Tropical Terror (4 page)

“Good, Johnson. Stick close to me. We're about to have a planning session like you probably haven't seen before.”

Ten minutes later Murdock had DeWitt, Jaybird, Master Chief Dobler, and Lam sat around a table. All had pads and ballpoint pens.

“Now, you know our mission, so how do we best work it?” Murdock asked.

“No EAR rifles,” Jaybird said. “We leave them here and use our twenties.”

“Agreed,” DeWitt said. “But we need the sniper rifles and the MGs.”

“Amen to both of those,” Murdock said. “I'm taking an MP-5 sub gun on my back. Anyone who wants to can have a second shooter.”

“Hit and run, sounds like fun, but where do we stash our extra ammo?” Lam asked. “We'll be all over the place. We establish a cache of ammo and explosives that we can't carry?”

“Double ammo if we can pack it,” Senior Chief Dobler said. “Yes, I'd agree, we need a stash somewhere. Maybe more than one.”

They went at it for an hour and came out with their operations plan. Johnson was amazed.

“I've never seen an outfit work this way before,” Johnson said. “Usually the officers work out the plan and the details. I like this way better. Everyone knows what's happening and you get input from your smartest EMs as well.”

“You got the idea. You want to work the field with us?”

Johnson laughed. “Hey, I'm a desk guy. Last infantry-type shit I did was in boot camp. I don't even have my shots.”

Murdock looked at his watch. It was l630. “When does it get dark here?” Murdock asked.

Johnson frowned. “This time of year, about 1930, more or less.”

“Be damn handy if we had a map of that area with the spot marked where the admiral thinks the Chinese are,” Dobler said. “Then we can figure out where we drop in and set up our stash.”

By 1800 they had a map.

The chopper was waiting on the pad at the runway.

Master Chief Dobler had the troops ready with fifty percent more ammo than normal. Six drag bags were loaded with ammo, grenades, explosives, and more ammo. They had an expanded first-aid kit as well as Mahanani's regular corpsman's gear.

Murdock checked everything. “Looks like we're about ready,” he said. “Ed, you happy with your mix of weapons?”

“Right. We have the sniper and MG, five Bull Pups, and three MP-5 submachine guns as doubles.”

“What's our mix on WP versus HE on the grenades?”

“Two HEs to one WP.”

Murdock turned to Johnson. “How far is it to that chopper?”

“About a mile and a half.”

“Have it set down in the parking lot behind this building within thirty minutes.”

Johnson shook his head. “Can't do it, Commander. None of our choppers are cleared to land anywhere but at the regular designated areas.”

Murdock grinned. “Commander, let's see just how good
that admiral's red signature is. Tell whoever you contact the level of the order and see what happens.”

Johnson laughed. “Yeah, let's see. It should work like a charm. I don't get to play with that red sig often. In fact, never before.”

Murdock got the right TAC frequency, and used the SATCOM to talk directly with a recon plane over the Kaneohe invasion zone.

“The town itself was bypassed,” the observer said. “They have some half-tracks, maybe six of them. Hard to hide their trails. They swung north of the town and moved about three miles from the coast in toward the mountains. Damn strange. They don't seem to be going anywhere. Just sitting there. Maybe waiting for orders. Maybe the Chinese command didn't think they would even get onshore.”

Murdock told the observer his mission.

“Where do you suggest we sit down and set up our stash?”

“Not more than two miles from the beach. There's a little stream comes out in that area. Just to the south of their half-track trail.”

Right on schedule, the Sea Knight, a CH-46 with the two big contra-rotating, three-blade main rotors, dropped in as requested. It kicked up a storm of dust even from the blacktopped parking lot.

The Third Platoon of SEAL Team Seven moved on board, loaded on the drag bags at l935, and lifted off two minutes later. Murdock showed the pilot on his map where he wanted to drop in.

“A recon plane reported that there should be no ground fire from that area,” Murdock said. The kid flying the chopper looked barely old enough to be out of high school. Actually he was a JG with probably five years of duty.

“Bring you in at that point in about eighteen minutes, sir,” the JG said. He wiped sweat off his forehead. “Sir, does this mean I'm getting combat pay?”

“Good guess, JG. Just be sure you live long enough to spend it. If we ask for a resupply, you'll probably be coming in to the same spot we land today. Memorize where it is.”

They swept up and over the Naval base, then the town of Aiea. Beyond that it was green. This part of Oahu seemed
to be made up of three elements, housetops, blacktopped streets and parking lots, and lush green foliage. Below, the landscape began to rise as they headed for the north end of the Koolau mountain range. The trees, shrubs, and grasses below were intoxicatingly green. Murdock knew that if he were down there they would even smell green.

They had planned to come in from the north, following Highway 83 from the village of Kahaluu south. When about two miles from Kaneohe they would swing inland and watch for the half-track trail through the brush and trees. By this time it was almost dark. Dusk came and went in a moment, and the pilots used night-vision goggles to check the landscape below.

It was a harder target than in daylight, but after five minutes of slow moving along the highway, the chopper pilot spotted the smashed-down grass and small trees. He picked out a cleared area nearby with a stark stone chimney standing by itself, all that was left of a previous dwelling.

“We go in about a minute,” Murdock told the troops. They were up in marching order, ready to run out of the bird as soon as the rear ramp dropped to the ground.

A light turned from red to green over the ramp and it lowered. The SEALs charged out, established a point twenty yards from the Sea Knight, then went back for the drag bags filled with ammo, explosives, and grenades.

Four minutes after landing, the Sea Knight took off and went back the way it had come to the north so it might escape detection by the Chinese troops on the ground.

The SEALs divided the bags and put two in each location. One by the chimney, the others by a struggling koa tree, about sixty feet tall.

Murdock had the men spread out, and used the Motorola to talk to them. “Recon said the main force of the Chinese is to the left, tucked up against the first rise of the mountains.

“We sit here for half an hour and see if they send out a patrol to investigate. If not, we move toward them or any elements they may have strung out around their main force. Remember, there are two thousand guns out there. We will not get in an all-out firefight with that kind of odds. We
punch and run, shoot and haul ass. No heroics, nobody taking on a company or any of that shit. Everyone read me?”

He got a chorus of chirps on his earpiece.

“Good. Someplace along here the mountains come down closer to the ocean. Sometimes they hang back. This is one of those spots. In twenty-five minutes more we take a hike a mile due west and then start working south to find the bad guys.”

Lam, the platoon's head scout and tracker, came on the net.

“Cap, we may not have to do much searching. Somebody is coming our way and not trying to be quiet. I'd guess there are six or seven of them, not more than fifty yards dead ahead.”

“We take them out,” Murdock said. “Silenced weapons only. As soon as we positively ID them. On my MP-5.”

They waited. Now the other men in the platoon could hear the soldiers coming. They sounded as if they were on a Sunday afternoon picnic. Only a few Chinese words came through.

“Can't make out the words, but they sound Mandarin,” Ching said. “Want me to yell at them when they get in our sights?”

“Won't hurt,” Murdock said. “Spread out in a line. Don't shoot each other.”

They moved apart, but each SEAL could still see the man next to him in the moonlight. Another minute, then shadows came out of the gloom. Six men walked forward, two by two. When they were twenty yards away, Ching sang out with a question. In Mandarin he asked: “What are you men doing here?”

The six stopped, whispered among themselves, then lifted their rifles. Four MP-5's on three-round bursts hammered at them. The chuffing sound of the suppressors kept the noise down as five Chinese slammed to the ground. One tried to
run. Three rounds hit him in the back and jolted him into a tree. He fell lifeless to the woodsy floor.

“Ching, check for survivors,” Murdock said on the radio. The quartermaster ran forward, touched the men on the ground. He stopped at the third one. The talk was soft and in Mandarin. A minute later Ching worked the other bodies, then returned.

“Talked to one of them. They were on a patrol to see if there were any American troops back this way. He said the officers figured this must be a trap since it was so easy to land on the bay and work inland. Then he died.”

“Leave them where they fell,” Murdock said. “We'll push ahead a little faster. Might find the camp tonight and get in some more good deeds before daylight.”

For an hour they moved ahead. Lam was out in front testing the waters, stopping and listening every hundred yards. He heard nothing unusual. He soon recognized a night bird and its short, repetitive call. He knew there were wild boar on the island, but they would most surely prowl for food during the day.

Fifteen minutes into the second hour of marching, Lam called to Murdock. He and DeWitt moved up to where Lam lay in some brush. They were still on the half-track's smashed-down trail. Lam was at the side on a small hill looking ahead and to the left.

“Campfire,” Lam said. “Too big to be a cooking fire. Maybe an outpost?”

Murdock put his binoculars on the spot and studied it. DeWitt did the same thing.

The fire was 150 yards away, Murdock estimated. He could see men moving around the area, crossing in front of the fire.

“Can't get a count on the bodies,” DeWitt said. “Too much brush. Bet you a buck the fire is against orders. How can an outpost do its job if it advertises with a fire? Might as well hire a band to play the hula.”

Murdock and Lam moved out to get the vitals on the group. They worked ahead silently, sometimes walking, sometimes worming their way through the tangle of brush and vines. Voices and soft laughter came from the camp
ahead. When they were forty feet away the two SEALs stopped, and each moved to a better position with an open field of fire.

The men in the firelight would be night-blind to anything outside that light. A large red star showed prominently on each man's uniform. They all had automatic rifles, one a submachine gun. Murdock counted nine men. Murdock had his MP-5 up. He knew that Lam carried the Bull Pup. They were going to have to get ordnance to build suppressors for the 5.56mm barrel.

The Chinese men were eating. One had just washed out a pair of socks, and held them on long sticks to the fire to dry.

“We take them?” Lam whispered into the mike.

“Yes. Let me see how I can do with the silenced rounds. At the first outcry, use your 5.56.”

“That's a Roger.”

Murdock zeroed in on the first Chinese, who lay to one side, evidently sleeping or trying to. The first round caught him in the chest and he moaned and rolled over, but didn't move again.

The second Chinese sat three feet from the dead man eating from a mess kit. No rice rolls? Murdock wondered. The Chinese Army was going soft. His round hit the soldier in the chest and spilled him backward. Somebody yelled something at the man and there was laughter.

Before Murdock got off a third round, one of the men cried out in alarm and lifted his rifle.

“Do it,” Murdock said, switching his MP-5 selector to three-round. He chattered off three rounds at two men side by side, then moved his aim as he heard Lam's Bull Pup chunking off two rounds at a time.

One man fired his weapon back at them. He must have seen the muzzle flash on the Bull Pup. Another small problem. Murdock emptied one magazine, jammed in another one, and shot at anything that moved.

“Hold,” Murdock said. They stopped shooting.

One man lifted up and began crawling out of the firelight. Murdock sent three rounds into him, and then all was quiet.

“Check them?” Lam asked.

“No. We made too much noise. Let's get the platoon and
haul ass out of here. The firing will bring somebody. Just hope we don't run into a reinforced company.”

They jogged back to the platoon, veering off the half-track trail but paralleling it heading west. Lam kept twenty yards ahead as the platoon moved out. A full moon crawled out of the east and bathed the whole scene in a half light that seemed too strong for the moon. It made trees cast shadows, and was the kind of scene that could make a man mistake a shadow for an enemy or perhaps a friend.

They kept working ahead.

Murdock heard it this time just before Lam used the radio.

“Yeah, Cap. My guess another moving patrol. Chinese love them. Used them all the time in Korea, my dad told me. Keep roaming around, trying to stir up something. They don't try to be quiet. Must have heard my firing back there. Looking for us.”

“Coming close to us?” Murdock asked.

“Depends. Right now they're moving due east, which would put them maybe five hundred yards away. On the other hand, they could change directions at the whim of the patrol leader and head right into our gullet.”

“All stop,” Murdock said. “Hunker down in place and we'll see where they're going. If we need to bug out in a rush, we head northeast. No radio talk except Lam. Out.”

It was more than three minutes before Murdock heard the night insects resume what must be their usual chatter. He thought he heard a cricket, but he wasn't sure if Hawaii had crickets. He remembered that almost every land animal and many of the birds, plants, and trees on the island now had been brought there by settlers and pioneers. He remembered that the Polynesians had brought with them fleas, lice, and flies.

The radio earpiece spoke.

“Oh, yeah, they changed directions. Can't see them, but by the noise I'd guess it's at least a platoon, maybe forty men. My guess is that they are now on the half-track roadway and moving toward us. How far are we away from that route?”

“My guess is about fifty yards,” Murdock said. “Not
enough. They could have scouts out on both sides. Estimate their distance?”

“Six or seven hundred yards,” Lam said.

“Everyone, we move silently as death a hundred yards to our right. Keep in visual with the man on each side of you. Let's go.”

It took five minutes to make the silent move. Murdock was pleased with the operation. No noise. Everyone kept in sight except Lam, who would take care of himself. They bellied down in the mulch and leaves and grass, and could hear the enemy troops passing to their left. When the last jangle of equipment died out, the speaker in Murdock's ear came on.

“Cap, they're past. I got a closer look. Must have been about fifty troops. They had what I guess were automatic rifles and an MG or two. Maybe a reinforced platoon. Figure they were out hunting us or whoever made the noise with the firefight. Somebody might have radioed in at that last hit we made.”

“Roger that, Lam. Let's get our men up to you and we'll try to backtrack them right into their soup kitchen. Any idea how far these troops came to get here?”

“They weren't dragging, no one lagging back. My guess is that they were fairly fresh, say not more than two miles into their hike.”

“We're moving, SEALs. Let's find Lam and go after the home base. Jaybird, I want you in sight of the last man as our rear guard. What we don't want is them yahoos storming up on our tail end without our knowing it.”

They hiked along the mashed-down half-track trail for almost an hour before Lam called a halt. DeWitt, Master Chief Dobler, and Murdock went up to where the scout stood looking down a slight grade at a camp. There were dozens of fires. Most of them small, as if serving as cooking fires for squads.

“Two thousand down there?” Dobler asked. “That's fifty platoons of forty men each. That many guns can do a lot of damage.”

“Anyone see a pattern to the fires?” Murdock asked. “Like maybe they are in lines or squares to show where the units
are set up. Would they have two-man tents or be roughing it?”

“I've heard that the Chinese Army doesn't believe in tents, except for its officers,” Dobler said. “My dad said he never saw a Chinese tent in the Korean War.”

“What kind of targets do we have?” DeWitt asked.

“Those half-tracks would be good ones,” Lam said.

“Maybe we could spot a tent used for a CP,” Murdock said. “Two thousand men. That would rank at least a major as the commander. He'd have a deluxe tent somewhere.”

They watched the site. A few fires went out. Some new ones sprang up. The new ones were larger. Murdock looked at his watch and punched the light. It was almost 2100.

“We'll move down until we hit an outpost, go around it, and try to follow the tracks to the rigs. If no luck, we send out two patrols to find and blow two of the half-tracks. If no luck getting to the rigs, we pull back to a thousand yards and shell the place with 20mm exploding. Say we dump a hundred rounds in and around those fires, we should have a good body count in the morning.”

DeWitt nodded. “Yes, I agree. Let's get it moving. Lam will stay out front.”

Third Platoon was on the move again. Excitement had begun to creep into the men's actions and faces. This would be a real test of their abilities to get a job done. The half-tracks were the key. They moved quicker now, knowing where they were going and what they would be doing.

It took them an hour more to come up on the Chinese camp. It was huge, spread out along a valley with a small stream. When they were a mile from the camp, Lam slowed the pace watching for the first guards.

The first guard post had a fire going and rifles stacked like they were in their barracks. Lam led them around the outpost and another half mile before they came to the next guard post. This one was well manned and alert. The SEALs went around the outpost without a sound and followed the half-track's trail.

A quarter of a mile ahead they came to a stop. Lam told Murdock what he found.

“A perimeter defensive line, Cap. Looks like a sentry
about every twenty yards. I can take out two of them and we'll walk right through.”

“Meet me,” Murdock said. He took Jaybird and worked forward until they found Lam. He pointed out the nearest two guards.

“Each of you take out one silently. Then give us a double click on the Motorola and we'll come through.”

Jaybird and Lam melted into the moonlit moderate growth of trees and brush. Jaybird had seen his target. He was just below a good-sized koa tree. Jaybird would come up behind the man.

The next fifty feet, Jaybird slithered along on hands and knees and belly, his MP-5 tied over his back. He spotted the big tree, then the Chinese soldier slumped under it. He had not dug in. Good. Jaybird went twenty yards behind the sentry, then began working silently toward him.

Jaybird was the best silent mover in the platoon. Sometimes he scouted when Lam was wounded. He inched his way toward the sentry, who he now saw had slid down the koa tree and sat leaning against it, his rifle in his lap. Jaybird pulled the fighting knife from his left-ankle scabbard and lay silently watching the man. Sleeping or just quiet? He didn't know.

Jaybird moved ahead another six feet. The soldier sat against the koa tree three feet ahead and to the left. In one fluid movement, Jaybird came upright and held the knife in his right hand. The blade had been sharpened on both sides of the point for slashing either direction. He held it waist high, stepped around the tree, and swiped the blade across the Chinese soldier's throat.

The only sound was a soft gurgle by the soldier before his head fell forward blocking the spray of blood from his left carotid artery. Jaybird held him against the tree for fifteen seconds, until he was unconscious, fast approaching death.

Jaybird eased away, leaving the soldier leaning against the tree. Then he looked to the left to see if he could spot the next Chinese soldier in the defensive line. He couldn't. Which meant that the enemy soldier couldn't see him either. He clicked his radio twice and waited.

A minute or two later he heard two clicks in his earpiece.
Lam had finished his task. The platoon would be coming. He lifted up, pulled the MP-5 subgun around from his back so he could use it if he had to, and made sure the silencer was in place. He had taken only three steps toward the center of the cleared zone when he spotted a Chinese officer walking quickly toward him. Another thirty feet and the man would start looking for the rifleman on the perimeter duty.

Jaybird froze where he was. He had to do something and do it damn fast or the whole operation could be blown right out of the water.