Operation Mayhem

by Steve Heaney MC

  Seeing the PARAs spring into action the blokes waving the weapons stopped doing so very quickly. They also stopped smiling. The pick-up juddered to a halt, the head of the dead man banging on the bonnet. There was more rust than bodywork on the vehicle, and it was a miracle that it was still driveable. With the PARAs doing their stuff, the guys in the pick-up threw down their guns by the roadside.

  The 1 PARA lads surrounded the wagon screaming for everyone to get out. As soon as the guy let go of the dead body it tumbled onto the ground. The corpse was dressed in the ubiquitous shell-suit ‘uniform’ of the rebels, so I figured it had to be one of the RUF fighters. Once out, the PARAs hustled the blokes around, lined them up at the rear and began to give them a good pat-down.

  That done the PARAs dropped them onto their knees, hands over their heads, and kept them covered. I knew the village chief would vouch for these guys one way or another, and we had a job to be getting on with here.

  We gathered to the rear of Dolly’s position, all of us Pathfinders minus Grant and Tricky. Wag had done a fine job of redistributing the ammo, so every man amongst us was well bombed up. H was up to 400 rounds for the GPMG, which was top news.

  I’d left the 51 mm mortar behind. It was heavy and cumbersome and of no use beneath the forest canopy, plus we only had illume rounds and it was daylight now. But we did have one 94 mm LAW per patrol, just in case we came across any rebel vehicles. It hadn’t escaped our notice that last night’s attack had been minus any of the rebels’ captured armour, plus their heavy 12.7 mm DShK machine guns.

  We had to presume they were saving those up for round two.

  22

  By now the sun was well up and it was burning hot. As we moved off from Dolly’s position, giving a thumbs-up to the lead sentry from 1 PARA, I caught the faint sound of a Sea King, flying in to rescue Captain Cantrill.

  I’d formed up my stick with Steve Brown – ‘Steve B’, a cracking bloke from Dolly’s patrol – as my lead scout. Super-fit and immensely strong, Steve B always started his day with 200 press-ups. He was robust mentally, and hugely capable, which was why I put him on point. I took up position immediately behind him, the blokes forming up in line to the rear.

  Whatever happened while we were on this fighting patrol, the golden rule was not to break the line of march. That way, each bloke would know where the other was at all times, which was key to ensuring we had everyone with us, and that the heaviest firepower – the 2 GPMGs and the one LAW – could be used to best effect.

  We pushed into the waist-high vegetation, moving silently as one, coherent, animal fighting unit. This is what we had trained and trained and trained for, and for the first time ever the Pathfinders were going out on an active seek-and-destroy mission. I could feel my heart pumping with the adrenaline. I knew with utter conviction that we would meet the enemy with deadly force.

  This was no longer a peacekeeping mission, or OOTW. Each of us had our weapon in the aim scanning our arcs, and poised to unleash hell. The gun had become an extension of our head and shoulders: wherever the barrel moved our eyes were looking.

  As lead scout, Stevie B’s arc was 180 degrees to our front. Coming directly behind him, I covered an arc from his left shoulder ninety degrees to my rear, with the guy directly behind me covering the same arc but on the opposite side. This was replicated all down the snake, so that no part of the terrain we were moving through was missed. Steve B had no reason to look at me again now we were under way, and no one would make any verbal communications. It would all be done in silence, using hand signals.

  We pushed ahead stealthily towards the canopy, moving through open terrain, with vegetation coming almost up to chin level, and at times head height. There were clumps of trees to skirt around, plus dips, depressions and small bushes to circumnavigate.

  After ten minutes we came to the edge of a V-shaped ravine – the rear entrance into Fern Gully. Steve B went down on one knee covering the ground to his front, and I dropped to one knee covering my arc, the move cascading silently down the line. He placed his left hand on his head, the signal for me to close in on him, his right hand keeping a firm grasp of the pistol-grip of his weapon.

  I moved up to Steve B’s right shoulder. He indicated the footprints that criss-crossed the soft, loamy soil at his feet, leading into the gully bottom. Sure enough, scores of rebels had been through here. I could see by the direction of the footprints that they’d gone both ways – once as they tried to rush Dolly’s position, the second when they were driven back under withering fire. In amongst the churned soil and crushed foliage were bright red strings of congealed goo: blood trails.

  Further down the gully’s length I presumed Wag’s patrol was coming across more of the same, plus the rebel dead. I turned to Steve B, and indicated the bearing to push ahead towards the thick jungle. As we moved off I gave the bloke behind me a signal: two fingers into my eyes with one hand, then pointed at the gully. Look in the ditch. The signal was passed silently down the line, so everyone got to see the gruesome evidence.

  We reached the edge of the trees, the shadows pooling thick and claustrophobic beneath the canopy. I glanced south, to check that Wag’s patrol was entering the forest at about the same time as us. That confirmed, we nudged into the hot, musty interior, the smell of moist rot and decay heavy in our nostrils. The forest closed around us. Without the constant hum of the night-time insects, and the thwack of blundering basher-beetles, it was silent and foreboding.

  Steve B paused again. He motioned to the ground at his feet. The leaves underfoot were thick with pools of congealed blood. No doubt about it, this was where the rebels had regrouped after we’d hit them in the gully. By the looks of things one hell of a lot of them had been seriously wounded and were bleeding heavily. Here and there a shaft of sunlight lanced through the canopy high above us, and where it hit the floor it formed a spotlight of bright, sickly red, like the hot point of a laser beam.

  All we needed to do was track the blood trails, and we’d have them.

  We pushed ahead, moving further into the ghostly silence. We moved due east for a good fifteen minutes, each footfall placed softly and with care, so as to cause minimum noise, or disturbance to the forest floor. When you’re tracking an enemy in closed jungle you can’t see very far, so you have to presume that an unseen force might be trying to hunt you. Or the enemy could be lying in wait, poised for you to move into their killing zone.

  We’d lost sight of Wag’s patrol as soon as we entered the jungle, but we knew where they were. Any movement to the north or east of us, and it was likely to be the enemy.

  Steve B dropped to one knee again. Signalling the rest of the patrol to a halt, I closed up on his shoulder. He pointed ahead. About a hundred and fifty yards away I could just make out a group of small huts. There was smoke rising out of the centre of a cluster of buildings, from what had to be some kind of cooking fire.

  I checked the map. I reckoned we were about 1.2 kilometres from the village, and via the Clansman 349 radios we had a range of 1.5 kilometres at best, less in thick jungle. We were on the limit of our comms, after which our only radio contact would be with Wag.

  I lowered my mouth to my radio mic, which was strapped to my webbing. ‘Wag, go firm. We’ve hit buildings.’

  ‘So have we,’ came back his hushed reply.

  We remained where we were, totally motionless, for a good five minutes, studying the ground ahead. There were half a dozen mud and thatch huts grouped in a small clearing. Smoke hung beneath the trees like a haze of early morning mist, and I could smell its distinctive woodiness. I could see a huge cooking pot perched on the fire nearest to us, but not a soul could be seen.

  This was the direction in which the blood trails – plus the scraps of vegetation ripped from the trees at the rebels’ passing, – were leading us. We had to presume they had moved through this area, or maybe even used it as some kind of temporary base from which to launch their attack. More to the point, we had to work on the as
sumption that there were still rebels present, and very possibly this was where they were treating their wounded.

  I radioed Wag: ‘We’ve got six huts, no hostiles visible. But loads of blood trails leading in.’

  ‘Three larger buildings,’ Wag’s voice came back at me. ‘They look like kind of school halls.’

  We agreed to go in and clear the areas simultaneously. Turning around so I was facing back down my patrol, I raised one hand showing two fingers. I closed it into a fist, before raising it to pat the top of my head. The fist was the signal that I needed the gun-group, the GPMG operators; two fingers indicated that I wanted both of them, and the hand on the head meant on me.

  One of the GPMGs was positioned halfway down the patrol, to cover those forward. The other was second from last, to cover our rear. H and the other GPMG operator, Morgan Taff Hansen, a guy from Dolly’s patrol, rose and came forward. I pointed out the buildings, speaking to them in a hurried whisper. We needed the short-barrelled weapons to go in and clear the huts – so the SA8os. I wanted the GPMGs positioned to provide cover, in case it all went noisy.

  ‘You guys push forwards slightly left,’ I whispered. ‘Co-locate yourselves and cover us as we go in.’

  They gave the briefest of nods, got to their feet and began flitting through the shadows. In a bent-over scurry they pushed 50 yards ahead, then got down into their fire positions, so we could move past them on their right.

  I radioed Wag. ‘Deployed a base of fire. Going in to clear buildings. H-hour fifteen.’

  ‘Roger, out.’

  Wag and I now had an agreed plan of attack. In fifteen minutes’ time we’d each take our patrols in to clear the buildings, with a GPMG fire base set up to cover us.

  I radioed Tricky: ‘In canopy to north of village twelve hundred yards. Come across huts. Will move forward and clear. May go loud. Inform Sunray.’

  ‘Roger. Out.’

  Sunray was now Grant’s call-sign, of course.

  Poor Tricky. I could tell by the tone of his voice that he was sick to death with being joined at the hip to the radio. He was itching to get out here with us lot, taking the fight to the enemy. I spared a fleeting thought for what he was going through back there – with Major Bryant and Grant locking horns over command, and Colonel Gibson very likely inbound on a helo to bang heads together.

  As I glanced forward at the smoke-enshrouded huts, I knew for sure where I’d rather be – out here on a hunter patrol.

  I tapped Steve B on the shoulder and signalled for him to follow me. I moved back past each man, gesturing for him to converge on me. I dropped to one knee in the centre of the patrol. The others closed in so we formed a tight circle with our faces practically touching. It was another of the joys of working in a small outfit like ours: you grew so close to the blokes that you knew instinctively what each was about, and you weren’t afraid of the intimacy.

  I broke the patrol down into two-man assault teams, giving each a number to better facilitate my orders. Glancing at the faces ranged around me, I could see the excitement burning in the blokes’ eyes.

  A lifetime of training, leading up to this moment.

  Let’s not let it go to our heads, lads.

  ‘Move silently into village,’ I whispered. ‘Assault Teams 1 and 2, move forwards under cover of fire base. AT 1, clear first building; once you’re done go firm, signal to AT 2 it’s clear; AT 2 move to clear second building. I’ll move in with AT 3 and 4, and so on. We’ll leapfrog across each other as we go, but all on my orders. Actions-on: SOP. Remember: weapons tight until we go loud.’

  SOP stood for standard operating procedure.

  I gave a final, searching look. ‘Understood?’

  I got nods of assent all around.

  One of the greatest dangers now was of a blue on blue – one of the teams getting ahead of itself, and getting mistaken for the enemy. I needed to grip the lads, and keep it smooth, tight and controlled.

  ‘Okay, AT 1 – go.’

  It was deadly silent as the two blokes from AT 1 crept forward, threading their way between the trees. Two more blokes from AT 2 closed on their heels. We were now in Room Combat Mode, as opposed to Room Clearance Mode. Room Clearance is easy: you boot the door open, lob in the grenades, then open fire with max violence. You do that when you know for certain it is an enemy position.

  But we couldn’t be sure what this was, so we’d have to go in weapons at the ready and scanning the room for the bad guys. We’d go through the door with one weapon high moving right, and the other low sweeping left, to cover all angles. There could be women or children in there, or there could be rebel fighters or their injured. This was all about recognising the enemy before they got to open fire, and taking them out without killing any innocent bystanders.

  I saw AT 1 scuttle across the sunlit clearing that stretched from the edge of the forest to the first of the huts. They reached the doorway, one behind the other tight against the wall. The forward guy stepped out and slammed a boot into the door, then both guys were piling inside, weapons at the ready.

  Seconds later a head emerged. ‘Clear!’

  I signalled AT 2 forward to hit the next building. I moved forward at a low crouch, AT 3 and 4 at my heels, skirting by the GPMG gunners as we went. They had eyes-down their gun barrels and they didn’t so much as nod at our passing. I heard a punching crunch as AT 2 went through the door of hut two, and an instant later there came a cry.

  ‘Clear!’ A pause. ‘Ammunition! Blood!’

  We’d found ammo already, plus blood trails. It looked like the rebels were here, or at least they had been very recently. I came up against the doorway of the first hut, joining the lads of AT 1. We were out in the open, the blinding sun burning hot above the forest clearing. The adrenaline was pumping, the sweat pouring into my eyes and trickling down my back in rivulets.

  I glanced into hut one. It had a dark, damp, decaying feel to it. The roof was sagging with thatch that was semi-rotten. I didn’t think anyone had been living here. Maybe this was just some sort of jungle camp, one where those gathering food or timber could temporarily shelter. It couldn’t be a rebel base. That was inconceivable – not this close to the village. The chief of Lungi Lol would have known and he would have warned us.

  Moving up to hut two I signalled to the next building: ‘AT 3 – go!’ I glanced through the doorway of hut two. Inside were several crates of what looked like AK47 rounds, plus belts of 7.62 mm ammo for their machine guns. Plus blood. Lots and lots and lots of it. In fact, it was like a charnel house in there.

  I tried to get inside the rebels’ heads; to imagine what sequence of events could have brought them here. From the blood trails in Fern Gully and the pools at the forest edge, I figured they’d retreated with their wounded that way, getting out of our line of fire. They’d moved through the forest heading east, and maybe paused at these huts to tend to their injured and take on water.

  A lot of rebels had been bleeding profusely in this hut, so maybe they’d triaged their injured here – assessing who could be treated and saved, and who was beyond help. But if that was the case, where were the bodies of the dead? I searched with my eyes for any rebel fighters who had bled to death here, but there wasn’t a single corpse.

  It didn’t make any sense.

  Where were the rebels?

  Where were their dead and their injured?

  You didn’t get blokes bleeding like this and surviving, especially not when you were in the jungle, presumably with no trained medics, no medical supplies and certainly no hospitals. So where were their dying and their dead? It was a total mystery. The only way to solve it was to keep going, and track them to wherever they had gone to ground.

  They couldn’t be far now.

  Blokes bleeding profusely can’t move far or fast, if at all.

  As I moved on to the next hut, I reminded myself that an animal is at its most dangerous when it is injured. Human beings are basically animals – it’s just that we have a thin venee
r of civilisation laid over us. I urged the lads to remain ultra-alert, then sent them forward to hit the next building.

  We pressed on through the clearing. In the very centre we came to a two-metre-wide fire-pit scooped out of the ground. The logs were still smoking and cooking pots were clustered all around it. There were tree stump seats to either side, plus a metal A-frame structure over the fire, for hanging pots. The smell of burning hung heavy in the air, with shafts of sunlight lancing through the lazy smoke.

  Around the outskirts of the fire-pit was dark, hard-packed mud criss-crossed with footprints. Plus there was one massive, smoke-blackened cauldron lying on some hot coals. It was about three times the size of the one in which Nathe had brewed up his balti specials. In fact, it was so large you could have packed it with enough snails and fungi to feed the entire village of Lungi Lol.

  Or you could have brewed up a dose of voodoo medicine large enough to ‘treat’ an entire rebel army. Back in Freetown we’d been briefed on how rebel fighters would bathe in a vat of voodoo medicine up to the neck prior to battle. It was via the total immersion method that you supposedly made yourself ‘bulletproof’. Well, from all the blood I’d seen so far, they’d sure got the recipe wrong this time.

  I placed my hand inside one of the smaller cooking pots and felt the remains of the food. It was still warm.

  Where were the rebels?

  Between the fire-pit and the far end of the settlement was eighty metres or so of open ground. I sent my teams pepper-potting across it. In the very centre was a huge pool of blood and body splatter, as if the wounded had been piled up there to die.

  But where were the bodies?

  We’d got all of the remaining huts cleared within ten minutes flat. More blood was found, plus piles of link ammo for the rebels’ machine guns, and AK47 magazines. But still there were no wounded, nor any corpses – let alone any live enemy.