Quest for Honor (27 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY

Somalia

J
im had heard
from friends that traveling overseas from the States was somewhat jarring. You wake up one morning in your own bed and the next morning you’re an ocean away, surrounded by people speaking a different language and flying a strange flag. But those friends had been talking about going to Europe or maybe Asia. He didn’t think any of them had ever been somewhere like this.

He’d slept on the transatlantic flight but awoke when they were still a couple hours out of Ramstein. An hour after landing in Germany they were on their way to the Horn of Africa. It was late afternoon, local time, when they landed at Djibouti-Ambouli International and boarded a string of Humvees for the short run to the adjacent base. A Navy lieutenant offered Jim the front seat next to the driver and got in the back.

Jim had never been to an actual military base before and Camp Lemmonier was like nothing he would’ve expected. His driver, a young Marine from Georgia, filled him in. “We call it ‘The Lemon’,” he said with a drawl that would’ve sounded perfect in a country song. “French built it for the Foreign Legion, turned it over to Djibouti and then we got here right after 9/11. Took some fixin’ up, they said. ‘Bout five hundred acres now, over three thousand troops. Mostly Marines, some squids—I mean, sailors. Beggin’ the lieutenant’s pardon, sir.” He glanced nervously in the rear-view mirror at the lieutenant.

“Carry on, Marine,” the sailor said.

“Uh, anyway, we’re fixin’ to come up on CLUville over here, sir. You aren’t in uniform, sir, so I’m assumin’ you’re a contractor?”

“Something like that,” Jim said. He gestured through the windshield at the rows of low, box-like structures. “Would that be Clueville?”

“Yessir, C-L-U-ville, for Containerized Living Units. What we live in here. Not too fancy, but better’n what we had over in Afghanistan.” He stopped at an intersection as a platoon of Asian soldiers in camo fatigues jogged past. “Japanese marines, I think,” the Marine said.

“Not quite, Corporal,” the lieutenant said from the back. “Special Boarding Unit troops, Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force. Japan doesn’t have a marine corps. Their navy is building a base here, helping out in anti-piracy operations.”

“Roger that, sir,” the Marine said. A few minutes and a couple turns later, he pulled up in front of a two-story building with unit insignia flanking the double doors. A man in plain fatigue pants, civilian-style shirt and a plain black ballcap was waiting. “This is your stop, sir,” he said to Jim. “I b’lieve that fella there will show you to your quarters.”

Jim found some unmarked fatigues and t-shirts waiting in his Spartan room. The bed looked small and not too comfortable, but after his long flight it was still very tempting. He would just lie down for a few minutes, just to unwind a bit. An hour later the phone on the desk jangled him awake. It was Denise, reminding him that chow was about to be served.

Eleven hours of shuteye helped him deal with the jet lag, and the next day was a blur of activity. He met Tom Simons, whom he knew to be the CIA station chief thanks to his briefings at Langley, and they went over the mission again. He got in a workout at the base gym and even sparred a couple rounds with some of the men when he saw them training on a mat and asked to join in. The Lemon, as stark and free of luxuries as it was, seemed to be his kind of place.

But by mid-afternoon he was in the air again, this time on a C-12 Huron, a twin-engine Navy transport plane, heading to Somalia, and he had the distinct feeling that he was going to miss the Lemon even more than he thought.

Jim had seen
Black Hawk Down
and was expecting a city that looked like Berlin in 1945, but what he saw left him bewildered and a little off-center. As they moved into the city along the coast from the southwest, he saw some sections that looked fairly modern and Western in appearance, contrasting starkly with areas that were little more than empty shells of buildings surrounded by rubble. Simons was sitting next to him in the back seat of the rusty Land Rover, and when Jim pointed out one building that looked like something from pre-war Europe, he chuckled.

“The Italians built that. They actually bought the city back in 1905 and ran it until independence in 1960.”

Buying an entire city? Jim wanted to ask what they paid for it, but instead said, “In the briefing today they said the government actually controls only about half the city, right?”

“More or less. Fortunately, that’s the half we’re going to, although the hotel where we meet Shalita is near Villa Somalia, the presidential palace, close to the edge of the federal zone. Things are still pretty fluid. Al-Shabaab holds some of the eastern and central sections, but the government’s making some progress, with help from AMISOM.” Jim remembered that acronym from the briefing. The African Union had sent troops into the city to help the shaky government root out the insurgents, while Ethiopians marched in from the north. It wasn’t as bad as it had been in the ‘90s, but it wasn’t exactly a place you’d want to come to on vacation.

Jim counted eight people in their two Land Rovers heading into the city, including himself. Denise was in the trailing vehicle. Jim didn’t feel too great about leaving her back there, but the three guys with her looked pretty competent. Well, hell, who was he kidding? Any one of those three guys could protect her better than he could. Not that she needed protection. He’d seen her working out enough over the past few days to realize that she was probably as skilled in close-quarters combat as any woman he’d ever met and most of the men.

His emotions had run the gamut in the past twenty-four hours. Sometimes he felt like he’d be able to handle anything that was thrown at him over here, other times he felt almost sheer terror. He forced himself to keep his breathing calm. Somewhere down deep inside, he hoped, was a reservoir of courage yet untapped. He suddenly remembered something he’d seen back home, a metal sign on the wall of a bar. There was a photo of John Wayne, and a quote: “Courage is being scared to death, but saddling up anyway.”

The streets became busier and more chaotic as they got further into the city. People were everywhere, most of them as dark-skinned as any Jim had ever seen, but there was a scattering of lighter-skinned men who could’ve been Arabs, and even a few Europeans. Almost all of the women wore shawls or the full-cover garments they called
burqa.
Jim had been told with great seriousness that interaction with the local women was not advised. It seemed that every fourth or fifth man had a rifle hanging loosely on his shoulder. Most of the weapons were AK-47s, but Jim saw a few bolt-action rifles that looked like vintage World War II-era arms. There were soldiers in different uniforms and a few men Jim took for police, but not that many.

The traffic was unbelievable. Small cars, trucks and SUVs, almost all of them old, dusty and battered, muscled for position on the streets with motorcycles and a few daring, or foolish, men on rickety bicycles. The few signal lights Jim saw were dark. At some intersections there were policemen trying to direct the traffic, and they weren’t getting a lot of cooperation. Even with the air conditioner roaring inside their Land Rover, Jim could hear the honking of horns and shouting of pedestrians and angry drivers.

“It looks like it wouldn’t take much to set these people off,” Jim said.

“Usually it doesn’t,” Simons said. “We’re getting near the hotel.”

Another few blocks and they came to a makeshift barricade formed by two pickup trucks and an ancient bus. Men in civilian clothes and carrying submachine guns were loitering nearby. “Doesn’t look like we can get through here, sir,” the driver said.

Simons peered through the windshield, then told the driver, “Take a right here. We’ll try to circle around.” The agent next to the driver lifted a portable radio to inform the trailing Land Rover.

“The Hotel Quruxsan is five blocks further,” Simons told Jim as the driver started navigating down a side street.

“What’s with the barricade?” Jim asked.

“I don’t know, but we may have to hoof it for a couple blocks.”

“That doesn’t sound promising.”

Jim knew the meet with Shalita was set for seven o’clock. By his watch, it was now just after six. He had an idea that punctuality wasn’t high on these people’s priority lists.

They made it another two blocks before Simons called a halt. Another barricade blocked the street ahead, but this one looked unmanned. The driver fought his way into a vacant lot between two ramshackle three-story buildings, with the trailing vehicle coming in next to them. “On foot from here,” the CIA chief of station said. “Three blocks and we’re in the clear.” Jim got out and the heat enveloped him again, this time combined with a foul, gagging stench. Exhaust fumes, rotting garbage, and who knew what else was in there. On the street behind them, a few cars turned away from the traffic jam.

Simons ordered the two drivers to stay with the vehicles, then gathered Jim, Denise and the two agents who’d been riding shotgun. “Stay together, people, stay alert, and don’t interact with the locals. The latest word I have is that the hotel is secure.” From somewhere in the distance came the staccato popping of small-arms fire.

“Al-Shabaab?” Denise asked.

“We had reports they might be making a push,” Simons said. “Not good timing for us. Okay, let’s go.” He clicked a button on the portable radio. “Backstop, this is Badger Team leader. We are three blocks to the south of the hotel, proceeding code white, plus three. Do you have the rigs?”

A confident voice came back through the device.
“Roger that, Badger leader. We have eyes on two rigs plus two. We’ll keep the bird with you.”

“Copy that. Badger leader out.” Simons pocketed the radio and said, “Okay, follow me. Carson, take the six.”

Jim was already starting to perspire through his short-sleeved cotton shirt. He was thankful he’d remembered to bring his sunglasses, but they’d told him to leave his boonie hat behind. His passport was in the right front pocket of his olive drab cargo pants, but his wallet was back at the base in Djibouti. Simons led the way onto the street, with Denise next, then Jim, followed by Jones and Bentler, the agents from Denise’s vehicle, and then Carson, who’d been in Jim’s.

He kept his breathing steady and tried to stay alert, concentrating on the people walking along the street. During the briefing he’d been told that a Special Forces team, code-named Backstop, would be keeping an eye on them. Jim assumed that meant some men on foot and perhaps a drone of some kind in the air, probably “the bird” he’d heard mentioned on the radio transmission.

The few people they passed either averted their eyes or gave them cold, unfriendly stares. Six Westerners moving purposefully along the street probably didn’t mean good news to a lot of the people here. Simons seemed to know where he was going, which was good, because Jim would’ve been hopelessly lost.

They emerged from the side street onto a broader thoroughfare where there was still some traffic. How had they gotten past the barricades? “Okay, there it is,” Simons said, gesturing two blocks to the east. A four-story building loomed, its architecture in a style Jim took for something out of Mussolini-era Italy.

The sound of gunfire erupted again, this time closer than before. Denise was looking around intently, scanning the rooftops and upper stories of the buildings. They were getting close to the last intersection before the hotel when Jim heard the growling of heavy engines coming from around the corner. Simons held up a hand and they stopped, then moved over to the wall of the nearby building. Jim fought to control his breathing.

An armored vehicle, snorting and belching diesel fumes, nosed its way around the corner from the left and swung through the intersection, turning back down the street from where the Americans had come. It looked like a tank, but nothing like the powerful Abrams tanks used by the Americans in the films and news footage Jim had seen. This one was smaller, with a long, rather small cannon pushing out of the turret, and it moved slowly and clumsily on its treads. Several men hung onto the turret as the vehicle rumbled past. Some of the fighters had AKs, others long tubes that Jim took to be rocket launchers.

Bentler, standing next to Jim, said, “Russian-made, probably a BMP. Thirty years old if it’s a day.”

“Here comes another one,” Carson said. The second tank followed the first about twenty yards behind, again carrying a full load of fighters.

“Intel said the government was holding this district,” Denise said.

“These guys look like government troops to you?” Jim asked. She shook her head.

After the two tanks came three Toyota pickups packed with armed fighters. Some of them looked suspiciously at the Americans, but the vehicles kept moving, although not fast enough, as far as Jim was concerned. Simons motioned them up to the corner. There was more civilian traffic coming, having given way to the military convoy.

Simons was at the curb, waiting for a break in the traffic to cross to the hotel’s block, when Jim heard a sound to his left. It was a familiar sound, one he’d heard many times in the dojo: the
thwack
of a stick on something soft.

Twenty feet away, a man was beating something with a three-foot stick. At first Jim thought it was a bag, but then the bag moved, and he saw it was a person wearing a burqa. A hand slid out of a sleeve, trying to ward off the blows. A woman’s hand.

“Hey!” Jim yelled, taking a step toward the pair. The man wasn’t a Somali, he looked more like an Arab of some sort, and when he heard Jim he turned and glared back at him. Two other men, both Somalis, were leaning against the nearby building, watching the show. One of them had an AK-47 hanging loosely on his shoulder. They showed no expression at all as they watched the beating, but when their eyes turned to Jim, they showed something else: a warning.

“Jim! Don’t!”

He heard Denise’s warning, but he still took a quick step toward the man and the woman, halting only when strong hands grabbed each of his arms. “Let it go, man,” Bentler said in a low voice. “Let it go.”