Vortex (24 page)

AUGUST
I
O-JAN
SMUTS
INTERNATIONAL
AIRPORT
,

JOHANNESBURG
,
SOUTH
AFRICA

The Jan Smuts International terminal building looked much like any other terminal in any other major airport anywhere in the world. Indecipherable boarding announcements and courtesy phone pages crackled over the public address system.

Cafeterias, bars, and small newspaper and book kiosks did a booming business as hungry, nervous, or bored travelers tried to pass the time before their flights. And television monitors showing arrivals and departures glowed from gleaming overhead metal stands.

But there were differences. Ominous differences. Most of those now waiting for incoming flights were men. Young men in their twenties and early thirties. Young men in military uniform-Citizen Force reservists summoned from their schools and jobs by Pretoria’s recent Emergency

Decree. Some looked as though their uniforms had shrunk or their stomachs had grown, but most were lean and fit-kept in shape by up to one full month of required military service in each calendar year.

Two American journalists in civilian clothes looked very much out of place in the sea of khaki-colored uniforms.

Ian Sheffield took his traveling case and identity papers from an unsmiling internal-security trooper and turned to help Sam Knowles. The little cameraman looked even more like a pack animal than usual. Pieces of video gear and sound equipment were slung across his sturdy back and shoulders and piled high on a squeaking, dented luggage cart.

“Behold the miracle of modern miniaturization. ” Knowles sounded disgusted.

“Now instead of just being buried under the weight of a single camera, I can rupture myself carrying the camera plus the rest of this shit.

”

They started down the teratinal, half-pushing and half dragging the overloaded luggage cart.

“Just whose bright idea was this move anyway?” Knowles huffed as he awkwardly maneuvered around a clump of curious South African soldiers.

Ian grinned but didn’t answer. The cameraman knew full well that he’d been badgering the New York brass for this change of location for nearly a month. With Parliament out of session and Vorster running the government practically single-handed, Cape Town was nothing but a pleasant backwater. Johannesburg, less than thirty miles from Pretoria, made a much more sensible base of operations. And since the network already leased a studio and satellite relay station

in the city, New York’s bean-counting accountants hadn’t been able to complain about added costs. At least not much.

Besides, being in Johannesburg put him that much closer to Emily.

They emerged into weak, lateafternoon sunlight and the loud, echoing roar of traffic. Chartered buses and trucks carrying more uniformed reservists jammed nearly every foot of curb space outside the terminal building. A sharp, unpleasant tang of mingled auto exhaust and unburnt jet fuel permeated the air. Ian fought the urge to cough, suddenly remembering that, at five thousand feet above sea level, Johannesburg sometimes had nearly as many air pollution problems as Denver did, back in the States.

Knowles nudged him with one camera-laden shoulder, indicating a young, stick-thin blackman dressed in a drab black suit, white shirt, and narrow black tie. He held aloft a handlettered sign with their names. Or at least a close approximation of their names. Sheffield’s was misspelled.

“We’re Sheffield and Knowles. What’s up?” Ian had to yell to be heard over the sound of traffic.

The young black man gestured nervously over his shoulder toward a parked

Ford Escort.

“I am Matthew Sibena, meneer. I am to be your driver while you are here in Johannesburg. Meneer Thompson sent me to pick you up.”

Ian nodded his understanding, surprised that Larry Thompson, the network’s penny-pinching Jo’burg station chief, had gone to all this trouble.

“Well, that’s nice of him. But I’m sure that we’ll be able to manage things ourselves. How about just dropping us off at the nearest car-hire firm on your way into the city?”

Sibena looked even more worried.

“Oh, no, meneer. That is impossible. It is a new security regulation, you see. All foreign newsmen must now have a

South African driver. That is why Meneer Thompson has hired me.”

Ian swore under his breath. Vorster’s government seemed to be doing everything it could to make the job of reporting events in South Africa even more difficult and more expensive. So now he and Knowles would have to work with this kid tagging along behind them. Ter-bloody-rific.

Then he shrugged and moved toward the parked car. They’d just have to see how things worked out.

“Okay, you’re our official driver. So let’s drive.”

The young black man looked greatly relieved.

Ian stopped in midstride and turned toward him.

“One thing, Matt. Call me Ian. And that pack mule over there is Sam Knowles. Save the meneer crap for Afrikaners.”

Sibena looked shocked at the idea of calling a white man by his first name. Then he nodded hastily, smiled shyly, and hurried forward to help

Knowles pile his gear into the Escort’s small: trunk and its scarcely larger backseat.

While he worked, trying to squeeze bulky equipment packs into every available nook and cranny, Ian and Knowles exchanged a lingering, speculative glance. Matthew Sibena undoubtedly worked for the network.

The only question was, just how many other employers did he have?

AUGUST
13-
ALONG
THE
NI
MOTOR
ROUTE
,
SOUTH
OF
JOHANNESBURG

Truck after truck roared past down the broad, multi lane highway, mammoth diesel engines growling loud in the still night air. Some carried troops wedged tightly onto uncomfortable wood-plank benches. Others were piled high with crates of food, water, and ammunition. A few trucks towed 155mm and 25-pound howitzers wrapped in concealing canvas. Fullbellied petrol tankers brought up the rear, gears grinding as their drivers tried to keep up.

The convoy, one of many on the road that night, stretched for more than six kilometers, moving steadily south at forty kilometers an hour-heading toward the road junction where it would turn northwest off the main highway. Northwest toward Namibia.

Northwest toward war.

AUGUST
18-20TH
CAPE
RIFLES’
FORWARD
ASSEMBLY
AREA
,
NEAR
THE
NAMIBIAN

BORDER
.

Very little of the light provided by the small, battery-powered lamp leaked out through the edges of the command tent’s tightly closed flap.

But even those thin slivers of light seemed bright against the ink-black night sky outside. With the moon already down and dawn still an hour away, the battalion’s ranked APCs and armored cars were almost invisible-dark rectangles against darker boulders and tangled patches of thorn bushes, tall grass, and thistles. Their squat, camouflaged shapes blended easily with the rough, rocky scrubland marking this southern edge of the Kalahari

Desert.

An eerie silence hung over the rows of parked vehicles. No radios crackled or hissed. Voicess were hushed, and orders normally bellowed were now given in swift, harsh whispers. Only the occasional crunch of boots on loose rock marked the passage of sentries patrolling ceaselessly around the battalion’s perimeter. The men of the 20th Cape Rifles were on a war footing.

Inside the command tent, Commandant Henrik Kruger looked round the circle of grimly determined faces caught in the lamp’s pale, unwavering light. He knew that many of the battalion’s officers shared his unspoken misgivings about this operation’s political wisdom. If anything, those misgivings had grown stronger since General de Wet’s preliminary briefing nearly a month before.

But none of them, himself included, would disobey orders. Once soldiers started picking and choosing which commands they would obey and which they would ignore, you had anarchy or worse. Black Africa’s assortment of fragile, coup ridden and corrupt governments showed that all too clearly.

South Africa was different. A civilized nation. A nation of law. Or so he hoped.

Kruger shook himself and looked down at the heavily annotated map before him. His company commanders followed suit.

He tapped the thick black line showing their planned axis of advance.

“Speed! That’s the whole key to this op, gentlemen. If we move fast from the start, we win fast and easy. The Swapo bastards won’t know what hit them. But if we move slow at first, we’ll get bogged down and move even slower later. And that’s something we can’t afford.”

The other men nodded their understanding. Intelligence reports portrayed the new Namibian Army as inexperienced and under equipped Its officers and men were still trying to cope with the difficult transition from being an often-hunted, often-harried guerrilla army to being a conventional defense force. South Africa’s powerful airborne, armored, and motorized forces should have little trouble crushing them.

Conquering Namibia itself was entirely another matter.

The country stretched more than one thousand kilometers from south to north-most of it an unpopulated, and wasteland. Windhoek, its capital city, the diamond and uranium mines, and everything else of any value Jay far to the west and north, spread across hundreds of thousands of square kilometers of rugged, inhospitable terrain.

Just supplying food, fuel, ammo, and water to the brigades and battalions slated for this invasion would absorb almost

all of South Africa’s military air transport and a good deal of its ground transport. Every extra day they took to achieve their objectives would increase the strain on the Republic’s economy. A quick war meant fewer casualties, lower costs, and less international outrage. A quick war was vital.

Kruger slid the map aside with an abrupt, impatient gesture.

“Our march order reflects this need for a rapid advance.”

He turned to the short, dark-haired major commanding the battalion’s attached reconnaissance squadron.

“Your boys will lead off, Daan. You’ll be moving about six to seven klicks ahead of the main column-probing for strong points and smashing anyone else trying to resist. Clear?”

Maj. Daan Visser nodded vigorously. His fast, powerfully gunned Rookiat and Eland armored fighting vehicles were perfectly suited to the job they were being given. They had the speed and firepower needed to blast open a hole in whatever hasty defenses the Narnibians managed to assemble.

The mission was probably Visser’s idea of heaven, Kruger reflected. The major had always prided himself on being the perfect hell-for-leather, death-or-glory cavalryman. It was an attitude reflected in everything he did, said, and even wore -right down to the bright orange scarf tucked into his camouflaged battle dress, in place of the regulation necktie, and the black beret rakishly perched above his right eye.

Kruger admired the man’s proven bravery. He just hoped Visser had the common sense to go with his guts.

“And the rest of the battalion, Kommandant?” Major Forbes, his executive officer, prompted.

Kruger noted the XO’s careful use of Afrikaans and bit back a frustrated sigh. It was evidence of the one continuing weakness in his battalion and in the South African Army as a whole-the deep and abiding mistrust between those of Afrikaner heritage and those of English descent.

Forbes was a good example of the price paid for that mistrust. He was a first-class soldier and a fine officer, but some of the battalion’s

Afrikaner diehards were still unwilling to accept him as an equal.

Despite the fact that his family had lived in Cape Town for nearly a century, they labeled him as nothing more than an interfering, toffee-nosed rooinek and outsider.

Forbes, aware of their feelings, had tried everything he could think of to blend in with the Cape Rifles’ Afrikaner majority-even to the extent of speaking accentless Afrikaans every chance he got. All to no avail.

Kruger came back to the present. He had more immediate problems to confront. Besides, once the shooting started, the first man who showed disrespect for the XO or who disobeyed one of his orders would swiftly discover that Henrik Kruger valued competence far more than a common ancestry.

“The infantry will follow Major Visser’s squadron. Companies A, B, and then C. ” A scarred finger stabbed the portable, folding table three times, emphasizing each unit’s position in the main column.

“You’ll move in road march formation, but I want flank guards out and alert.”

He smiled thinly.

“Ratel APCs are expensive, gentlemen. Lose one to a lucky shot from some Swapo
RPG
and I’ll see that it’s docked from your pay.”

Nervous laughter showed that his warning had hit close to home. Ratels offered good protection against bullets and shell fragments, but rocket-propelled grenades could turn them into flaming death traps. The only way to deal with an enemy soldier carrying an
RPG
was to see him and kill him before he could fire.

Kruger turned to the tall, burly, towheaded officer on his right.

“D

Company will bring up the rear. No offense, Hennie, but I hope we won’t have too much work for your boys on this jaunt.”

Hennie Mulder, the captain commanding his heavy weapons company, nodded soberly. His truck-carried 8 1 mm mortars and Vickers heavy machine guns represented a large part of the battalion’s firepower, but they were also relatively immobile and required time to deploy. The battalion would only need D Company’s weapons teams if it met strong resistance-and that, in turn, would mean Nimrod was going badly.

“Wommandant?”

Kruger looked toward the hesitant voice. Robey Riekert,

his youngest and least experienced company commander, had a hand half-raised.