Land of Promise

by James Wesley, Rawles

  He motioned Rick to come up to the microphone. Rick thanked him and quickly repeated most of what he had said at the Messianic meeting -- including his need to recruit aviators -- but then transitioned into an appeal to support American missionaries, specifically the couple that stood beside him. He closed by saying, “For the Ilemi Republic, all that we ask is your prayers. But this couple deserves both your prayers and your regular financial support. Missionaries like these who are committed to long-term overseas missions are the embodiment of the Great Commission that Christ gave his disciples and all Christians in future generations until his return, in Matthew 28, verses 18 through 20. Please consider that prayerfully.”

  After a few moments to let that sink in, Rick gestured to the young couple and said, “And now… back to you. Please let this congregation know what you have planned in Malawi. May God bless and protect you and make you his instruments.” With that, he shook the young man’s hand and returned to sit with Meital.

  It was illegal to recruit mercenaries in the United States, which was a belated signatory nation to the UN’s 2001 International Convention Against the Recruitment, Use, Financing, and Training of Mercenaries. It was also a violation of the Pelosi Act, which added a miry layer of restrictions to what the UN spelled out. So Rick and Meital had to be very careful about how they conducted themselves while recruiting pilots and technicians. They had diplomatic immunity, true, but it would hamper them greatly if they were ever declared persona non grata by the U.S. State Department. According to their legal counsel, as long as they mentioned Citizenship first in their contacts and “required IRDF service” later, then the new IRDF cadre would not be classified as mercenaries.

  Following their now standard travel security procedures, the Akinses checked into different hotels each night and exchanged rental cars once every two days. They usually alternated between nondescript compact cars and small SUVs. The stated excuse for changing vehicles was either that they needed a car that could handle dirt roads, or that they were done offroading and no longer needed that capability. All initial contacts with aviator candidates were handled via e-mail, Skype, or Unseen. Face-to-face meetings near Fort Rucker were usually scheduled at restaurants. All phones were left in Faraday bags and never turned off at a scheduled meeting because the change in the device’s status would easily establish association networks. They were careful to never mention where they were staying and also careful to avoid mentioning their planned travel to the Philippines for additional recruiting.

  The nightly change of hotels made it difficult for the FBI Special Agents to catch up to the Akinses. They had a description of their car and some still captures from the hotels’ video systems, but not much else. Their inquiry with the Provost Marshall’s office showed that the Akinses had never officially contacted Fort Rucker; their queries with the Dothan and Enterprise police departments also drew blanks. So Sunday and Monday were frustrating days of calling hotels and driving around, hoping to get a glimpse of the diplomats.

  On Tuesday afternoon the Akinses visited the VFW post in Daleville, but they only found one retiree who was vaguely interested. Disappointingly, the VFW seemed to be more of a gambling and drinking establishment. But that evening, they attended a prayer meeting at the Military Christian Center in Daleville. There they met four pilots, three of whom were Reservists on active duty tours and one who was recently retired; all had extensive UH-60 and MH-60 flying experience. One of them ended up on Rick’s “hire” list. It was that evening that Meital noticed that because they had been around so many southern drawls, Rick unconsciously slipped back into his soft Texan accent.

  About half the candidates they interviewed backed out for various reasons. A couple of them were hoping for a big signing bonus above and beyond the value of Ilemi Citizenship, and one was hoping to earn Citizenship with just a 24-month commitment. One other could not get his wife, a non-believer, to commit to a long-term move to the Ilemi. Rick flatly turned down two candidates. One of these seemed overly-confident, brash, and too eager. The other seemed to have insincere faith in Christ and, when quizzed, proved to be Biblically ignorant. Then he admitted that he wouldn’t be able to provide references from any recent church pastors.

  But most of their meetings went well and ended with handshake agreements. A few of the recruitments would be delayed, because these officers and NCOs still had additional Army Reserve obligations ranging from three months to two years. Rick promised to be patient and hold slots for them.

  On Wednesday afternoon, the FBI agents caught up with the Akinses. However, with just one car available, following them discreetly was difficult to do without being detected.

  By the time they had dinner on Wednesday, Rick and Meital had commitments from eight pilots, five of whom had served as instructor pilots and one as a maintenance test pilot, 2 E-6 “15 Tango” Helicopter Repairers (A&P mechanics) who had both recently become Crew Chiefs, one E-5 “15 November” Avionic Mechanic, one CW4 maintenance warrant officer who had formerly been both a MOS 15B Powerplant Repairer and a 15D Powertrain Repairer, one E-4 “15 Bravo” Powerplant Repairer who had just recently cross-trained as a 15G Aircraft Structural Repairer, and one aerial gunnery instructor. The latter was a former pilot who recently lost his flight status because of a heart murmur. Rick hadn’t been shopping for an aerial gunnery instructor, but because this WO-3 could double as a pilot, Rick “waivered him in.” The IRDF’s flight physical exam standards were just being developed at the time and would not as demanding as U.S. Army standards.

  Meital helped Rick compose a summary list of their candidates and sent it via encrypted e-mail to Colonel Kamwi. As usual for all of his overseas trips, Rick used three nested VPN connections to hide his location. He then got busy composing individual acceptance e-mails to the candidates. These were carefully worded to only mention “Citizenship, per our discussion, with requisite service in the Ilemi Republic Defense Force” but not offer any details on full-time cadre service. In addition, recruitment was contingent upon references and a favorable background check.

  Just before midnight on Wednesday evening, an e-mail popped into Rick’s inbox from an instructor pilot with the 1st Brigade of the 212th Aviation Regiment. He said he was a Lebanese Christian who had first served as a U.S. Army avionics technician before attending OCS and then flight school. He had logged 356 hours of experience as a UH-60M/UH-60V pilot and more recently 818 flight hours as a UH-100 pilot.

  Reading parts of the letter narrative aloud, Rick told Meital, “Hey, this guy sounds good.”

  The next part of the letter mentioned that he was TDY in Panama and would be returning to Fort Rucker in 24 hours. He begged Rick to stay in town so they could meet “for a F2F interview.” The letter also mentioned, “You will note that this letter is coming from a FreeMail account, that’s because I am TDY…”

  That caused Rick to raise a suspicious eyebrow. Then he noticed that the letter was signed,

  Your Brother in Christ,

  Capt. Simon Halfan, AV, USAR (15O)

  Lead Transition Instructor Pilot, Co. B, 1-212th Aviation Regiment

  Reading one of those lines made Rick gasp.

  Meital asked, “What was that about? You sound like you just felt a black mamba slither by your leg.”

  “No mambas here, but this is some sort of snake in the grass! This guy is supposedly an Army Captain, but his signature block says ‘C-A-P-T.’ That would be fine and good in the Air Force, but that’s a definite no-no in the Army. They always use the abbreviation ‘C-P-T.’ What we have here is a fake e-mail. I’m sure of it.”

  After he re-read the letter aloud to Meital, she said, “Wow, talk about ‘targeted for termination.’ It sounds like WIS-MOIS is sending us a special delivery hit man, or perhaps a suicide bomber.”

  A quick Skype call to one of Rick’s other candidates from the same brigade yielded the response, “I’ve never heard of him, and I can assure you that I know every company-grade instructor pilot in the briga
de by their first names, since one of my brigade-level Additional Duties is ‘Stress, PTSD Support, and Morale Officer.’ My assignment is to keep tabs on all O-2 and O-3 Instructor Pilots. They even make me keep track of their birthdays, so that I can send them obligatory birthday greetings. I kid you not.”

  Rick tried to make light of the situation by responding, “Gosh, and I thought that I had aggravating Additional Duties when I was in the Air Force. That one of yours is a real charming time sink.”

  After they had pleasantly signed off and he flipped his laptop screen shut, Rick said, “Meitali, I think that by God’s grace we just dodged another bullet.”

  “Okay, Rick. So now we’ve dodged one car bomber and one hit man.” Then she looked toward the ceiling and said, “Thank you, Lord, for Your protection.”

  Rick said in a low voice, “I think this tells us that we have to be a lot more careful about how long we stay in any one place whenever we are outside of the Ilemi.”

  Feeling agitated, Rick stayed up and used some standard tools to trace the e-mail’s originating IP address. He quickly found that it had been sent from Dearborn, Michigan. It was frightening to think that the hit man was already “in CONUS,” but the Dearborn locale did not surprise him, since it had long been a hotbed of militant Islamic activity. As far back as 2010, Dearborn had been nicknamed “Dearbornistan,” and it was considered the bellwether for the growth of Thirdism in the United States. By the time the Ilemi Republic was formed, most of the major cities in the U.S. were at about the same point that Dearborn had been in 2015.

  Rick and Meital both had trouble sleeping following their usual prayers. Rick could tell from Meital’s breathing that she was awake. At just before 4 a.m., he whispered to her, “What do you say we get to the airport a day early, switch to the first flight heading to the west coast, and also re-book for an earlier flight to the P.I.?”

  “Sounds like a plan, my dear husband. I’ll sleep a lot better on the plane than here. Let’s go.”

  The sudden departure of the Akinses was missed by the FBI agents. When they interviewed the morning shift clerk at the hotel where the two were saying, he seemed confused.” He said, “Like I told your other agent, they left without checking out. They were pre-paid with a credit card, so that’s not a problem.”

  Traci shook her head and asked, ‘What other agent?”

  “Special Agent Aziz. He took the security camera DVD. He left here about 45 minutes ago. ”

  Traci asked, “Did he say he was an FBI Special Agent?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did he leave you a business card?”

  “Nope.”

  Traci put on an incredulous face and said, “Well, we’re famous for leaving a littered trail of business cards with everyone we contact. So that doesn’t sound right.”

  After a moment, Special Agent Jackson interjected, “The badge that he showed you: Did it look like this?”

  He handed his photo badge and credentials card to the clerk for a long look.

  “His badge was sorta like this, but it didn’t have one of these ‘Title 18 Delegation’ things.”

  Traci put on a frown and said, “No delegation card. Sounds like an impostor.”

  Delon asked, “Can you show me the video of when he was at your desk?”

  “Sure.”

  They went to the back office but discovered that the video surveillance system’s recording console had been unplugged.

  The clerk shouted, “What a tricky bastard. I shouldn’t have trusted him when he said, ‘You can go back to your desk, I’ll be right out.’”

  A quick call to the FBI headquarters confirmed their suspicion: There was no Special Agent named Aziz, and in fact the only FBI employee named Aziz was a female records clerk in Denver, Colorado.

  After that call, Traci said, “We’ll be making arrangements for an FBI suspect portrait artist to visit you as soon as possible. We’ll need your contact information at home.”

  The clerk was shaking his head, and he put on a little grin. “A fake Fed. Who would’ve thunk it.”

  It was not until Thursday evening that the agents got word relayed from the State Department that the Akins couple had taken a flight to Dallas and cleared Customs before taking a flight to Manila.

  On their way back to Mobile, Traci did the driving while Delon wrote their report on his Macbook. He complained, “I’m having to use the word ‘inconclusive’ a lot, Trace.”

  “Yeah, tell me about it. That’s what they get for sending us in blind, and just two of us. No surveillance support, and we couldn’t even tag the couple’s car. The only one who would agree to talk with us about them was some drunk at the VFW. And now there’s a Middle Eastern Male who is posing as an FBI agent. That means a whole ‘nother investigation.”

  Delon sighed. “And since we initiated, guess who gets to make another drive all the way to Mother Rucker.”

  “We do.”

  After taking a long time to reflect, Traci said, “When I was in my motel room last night, I had another vid chat with my brother Antoine, up in New York. He told me that a lot of his clients and even he himself would love to get Ilemi citizenship. So there seems to be this huge disconnect: The American mass media, the POCLC, and The Administration are telling us that the Ilemi Libertarians are some kinda racist criminals. But near as I can figure, their intentions are good, and the facts don’t support a charge of racist.”

  “I thought you were of the opinion that all white dudes were racists.”

  “I did back when I was in college. But now I’ve adjusted that opinion to just most white folks.”

  Delon gave a snort and then asked, “Can I assume you don’t want to mention any of your conclusions in our report?”

  “Of course not. It’s dangerous to be right when your government is wrong. As one of my professors at Tulane was fond of saying, ‘Label this Food for Thought and Grounds for Further Research.’”

  Chapter 22: Lumpia

  “The current age of warfare is what could be termed the post nuclear age. Here the time of huge battles is gone and Western warfare is dominated by projecting power to trouble spots around the world and fighting insurgents. Politically loss of life is virtually unacceptable so the infantry element although important is heavily supported and B.B.C. to reduce casualties. Numbers of infantry deployed have shrunk further and development of very hi tech infantry equipment is under way. Mobility is the key and much of the infantry element is mounted in helicopters or armoured vehicles, yet its role of taking and holding ground especially in the urban battlefields of the Third World remains vital. The shock element is under pressure to become smaller, lighter and more flexible , the days of the 70 tonnes MBT are numbered, with helicopter gunships and air cavalry making up a large part of this element. Fire support is now long ranged and highly accurate, not only artillery guns but unmanned aircraft and cruise missiles, with the focus on highly accurate strikes and interdiction rather than sheer mass of weapons delivered on target. Air power itself is becoming more unmanned with a clear indication that most air support will be unmanned within the next 50 years.” -- Martin Van Creveld, On Future War, 1991

  Solus Christus, The Ilemi Republic -- Late July, Four Years After Declaration of the Caliphate

  Their trip to the Philippines was abbreviated -- both because of their nervousness about the possible assassination attempt they’d avoided and because there were fewer potential candidates available. The one advantage of the Philippines was that it was the last government on the planet to still extensively use Blackhawk-type helicopters. After retiring the last of their UH-1s in 2038, they still had, scattered across the archipelago, 26 Sikorskys (a mixture of former U.S. Army UH-60s and S-76 export model) in service, primarily for Search and Rescue and as air ambulances. However, they were all scheduled to be phased-out completely in the next three years and replaced by S-100s. Old flexible-rotor helicopters were considered passé, after being supplanted by faster and more versatile hybrid aircra
ft with rigid counter-rotating blades, FADEC engines, fly-by-wire controls, and pusher propellers.

  The highest concentration of Blackhawk-era Sikorskys (and Sikorsky crew members) in the P.I. was on Luzon Island, in and near Fernando Airbase near the town of Lipa. This was the home of the Philippine Air Force Air Education and Training Command -- their equivalent of the U.S. Air Force Officer Academy, the Air Force NCO Academy, and Fort Rucker, all rolled into one.

  Rick and Meital were able to drive on base after guards gave just a quick glance at their diplomatic passports. They were directed to the Air Education and Training Command headquarters. They learned there that the flight school’s commandant was on a liaison trip to the U.S., but his Executive Officer, a Philippine Air Force Colonel, sounded enthusiastic about the formation of the Ilemi Republic.

  Sensing that they had found an ally, Rick spelled out why they had gone to Fort Rucker and why they were now in the Philippines. The Colonel lifted his hand and said, “Wait, I have to show you two things on my tablet comp!”

  He jabbed and swiped at the screen several times and said, ‘Look at this! This is a pic taken six months ago of my cousin Ramon with Harry Heston’s agent when they signed the deal for our surplus UH-60 birds.”

  After jabbing some more at the screen he said, “And this, this… is the Drudge Report article that I bookmarked about the forming of the Ilemi Republic. And there you both are, in the picture of the flag-raising. I guess that makes me a Pinoy Ilemi Fan Boy.”