Tranquility Denied

by A. C. Frieden

  They were a small work crew, only twelve prisoners, the best of them were shambling skeletons. They wore nothing but loincloths for the most part, a shirt here or a pair of shorts there. Several of the men had the blessed protection of hats. The wooden boxes were heavy, requiring four men to share the strain of carrying them down and loading them into the back of the boat

  It took over an hour as they moved slowly and carefully. Ten Japanese soldiers armed with rifles were shepherding them from the central building down to the boat and back.

  After the boat was loaded, they brought out more boxes and loaded them into the back of a truck. When it was half full they were ordered to get into the back of the truck. The truck, followed by another loaded with the Japanese guards, went out of the camp gate along a dirt track that ran parallel to the river. After what seemed like ten minutes of slow bumping along the track, the truck turned off and stopped.

  When they disembarked the sergeant in charge of the work crew barked at eight of them, walked them twenty yards off the road, gave them water to drink, shovels and told them to start digging a trench to bury the boxes. They set to work. The sergeant returned to the rest of the work crew and instructed them to start unloading the boxes and to carry them down alongside the newly dug trench. They moved back and forth until they had stacked the boxes from the truck fully alongside the trench.

  The crew unloading the truck joined their fellow prisoners who were just finishing the digging of the trench. The sergeant told them all to load the boxes down into the hole. Once all the boxes were down in the hole the sergeant called a halt and gave them water to drink and told them to rest. The prisoners were exhausted. As they slumped down next to the trench, their backs to the sergeant and the guards, one of the prisoners in the trench looked up and yelled a warning, but it was too late. Before they could turn around the bullets started hitting them in the back. The prisoner who had yelled the warning was hit in the face and upper chest with several rounds. The firing continued for less than a minute. Then silence. The guards came over and shot into the trench at each of the prisoners there to ensure their death. Then the remaining prisoners, whose bodies had dropped at the edge of the trench, were toppled in. After twenty minutes of shoveling dirt into the trench and putting some rocks on top, the work was done. No prisoners would live to tell the story. The guards returned to the truck and drove off.

  As the trucks were returning to the camp, the buildings were being set on fire. When the blaze was well underway, an officer ordered the sergeant and his troops into the trucks and they rolled off down the dirt road, past the trench and toward Chiang Rai. The officer and several staff loaded onto the boats and then motored off towards the Mekong.

  Chris and Ton were stunned and silent. There was nothing they could have done or could do now. The prisoners were dead. The camp was destroyed. The Japanese were gone. What the purpose of the camp was or why it had so few prisoners were questions that couldn’t be answered now. They would return to the hill tribe camp and make a report. Any investigation would have to be done after the allies drove the Japanese out of Thailand.

  Manchuko—Japanese occupied Manchuria

  The compound of Manchuko Unit 731 was a bee’s nest of activity. Japanese soldiers were running from different directions carrying boxes to the train pulled in at the rail siding serving the camp. Smoke swirled upwards struggling to rise against the humid, rainy season air. Three buildings at the outer edges of the camp had already been set afire.

  From his office at the center of the camp, General Ishii Shiro watched dispassionately. He had pulled together all his important papers for shipment and sent out the remainder to be burned. Research Unit 731 was being dismantled. The remaining one hundred fifty prisoners being held for use as research subjects had been executed.

  The general had enjoyed a rapid rise through the ranks of the Japanese army since his graduation from Kyoto Imperial University Medical School and entry to the army in 192l. The army had strongly supported his interest in biological warfare studies from the very beginning. This camp was the fruition of his years of research and experimentation. Now all evidence of his camp and its existence was to be destroyed. What was considered too valuable to lose was being packed on the train from the Chinese city of Harbin headed back down the Korean peninsula to be carried over to the sacred island Nippon.

  What was too valuable to lose was the research data. General Ishii was determined that his decade of work in Japanese occupied China and Manchuria would not be lost. The trials of plague, cholera and malaria viruses, the vivisection of the “monkeys,” in reality, Chinese peasants and allied prisoners of war including several downed American airmen unlucky enough to come into his staff’s hands, had all produced interesting and potentially useful results. He felt using human subjects gave much more credibility to his research regardless of any ethical questions. Actually for General Ishii and his staff of medical researchers there were no ethical conflicts. What they were doing was for the Emperor and the Empire. All was justified.

  Manchuko Unit 731 was shorthand for the Epidemic Prevention and Water Purification Department of the Kwantung Army. Over three thousand medical staff were working on projects in research, experiments, anti-epidemic and water purification and production. The Kempeitai were responsible for providing the prisoners on whom experiments were to be conducted. Beyond vivisection and other forms of tests of infectious diseases on human subjects, the diseases being researched for biological warfare purposes included cholera, epidemic hemorrhagic fever (EHF) and plague. The latter was of the greatest interest for use in biological warfare experiments. As the Japanese army was pushed back on all fronts, it was felt important to protect the safety of test results for future use in the defense of the empire. Thousands of test subjects had been killed in the research but more had always been made available through the efficient network of the Kempeitai

  It was time to take the results of years of human experiments back home to keep them safe for the empire’s future needs. General Ishii and his colleagues, General Kitano and Colonel Ota, would return home to protect the future of this hard earned knowledge.

  1947—Sugamo Prison, Tokyo

  As former General Ishii Shiro walked through the gates of Sugamo prison he was a satisfied man. He had successfully negotiated a full pardon and release for himself and his principal deputies in the medical research work of the Kwantung Army. His path in medical research, specializing in biological and chemical warfare, had led him to rapid promotion in the military. Now, with Japan fallen to the Allied Forces, his research had saved him from reprisal for his war crimes. The Americans wanted his research. He had shown himself a much stronger negotiator than the U.S. Army colonels from the Biological Warfare Center in Ft. Detrick, Maryland. They had initially offered only a reduction in his prison sentence but he had held out, stonewalled them as the Americans said to him. In the end with the Army negotiators receiving General MacArthur’s permission, he had won a full release for turning over his unit’s research papers. He and his colleagues would be free to continue to serve the Emperor and Japan’s imperial interests long into the future.

  Chapter 1

  Matt Chance was tired. He had started shooting pool in the nine ball tournament at two in the afternoon and it was now eleven o’clock in the evening. He had played six matches in the two losses and out competition. He had won five, lost one and this was his last chance to get in the money. If he won this match, third was a lock. If he lost, he was out.

  There was a lot of movement in the pool bar as the hostesses, tottering along on their high heels, hustled drinks to customers while keeping time with the mix of rock music being played on the sound system. It was good rock, Dire Straits. The air in the bar was getting a bit thick as many of the players and bystanders were ignoring the local regulations and smoking, including one who had brought along his stash of pot. The bright lights over the tables ensured they were clear but the lighting through the rest of the pool bar was so
mewhat dim with the exception of the back booth where a card game had started up amongst some of the early pool competition finishers. The card game would go on until sunrise. The window shades would be drawn to block the view of the police outside. Inside, a cop from the local station was one of the players.

  Matt was a bit distracted. He had noticed a non-pool player type watching him closely for the last three games of this match. He was sure the guy, a foreigner, was a non-player since he had started out standing too close to the tables and someone had to tell him to stand back out of the line of sight of the players while they were shooting. This was a money game, the semi-final, and both Matt and his opponent were on the hill. In pool jargon that means both were just one game short of winning. The winner of this game would win the match. Matt had a difficult shot on the nine ball to finish. He could play safe and hope for another chance to shoot. The hell with it, attack and win, right? He tried the shot, an almost ninety degree cut into the corner pocket and for a second he thought he had it as the nine ball hit the pocket edge but then bounced to the other edge of the pocket and hung there, easy pickings for his opponent. Matt didn’t concede the shot to his opponent. He just didn’t believe in conceding at most anything. His opponent knocked the ball down and came over to shake Matt’s hand.

  “Good match,” he said. “You could have played safe on that last shot. That was a tough cut.”

  “Yeah, maybe someday I’ll learn not to go for every shot. Good luck in the next match.”

  Matt disassembled his cues, ready to call it a night. Then the stranger approached him. He was well over six feet tall with a blockish build, not fat just on the wide side with muscle, and military cut blond hair. He was dressed too uniform for a tourist: khaki slacks, black loafers and a short-sleeved blue shirt with a button down collar. He looks government, Matt thought.

  “Great shooting, just a bit of bad luck.”

  “Thanks,” Matt said, “but you make your own luck. I just plain missed the shot. Are you visiting Bangkok?”

  The man held out his hand and said, “Mr. Chance, my name is Jim Aspen. A mutual friend, Carl Winters, said to look you up. He thought you might be able to help me out with something.”

  Matt stepped back and looked at the man more closely. This was not a casual visit. Carl was his best buddy from his ranger days in Iraq and Afghanistan. Carl was working in an anti-terrorism role with the government now. He wouldn’t send a casual visitor. This must be government business of some sort and Matt really didn’t want it, but the guy had used Carl’s name. That meant a lot. Matt shook his hand and nodded toward the door, away from the throng of pool players, night people and bar workers.

  “How did you know to come here to Jack’s?”

  “Carl told me. Said it was like your second office and as my business was urgent, he told me to check here first.”

  Matt had an office in the Emporium building on Sukhumvit Road in central Bangkok. It was modern in appearance: all glass, gray and black metal and overlooking a park. His mother had insisted on it after his separation from the American military and return to Thailand. She had the real estate connections as part owner of the building to get a bargain deal for the space and told Matt it was a matter of family face. She couldn’t have him working out of his home or a pool bar. Matt had gone along to keep Mom happy. But beyond checking in for an hour or two daily when he was in town, he didn’t spend a whole lot of time there.

  “Did Carl have any special message for me?”

  Jim smiled, “He said to tell you that rangers lead the way.”

  For Matt that was the recognition code. It was a comment and grim joke they shared when things got rough in Iraq and one of them would ask, “Why are we here?” Then the other would smile wryly and respond with the ranger motto, “Because rangers lead the way.” He and Carl had agreed to use it as a recognition code if Carl needed to get in touch with him through a third party.

  Matt nodded. “That’s right. Rangers lead the way. I take it you want to talk. Let me put my cues in the locker. We should find a quieter place. Do you have an idea where we should go?”

  “Yeah, if you don’t mind we can go back to my hotel, the Hyatt. The lower floor has some traffic going to the nightclub but I noticed earlier there is no one at the bakery near the nightclub since it’s closed right now. It’s quiet there.”

  A light rain was falling as they walked down the dark alleyway outside Jack’s to the street. The light over the pool tables reflected through the glass front of Jack’s off pools of standing water in the alley. A young woman, coming to visit her friends inside Jack’s, stopped and performed a wai towards the spirit house guarding the entrance. A working girl, Matt thought, probably praying for a customer to pay her way for the night. Despite the rain, the street was full of empty taxis with their red meter lights on, jostling along the road looking for customers, and they were able to wave one down immediately. They rode to the hotel together in the taxi making small talk.

  Matt noted the taxi was a nest of Buddha statues, at least six small statues on the dashboard—under glass—and a larger one—looking forward—as well as the images of two monks, famous for their moral strength, hanging from the rearview mirror. It would be a safe trip.

  Jim mentioned it was his first visit to Thailand. He had arrived a day earlier and said he was here for a week or two. Matt took that to mean however long it took until his unnamed business was done.

  This late at night there was little traffic so the ride from Jack’s Pool Bar on Asoke Road to the Erawan corner area on Rajadamri Road took only ten minutes. Matt had the taxi stop before the intersection outside the nearby McDonald’s and showed Aspen the rear entrance of the Hyatt. He wasn’t sure if this was intended to be clandestine business or not, but it seemed best to remain inconspicuous right from the beginning.

  In the lower level of the hotel, they took a couple of chairs at tables near the closed bakery outlet. No one was around though the nightclub across the floor was starting to fill up with customers. There was a glass wall around the club and they could feel the thumping of the bass from the imported hip hop band and see the bar and dance floor dotted with foreign businessmen and young Thai women dancing and talking. Their shadows danced through the glass front of the club and across the floor to the dimly lit area where Matt and the government man were seated. A hotel security guard came by, looked at them, decided not to bother a foreign customer and walked away.

  Matt sat and looked at Aspen and wondered what the hell was Carl doing? He knows I won’t get involved in agency business.

  “Well, Jim, I have to warn you. You used Carl’s name so I feel I have to talk with you, but I am just not interested in the work he is doing nowadays. First I have a question for you: How did you come to know Carl so well that he would direct you to me?”

  “I know him from the same place you do: the Army in Afghanistan. I was one of the doctors who worked on Carl after he was wounded. I followed up and saw him again several times during his stay at Walter Reed and his separation from the service. We became friends. My current work for the government is in medical research in Atlanta. When I found myself needing some advice and help on matters Asian and Thailand, I went to Carl. He recommended you. ”

  “Fine, but I am still not interested in Carl’s line of work. He is a good man working with a bunch of liars and double-dealers.”

  “Matt, may I call you that?” Matt nodded okay. “I can say, at least as far as we know right now, this isn’t CIA business and not in Carl’s scope of work. My current efforts are in a completely different area: medical research. Right now, this matter may not even be in the U.S. Government’s area of interest. That is one of the things I am here to look into.”

  “What is it then?”

  “There was an American tourist who disappeared up north outside of Chiang Rai a few days ago. Possibly you saw something in the newspaper.”

  “Yeah,” Matt said, “apparently he went off hiking by himself and nev
er returned.”

  “Well, he is a very important researcher at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. I also work at the CDC and that’s the report the CDC got. However, there are some circumstances involved here that have raised some concerns in the U.S., so it was decided it should be looked into a bit more thoroughly. I was nominated for the job.”

  “That’s fine,” Matt responded, “but why the trip? Just tell the embassy staff to go up and check further.”

  Aspen coughed and looked at the floor for a moment. “Let’s just say there are some complications and sensitive possibilities vis-à-vis the Thai government. It was decided that we couldn’t be officially opening this up through the embassy without calling the attention of the Thai government to it and we would rather not do that at this time.”

  “If it’s not feasible to bring the Thai government in, why is it feasible to bring this to me? I guess you know I act as an advisor to the government, the parks and wildlife department under the Ministry of Environment as well as the forestry people. My work is pretty much limited to helping to train park rangers and assist with wildlife and forest conservation matters. It’s not a security position at all.”

  “Yes, but you also still hold a U.S. passport and up until two years ago had top operational security clearances from the U.S. Government. Your combat awards—the Purple Heart medal and medals for valor in Iraq and Afghanistan—give you street cred as they say. Also, you have a great advantage in being considered local by the Thai government and provincial officials you meet when traveling in the countryside.”

  Matt laughed, “Being mixed blood Western and Thai, or luk krung as the Thai say, I will not be as noticeable as a blond-haired American walking around asking questions.”

  Aspen smiled possibly in appreciation at Matt’s laying the cards on the table for him. “Yes, there is that, too. Please hear me out.”