Aftermath

(Source)

The lieutenant saw the three bodies in the road and sighed. He had expected something like this, especially after his lead vehicle had hit a mine as the QRF had been moving at speed up the road towards where gunfire had been heard.

"Pull over," he ordered as he touched his driver's arm. Looking to the rear of the vehicle he nodded at his sergeant, the squad aboard his armored scout car began deploying almost before the car had rolled to a stop.

The lieutenant stepped out, his machine pistol at the ready. He crouched next to the car as the squad deployed to cover the area. When his sergeant signaled that the covering team was in place, the lieutenant moved over to the dead men.

At a glance he could picture what had happened, obviously the corporal had been hit first. The position of the sergeant indicated that he had tried to pull the corporal into cover and had been wounded while doing so.

He shook his head as he looked over at the dead private, the man's head was blown apart. He was both angry and sad, the young soldier had showed a great deal of promise. Now he was dead, and for what?

The lieutenant tended to turn a blind eye to the excursions his men made from the compound. Their rations were meager and boring, their pay was worse. So when there was possible loot to be had, he looked the other way.

However, pickings had grown slim over the past month, the government was trying to reconcile the locals to the new way of doing things, so randomly robbing households was frowned upon. The empty farms within ten miles had all been picked over many times. In reality, there was nothing left to be had. His men were getting restless.

Just the other day he had had to discipline one of his corporals for beating a civilian that he felt had not shown him the deference due a soldier. Things weren't good, this ambush so near the compound was just one sign of a growing restlessness among the locals.

As he looked at the bodies he had a sudden realization, the sergeant had been sitting in the road, his weapon was still slung. He had been executed, shot in the face at point blank range. A chill ran up his spine as he realized that not only was this the first incident of violence against his men, it looked as though the terrorists were resolved to take no prisoners.

This was something he would need to discuss with the district commander.

The chief was getting awfully tired of beef jerky and dehydrated vegetables. But as he had no desire to die just yet, they couldn't build any fires. Though they were way up in the hills, the helicopter he could see flying up the valley reminded him that the enemy had most of the advantages.

After the ambush they had headed towards the enemy compound, he had figured that they would search near the ambush scene and then outwards. After all, who in their right mind would run towards the enemy rather than away?

Well, he would, for one. He knew this land like the back of his hand, a phrase which his son often kidded him about, but which was nevertheless true. The enemy were not from around here, they relied on maps. But then again, a helicopter could cover a lot of ground.

His next door neighbor had flown choppers, as he called them, when he'd done his Army service in the old days, before things had gone to Hell in a handbasket.

"If you hear a chopper, never look up, your pale face looking up to the sky will give you away every time," the neighbor had told them all, more than once.

"Even mine?" One of the men had grinned, he was originally from Senegal and very dark.

"Well, you might get away with it," the pilot had chuckled. But the men saw his point.

He'd also cautioned them about moving, movement was easy to spot. "Just hold still until he flies past, keep your head down, and pray, pray real hard that the chopper pilot is near the end of a long patrol."

Just one of the many survival skills some of the men, and women he had to remind himself, had brought to the group.

The pilot moved the cyclic to his left as he eased back on the collective, slowing the helicopter as he turned it to a new heading. The trees here were much thicker and he felt that they had little chance of spotting anyone on the ground in this area. The valley was empty, the terrorists were probably long gone.

"The bastards know this area better than we do." His co-pilot muttered over the intercom.

"Yup, we'll need to send ground patrols up here. Poor bastards will probably have to dismount and walk most of the way. That's pretty rugged ground down there. Let's RTB¹, I think we've done all we can."

The pilot shook his head as he gained altitude and increased his speed, the bosses back at the compound weren't going to like what he had to report.

Go along to get along, that had always been his mantra. Up until now he had managed to climb the ladder in local politics by telling people what they wanted to hear. Now he was on his way to the district commander's office in the old town hall. The man was not happy, nor should he be.

The ambush on the old road out of town was the latest in an increasing series of troubles. The few farmers left in the area weren't sending their crops to town to be distributed by the committee. They claimed it had been a bad harvest, the politician felt that they were probably holding back, keeping the products of their labors for themselves.

Now there were three dead soldiers, the district commander would no doubt want to know what the politician planned on doing about it. For the first time in his life, the politician didn't know what to tell the man. He was a figurehead, he had no real say in the running of things in the district.

Of course he would suggest a new committee to "investigate" the problem, he might be able to spin that out for a week or so and hope no further incidents occurred. It wasn't really important that he fix anything, simply appearing to be concerned had always been enough to get by in the past.

At least he hoped that that hadn't changed.

The district commander ran both hands over his balding pate, it hadn't been that long ago that his hair had been full and thick, back when he had been a fighting soldier, not a jumped up bureaucrat. He heard a soft tap on the door to his office, he despaired of ever teaching his aide to knock on the door with authority.

"What?" he snapped.

The door opened to reveal his aide, a stoop shouldered man who appeared ready to blend into the woodwork, he was that non-descript. "Commander, the local administrator is here, along with the garrison commander."

"Tell the politician to come back tomorrow, tell the colonel to come in."

As the colonel came in, the district commander heard a protest from the waiting room, "I've set aside my entire day to help the commander address this latest outrage and..."

The commander burst from his office, practically shoving the garrison commander aside as he did so. "You've set aside your entire f**king day have you? I have three dead soldiers to bury, three grieving families to console. I don't care about your damned day you sniveling idiot. Be here tomorrow morning at 0600, wear comfortable shoes, I'm sending you out with the morning patrol. Now GO!"

The politician turned as white as a sheet when the district commander had barked at him. "But Sir, I..."

When the district commander had moved towards him, fists clenched, the politician fled.

"Whatever am I supposed to do now?" he whined to himself. He hoped his wife hadn't thrown away his old hiking clothes. He hoped that they still fit!

"Sit," the district commander said curtly to the colonel of infantry, pointing to a chair facing the desk.

"You have a full battalion here, correct Colonel?"

"Yes Sir, fully motorized and..."

"I don't need the f**king details. I want you personally to lead an entire company to the western hills tomorrow morning, take that sniveling ass of a politician with you. He can help liaise with the locals. They might talk to him, they might not. Track down those damned terrorists, bring some of them back alive. A public trial and execution might be just what this district needs. We need to show a firm front, now go, get things moving."

The colonel didn't bother to say a word, he knew it would be pointless. As he went down the stairs, he wished he had never been given this assignment. There was no honor in fighting civilians.

He summoned his aide, "Drive me down to the barracks of the Sixth Company."

As the car drove off he thought it would be appropriate to use the company which had lost the men killed that morning. At least their captain was somewhat competent.

¹ Return to base