The Tuzla Run

by Robert Davidson

  Success!

  A dense cluster of 7.62mm bullets filled the tin. Spurred on by his find, he redoubled his efforts to find the rest of the contraband. By four o’clock in the morning, he had located the anti-tank launchers, the truncated folded skeletal frames of the Kalashnikovs and more ‘vegetables’, which he knew by the weight were small-arms ammunition.

  A new thought struck him, and he felt like kicking himself at how obvious it was! Those expecting the shipment must have some way of identifying the consignment. Going back to the last pallet in which he had discovered weapons, he examined it, comparing it closely with a nearby box that had proved free of arms.

  Then he found it; the spelling of one of the words on the logo on the outer packing was different from the others. He decided to confirm his findings by looking for the same word on another of his previous finds.

  Match! After about an hour, he had identified the entire shipment.

  * * * * *

  Spider woke, keen and alert; head still on the pillow, his eyes quickly focused in the darkened room. He listened for a few seconds, and then sat up to look around. Nothing shifted, added, disturbed or removed. Relaxing, he swung his legs over the side of the bed.

  The confrontation with Declan Rath the previous evening, and his immature admission that he already knew who the Irishman was, now appeared foolhardy. The cliché forewarned is forearmed had particular relevance in this case. Despite his claim to being professional, he had shown a total lack of control by warning Rath of his future intent to settle the score. He would now have to be more vigilant to avoid the terrorist pre-empting him.

  Spider was aware that what he was looking for when he checked his surroundings was unlikely, especially here in the base area, but it was a force of habit developed in the Regiment. After leaving the Special Air Service, he had been unable to sleep through the hours of darkness without an alarm being set in his system. It caused him to wake, without effort, at the slightest change in his immediate area. It was as if he had a sensory surveillance system installed in his body.

  He could not remember when he had last slept through eight hours of darkness. Even when he was dreaming, no matter whether the experience was pleasant or not, the alarm system would override the visions, causing him to awake and check. Still in a sitting position, he raised his arms and stretched, turning his flexed neck first to one side and then to the other. He yawned, flinching as the spasm rippled from his jaw into his shoulder. Disregarding the pain he stood, and with his feet apart, began twisting his torso from side to side.

  After several minutes, he started forward trunk bending. Eventually, he brought his feet together, and then fell forward with his arms extended and hands spread into the prone position for press-ups. With his breathing under control, he completed one hundred press-ups then, rolling over, he performed his daily one hundred sit-ups. Without effort, he rose to his feet.

  His lower body was a catalogue of the places he had been and the actions he had seen. Scars on his legs were the result of bullet and shrapnel wounds.

  Picking up his running shoes from beside the door, he walked over to the chair where he had laid his shorts and athletic supporter the night before. He dressed quickly and left the room, after locking the door. He slipped the key into his supporter. He trotted down the concrete stairs to the road, turned right and ran up the hill.

  As he ran, Spider thought of the preparations they had made for the tasking. They had spent less than an hour in the United Nations High Commission for Refugees depot, loading the eight-wheeled trucks. The loading crew was proficient and worked as a team to load the supplies without wasted effort or time. The drivers spent a further hour tying down the tarps and completing the various checks on the vehicles back at base. They parked the trucks close together in a line side to side, so that just the outside doors of the end vehicles were accessible. Only by moving the end vehicle was it possible to gain entry to the cab of the next one.

  When they had stayed overnight in Velika Kladusa on a previous run, they discovered their tool kits had been stolen and the diesel in the main tanks siphoned off. A large part of the consignment was no longer there. The Convoy Management had reported the loss to the local UNHCR officials, who minimized the theft to prevent the report reaching a higher level.

  However, despite the loss, no one bothered to devise a viable way of protecting the cargo for future taskings. He shook his head at the naiveté.

  Spider believed that Convoy security was paramount. What could they accomplish in Serb territory with no fuel and no tools? Breakdowns had increasingly become the norm, rather than the exception, in the last few months. He made a mental note to tell Kurt, the reserve Convoy Leader, about the first aid box and the additional items the British Liaison Officer at UNHCR Metkovic had given them.

  Turning at the top of the hill to run along its crest towards Osmo, he reviewed the list of equipment still needed. It caused irritation when one thought of the gear, considered everyday necessities in a wartime environment, that other sponsored convoys possessed and they did not. He knew that the main problems with their convoy were twofold: the rank amateurism of its management and some of its drivers, together with their motive for being there, namely, profit. No one had altruistic motives.

  He accepted that profit was not always a bad thing. However, it had soon become obvious that bribes and kickbacks were an integral part of its acquisition. These paved the way to disregard dishonest or non-existent workmanship; they were the incentive to delay purchase of essential items and spare parts, and were the inducement to buy shoddy and inferior materiel. There was no area in their operations that did not result in some personal monetary benefit. Services were billed that were either not performed or were inadequate. Huge sums were available for the payment of inflated invoices.

  At the same time, legitimate needs, such as first aid items, sufficient body armour, flak jackets, functional winches and chains together with other recovery equipment, continued to be ignored. Promises for the purchase of new equipment on extension of the contract never reached fulfilment.

  As he loped past the ruined restaurant, Spider increased his pace and felt the pump action of his heart increase. Today was the big one. Today was T-1. Today they would make the run into Tuzla.

  Everyone was apprehensive, but none more so than the Germans in the team. The Serbs who operated the many of the roadblocks upcountry did not welcome them. These militiamen were often drunken old misfits and hopped-up teenagers.

  He remembered how fearful Kurt had been at the barricade on the way to Banja Luka. A grizzled ancient, festooned with bandoleers of ammunition, an antiquated rifle in his left hand and a well-depleted bottle of slivovic in his right, had sprayed his bitter hatred into the driver’s face. The man threatened to kill any German who ventured into the new Republica Srpska. Kurt was no coward and not easily intimidated. However, when the geriatric gunman fired a shot, shattering the windscreen and showering him with shards of glass, he burnt rubber and U-turned the Toyota, almost in its own length, to get away.

  Spider blew the sweat off his upper lip and increased his speed as he headed into the home stretch towards Nastri. He hoped the trip would be uneventful and that awareness, together with good convoy discipline, would be sufficient to outweigh or at least minimize the possible dangers.

  He would soon know whether this was likely or not. There were thirty minutes before he was due at the seven o’clock security briefing.

  * * * * *

  At nine o’clock, after roll call, Spider reminded Crowther that it was his turn to go to the post office in Opusan to collect the mail. The man took the jeep and soon reached the arched sandstone bridge leading to the village square.

  He decided he would have a coffee later, but now was an ideal time, free from discovery by anyone in the convoy, to call Paroski. Without leaving his vehicle, he made the connection.

  “Yes?”

  As usual, the colonel did not identify himself, but there w
as no mistaking the gruff tones.

  “The trucks are loaded for Tuzla.”

  “Dobro. Are you sure you located everything?” There was no change in Paroski’s voice. Crowther detected no surprise, no elation, and no thanks.

  “I believe I found it all.”

  “Do you know at this stage when they plan to move out?”

  “Later this morning. They’ve emptied the warehouse. It’s possible that it might not—”

  “Once loaded,” Paroski interrupted, “if the convoy doesn’t go, would they unload?”

  “Unlikely, but the—”

  “Let me know if anything changes.” The connection was broken.

  Crowther shrugged, then collapsed the aerial. What the colonel intended to do with the information he did not know, but he had closed his mind to the question. Leaving his vehicle parked next to the church, he walked over to the café.

  * * * * *

  As Crowther deposited the official and personal mail in the main office, he overheard Spider on the phone confirming that the convoy was ready to pull out. The call gave the all clear from UNHCR. Spider immediately gave instructions for the drivers to assemble.

  Crowther left the office and entered one of the toilet cubicles, locked the door and dialled the mobile for Paroski.

  “It’s definitely go.”

  Expecting the usual abrupt termination of the call, he was unprepared for the other’s next remark.

  “You have the numbers of the trucks on which the items have been loaded?”

  His own silence seemed to last forever.

  “Did you hear me? Which trucks?”

  “I don’t know! You never said you wanted... I couldn’t be there when... Just confirmation about the stuff...” he finished lamely and dreaded Paroski’s response.

  “Are records kept in the office of the individual truck loads?”

  “Yes, but only of general categories, not individual consignments—medical, food, hygiene supplies. Often, they carry mixed loads...” Crowther’s voice died.

  “Think carefully, very carefully. You are sure there is no way to show which trucks are carrying the goods and which order they will be in convoy?”

  “Only if the trucks were searched again,” his voice rising as the panic increased, “and they leave at any time now.”

  “I don’t care how you arrange it, but I need to know which vehicles are loaded with the weapons.”

  “There is no way I can. I don’t know the order of travel, which is leaving first, which truck is next... It’s just not... The stuff could be spread over all the trucks!”

  “Make sure you are on that convoy. Call me again when you are underway.”

  The line went dead.

  Dejected, Crowther stared at the mobile.

  * * * * *

  In the HQ operations room in Pale, Kalosowich stepped back from the wall map and, in response to its persistent beep, picked up the mobile phone lying next to his pistol belt on the desk.

  “Kalosowich.”

  “Paroski.”

  The Serb pulled his chair round and sat down.

  “Unfortunately, I have not been able to get the information I promised you. It looks as though you will have to eat all the apples.”

  “Comrade Paroski,” Kalosowich bared his yellowed teeth in a grin, “I always intended to.”

  * * * * *

  Following the right-hand fork out of the centre of town, the road reached the border crossing into Bosnia Herzegovina after only a few minutes of travel. The aid convoys, however, together with the commercial trucks heading north, could not use this crossing. The noise of heavy vehicles and density of traffic inconvenienced the local residents.

  An alternative border crossing for the aid convoys was established at Mali Prolog, a group of buildings too few to be termed a hamlet, on a hillside twenty miles from Metkovic. During ceasefires and moments of calm and inactivity, a column of waiting vehicles would stretch for several miles, from the valley floor up to the crossing. The majority of drivers had long accepted that a ‘gift’ of cigarettes, whisky or money no longer expedited a crossing, but failure to do so could ensure days of waiting.

  Normally the official relief convoys, those sponsored by the United Nations and other recognized charitable groups, were not delayed or subjected to excessive inspection, since they had already agreed to pay ‘tribute’ of a percentage of cargo to the regional government. This levy was not from each truck, but periodically the entity in question had to make a complete convoy available to the Croats or the Serbs.

  The UNHCR convoys did not blatantly display their preferential treatment in crossing priority. When they arrived at Mali Prolog, their vehicles, with the exception of the lead jeep, would tag on to the end of the line of parked trucks, sometimes as much as three miles long, to wait their turn. The Convoy Leader would go forward to the head of the line, process the necessary paperwork and then, using the radio, call the convoy forward.

  During the waiting period, which could be as long as three hours, the drivers would brew tea or coffee and reminisce about other missions and other crossings.

  Today was different. After just twenty-five minutes, Spider radioed that they had clearance for crossing. The convoy pulled out in sequential order and rolled in low gear down to the barrier, then onward down the steep slope into Bosnia Herzegovina.

  Safely through the first of many checks, the convoy picked up speed and was soon heading southeast to Capalijna where, dependent on Spider’s instructions, it would join the main road north to Mostar or head north-west to Ljubusk.

  * * * * *

  Crowther checked the mobile phone in the glove compartment for the umpteenth time. They had travelled thirteen miles, but he still had not given a location fix to Paroski. Then almost as if on cue, the radio crackled and Spider said curtly, “Convoy Leader to all Vehicles. Mostar. I repeat Mostar. Out.”

  Secure in the isolation of the cab, Crowther took a deep breath and, with the mobile lying on his thigh, hit the prescribed number to contact Paroski and pass on the information.

  * * * * *

  On the southern slope of the seventeen thousand metre-high Mount Orfinka, a gun team of the Bosnian Serb Army was finalizing the changes to the howitzers’ sightings. The commander pencilled in the new angles on the map, adjusting his previous calculations and marginally altering trajectory and direction. The gun crew moved the bombs closer to the gun to reduce the load interval, and a radio check with the observer verified that the radio was operational.

  Preparations completed, the men waited for the whistle that would signal stand-to.

  * * * * *

  The first villages encountered by the convoy after the crossing showed no sign of the wanton destruction that disfigured the rest of Bosnia. However, after Capalijna and less than seven miles south of Mostar, the signs of war became evident. The countryside had the same appearance as those areas of the Krajina where the more numerous Serbs had evicted the less fortunate Croats and destroyed their homes.

  However, in this region the Serbs were not to blame for the bulk of the damage to the dwellings. The devastation here was the result of the conflict between ethnic Croats and Bosnian Muslims. The wrecked homes, systematically looted then destroyed by the detonation of explosive charges, more often than not landmines, were a blight on the landscape.

  At varying intervals, groups of people, standing with bowed heads at the sides of the road, would raise their faces to glare up at the relief trucks, revealing their deep loathing; they detested the well-fed drivers and hated the unknown recipients of the aid, with the bilious antipathy that only natives of the Balkans can display.

  At last, the convoy reached the outskirts of Mostar. The column of relief trucks snarled its way up the steep gradient of the route north, passing the remains of the monastery, which overlooked the river and the city. The extent of the destruction and desolation of the shattered buildings bore stark testament to the ferocity and brutality of the conflict be
tween Muslim and Croat.

  Each truck in the convoy had been equipped with a YAESU vehicle-mounted radio with a power output of 50 watts that was sufficient to allow communication between each of the vehicles in the convoy. In addition to its YAESU, the convoy leader’s jeep had a CODAN HF radio for long-range communications with its own base station and UNHCR or UNPROFOR bases throughout the country.

  Spider used the YAESU to alert the drivers.

  “Convoy Leader to all vehicles. That is Mostar down there on the left. We will be at the checkpoint shortly. This part of the route to Jablonica is dicey; it is open and exposed and well within range of the Serb guns. We will all, I repeat, all, put on helmets and flak jackets at the checkpoint. Keep the gear on until I give you the word to remove it. Out.”

  The UN eastern boundary checkpoint was at the southern edge of a cluster of wrecked houses, blackened and stained like decayed stumps in the infected gums of the landscape. The villagers had been prey to an element of the HOS, a Croatian paramilitary unit whose members legitimately boasted that no living thing existed in their wake.

  When the barrier came in sight, the trucks slowed, then stopped as each driver achieved the requisite fifty yards between vehicles.

  The late morning sun had reached its zenith. An oppressive heat haze swathed the unkempt abandoned fields and the ruptured walls of the ruined dwellings, and the encircling ramparts of the mountains seemed to increase its intensity.

  * * * * *

  A couple of Spanish troopers indulged in lazy, half-hearted horseplay to the feigned amusement of three girls who had come to the checkpoint to cadge cigarettes. The remaining soldiers, some openly and some surreptitiously, ogled the females from the meagre shade provided by the ruins.

  A stationary Spanish BMR-600, a Blindado Medio de Ruedas 600 Infantry Fighting Vehicle, was several yards to the right of the barrier pole of the checkpoint. Due to the heat and the presence of the teenage girls, the carrier, which could carry eleven fully equipped infantrymen, was empty. The cupolas and rear doors were open; the externally mounted 12.7mm machine gun was unmanned. In motion, the three-axle BMR-600 powered by a Pegaso 9156/8 diesel could achieve a road speed of 110 km/h. Its British all-welded aluminium spaced armour would give adequate protection to the occupants from 7.62mm ball and armour-piercing rounds.