The American Mission

by Matthew Palmer

  • • •

  When they woke, the sky was already gray and Marie set about supervising the loading of her modest flotilla. Most of the rifles and small-caliber machine guns were stowed on the Nkongolo. A few motorbikes and ATVs were driven onto one of the barges and parked alongside three plastic boxes the size of footlockers with heavy latches. These were the shoulder-fired Igla missiles that Marie hoped would save her village.

  Standing on one of the barges, Marie watched as Alex and a young Hammer of God guerilla mounted a .30-caliber machine gun on the Nkongolo’s rear gunwale, transforming the vessel—as far as she was concerned—from a humble fishing boat into the flagship of the Busu-Mouli navy. Thick planks served as a loading ramp for the barge. When he had finished mounting the gun, Alex hopped off the Nkongolo and walked over to the barge with an easy and confident stride. She liked the way he walked. The American paused at the bottom of the ramp and gave her a lighthearted salute.

  “Permission to come aboard, Admiral?” he asked.

  “Another job title? I’m going to have to update my résumé.”

  The trip back was uneventful. Even fully loaded, they made considerably better time traveling downstream. It was midafternoon when they reached Busu-Mouli, and Manamakimba wasted little time in getting to work. They had less than thirty-six hours to prepare for the attack. The efficiency and discipline of the Hammer of God was impressive. At first, Jean-Baptiste betrayed a degree of resentment at having been displaced as the head of Busu-Mouli’s armed forces, such as they had been. Even Jean-Baptiste had to admit, however, that the newcomers brought weaponry and practical battle experience that he could not hope to match. Soon enough, he had installed himself as Manamakimba’s chief lieutenant and the guerilla leader was politically savvy enough to let him do so. Together they directed the farmers and villagers as they dug trenches and fortified firing positions.

  The Igla missiles were most effective if they had some elevation. The Hammer ordered his soldiers to build platforms on the roofs of three houses in different parts of the village and posted two-man teams at each site. One man served as the spotter and loader. The second was the shooter. All three teams knew their business. They had three tubes with two spare rounds for each. The equipment was elderly, however, and the soldiers had neither the training nor the tools to do even routine maintenance. Some of the rounds could turn out to be duds. It was even possible that they were all too old or worn-out to fire. In which case, Manamakimba observed philosophically, they were all likely to die.

  • • •

  By the night of the twenty-third, they had done everything possible to prepare. Marie waited behind the sandbag revetment near the well in the village square where Manamakimba had set up their command post. She had an AK-47 slung over her back. Most of the women and all of the children had taken shelter in the mine. A handful of women had taken up rifles and were prepared to fight for their village. As Chief, Marie would lead from the front, but Manamakimba had insisted that she accept a “Royal Guard” charged with her personal protection. One Hammer of God soldier and one village guardsman stood just behind her, pledged to protect their chief with their lives. Manamakimba had warned them that if Marie was hurt in the fighting, they had better be dead.

  Manamakimba asked Alex to take responsibility for battlefield intelligence. The Night Hawk scope offered another capability that the attackers did not expect. He posted Alex on one of the rooftop firing platforms, from which he had a commanding view of the tree line and clear sight lines for spotting the South African helicopters. He could communicate with Manamakimba via SMS text messages sent over the sat phones.

  The sky was cloudless and the half-moon cast a dim light on the village. Marie was pleased. It was enough light to aim by. A little after eleven, Manamakimba’s phone beeped and he showed Marie the terse message from Alex. “They’re here. Estimate one hundred men advancing from tree line to the north.”

  “Let them come,” Chief Tsiolo replied.

  • • •

  The genocidaires moved quickly toward the village, understanding from both instinct and experience that they were terribly exposed in the open field. The village promised shelter and safety. It was an illusion. When the lead elements of the genocidaires had nearly reached the village square, a white flare arced up from the command post, illuminating the invaders and signaling the defenders to open fire. The first fusillade from the entrenched positions was devastating. Hammer of God soldiers and village guardsmen fired from the rooftops and from shallow foxholes reinforced with sandbags. A score of genocidaires fell in the first few seconds. The others sought whatever cover they could and returned fire. The invaders still outnumbered the villagers, but the momentum was now with the defenders. For just a moment it seemed as if the genocidaires would break and retreat back into the jungle, but the Rwandans dug in and the fight became a brutal slog.

  Lacking any meaningful communication capacity, Manamakimba used the younger men and older boys as runners to carry messages to different groups of fighters and to bring back reports from the front lines. The picture was mixed. In places, they were driving the Rwandans back. In other parts of the fight, however, Hammer of God and village guard forces were pinned down by heavy fire.

  Fifteen minutes after the shooting began, a Busu-Mouli teenager, bloody and terrified, raced up to the command post from the northern skirmish line. He was breathing so hard from both exertion and panic that he could hardly speak. Marie remembered holding him in her arms on the day he was born.

  “Calm down,” she said gently. “Take a breath. Then give me your report.”

  “It’s Katanga,” the boy said, when he could speak. “He’s been shot. Jean-Baptiste is trying to defend the position, but there are too many of the enemy. He can’t hold on. He sent me back for reinforcements.”

  Marie looked at Manamakimba, who spread his hands helplessly.

  “There is no one left to send,” he said.

  “Yes, there is.” She turned to the soldiers who had been sworn to defend her. “Boys. You’re with me.”

  “Dulline,” Marie said to the teenage runner, “you must lead us to them.”

  The boy nodded.

  She did her best to ignore the icy ball of fear that seemed to have settled in her stomach. Marie was suddenly certain that she was leading these men to their deaths. She feared this responsibility, as she feared being measured against her father and found wanting. She shouldered her rifle.

  Young Dulline led Marie’s small unit back the way he had come, using the narrow alleyways of the village to keep as much cover between them and the shooting as possible. Abruptly, the buildings ended and Marie understood the challenge they faced. A .30-caliber machine gun was keeping the defenders pinned down. The villagers had just enough cover to keep the machine gun from tearing them to shreds, but they could not fire back effectively, and disciplined genocidaire fire teams were advancing under cover. The gun had to go. Marie pointed at her personal guard with the middle and index fingers of her right hand. Then she pointed at the machine gun.

  “We are going to kill those bloody bastards,” she said. “Are we clear?”

  “Yes, Chief,” the two responded.

  She turned to the Hammer of God soldier, an older man named François with a four-inch scar across one cheek. He was an experienced jungle fighter. Marie hoped he was a crafty one as well. “What do you suggest?”

  “Flank the position and kill the gunner and the loader. Then pin the rest between us and our men on the rise. Keep low.”

  Without further discussion, Marie started crawling forward to a spot where they could bring flanking fire onto the machine gun. François and his Busu-Mouli comrade were right behind her. Dulline was not far behind them. She was proud of the boy. Fifty meters of crawling gave them the angle they needed. On Marie’s signal, all four opened fire on the machine gun. The shooter and the loader collapsed
in a twitching heap.

  “Katanga, Jean-Baptiste!” Marie shouted over the din. “We’ve taken out the gun. Help us with the others.”

  Jean-Baptiste and two unwounded defenders popped up far enough to begin shooting at the Rwandan fire teams. Marie and her small team joined in, catching the invaders in the cross fire. They advanced toward Jean-Baptiste’s position.

  • • •

  Through the eerie green world of the Night Hawk scope, Alex watched Marie leave the relative safety of the command post and head toward the thick of the fighting. At high magnification, her face was clearly visible. A small knot of village guardsmen was defending a rise in the field that separated the village from the jungle. Rwandan genocidaires had cut off their line of retreat, and they were trapped there.

  Alex saw Marie take out the machine gun and begin the advance toward the small ridge. The action was some four hundred meters away, but the starlight scope brought it all up close and personal. Then Alex saw something that made his blood freeze. Five heavily armed Rwandans emerged from the trees behind Marie and dropped to the ground. Alex could see them moving on their bellies through the tall grass.

  “Marie!” he shouted uselessly. They were too far away and there was too much noise from the ongoing fighting for her to be able to hear. Without further thought, Alex jumped off the roof, gasping at the pain that ran up his injured side. Abandoning any attempt at stealth, he ran toward Marie, shouting her name. From ground level he could not see either Marie and her team or the Rwandans creeping up stealthily behind them. He could only imagine the worst as he weaved his way between buildings and concentrated on keeping his footing as he raced over the rocky ground. His rib cage screamed at him as he pushed himself to run faster.

  Without breaking stride, Alex slung his AK-47 off his back. The State Department had taught him to shoot in the two-day “crash and bang” course mandated for all diplomats going to high-threat posts, but he had minimal experience with the AK-47. Manamakimba had advised him to keep it on semiautomatic. Full auto burned through ammunition too quickly. To hell with Manamakimba’s advice. Alex thumbed the safety on to full auto. He rounded a corner at high speed and suddenly found himself completely exposed in the open field. The darkness saved him. The buildings behind him obscured his silhouette, while the Night Hawk afforded him a clear view of the battlefield in front of him.

  “Marie,” he shouted again. “Watch behind you.”

  She did not seem to hear him and Alex raised his rifle and started firing wildly in the general direction of the attackers, howling like a lunatic. He felt detached from the experience of battle, as if it were happening to someone else. Everything seemed to unfold in slow motion. Alex saw one of the attackers stand up and point a rifle in his direction, zeroing in on the muzzle flashes. He saw his own rounds traverse the target, dropping the Rwandan to the ground. That’s for Antoine, you son of a bitch. The defenders turned at the sound of the gunfire and were soon taking well-aimed shots at the attackers. Through the scope, Alex recognized Jean-Baptiste among the defenders.

  Alex continued his mad dash, reaching the attackers’ position at about the same moment that he ran out of ammunition. It had not taken more than fifteen seconds for him to burn through the entire clip. Maybe Manamakimba had a point. He still had the advantage of the Night Hawk. And he swung the assault rifle by the straps at the next genocidaire who tried to stand. Through luck more than skill, the heavy stock crashed into the man’s forehead and the Rwandan fell unconscious. The other invaders, who believed they were under attack by a much larger force, broke and ran for the jungle. Alex thought it was all over, but when he turned back toward Marie, he found himself nearly face-to-face with Innocent Ngoca. The genocidaire leader had his rifle leveled at Alex’s midsection. A malevolent smile played across his face. The green glow of the starlight scope made it look even more sinister, almost like a Halloween mask. For all practical purposes, Alex was already dead.

  Suddenly he was thrown to the ground and he could both hear and feel a hail of bullets flying over his head in both directions. Ngoca collapsed to the ground, but so did Jean-Baptiste, who had just saved Alex’s life by forcing him out of the line of fire. The leader of the village guard lay on his back a few feet from Alex. Blood dripped down one corner of his mouth and the bullet hole in his chest was making a horrifying sucking sound. Alex dropped his useless rifle and went to Jean-Baptiste’s assistance. It was quickly apparent even to Alex’s untrained eye that there was little that could be done for the guardsman. Jean-Baptiste knew it as well. He tried to speak, but could not. Instead he reached up and pressed the tips of his fingers to the circular scar on Alex’s chest. Then his hand fell limply to the ground.

  • • •

  A moment later, Marie knelt in the dirt next to Alex and put her hand on Jean-Baptiste’s bloody chest. Tears blurred her vision. She had not loved Jean-Baptiste the way he had loved her, but he had been her friend. The entire village would mourn him, assuming that they survived the night.

  Just then, she heard the distinctive thrumming sound of rotor blades. There were two deadly Rooivalks in the sky over the village. The navigation lights were lit, giving the helicopters the air of giant prehistoric insects. Red fingers of light, tracer fire, reached out from the twin chain guns mounted just under the canopy. Whatever the beams of light touched, they destroyed. Marie saw three Hammer of God fighters literally cut in half by the chain guns. Why didn’t the missile teams fire?

  Almost as soon as she was able to form the thought, she heard a waterfall-like roar and watched a bright white line arc into the sky from a nearby rooftop until it connected with one of the helicopters buzzing over the river. At first, the Igla seemed to have no effect on the Rooivalk, which turned its chain gun on the offending missile team, killing both men and shattering the platform from which Alex had been monitoring the battle just a few minutes before. Then the South African gunship slipped to the right and pitched backward. The chain guns fired their red tracers wildly into the sky. The Rooivalk spun once in a complete circle before dropping tail first into the river.

  Two more Igla missiles shot into the night sky, bracketing the other Rooivalk. The first missile narrowly missed the helicopter, but the second destroyed the back half of the tail. The gunship limped out of the fight with the pilot struggling to maintain flight stability. The helicopter dropped low to the river and flew off at speed.

  Disheartened by the loss of air support, the Rwandans started looking for their exit. Small groups of fighters broke and ran for the tree line, pursued by elements of the village guard and the Hammer of God. As many as half of the retreating genocidaires were shot in the back. Marie would gladly have shot them all.

  28

  JULY 24, 2009

  BUSU-MOULI

  On the day after the battle, Marie Tsiolo buried her dead. Busu-Mouli had survived the night, but at a terrible cost. Twenty-two villagers were dead and another nine injured, two of them so badly that they were likely to die. Marie knew every one of them. Some had been her playmates growing up. One had been her lover. Others had been mentors or teachers. Some were young enough that she had been a mentor or teacher to them. Those deaths were the hardest to bear. The Hammer of God had lost another eleven men and boys. Marie did not know their names, but she was their chief and she grieved for them. The invaders had lost even more. There were some fifty bodies scattered through the village and the surrounding fields. At least two more were entombed in their helicopter at the bottom of the Mongala River.

  The village cemetery was too small to accommodate all of the bodies. At Marie’s direction, Mputu and his sons organized work crews to gather the dead and dig their graves. Alex worked alongside Mputu, digging into the rich black earth with a dull spade.

  In her anger, Marie had wanted to dump the bodies of the Rwandans into the river or gather them in a pile and burn them. It was Manamakimba who dissuaded her. These were sim
ple soldiers, he argued, not leaders or commanders. Born into other circumstances, they might well have grown to be good men. Moreover, the village could ill afford the risk that the ghosts of the genocidaires would return to haunt Busu-Mouli. Still, Marie felt there had to be some distinctions made. The defenders would each get their own grave and marker, but she had Mputu dig a single long trench for the bodies of the Rwandans.

  By midafternoon the work was done. Mounds of earth in neat rows served as mute testament to the costs of Busu-Mouli’s defense. At the base of each mound was a wooden plaque with the name of the deceased. Later, the families would carve more elaborate grave markers. For now, however, the goal was simply to remember the dead. As Chief, it was Marie’s obligation to lead the burial ceremony.

  The ceremonial clothes and jewelry that her mother and grandmother had worn before her were kept in a storehouse and so had survived the fire that had destroyed her home. At the bottom of the trunk, Marie found something that first made her smile and then brought tears to her eyes. It was a small wooden doll that she had played with as a child. The doll wore a dress made from scraps of the same material her grandmother had used to make the ceremonial gown Marie had come in search of. Her father had carved the doll from a block of rosewood. She remembered her mother sewing the dress, her nimble fingers making perfect stitches as she worked by lamplight.

  Marie was not long past playing with dolls when her mother had died from some nameless fever. Her mother’s absence was a dull but persistent ache. The loss of her father was still fresh and raw. For a moment she felt utterly alone. Marie was only now beginning to grasp the essential loneliness of life as a chief. Her father had borne that burden effortlessly. Marie felt less than worthy. She gently placed the doll back in the trunk. I have not forgotten, she promised silently, as she closed the heavy lid.