Vortex (122 page)

“Okay, Jerry, I see your point and agree. But what rules will they enforce?”

“That’s the hard part.”

JANUARY
21ON
NATIONAL
ROUTE
1

Nxumalu Mchwenge was a Xhosa, He was also an ex-member of the
ANC
, the

South African Defense Forces, where he had been a spy, and of Vega’s army.

Mchwenge had gladly acted as a scout for the Cubans. They had promised to drive

the Boers out, to bring about the socialist paradise that he had always dreamed of.

Then had come Potgietersrus. Thousands of black civilians had been gassed, shocking all of the native Africans working with the Cubans. A delegation sent to Vega’s chief of staff had been turned away, and two men who had protested more vigorously had been arrested, never to be seen again.

So Mchwenge had acquired another enemy. They had fled the Cuban column and joined the army opposing them. His army had no name, but with others, they had bombed and raided the Cuban liberators-tumedinvaders. Sometimes, they had even worked with white farmers to attack the Cuban soldiers, but that had been an exception, not the rule.

The war was over between the Cubans and the Boers now, but they were still his enemies. The Americans and British were probably his enemies as well, even though they had ended the war. Mchwenge had decided that he had a very short list of allies.

Now Mchwenge lay in a small rock pile fifty meters from the highway. The small, stocky black was used to the heat and discomfort, especially on a mission such as this. He had been tracking the retreating Cuban column for days, watching and thinking. Finally he had picked his spot.

Preparing carefully, he had quietly lain since before dawn, easily evading the patrols that covered the highway. Now he clutched the controller and waited.

Headquarters was the back of a truck. Its canvas cover provided protection from the summer sun, and its bed was more than ample for the few functions Vega’s staff still had to perform.

Gen. Antonio Vega, Liberator of Walvis Bay, sat easily on a camp stool in the moving truck, reading a summary of the previous day’s casualties.

The truck was moving slowly, out of deference to the thousand-plus men who still had no transport.

Facing to the open rear, he looked out and saw the entire column laid out behind him. Vega’s truck was first, not only to avoid the dust but to make him easy to find. Even with the lead position, the dust and the heat had become more than irritating, almost intolerable.

Twin lines of men filled the road, with trucks interspersed among them carrying the column’s wounded, as well as its food, water, and other supplies. There were nowhere near enough trucks to carry all the men.

Virtually all of Vega’s own transport had been destroyed on that terrible morning. These were supply vehicles that had been en route from the north, their original cargoes dumped or consumed.

His men were suffering in the heat. A week on the road had weeded out the weak or infirm, but even the strong were tested by the midday sun and the dust. There was nothing to do but march, though.

The enemy had stopped molesting his supply line and had virtually given over National Route I for his exclusive use, as long as he marched north.

A company of American and British military police preceded him, clearing the road and making sure none of the Cubans strayed. A similar unit followed, picking up any stragglers. They had also picked up more than a few deserters” defectors in Western idiom.

It angered him that all the men under his command did not share his desire to return to Cuba. Even with Castro’s wrath to look forward to, the general’s only impulse was to get home. So far, his demands for the deserters’ return had been ignored. Of course, it’s easy to ignore a beaten general.

His leg still hurt, his clothes were filthy, and he ached in a hundred places. The rigors of life in the field seemed to be no different from before, but now there was no purpose to them, nothing else to occupy his mind.

Nothing except the casualty list, he thought, returning to the paper. No deaths, he was grateful to see, but more casualties to heatstroke, foot-related injuries, and two men who were hit by a truck.

They would last, though. Without any enemy assistance, he would march his forces out of South Africa and onto the airplanes in Zimbabwe. The

Americans and British had prohibited any landings by Soviet aircraft or personnel in South

Africa, and no amount of paint would ever convince them that the Cuban Air

Force had suddenly acquired 11-76 cargo planes.

More trucks would arrive over the next few days. Once his entire column was mounted, they would move ten times as fast. He allowed himself a faint anticipation. Even with delays, General Vega knew he would be home in a week.

Mchwenge felt the column’s approach in the ground beneath him, then saw the dust plume. Finally, almost an hour after the first warning of its approach, the column’s head appeared on the horizon.

They were slow, walking at the pace of an infantryman’s tired stride. The same slowness that had made it easy to pace and scout the Cubans now maddened him, filling him with impatience.

The Xhosa picked up the controller, then put it down, then picked it up again, checking the settings on its simple controls. He put it down again, almost throwing it, and fought the urge to pick it up again and check for damage.

The rock pile was waist high and had been altered slightly by Mchwenge to provide overhead concealment, as well as shade. Gaps at various points allowed him to peer out, and his comrades, checking the day before, had assured him that he was invisible from more than a meter away.

Mchwenge lay in the dark heat and waited, watching the steady progress of the column. His original plan had been to sneak looks occasionally, remaining completely concealed to minimize the risk of detection.

When the trucks had actually appeared, though, he had found it impossible to tear his eyes away, as if from half a mile’s distance they could suddenly zoom past the spot before he could react.

So he had watched through the gaps and waited, and finally, after half a morning of waiting, he reached for the controller again.

The small black box had a wire running from it. He looked it over carefully and again fought the urge to fiddle with its insides. He had put in fresh batteries that morning and so limited himself to one press of the test button. The yellow test light came on, and Mchwenge knew he had a circuit.

He had placed a small stone twenty meters from the spot, and as the lead truck’s tires passed, he lifted a cover on the controller’s box and flipped a toggle switch up. A red light next to the yellow one came on.

The circuit was armed.

The actual spot was easy to see. The meta led road had been torn up here, by weather or fighting. Even tracked vehicles crossing it could have created the break, but it was just what he had needed.

It was no different from a hundred other gaps, but it was close to the crash site and had made their trip relatively short. Besides, why should the Cubans be suspicious? The fighting had stopped.

There was no sign of any reaction in the column, just a slow, steady march north that took them right over the break in the road.

A few miles from here, a South African jet had crashed, a forced landing by the looks of it since the airframe was still intact, The pilot had died on landing. Mchwenge’s comrades had found his dessicated body, still gripping the stick.

The plane’s ordnance load had also survived, or almost. Two five-hundred-pound bombs had been found near the wrecked plane, and one was adjudged safe enough by ordnance experts to be moved.

As the truck rolled over the gap in the meta led road, Mchwenge pressed the firing button, sending an electric pulse through a buried wire to five pounds of C4 plastic explosive. It detonated, serving the same purpose as the bomb’s damaged fuze. Two hundred pounds of Minol detonated exactly under the lead truck’s center.

Colonel Vasquez saw the explosion. He had gotten out to walk for a while, not only to give the general a little room but to think about his own future, personally and professionally. Castro was not a tyrant, shooting people at whim, but they had failed their leader, and he would need scapegoats. What would be their fates?

He was looking at Vega, sitting in the back of the truck,

when a bright flash and a roar knocked Vasquez over, stunning him. He had one brief impression of the surprised general, unable even to lift his eyes from the paper, before the entire vehicle was enveloped in smoke and flame.

Vasquez came to a moment later as a soldier dragged him away from the fire. A thick column of greasy smoke rose from the blackened, shattered remains of a Russian-built
ZIL
heavy truck.

Panic filled Vasquez, and he grabbed at the arms pulling at his. He looked up into the soldier’s face and shouted, “Did anyone get out? Where is the general?”

“He is gone, Comrade Colonel. Nobody escaped.”

Vasquez refused to give up.

“Maybe someone was blown clear.” Maybe that someone was Vega.

“No, Comrade Colonel, the explosion was too great. They were all killed instantly.”

The soldier, absorbed in their conversation, was still dragging the officer. Vasquez shook off the man’s hands and stood up unsteadily. His uniform was torn and blackened from the blast, and he saw, but did not feet, blood trickling from a few small cuts.

He took one unsteady step back toward the wreckage, then another, until he could clearly see that only the bare metal skeleton of the vehicle remained. The wooden flooring had a four-foot hole blown in the center, and the frame was twisted, as if it had been softened by the heat and then dropped. He could see no sign of any bodies and knew that any human remains that might be found would be in pieces too small to identify.

Vega was gone, and Suarez, and Gomez, who had been driving, and perhaps others he would have to search for. His sadness was mixed with relief for his comrades. At least they would not have to make the long journey home to face Castro’s anger.

“Colonel, what should we do?” One of the lieutenants nearby, in charge of a group of men that had once been a company, looked to him for orders.

Vasquez was almost certainly the senior officer in the force now. He looked again at the wreckage of Vega’s truck. It was one post he had never wanted.

The lieutenant repeated the request.

“Colonel, what can we do now?”

Vasquez pointed ahead and to the side of the road.

“Bear left and keep marching.”

FEBRUARY
15-
CNN
HEADLINE
NEWS

In many ways, the televised images from Cape Town carried even more meaning than the reporter’s spoken commentary.

Pockmarks were still visible on the graceful columns fronting the Houses of Parliament. Sections of its iron rail fence were missing, warped, or shattered by shell bursts. Most of the century-old oak trees that once shaded Government Avenue’s gravel walk were also gone-blown down during the fighting and now replaced by newly planted saplings.

There were even more dramatic changes among the somber faces of the men and women filing slowly in past temporary metal and bomb detectors. Most wore business suits and many carried bulging leather briefcases. Unlike past gatherings in South Africa’s legislative chambers, however, those assembling for this first, full working session of the new Constitutional

Convention represented all of the nation’s varied races and ethnic groups. Some were lawyers and politicians. Others were farmers or doctors or teachers or businessmen,

$86

people with no experience in government. Despite their obvious differences, they had one important thing in common. All had opposed Vorster’s regime at the risk of imprisonment or death.

“Although innumerable problems remain to be settled, one thing is clear:

apartheid in South Africa is a thing of the past.

“With so many of the extremists on all sides dead or in prison, the way may finally be clear for others to lead South Africa’s separate peoples toward a better future together. The political settlement that emerges from this convention’s closed-door conference rooms is unlikely to be perfect, but it just might be workable.

“For
CNN
headline news, this is Tom Stavros, reporting from Cape Town,

South Africa.”

The camera cut away to show the network’s Atlanta studios and anchorwoman.

“In other South Africa-related news, reports that Witwatersrand mining operations were back to fifty percent of prewar levels sent commodities prices tumbling at exchanges around the world. Commerce Secretary Reid hailed the news as a ‘firm signal that the battered global economy is on the mend.”

”

MARCH
23-
HEADQUARTERS
,
ALLIED
PEACEKEEPING

FORCE
,
DURBAN

Both Gen. Jerry Craig and U.S. special ambassador Edward Hurley had kept their offices and headquarters in Durban instead of moving them to either

Cape Town or Pretoria. Part of their rationale for that was military common sense. After all, Durban was a central strategic point. Ships arriving at the city’s deepwater port supplied the U.S. and British units stationed throughout South Africa.

But their biggest reason for staying put was political. Both men were determined to avoid even the slightest appearance that the American and

British military presence in South Africa meant they were dictating every last word of the country’s new political framework. Periodic plane trips between

Cape Town and Durban were a small price to pay for making it clear that

South Africa’s ultimate fate rested in the hands of her own people.

“Hot off the fax machine, Jerry-a genuine historical document. ” Edward

Hurley couldn’t hide his excitement or his relief. He plopped a mass of thin papers on Craig’s desk, threw himself into a chair, and exhaled loudly. He looked more as if he’d run a race instead of just walking over from his office.