by John Ringo
I was told, later, that my "winning looks" had a part to play in all this. Given the sexual orientation in some of the "switchers" I'm not sure that was a good thing.
And the Brass was being notably passive aggressive.
Then I got The Call.
So there I was, trying to stay away from the flies . . . Really, it was the only reason I was lolling around in bed. Oh, that and that it was, like, 2AM again.
And the phone rings.
"What now?"
"Sir, you've got a call."
The on-duty RTO wasn't real happy. It was either brass or reporters again.
"I'll be right over."
"It's . . ."
"I'll be right over."
So I sit down, wearing my best uniform and at least half awake.
Guy comes on. Colonel in dress uniform.
"Captain Bandit? Stand by for the President."
"Roger."
Oh, holy FUCK. No, no, no, NO!
Yes.
So there's the robot bitch. And to add to the misery, there's the fucking Chief of Staff and the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of State on other screens.
I'm a captain. They're the Gods. This was not going to be good no matter how it turned out.
Look, yes, I hated the Bitch. Still do. But she was, after all, the President. Anybody who sits in that chair carries a certain mystic chill. The weight of history, etc. She was sitting in the same position as George Washington and Lincoln and Reagan. Yes, she looked as if she wanted to eat my brains. But she still was the President. Making fun of her in abstract was one thing. Looking her in the eyes was another.
I resolved to put the words "robot" and "zombie" out of my lexicon.
"Captain, I'm told that all standard conceivable methods of extracting your force are impossible to effect at this time."
"Yes, ma'am?"
"And you have . . . issues with moving your troops over to Israel."
"Yes, ma'am. The security situation in southern Iraq is notably unstable and the Israelis refuse to accept my Nepalese attachments or the local contractors. It would be . . . dishonorable to simply leave them behind. I hope to get them to the U.S. Barring that, to some area of relative safety."
The "security situation" I'd thrown in just to throw her. But the Nepalese were a major telling point.
The "Ghurka Meme" had infected the reports. Overnight, it seemed, we turned from being evil murdering destroying bastards to "heroic fighters." You see, the news media had noticed that we had little brown brothers we were helping. That made it all right and good.
Getting the Nepos out was probably right up there with getting us out in her mind.
"So how are we going to get you home, Captain?"
"The Ten Thousand, ma'am."
"Excuse, me?"
Yeah. Shows how much she knew about military history.
Group of Greek mercenaries from various city states at one point hired out to a pretender to the Persian throne. This was between when they'd kicked Persian ass at Thermopylae and Marathon and before Alexander ended up teaching the Persians who was the real boss.
Their side lost. Not far from here, again. Hey, there's a lot of history in this area.
Anyway, they ended up fighting their way home. Look up "Anabasis."
What I was proposing was the same thing.
We were going to march to the sea. The Black Sea in this case. Well, part of it. Sort of.
"Anabasis?" the Chief of Staff asked.
"Yes, sir. Bosporus, actually. I think the Greeks might be more willing to take us in."
"Turkey is not willing to permit your movement," the secretary of State said, cutting off that suggestion.
"There is no Turkey," the Chief of Staff said, giving him the exact value he deserved. "How are you going to cross the Bosporus, Captain? There's a very unfriendly Caliphate in the way."
Fuck.
"Dardanelles?"
"No bridges."
"Cross that strait when I come to it," I said.
The Prez might have been a fuck-up but she wasn't a complete moron.
"So you're suggesting that you march through Turkey to Greece, Captain? Can you do that?"
"Yes, ma'am," I said. Fuck it. I was fucked anyway. If the Chief of Staff didn't like it he should have sent me a fucking MEU. Or something. "I have sufficient supplies to take the full unit, including attachments, to the Bosporus. And beyond."
"The security situation in Turkey is not the greatest, Bandit," the Chief of Staff said.
"Yes, sir. Duly noted. I'm better prepared than the Ten Thousand and I've got better troops."
The last was debatable. Those Greeks were kick fucking ass motherfuckers. But I had to say something.
"Approved. Break this down."
That was it. No "good luck." Nothing. Just "Approved."
You know, Johnson used to get on the radio and order around companies. We lost that war.
Then there was the question of the Greeks. Would they let us in? All of us?
"Oh, sure. No problem, buddy. By the way, could you bring some supplies?"
There was one Greek government. Not four. One. All the surviving ambassadors agreed and there was even a U.S. Embassy still open. They'd had some major issues, still did. But they were, well, the Greeks. Sure, they hadn't won a war since Palatia. But they'd been fought for and over and through for centuries and they just kept being Hellenes. As long as there was enough mutton, retzina and ouzo they were good. A company of infantry replicating the Ten Thousand's march. Oh, hell, yeah! Come on over! We'll bring the ouzo! You're cute, you know that? How's your butt look?
Great. Problems settled. All we had to do was fight our way through Iraq and Turkey, over some stone bitch mountains which were already starting to fill up with snow, dragging along some Nepalese irregulars, who might be some good in the mountains come to think of it, and a trail of camp followers.
This was starting to feel too much like the Ten Thousand.
And I hadn't even found out the bad parts, yet.
Chapter Ten
Uno Problemo
There were a few details to work out. I paid my second in-person visit to the refugees.
The "mullah" who had taken over was a guy in his forties. He had, somewhere, scrounged up traditional Islamic dress and never actively carried a gun.
Let me explain the quotes. A mullah is, technically, nothing more than a teacher. That's actually the translation of the word: Scholar. He's not a priest specially annointed by God through a chain from some distant past. The Islamics simply don't have that. They have some people, like Hussein Jr. in Jordan, who are descendants of the Prophet and therefore specially important. But they are not necessarily or even commonly mullahs. A mullah is more like a rabbi, but even rabbis tend to go through an elaborate preparation for their posts. The only fixed requirements for a mullah is that he has completed the Haj, the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, and that he reads Arabic so he can translate and "explain" the Koran, which is a fairly baroque and in place opaque document.
(These "explanations," by the way, are called "fatwahs." A fatwah is not always a license to kill although it often seemed that way to Westerners since those were the only fatwahs we ever heard about. A fatwah can be something as simple as whether you can talk on your cell phone while doing your morning ritual washing. No, by the way. And, yes, there's a morning ritual wash. Why do Islamics often smell like the backside of a camel? Because it's based on people washing in the DESERT. Water is not required. Trust me, as OCD as Mohammed was (and he was very OCD) if he'd been around for modern conveniences he'd have added "And use water you morons! And soap! And maybe some fucking deodorant! You all smell like camels' butts!")
Down south and to a certain extent anywhere in the Bible belt you'll find small churches all over that are set up by a "preacher" who then brings his personal version of the Word of God to people every Sunday. Such preachers range from guys with multiple degrees in divinity (one of the schoo
ls Al Bore failed, by the way) or theology to some guy who can barely read the Bible.
Now you know what mullahs are. They're guys who a) went on the Haj, b) can or fake that they can read the Koran and c) convince people to give them money to preach.
And among the Shia they occasionally act as pimps. It's a funny old world.
This mullah seemed a decent enough guy. Whether for propaganda reasons or faith he seemed, also, to be trying to live the life that Shia mullahs had tended to live prior to the Mad Mullahs taking over Iran. That is, he advised and suggested how things should run, but didn't actually run them. Not under "shariah law." It's kind of like, a guy may be one of those small town preachers. He can still run for office. But if he's smart he doesn't bring God into every discussion of a bill. By the same token, his advice and suggestions were taken. Look, I wasn't going to tell them how to run their little society as long as it ran.
They'd gotten the gist that we were pulling out. And, of course, they'd been around for the earth shattering kabooms. The fight, fortunately, hadn't spilled their way but with no defenses and no chance of decent survival if we lost they couldn't have been real happy. And they weren't real happy we were leaving.
People were trying to kiss my hand. I hate that. But they apparently hadn't cared much for HAMB, either.
"We're pulling out. We have a way we can get home."
Hollywood duly translated.
Mullah: That sucks. (This, of course, took about ten minutes.)
Yeah. Well, things suck all over. We're not leaving you in the lurch. You've done good by these people and I hope things go okay for you when we leave. To help with that, we've left all the noncombatant stuff in the base intact. Food, water, a water plant and of course the defenses. Even some AK ammo for your boys.
You rock. (Another ten minutes.) Guy was crying. Yeah, I probably would have cried too.
They were figuring we were pulling out and destroying all the food and shit. I'm a farmer. Food is my religion. Well, and killing all enemies of the Constitution "foreign and domestic."
Bandit: Got a problem, Mullah. The girls. Our "temporary wives."
We'd explained to the girls what the plan was. Then we had to explain again, in more detail.
Look, most of the girls were from pretty reclusive families and they might have been taught their ABCs but that pretty much covered it. Girls only had to know three things in Islamic society: How to cook, how to clean and how to obey men. They mostly figured out having babies on their own.
The world had already gotten to be a very big and unpleasant place with the Plague. Trying to explain to them what was about to happen was hard. Think cheerleaders but with even less knowledge of the world. Not bright, ignorant and with a very short attention span.
When it was finally explained to them so that they understood, and I could see it sinking into their tiny little brains, I explained that it would probably be better for them to stay. We weren't sure we were getting through and if they got captured when we lost, it would be bad for them.
Problem being, it was going to be bad for them anywhere.
Islam was really strict about the whole "premarital sex" thing. The penalty for being raped, not for the rapist but for the girl who was raped, was stoning. Generally the family of the rapist paid a nominal fee and it was all good. Rape was, in fact, a way of exacting punishment on someone in (really backward) Islamic societies. Say a guy was caught stealing. Technically, the punishment was losing his hand. But say that he was the sort of lout who comes from a good family that's politically connected. Just one of those fuck-ups you get when power is in the wrong hands.
Say he has a sister. The penalty for him and for his family was often for the sister to be raped. Not because they cared about the sister as a human being, not because he loved his sister (they never did), but because it was dishonor to the family.
Then to purge the "dishonor" the sister would be stoned to death and everyone was happy.
I am totally not shitting you. There is some shit you just can't make up. We saw it, later. Another story I'll get to. The basis of "Stones."
Technically, if we left the girls behind they'd all be stoned to death. More likely, they'd end up as concubines doing scut work for the rest of their lives.
(Yes, they'd been concubines doing scut work for us. But we treated them with respect. The same would not be the case in most Islamic households. Mohammed the OCD also included precise instructions for how wives and daughters, any women, were to be "instructed" using a cane "no more than the width of a man's thumb." At the time and society, this was actually enlightened like a lot of Islamic law. Problem being, times had changed.)
I told them I'd do what I could to make sure they were better off than that. And this was me trying.
Mullah: This is a problem. I'll do what I can. (Ten minutes.)
Bandit: Yeah. I'm sure that will work. You're a good Islamic preacher, right?
Mullah: Yes. (Maybe three minutes.)
Bandit: Women can inherit under Islamic law, right?
Mullah: True. But a man must manage it.
Bandit, pulling out a bunch of paper: This is the printed out inventory of what's left in the camp as far as I can figure it. I, a male, am gifting to them, for their extraordinary service to the United States Army in times of peril above and beyond the call of duty, all the materials in the camp. Actually, I'm gifting it to their "temporary husbands" who in turn are willing to turn it over to new husbands. Each of them has some of the materials, basically broken up by areas and what I figured you guys would value. Guys who marry these girls, under all official Islamic law and the blessing of Allah the Beneficent and the Merciful, get the goods. As long as they remain their husbands. By the way, the prettiest one was my temporary wife under Shia law. And she got quite a bit of shit. More than the rest is all I'll say including all the ammo and the water supply. How many wives do you have?
Look, I said I didn't like Islamic law, never said I wasn't good at it.
We stuck around long enough for the weddings. All the girls decided they were staying. I had a talk with a couple of the grooms on the subject of how we really liked our former "wives" and that some day I was going to be back and they'd better be just as happy and smiling.
(By the way, they were never in any way officially or unofficially, Shia or American or Chinese law, our wives. I lied. He knew I was lying. He also saw it as an excellent out. Good guy, like I said.)
Did I miss Shadi?
Pussy like Shadi's is very nice. Do not get me wrong. But I like someone I can talk to. And even after Shadi got a few words of English, we really didn't communicate very well. I'd gotten her started on reading before we left but it was at C-A-T equals Cat and then explain what a Cat is.
(She also got me learning Farsi and Arabic. It's called a sleeping dictionary. Most military guys learn the local language that way. For that matter, it's how English came about. No shit. There are benefits to "fraternization" I don't think the brass ever consider.)
I'd done the best thing I could for her. I'd married her to the local strong man who also seemed to be a pretty decent and wise guy. Right age difference according to Islam, etc. We were going where angels feared to tread. Leaving her in the care of a good man was the best I could do for her. But I was going to miss her.
Pax Americana: Like a gnat in a blast furnace in the Mideast.
(Sort of. The mullah? Thaaat would be Mullah Rousham Faravashi. Yeah. That Mullah Rousham Faravashi, former Ambassador to the U.S. and current president of the Persian Union.
(You know his really hot oldest wife? The serious "Islamic women's libber" who goes around unveiled and is on all the talk shows? "Gorgeous eyes?" Also a former ambassador? But more importantly the current head of the PU Secret Service and touted as the next president?
(Shadi is going to fucking kill me. She's got lots of assassins on her payroll. I'm going to fucking die.)
(Wife Edit: So that's why we get that big box of almonds
every year. I'm not eating any when this comes out. You can have them all.)
So we rolled.
I'm not going to do an Anabasis and give a blow by blow account of the whole trip. Basically, it sucked. Not quite as much as it sucked for the Ten Thousand, but it sucked.
Oh, hell. Okay. I'll do the whole fucking Anabasis . . . Even if most people have seen it in reruns.
We were starting off, by then, in late September of 2019. We left on September 25th.
Now, in late September in Minnesota, back then you could get some frosts.
Abadan is on the same latitude as Jacksonville , Florida. And for some pretty straightforward meteorological reasons, it has a hotter climate. Way hotter in the summer, rarely as cool in the winter.
The day we had the wedding it snowed. Let's just say that it didn't used to snow much in Jacksonville anytime and it hadn't snowed in Abadan in recent memory even in the dead of winter.
Snow in September.
Yep, classic Big Chill weather. We all know that. Intellectually, I knew that. Problem being, we were headed north.
So that's the climatological issue covered for the nonce.
Second "issue."
We didn't want to go over by Ahwaz. There were still probably remnants of the HAMB over that way. My plan was, as much as possible, to get through all areas with as little incident as I could manage. I knew that there were going to be incidents.
("Incidents." Hah-hah-hah-hah! This is me madly chuckling. "Incidents." Bwah.)
I took a look at a lot of maps and had traced out a route I figured was going to keep us away from the majority of problems. We weren't going near any big cities and were going to skirt towns as much as possible. Unfortunately, for some really simple terrain reasons, we were going to have to get closer to Baghdad than I liked. And because we were moving to the east of the Tigris, which was the wetter side, there were going to be a lot of water crossings. That was going to totally suck.
Might as well talk about equipment, which has to cover personnel as well.
We'd dumped the girls. So there were three groups under my command and control: The infantry company under Fillup, the Nepos, and the technicians under their NCOIC.
