The Madmen of Benghazi

by Gérard de Villiers

  Cynthia seemed impressed by what she saw.

  “Is it true that Qaddafi nearly destroyed the city?” she asked.

  “Yes, and he would have succeeded if NATO hadn’t taken action.”

  They drove around the lagoon—23rd July Lake—on Algeria Street to the Ouzou. Ted took the turnoff to the hotel, which was set back from the street and guarded by a checkpoint manned by thwars under a big umbrella with the black, green, and red Libyan flag.

  To deter car bombs, vehicles were first given a cursory inspection, then shunted off to a parking garage.

  Malko left Cynthia and the Americans in the garage and went into the hotel.

  He very much hoped he could find Manuela Esteban.

  The alarm on the metal detector at the lobby entrance beeped continuously under the indifferent gaze of the rebels manning it. It was more symbolic than anything else. The Ouzou housed most of the journalists in Benghazi, and their gear was constantly setting off the alarm, coming and going.

  Malko walked over to the front desk, where the smiling Libyan clerk spoke only Arabic and had no idea what Malko wanted. He realized that the name Manuela Esteban alone wouldn’t be enough to find Farnborough’s friend.

  A dozen hotel guests, men mostly, were sitting in the lobby’s leather armchairs, so Malko started making the rounds.

  At the fourth chair, he found what he was looking for: a reporter who knew Esteban.

  “She went to Ra’s Lanuf for two days, to teach mine-clearing classes,” the man said. “Otherwise, she’s in Room 315. She’s very short. You can’t miss her.”

  Malko thanked him and left the hotel. He would just have to be patient.

  “We’re going home,” he told Ted when he reached the Cherokee.

  Leaving the hotel, they took Urubah Road south toward the First Ring Road.

  Before they’d gone a hundred yards, Ted announced calmly:

  “We’re being followed, sir. An armed pickup is trying to catch up with us.”

  Malko turned around and saw a twin-barreled gun mount in the pickup’s bed. The guns weren’t firing, but for some reason, he felt threatened. There were several men inside and in the back of the truck.

  Ted accelerated.

  Two hundred yards farther, they reached the junction with the First Ring Road. Seeing a second armed pickup parked by the side of the road, Ted cursed. The moment it spotted the Cherokee, it pulled out and stopped, blocking the roadway. Malko could see its cannons swinging around to bear. The moment they passed in front of them, the guns would riddle their vehicle.

  “Shit, shit, shit!” Ted swore.

  Instead of turning, he continued south on Urubah Road.

  The first pickup was still behind them, apparently holding its fire until they were in an area without any houses. The Marine in the backseat was feverishly talking into his radio.

  “We’ve got to lose them!” said Malko.

  They had to be Abu Bukatalla’s men and had probably been following them ever since they left the base. The Cherokee sped up and gained some ground on the pickup. They were racing due south and soon found themselves in open desert, between stretches of unfinished buildings.

  “We’re on the Brega highway,” Ted announced.

  The pickup truck was still behind them but wasn’t gaining.

  “What happened here?” asked Cynthia, pointing to a gutted troop transport lying by the right side of the road. It had been hit by a missile.

  “NATO planes,” said Ted tersely. “Nice work.”

  A mile farther, a T-72 tank, its treads blown off, was permanently parked under a tree. Both sides of the highway along here were littered with the hulks of tanks and armored vehicles, their turrets and treads destroyed and their flanks pierced.

  There couldn’t have been many survivors. This was the road on which NATO planes had destroyed the armored column that Qaddafi sent to attack Benghazi in February. On such completely flat terrain, without so much as a cactus, even a novice pilot could hit a tank with an air-to-ground missile.

  Particularly since the armored vehicles had no antiaircraft defense.

  The rusting metal carcasses, emblazoned with vengeful slogans, stretched for a dozen miles. If the armored column had reached Benghazi, it would have made quick work of the pickup trucks with their machine guns and light cannons.

  In front of the Cherokee, the road toward Ajdabiya and Ra’s Lanuf ran south to the horizon.

  Malko turned around. The pickup was still on their tail.

  “Where are we going?” asked Cynthia, who hadn’t noticed anything amiss.

  Malko didn’t have time to answer her. He had just seen orange flames spitting from the pickup’s twin cannons. Now that there weren’t any more houses nearby, it was attacking.

  A dull thud shook the Cherokee. A shell had knocked something from the back of the SUV. Other shells ricocheted off the pavement, kicking up chunks of asphalt.

  Cynthia screamed, and Ted accelerated even more. They were driving faster than the pickup, but nothing can outrun a 23 mm shell. Malko looked around: nothing but desert as far as the eye could see. They had about as much chance of escaping the pickup’s weapons as Qaddafi’s armored vehicles had of escaping the NATO fighter planes.

  “They’re shooting at us!” Cynthia screamed.

  Luckily, the rebel pickup was being jolted by the highway’s many potholes and had trouble taking aim. But if just one shell hit the Cherokee squarely, they would all be dead.

  Frowning, Ted turned to Malko. In a level voice, he said, “We’re running out of gas, sir.”

  A fresh volley of cannon fire sent chunks of pavement skittering left of the Cherokee, and Ted involuntarily swerved.

  Cynthia screamed again.

  Malko’s mind was racing, but it wasn’t producing any solutions. Death was very close now. If their Cherokee ran out of gas, it would be a sitting duck. Even if it didn’t, the 23 mm shells would get them sooner or later.

  Ted had the pedal to the floor, but they still weren’t moving fast enough to get out of range.

  Suddenly Malko noticed a group of rusting armored vehicles on the stony desert off to the right, including a big self-propelled howitzer. Its tank tracks had been blown off, and its impressive 155 mm cannon would never fire again. But the howitzer itself wasn’t damaged; it had just lost its tracks and later been looted. Its armored sides were covered with inscriptions in Arabic.

  The sight of a square hatch on the turret gave Malko an idea. He turned to Ted and yelled, “Head for that howitzer over on the right.”

  A dirt road ran perpendicular to the highway, and the special-ops leader swerved onto it, then raced toward the howitzer. He drove around behind it and stopped. The rebels’ pickup truck was still on the highway, but was sure to follow.

  Malko got out, leading Cynthia by the hand. Ted and the Marine jumped out, Uzis at the ready. The howitzer’s bulk shielded them from fire from the pickup.

  Malko pushed the young woman toward the square hatch.

  “Quick, get inside!”

  He helped her climb the side of the howitzer, and she crawled through the hatch. Malko shoved her down inside, then followed. The stench in the crew quarters was nauseating. At almost the same moment they heard the boom-boom-boom of the 23 mm cannons, they felt the shells’ impact on the tank’s heavy armor.

  The two Americans dove in headfirst. There was nothing left of the howitzer but the steel walls and the cannon’s breech. Everything else had been stripped.

  Ted handed Malko an Uzi with a magazine in place.

  “You take care of those tangos!” he shouted. “I’ll call the cavalry.”

  A volley of detonations could be heard outside. The pickup had taken up position on the dirt road and was firing at them steadily.

  But the 23 mm shells were completely ineffective against the howitzer’s armor. They crumpled against the steel plate or ricocheted off it like tennis balls. Malko stood by one of the hatches, observing the pickup. Its driv
er realized his guns were having no effect on the enormous howitzer, so he pulled forward to better aim at the hatches.

  Malko waited, then fired a short burst with the Uzi, hitting the front of the pickup. It quickly backed away, then resumed its pointless firing.

  Ted had been yelling into his radio. When he hung up, he said to Malko, “They’re coming with an RPG. Gonna blow those bastards away!”

  “How long will it take them?”

  “Quarter of an hour, at least.”

  A long time.

  Malko risked a look outside and saw several men with AK-47s jump from the pickup and advance toward the motionless howitzer.

  He waited until the rebels had covered half the distance before opening fire. One man fell and the others precipitously retreated. Out in the open without any cover, they were particularly vulnerable. Ted joined in, firing several short bursts with a second Uzi.

  Another thwar fell.

  The others came back and dragged their wounded to the pickup. The man operating the twin-barreled gun continued to waste ammo plinking at the howitzer.

  The men in the pickup clearly hadn’t expected this tactic.

  Suddenly Ted gave a happy yell:

  “They’re pulling out!”

  It was true. As soon as the two wounded rebels were loaded onto the pickup’s bed, it drove away.

  Malko looked at his watch. Less than five minutes had passed since they took shelter in the armored vehicle.

  At the bottom of the compartment, Cynthia sat huddled against the steel wall, sobbing convulsively.

  Malko knelt down next to her.

  “Everything’s going to be okay,” he said quietly.

  The pickup truck was now out of sight, but it could be stopped farther down the road, lying in wait.

  Ted got back on the radio to guide his men. A civilian car passed on the dirt road, apparently without noticing anything amiss. About ten minutes later, two white Cherokees appeared on the Brega highway. They skidded onto the dirt road like Le Mans racers and slammed to a stop next to the howitzer’s barrel.

  Seven men burst from the vehicles wearing helmets and bulletproof vests and carrying M16s with grenade launchers. The last man out carried a loaded RPG-7 and a canvas backpack with three spare grenades.

  Ted, Malko, and the Marine climbed out of the howitzer, glad to be breathing fresh air after the stench inside.

  “Where are the bandits?” asked the man with the RPG.

  “Didn’t you see them on the highway?”

  “No. They must have turned off somewhere.”

  “Okay, let’s move out,” said Ted. “You lead, we’ll follow, and Max is the drag.”

  That’s when Malko noticed the big American flags mounted on poles on the backs of the two vehicles.

  “It’s good insurance,” Ted said with a grin. “If somebody shoots at us, it’s an act of war, ’cause we’re NTC allies. I call in a NATO air strike and pulverize them.”

  Very effective.

  They were getting into their vehicles when Malko suddenly yelped, “Cynthia!”

  He’d forgotten she was still inside the howitzer.

  He went over and stuck his head down the hatch.

  “Cynthia?”

  She didn’t answer right away. Then she said, “What’s going on? I’m scared.”

  “They’re gone,” Malko assured her.

  She eventually began to move, and he was able to take her hand and haul her out. She was absolutely terrified, shaking all over. She let him push her into the Cherokee, and she collapsed on the seat looking haggard and in shock.

  The little convoy started up, flags flying.

  A few miles down the road they saw a checkpoint on the right that they hadn’t noticed before. The rebels manning it waved at them joyously. In his enthusiasm, one fired an AK volley into the air.

  Cynthia screamed and grabbed for Malko.

  “They’re not shooting at us,” he said reassuringly.

  They continued driving at top speed, with people often waving as they passed, applauding the American flag.

  Benghazi was a friendly city—it just wasn’t all that safe.

  They pulled into the CIA base a half hour later. Cynthia was dead on her feet and had to be helped out of the car. When Malko got her to their room, she collapsed on the bed. The Chadian woman named Aya heard the noise and silently appeared.

  “She’s in shock,” Malko told her. “Run her a bath, then try to find her a sleeping pill.”

  He grabbed his Thuraya and ran out onto the lawn. He absolutely had to talk to Jerry Tombstone and coordinate what to do next.

  “We’ve got to extract Ibrahim as fast as possible,” the CIA chief said decisively. “We don’t know how soon we’ll be able to get to Abu Bukatalla.”

  “How do we do it?” asked Malko.

  There was a silence on the line, then Tombstone said, “We absolutely have to contact him. Here’s his sat phone number: +8787 72394053. Call him. Better yet, have Cynthia Mulligan call him.”

  “What if the Thuraya isn’t turned on?”

  “It has voice mail. She can leave a message to call her back on your Thuraya.”

  “He’ll be furious when he calls back,” remarked Malko. “He thinks she’s still in Cairo, somewhere.”

  “That’s just too bad. It’s the only sure way of reaching him. Anyway, Ibrahim will be so happy to hear his sweetheart’s voice, he’ll swallow her lies.”

  “There are an awful lot of them.”

  “She can make up some sort of fairy tale. The main thing is to get him out of where he is and move him to safety.”

  “Here?”

  “Maybe. I’ll ask Langley for instructions.”

  “Fine, I’ll start the ball rolling. I just hope Ibrahim doesn’t blow up in our faces.”

  “It shouldn’t keep you from continuing to track Abu Bukatalla,” said Tombstone.

  “There’s nothing I can do until Manuela Esteban gets back.” Their conversation over, Malko went to the bedroom. Aya was tucking an unconscious Cynthia under the covers.

  “She didn’t take a bath,” said the Chadian. “Too tired. I gave her a sleeping pill.”

  Malko leaned over the young woman and tried to wake her, in vain. No response. Between the sleeping pill and her fright, Cynthia was out of commission for the time being. She would have to be conscious before she could call her lover.

  Standing behind the shutters, Ibrahim al-Senussi cocked an ear every time he heard traffic on al-Sharif Street. Whenever a car braked, his heart began to pound. But the cars never stopped. They just slowed, went through the intersection, and drove on.

  General Younes should have arrived more than an hour ago, as he’d promised on the phone. Al-Senussi had called the general’s cell a dozen times, but it went immediately to voice mail. Feeling increasingly concerned, he went downstairs to consult the two militiamen guarding the house, but they didn’t know anything.

  Something had happened.

  Now al-Senussi was pacing, feeling more and more worried. The meeting with Younes was the whole point of his trip to Libya.

  He tried to call Abu Bukatalla, but without success.

  To make things worse, his air conditioner had broken down, and the heat in the little room was unbearable.

  If General Younes wasn’t there by morning, he decided, he would call the MI6 agent in Benghazi. His name was Peter, and Ibrahim had his phone number.

  General Abdul Fatah Younes was dozing, supported by his seat belt, his head on the headrest. Since Ra’s Lanuf, they had driven more than two hundred miles on a boringly straight road.

  Next to him, his driver was having trouble keeping his eyes open. In the back, the two colonels accompanying the general were sound asleep.

  The NTC chief of staff normally traveled with a more impressive escort: a dozen heavily armed pickups driven by men whose loyalty he could rely on. But for this meeting with King Idris’s grandson, Younes had opted for discretion. As soon as h
e picked Ibrahim al-Senussi up, he would take him to one of his tribe’s properties outside Benghazi. It would be a safe place for them to hold their discussions.

  Younes was wearing a camouflage uniform with his service medals and the red collar insignia indicating his rank. An impressive-looking man, he had an energetic face, a strong nose, and a shock of gray hair.

  The car suddenly slowed, and Younes opened his eyes. There were lights on the road up ahead, though they hadn’t yet reached downtown Benghazi. He could make out an armored vehicle positioned across the highway, its barrel pointed in his direction. There was no way around it.

  His driver stopped, and the two colonels woke up.

  The car was immediately surrounded by armed men wearing full beards and ragtag outfits.

  The driver rolled down his window.

  “Let us through,” he said angrily. “This is General Abdul Younes.”

  “We know that,” the nearest bearded man said smoothly. He put his hand on his heart. “Salaam alaikum! The NTC sent us to escort the general. You’ll be driving with us.”

  Younes was surprised.

  “Who sent you?” he asked.

  “The leader of the February 17 Brigade,” said the man, and walked away.

  The armored vehicle pulled back, and they drove on, now boxed in by a dozen pickups full of rebels ahead and behind.

  Puzzled and concerned, Younes took out his cell and called NTC president Mustafa Abdel-Jalil’s deputy on his direct line.

  The man said he had absolutely no idea what Younes was talking about. But that didn’t mean much, given the council’s usual disarray. He promised to check and call the general back.

  Younes hung up. His men were nearly two hundred miles away, in the south. It would take more than the two colonels, who were now wide awake, to protect him.

  Tensely, he looked out the window. Despite the darkness, he knew exactly where he was, recognizing a ruined building that stood at the junction with the Fifth Ring Road. But the convoy turned right, heading east. This absolutely wasn’t the direction of downtown, which was to the north.

  Now Younes was sure something was wrong. He picked up his folding Kalashnikov from the floor of the car, prepared to fight for his life.