Spider Shepherd: SAS: #1

by Stephen Leather

  Harry shrugged. ‘You’re right Dan, but if they waited until the F-16 was directly overhead, its early warning and counter-measures would be at their weakest. Anyway, however they did it, they got off two missiles. One missed but the other one broke the F-16 in half. The pilot did manage to eject but nothing’s been heard of him since. He may be lying up somewhere. USAF pilots are briefed that if they’re shot down, they are most likely to be captured if they radio for help too soon and give away their position to searching enemy forces so their SOPs are not to switch on their radios or survival beacons until two or three days have passed, to give the enemy searchers time to lose interest.’ He paused. ‘Anyway, seems like the gloves are finally coming off and the Serbs are going to get an awful lot more than they may have bargained for. Right, get your kit together, we’ll need to be on our way sharpish, so briefing and work-up training are going to be short and sharp. Because of the time constraints we’ll not be able to convert on to new weapons and, although I would have much preferred that the patrol was armed with Armalites or even AK-74’s, we’re going to take the SA-80 which the non-SAS guys are familiar with. We’re all going to be carrying the same weapon, because the ammo is interchangeable and since you’re all well versed in the SA-80, I’m assuming that you should all be confident that you can hit the arse end of an elephant at twenty paces if I ask you to. Diesel and I will also be carrying M-79 grenade launchers.’

  They spent the rest of the day test-firing their weapons, and practising drills for immediate action, anti-ambush, escape and evasion and a series of rendezvous drills. Harry outlined their task and briefed them on their individual roles, and then glanced at his watch before adding ‘Right, wagons roll. We’ll finish briefing it in the back of the truck on the way to Sarajevo.’

  They piled into the truck with Shepherd wearing his full camouflage uniform, complete with red beret. Harry took one look at his beret and told him to take it off and said put it in his bergen.

  ‘But we always wear our berets,’ Shepherd said.

  ‘No doubt, but you’re not with the Paras now. We don’t wear anything that shows people who we are. We keep the enemy guessing because usually what they surmise is more scary than the reality!’

  ‘And trust me,’ Diesel said, with a wink, ‘the reality is scary enough. Harry can knock an enemy out at fifty paces just with his armpits and his breath. Isn’t that right, Harry?’

  ‘True enough,’ said Harry. He grinned. ‘Mind you when Diesel farts, he can clear an area twice as big. The only trouble is his farts don’t discriminate between friend and foe, so you’ve got to watch out for friendly fire.’

  Shepherd took off his beret and stashed it in his bergen. Harry carried on briefing them as they bounced and jolted over the rough dirt roads towards the capital. ‘As you’re fresh off the boat, Gus,’ Harry said, ‘here’s a little potted history for you. The regular Serb forces here are being aided and abetted by several hundred Russian volunteers - so-called volunteers anyway - and by Serbian police and paramilitaries, or death squads to give them another name. One group, known as the Scorpions, were run by the Serbian Interior Ministry until the end of the Cold War, and they’re still around now. They operate as freelance killers, and are about as nasty a bunch of mass-murderers as you could ever hope to meet.’

  He glanced at Shepherd. ‘You’ve been on the ground here a fair bit, Dan. Anything to add?’

  Shepherd nodded. ‘Just that the local Serb population also tend to help out the Scorpions and the other Serb forces, by informing on their neighbours and often by taking part in any theft, rape, beating and killing that’s going, and there’s usually plenty of those. The Serbs target a town or village, wipe out the defenders and then carry out what’s become their trademark SOP: the houses and apartments of the Bosnian Muslims are looted and then torched, the civilians are rounded up and herded together, and the men separated from the women. The men are beaten if they’re lucky, but many are killed, and many more are thrown into prison camps under appalling conditions. There have also been allegations of large-scale massacres - in fact, Europe has seen nothing to compare with it since the Nazis. The Bosnian women are also herded into detention centres where they have to endure the worst kind of abuses. Many are routinely raped by their jailers, but squads of Serb soldiers and police also visit the detention centres and select women who are then dragged out and repeatedly raped. It’s a bloody nightmare, And meanwhile the governments of Europe all sit on their hands and do nothing to stop it,’ he said, his fists clenching involuntarily.

  ‘We’re here, aren’t we?’ Diesel said.

  ‘Yes, but with one hand tied behind our backs,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Mine aren’t,’ Harry said, with a chilling smile. ‘Dan’s right. The politicians have fucked this up big-time. Anyway, the Serbs repeatedly tried to capture Sarajevo but they were driven back every time and instead, beginning in May 1992, they’ve laid siege to the city. They established a total blockade, blocking the roads, cutting off all supplies of food and medicine, and severing the water mains, the electricity cables and telephone lines. There are about 12,000 Serbs dug in on the surrounding hills and pouring down fire pretty much non-stop. The Bosnian forces trapped in the city actually outnumber the Serbs by a factor of three or four but they are very poorly equipped, lacking heavy weapons and often even ammo for their small arms. Most of what they have, including the materials to make IEDs, their main offensive weapon against the Serbs, they’ve had to buy on the black market from people smuggling arms through the Serb lines. However as the main sources of supply of weapons thus far have been criminal gangs - the Bosnian Mafia if you like - the price is pretty high and the quality pretty dubious.

  ‘They’re also fighting uphill against a well-entrenched enemy force equipped with rocket launchers, heavy machine guns, anti-aircraft guns, artillery, mortars and even tanks. You don’t need a doctorate in military history to know that that’s a pretty bad idea. The city is under continual bombardment from a couple of hundred gun emplacements and bunkers set all around the ridge lines and the surrounding hills. The siege has already lasted twice as long as the Siege of Stalingrad and shows no sign of ending any time soon. The Serbs have already been raining down shells and sniper fire on the poor bastards trapped here for over two years, though it’s usually their Russian friends doing the sniping. They’re raping, robbing and murdering with impunity as well, so if we can finally even up the odds with a little air support, so much the better.’

  ‘It’s just a shame it had to take a Yank pilot getting shot down before our political masters decide to send us in,’ Diesel said. ‘What sort of message does that send? That one American pilot is worth a thousand civilians?’

  ‘What about the UN forces?’ the signaller asked, earning a burst of derisive laughter for his pains.

  ‘UNPROFOR?’ Harry said. ‘United Nations Protection Force? Don’t make me laugh. The Serbs take them hostages and use them as human shields, and they also steal their uniforms and then use them to hijack UN convoys and weapons. Just last month Serbs disguised as French troops, complete with stolen French uniforms, flak jackets, helmets and weapons, and driving a hijacked French armoured personnel carrier, captured another dozen UN troops without firing a shot. Two are now being used as human shields, the rest have simply disappeared and, given the Serbs’ previous record, their fate is easy to predict. So that’s the UN forces and as for the Bosnian army, the only thing that they have managed to achieve is to dig the Sarajevo Tunnel.’

  ‘Which is what?’ Shepherd asked, intrigued.

  ‘The only way in or out of Sarajevo. It links the Dobrinja district inside the besieged city, with Butmir, a territory that the Bosnians still hold on the far side of Sarajevo Airport. As you know, apart from Camp Pegasus, the airport itself is neutral ground and supposedly under the control of the United Nations forces. The Bosnians couldn’t use heavy equipment to dig the tunnel because the activity might have alerted the Serbs, but in any case the
re is virtually no intact heavy equipment behind the Bosnian lines, so instead the entire tunnel was dug by hand, with picks and shovels and wheelbarrows. Most of the labour was supplied by the army though civilians helped. They were paid for their labour, a daily rate of one packet of cigarettes because the paper currency is pretty much worthless.’

  ‘The notes make good bog paper though,’ Diesel said with a grin. ‘Nice and soft with none of those tiny metal security strips to rip your arse to shreds.’

  ‘But unfortunately it doesn’t muffle the sound of Diesel talking through his arse,’ Harry said. ‘The Serb siege and the constant shelling of the city have disrupted supplies of almost every commodity so the tunnel is used to keep the Bosnians supplied with food, water, medicines, fuel, alcohol, cigarettes, even newspapers. The tunnel is also used to bypass the UN controls and the international arms embargo and supply the Bosnian forces in the city with weapons and ammunition, and it even has an oil pipeline and electricity cables laid in it. Of course it’s also used by people, though as usual here, bribery and corruption mean that anyone using the tunnel, whether entering or leaving the city, has to have a permit issued by the Bosnian army who are guarding the entrances at both ends of the tunnel. And charmingly, they make their own countrymen fleeing the shelling and killing pay a fortune to escape. I’ve heard of civilians having to pay over one hundred dollars - more than most people here earn in a year - to get themselves and their families through the tunnel. The President of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina also used it to make his escape as the siege tightened but unlike his subjects, he didn’t have to dirty his patent leather shoes, apparently, because he was carried through the tunnel on a chair.’

  ‘They made the refugees pay to leave?’ asked Shepherd.

  ‘Yeah, their own people,’ said Harry. ‘They should be ashamed of themselves, but…’ He shrugged. ‘Let’s just say wars don’t tend to bring out the best in people.’ He shook his head sadly before continuing. ‘Parts of the tunnel run close to the surface, so it’s more of a covered trench than a tunnel for part of the way, but it also runs right underneath the airport runway and for obvious reasons it’s much deeper - about five metres down - under the runway. Oh and a couple more things: there’s no ventilation and the air is apparently so foul in the middle that we need to use breathing masks, and it’s also subject to flooding, so bring your water wings if it looks like rain. However, at least that may help to deal with the other problem.’

  ‘Which is?’ Spud said, eyeing him suspiciously.

  ‘It’s crawling with rats, apparently.’

  ‘So where is it?’ Shepherd said, as the truck lurched to a halt a hundred yards short of the airport perimeter fence.

  ‘You’re looking at it,’ Harry said, gesturing at a drab house, one of a row of a dozen or so standing just outside the fence. The only clue that one of them contained something of value was the ring of trenches, manned by Bosnian soldiers, that encircled the houses and the muddy ruts and potholes that hundreds of vehicles and thousands of feet had worn in the dirt road and across the waste ground surrounding them.

  ‘That’ll be our guide,’ Harry said, as a Bosnian wearing filthy blue jeans and a combat jacket and carrying a Kalashnikov emerged from the doorway of one of the houses and beckoned to them. ‘I’m Ibrahim,’ he said, ‘but everyone calls me Ibro.’ Shepherd studied him with interest. His eyes, so dark that they looked almost black, made a vivid contrast to his face which was as pale as if he had spent years underground. ‘There are no suntans in Sarajevo, my friend,’ Ibro said, intercepting Shepherd’s look. ‘We are all nocturnal here, or those of us who wish to stay alive anyway.’

  He led them to the third house in the row. From the outside it appeared no different than its neighbours but as they reached the doorway they saw that it had been completely gutted inside, leaving an empty shell with walls and ceilings reinforced with concrete and steel girders. A ramp just inside the door led down into a dark opening barely wide enough for two men to pass each other.

  Four Bosnian soldiers lounging against the walls gave them a suspicious look but made no effort to stop them as Ibro led them into the tunnel. He took a breathing mask from a row hanging on nails driven into the walls at the mouth of the tunnel and gestured for the soldiers to do the same. Carrying the laser target designator between them, Shepherd and Gus the ammunition technician struggled into the tunnel. Even through the mask, the air Shepherd breathed was stale and the mildewed stench made him want to gag. The walls to either side were stained with mould and slime and he heard the steady drip of water somewhere ahead of them.

  A rudimentary system of lamps spaced at irregular intervals cast pools of yellow light onto the ground, giving just enough light for them to see their way. The tunnel was cut through solid rock, the marks made by the picks that had dug it clearly visible in the walls. Iron supports had been used to reinforce the first section, their surfaces streaked with orange rust, but the Bosnians must have run out of iron and steel beams, for the remainder of it was shored up with a motley assortment of wooden props. ‘My dad was a miner,’ Diesel said, his voice muffled by his face-mask. ‘He would not have been impressed with those pit props.’

  Thin metal rails had been laid in the floor of the tunnel, suggesting that a primitive railway was used to transport goods but there was no sign of any carts or trucks and Shepherd resigned himself to having to carry the LTD marker all the way into the city. The tunnel was only five foot three inches high and Shepherd, who was more than six inches taller than that, had to duck down to avoid cracking his head on the roof.

  The strain of carrying a heavy weight while bending over meant he was mightily relieved to see the glow of light that at last signalled the end of the tunnel ahead. They emerged in the underground garage of one of the city’s shell-battered apartment buildings. Shepherd and Gus set the LTD marker down with sighs of relief. Ibro beckoned them towards a grating set high in the wall, which offered them their first view of Sarajevo. ‘Welcome to our beautiful city,’ he said with a bitter laugh.

  Just outside the building, Shepherd could see more trenches manned by Bosnian troops. Beyond them, as far as the eye could see, there was not a single undamaged building. The years of shelling had reduced almost all of the houses to rubble, and though some of the Soviet era apartment blocks still stood, they had been reduced to skeletons, with their reinforced concrete pillars supporting only empty space. One gable end still stood but it was so pitted by small arms fire, and so pierced and shattered by shelling that it looked more like filigree than concrete. They could hear the constant rumble of mortars and artillery in the distance and every now and again the crash and thud of a round impacting in the surrounding streets.

  ‘What now?’ Harry said.

  ‘Now we wait for nightfall, my friend. Nothing moves here by day, but at night the city comes alive.’

  They made themselves as comfortable as they could. Diesel and Spud, like soldiers of the world over, snatched the chance to close their eyes and catnap, but Harry remained alert, conferring with Ibro in whispers. Shepherd kept staring out into the darkening streets. A few men came and went through the tunnel, each one, like Ibro, as pale as a ghost. The traffic increased as night fell.

  At last, at a word from Ibro, Harry roused his men and Ibro led them out into the street. They moved slowly, picking their way through a morass of rubble and shell craters. Even though the front and back walls of almost every apartment building they passed had been blown out and shell holes in the roof and upper floors had left them half open to the elements, Shepherd could glimpse people still living in them, like troglodytes in their caves. Using whatever wood they had managed to scavenge despite the risks from snipers, several had lit small fires set in the middle of what might once have been their living room floors. The glow of those small fires and the flickering light of an occasional candle was the only illumination in the whole of the city, for every street light had been shattered and the night sky was moonles
s and overcast.

  Shepherd and the others used their PNGs - Passive Night Goggles - but though Ibro had none, he seemed as keen-eyed and sure-footed as a cat in the darkness as he led them on through the streets, making for the outskirts.

  The shelled and burnt out wrecks of four cars littered one street, one of them blown onto its side by the blast that had destroyed it and, from the reddish-brown stains of dried blood that were still visible on the dashboard and the inside of the door, had also killed its occupants. The seats had been taken, probably for use as makeshift furniture by some of those living in the bombed-out wrecks of buildings. The doors, boot lid and bonnet of another wrecked car had been converted by one desperate family into a sort of steel igloo, erected in a patch of scrubby, weed-strewn ground that seemed to have escaped the worst of the shelling. A woman squatted cross-legged in the entrance, holding a small child to her breast, while two others sat in the dust at her feet. Her eyes met Shepherd’s for a brief moment. He had never seen such a look of utter, blank desolation on a human face before and he looked away, embarrassed.

  ‘See those?’ Ibro said, pointing to a strange pattern of red marks on the ground in front of them.

  Shepherd grimaced. ‘They look like bloodstains.’

  Ibro nodded. ‘We call them “Sarajevo Roses”. They mark the places where people have been killed by Serb mortar fire. Mortar rounds landing on concrete make a fragmentation pattern that looks a bit like the scattered petals of a rose. Those of us who are left stain them with paint or red resin as a memorial to those who were killed, and as a reminder to ourselves and others of what the Serbs have done to us.’ He waved his arm around. ‘ You’ll see hundreds, maybe even thousands of them around the city. Each mortar round kills or wounds one or two more people, and often many more than that. A dozen people were killed and 130 wounded when a mortar shell exploded among people watching a football match a few weeks ago, and another dozen were killed a few days later while they were queueing for drinking water. Water has been scarce from the start, because the first thing the Serbs did when they besieged the city was to sever the pipes that brought water into the city from the reservoirs in the hills. The worst massacre of all was when a mortar shell hit the Markale market.’ A shadow passed over his face. ‘Seventy were killed that day and more than twice that number were seriously wounded. Among the dead were my wife and son.’