an occurrence so routine it didn't disturb the soldiers around the fire.

  An hour later, Serge wrapped himself in the blanket and was soon asleep. I began patrolling at uneven intervals with the AK slung on my shoulder. The soldiers soon quieted down and turned in for the night.

  Guard duty gives one time to think. The malfunction of the AGM bothered me. It flew into the ground, a catastrophic failure, wasn't even a close miss. I could understand that, but my sixth sense told me something else was at play. — Jamison, why couldn't they find him? Did something happen? — I didn't have a clue, but was determined to find out when, or if, we made it back to N'Djamena.

  Then I thought about the mission. The best way to take out Marsden and the Škorpion Brigade would be to send in B-52's or a squadron of fighter-bombers. But that's not the way it works. Our so-called leaders only do what is easy and risk free: follow the path of least resistance, do only what is politically expedient, and above all don't offend anyone. Use someone expendable, like the French, the local Chadian forces, or me.

  It's still a sucker's game, and I'm holding the worst hand at the table and everyone knows it. Maybe that actor will get elected and change things, but don't bet on it. — Perhaps he's smart enough not to listen to the so-called experts, the ones who got us in this mess. — Maybe he'll tell the Russians to pound sand. — Nah, who could be so lucky?

  Tuesday, 21 October 1980, Abeche, Chad

  A muezzin calling the faithful to prayers at 0430 woke me from a dream: on a beach in Antarctica counting penguins. The only other sound was the crunch of Serge's boots on the crushed lava. Heat from the previous day a distant memory, replaced by the chill of a desert morning. Cold and stiff, I rolled over, pulled the much too thin blanket tight, and went back to sleep.

  The sun was making its appearance over the far ridge when I woke to the now familiar clack-clack of an AK-47 somewhere in the distance. I yawned, stretched, and strode around the plane to warm up. Serge stood halfway to the shed talking to a man. I folded the blanket, stuffed it in the rear compartment, and ducked back under the wing.

  Serge and the man walked towards the aircraft engaged in conversation. The man, with dark cream-colored skin, appeared to be in his early thirties. Clad in jeans with a khaki shirt and a turban-like headscarf wrapped around his head and neck. As they got closer, I could hear them conversing in French. The man spoke with an unusual accent, one vaguely familiar.

  Serge introduced him, "Je vous présente Capitaine Le Beau."

  I said, "Bonjour," assuming he was a local official.

  The man with a mischievous twinkle in his eye, responded, "Bonjour."

  Serge continued, "Le capitaine est avec l'ambassade."

  I wondered which embassy and asked, "Embassy?"

  The man offered a playful smile. "Captain Bobby Le Beau, U.S. Army assigned to the embassy in N'Djamena."

  He took me by surprise. "Thought it was closed."

  "Yeah, you right, the suits left, but some of us still have jobs to do. Been out here for the last month monitoring the situation. Captain Constantine offered to give me a lift back to N'Djamena."

  Captain Constantine: Serge and the other pilots always used their first names, a common practice for mercenaries. "Okay by me, but one of us will have to sit on the deck. We only got one extra seat."

  "No problem." He eyed me with suspicion. "You in the Legion?"

  It was my turn to laugh. He thinks I look tough enough to be a French Foreign Legionnaire. "No, I'm just here on vacation. Serge's been giving me flying lessons." His eyes narrowed. "Well, you could say you and I work for the same outfit … Uncle Sam."

  "Oh, you're CIA?"

  "Wrong again. You might say I work for a different agency. That's all I can say."

  "N–S–A, no such agency. Am I right?"

  I had to give it to the guy, he was smart. "If I told you, I'd have to kill you."

  His face contorted in a sneer, shook his head, and sighed. "Man, that's a stale line. I can tell you been hanging round embassies too long."

  I laughed. "Guess you're right." I stuck out my hand. "Name's Ross Brannan. Can you fill me in me on the local situation?"

  Le Beau hesitated for a moment and shook my hand. "The Libyans are about a day or two away from mounting an attack." He glanced at Serge. "Thought it best to go to town while I had a chance. — If I may ask, what are you doing here?"

  "We were on an operation north of here and diverted to this field when we got hit by ground fire."

  He inspected the obvious bullet holes in the fuselage. "Fresh, huh?" … You were out kinda late. We don't see many night flights around here."

  "Yeah, it was a rush job. — What's your connection with the embassy … military attaché?"

  "That's right. They call us defense attachés these days. Different name, same job. How long you been in the area?"

  "Not long. Job's finished, probably be going back to Bangui ASAP."

  "Don't say. That's where I work out of now. You know Chambers?"

  "Haven't been to the embassy. I work out of Camp Béal."

  "You have a joint operation with the French?"

  "That would be one way of putting it."

  Serge completed his walk around inspection and said, "Allons-y." Let's go.

  Le Beau grinned. "Laissez les bons temps rouler."

  "You speak pretty good French."

  "I should, I'm from Nu Awlins."

  "Oh … New Orleans."

  "Spoke Creole before I spoke English."

  Minutes later, we were airborne on our way back to N'Djamena.

  * * *

  A grim-faced LeGrande greeted us moments after we landed. Serge gave him a quick rundown, omitting the details. The commandant expressed no emotion and ordered Serge to go with him to operations for a full debriefing, leaving Le Beau and me alone on the tarmac.

  Le Beau spotted a jeep with a driver. "I'll catch up with you later. Gotta go across the field to meet one of my contacts." The soldier halted, and the captain hopped in and they drove away.

  It occurred to me that Le Beau seemed indifferent about our mission. He asked no questions and showed little interest when Serge was speaking with the commandant in French. I decided to look around for Joe Hardy and headed across the tarmac to the nearest hangar.

  I spotted Joe sitting on a crate having a beer with one of the French mechanics. He noticed me, chugged the tall green bottle, and we met beside a Skyraider.

  "You're late again. You guys got some women stashed in the desert?"

  "Yeah, you figured it out, don't tell my wife. What's the latest on this end?"

  "That LeGrande dude sure is in an uproar."

  "El Commandante's always in an uproar, so what else is new?"

  "We seem to have a security issue. Jamison is still missing."

  "Any idea what happened to him?"

  "One of the mechanics said he heard Jamison was spotted across the river in Cameroon, but they can't find no trace of him. — By the way how did the flight go? They don't tell me nothing."

  "The missile was a dud. It flew straight into the ground in front of the aircraft."

  "Never heard that happening before. They got a tendency to not hit the target, but nothing like that."

  "With Jamison missing, I think there might've been something else going on."

  "Like sabotage?"

  I nodded in agreement. "Could be."

  "But why?"

  "Not sure … but I intend to find out."

  "You're saying the mission was a bust?"

  "No, we got the radar. Serge saved the day. He put a full rack of rockets into the mobile carrier and hosed the place with his 20-mil … made for a nice little bonfire. We even popped a few Libyan trucks on the way back with leftover ammo. Serge don't like to come home with any
thing left in the ammo belts."

  Joe's face lit up with a smile. "Great … I guess that means we can go home."

  "ASAP as far as I'm concerned."

  * * *

  ASAP doesn't always mean as soon as possible, especially when a military bureaucracy is involved, French army included. Le Grande insisted on a full report after hearing Serge's version. We went over everything twice, and at last, he seemed halfway satisfied. The conversation then turned to the disappearance of Jamison. I insisted Joe Hardy be included and the commandant reluctantly sent for him.

  Joe walked in with a puzzled look. I told him, "We need you to tell the commandant all you know about Jamison."

  "I met him on the plane, and he didn't talk much, except to say he was a last-minute substitution and didn't like it."

  Le Grande asked more questions; giving the impression he thought Joe and Jamison were somehow co-conspirators. I was about to blurt out, 'look here Inspector Clouseau,' when the commandant threw up his hands and stormed out of the room.

  "Why's he mad at me?" asked Joe. "What's his problem?"

  "He's French."

  Joe nodded and smiled. "Let's see if the mechanics have more beer. That Gala's pretty good stuff, even if it ain't cold."

  "Yeah, I could use some lunch too."

  "You're in luck. The Chad guys are roasting a goat out back."

  I was that hungry. "Okay, let's go see if it's ready."

  * * *

  We sat on the shady side of the hangar, finishing off the last of the beer, taking a well-deserved postprandial pause. I thanked the cook, a jolly heavyset Chadian sergeant, and slipped him a five-dollar bill.

  Moments later, Bobby Le Beau appeared around the corner. It was easy to tell he was upset.

  I asked, "What's the matter?"

  "Ran into a problem."

  "Seems to be standard procedure over here — What's up?"

  "My best contact, the officer in charge of airport security, was killed about a week ago."

  "What happened?"

  He shook his head in disgust. "Shot on the street on the way to his girlfriend's house."

  I took a wild guess. "An assassination?"

  "Yeah, I suspect his lieutenant. Never did trust the SOB."

  It wasn't such a wild guess. "That wouldn't be Lieutenant Idriss?"

  "How the hell would you know?"

  I stood and took a couple of steps towards him. "Idriss and your captain buddy held me and my team prisoner for several days after we landed. He murdered one of them, an injured guy, unconscious and in need of medical attention. The SOB got what he deserved. My only regret is I didn't get to pull the trigger myself."

  "How did you—"

  "You might say I facilitated the hit. The rat-bastard SOB had it coming. You sure don't choose your friends very carefully, do you?"

  "What kind of operation you involved in?"

  "Like I said before, if I told you—"

  "Don't give me none of that BS." His eyes sparked in anger. "Tell me what the hell's going on with you people."

  I paused and took a deep breath. I was about to stray from normal security procedures, but didn't need him digging around, stirring things up. "Okay, I guess you'll find out anyway. You heard of the Škorpion Brigade?"

  His face froze as his eyes turned to granite. "What if I did?"

  "I asked you a direct question and want an answer."

  His expression hardened even more. "That's way above your pay grade."

  "Hell, if it is. There ain't nothin above my pay grade when it comes to the Škorpion Brigade. I'm out to kill all the SOB's I can."

  "On whose authority?"

  "The frickin White House." At last, Hansen proved useful, even if it was an egregious stretch of the truth.

  "Since when does NSA send out death squads?"

  "I didn't say. That was your idea."

  "Then who the hell are you with?"

  "I can't tell you, but I will say we killed a bunch of those bastards last night."

  That got his attention, big time. "You hit one of their advance bases?"

  He knew about the bases. It occurred to me that he might know more than I thought. "Yeah, they were setting one up at Oum-Chalouba—"

  "Oum-Chalouba. How did you know—"

  "It's my job to know. What's your involvement?"

  "That's why I'm still in country. We've been trying to get a handle on their whereabouts for the last month." He paused, took a breath, and shook his head in frustration. "Appears somebody upstairs dropped the ball coordination wise."

  "Tell me about it. You're not surprised, are you?"

  "Nope. Sounds like you're in the same situation as me … running point for somebody else."

  "Yeah, we do the work, they get the glory and if it all goes to hell—"

  "We're the convenient scapegoats."

  "I like the way you think Captain."

  "Name's Bobby." He nodded with a faint smile. "Now tell me what you know."

  "Okay, one more question. What do you know about Frank Penwell?"

  Again, he stood mute, an unvarnished message of surprise in his eyes. "Penwell … Ah, how's he involved?"

  "He's helping the Libyans supply the bastards." I decided to tell him everything — well almost everything — and went over the highlights of the last weeks. "…and then we hit a convoy before we landed."

  "I knew they were trying to get advanced weapons but didn't know they're so close. — I still can't believe Penwell's involved with them. You sure?"

  "Yeah, I'm sure. Why are you surprised?"

  Le Beau stared at the ground, then off into the distance. He sighed and stomped his foot. "Penwell's men supplied us with some information in the past and we've used their aircraft on occasion."

  "This guy seems to have his fingers in just about everything." A thought occurred to me and I turned to Joe, who had been following the conversation in silence. "You think Jamison might've been working for Penwell?"

  "Well he said he was a last-minute replacement."

  I looked at Le Beau. "We've been played for sucker's big time."

  "You're right. — Say, for the record, I think Captain Seid was a SOB too. But he did prove useful." He let out a hint of a smile. "Anyway, I got the feeling Idriss will work a whole lot cheaper."

  Our conversation paused as a French Transall came in for a landing. Joe said, "That should be the flight from Bangui. One of the mechanics told me he was flying out this afternoon for a few days of R n' R."

  The two-engine turboprop taxied back down the runway and halted on the tarmac. The rear door let down, and out stepped John Smith and Jack Richards.

  "Here come reinforcements," said Joe.

  "Some more of your guys?" said Le Beau.

  "Yeah, the big one's—"

  "John Smith. What the hell's he doing here?"

  "You know him?"

  "Yeah, we were in Laos back in seventy-two. Me a raw lieutenant and he was the biggest badass sergeant, I'd ever met. He saved my butt more than once and we only served together for a couple of months. Last time I saw him was in Bangkok."

  John eyed Le Beau as he approached. Jack looked like he wanted to say something but kept quiet. They halted in front of us and John said to me, "Looks like your keeping bad company. Don't let him borrow money off you." His expression stayed stern and serious.

  "Oh man, that was eight years ago, and it was only twenty bucks."

  "Twenty bucks you didn't have." John shot me a glance, "Bailed his sorry butt out in Bangkok when he couldn't pay his bar bill." The grim face melted into a smile. "Good to see you. You still Special Forces?"

  "No. I'm a defense attaché assigned to the embassy here but working out of Bangui now. How 'bout you?"

  "Retired in seventy-three, now I'm a baby sitter for this bunch." He gave me an intent glare. "If you got anything you want to take, get it now. We're heading back when they're ready in about an hour or so." He said to Joe, "You too. We're shutting down here
. ASAP."

  "You're not going to ask me about the mission?"

  "What about it?"

  "We got the radar last night."

  His eyebrows arched in surprise. "You don't say."

  "Yeah."

  "The missile worked okay?"

  "Hell no, it was sabotaged, but we took it out anyway."

  "Sabotaged," he huffed, "that's no surprise."

  "What do you mean?"

  "They found Jamison's body yesterday." It was my turn to be surprised. He answered before I asked, "Juarez, the Mexican police found his body—"

  "Juarez … how … how could he … Wait a minute, are you saying we had an imposter?"

  "Yeah, that's what we were sent here to find out. Now where can I find him."

  "You ain't gonna find him, he's been missing for more than a day."

  Anger swelled in the veins on John's neck, "No one reported that little gem." He let out a sigh of frustration. "I need to have a word with the commandant."

  "He's over at the ops shack."

  "I'm going to find Le Grande." He eyed Jack, "You keep an eye on these yahoos and don't let'em wander off." He motioned with his head to Le Beau, "Come on, we'll talk while we look for the commandant."

  Le Beau had been taking it all in with great interest. He said to John as they walked away, "I need to hitch a ride with you on the way back. Have to file my report with the embassy in Bangui."

  Jack shook his head. "Wilson's fit to be tied. He thinks you deliberately disobeyed his order." He paused when he noticed my smile. "Did you find the radar?"

  "Blew it up last night — Kaboom — Finito — the sucker's toast, this operation is over, let's go home."

  Jack grinned. "They ain't heard about that back in Bangui. Maybe that'll get you off the hook."

  "I don't give a flying-flip. Far as I'm concerned, Wilson can take the whole thing and shove it. No more Raven-One for me. I'm taking the first flight out of Bangui to Lamu."

  "What you gonna use for a passport. They took ours across the way and—"

  "Don't care if I have to hold up the embassy at gunpoint. I'm getting-out-of-Dodge ASAP."

  Jack shook his head. "This Le Beau guy, where did he come from?"

  "We picked him up this morning. He was at Abeche snooping around for the embassy. He knows John, you ever meet him?"