cross-legged on the ground wrapped cozily in his rain gear while dozing with his night vision goggles pushed up on his forehead. They had noticed these were all older men as they moved stealthily through the enemy's picket line at the front of their main defensive perimeter. While these veterans were excellent noncommissioned officers, their age had caught up with them from the long hours of fighting that day. The heavily failing rain added to their fatigue. Most were inattentive and exhausted, with the vigor and alertness of youth badly faded, taking down their energy levels.
Redhawk had his K-Bar knife in his right hand as he got to his feet in a semierect position. He moved toward the sentry, glad the noise of the storm covered any inadvertent sound-he might make. His boots seemed to tread nothingness as he approached his victim without disturbing even the heavily soaked knee-high grass. The SEAL struck suddenly and silently, putting a smothering hand over the guy's mouth and nose while making a deep cut completely across the throat. The wound from the razor-sharp blade went all the way down to the neck bone.
Mike Assad now spoke softly into his LASH. 'All enemy sentries are cleared.'
The word was passed through Wes Ferguson to Pech Pecheur. Pecheur, the last of the LASH link on the bank, now gave the welcome information to Wild Bill Brannigan, who waited back on the river with the rest of the detachment. When Brannigan spoke, the remaining men is the piraguas all heard him: 'Drag 'em out of the river!'
Wes and Pech headed back to give a hand with the wooden boats.
.
THE FALANGIST FORCE
0715 H0URS LOCAL
CORONEL Jeronimo Busch was so furious that spittle flew from his mouth as he railed at all the comandantes and capitanes. He had called all six officers to come in from their units and report to him. 'There are four dead pickets scattered up and down the line of battle! And now the bandidos are gone! They dragged their piraguas from the river and pulled them a kilometer! Un kilometro enteral Then reentered the water and have now made good headway toward the Selva Verde Mountains!'
'No one heard anything, mi coronel,' Comandante Toledo said, shamefaced. 'It was as if the norteamericanos or europeos or whatever they are, had turned to shadows and floated through us.'
'Con permiso, mi coronel,' Comandante Cappuzzo said, 'but our men worked very late loading and carrying ammunition from the helicopters. This was done on both sides of the river. Our lines were not at full strength. Or even half. Two out of every three men were on the ammunition detail.'
'We need to bring in younger men, mi coronel,' Toledo interjected. 'Our older noncommissioned officers run out of steam eventually. It cannot be helped.'
Busch knew Toledo was right, but he had to give everyone's fighting spirit another jump start. 'That is no excuse! It is imperative that we defeat these bandidos as quickly as possible.'
The new officer, Capitan Pablo Gonzales, was impressed by the enemy and didn't bother to hide it. 'Those men we fight are not bandidos, mi coronel! Their skills and capabilities show that they are militares profesionales of an elite force. Mercenaries could not fight like that!'
'But we have two helicopters now,' Toledo pointed out, 'surely we can pursue them and catch them someplace on the river.'
'Tonto--fool!' Busch bellowed. 'There is every real possibility they were going to meet another group coming in from the east. That was why it was so important to pin them down here! If we go after them now, we could find ourselves drawn into a trap where we would be surrounded by an overwhelming force!'
Cappuzzo was in the mood for a fight. 'I say we take a chance and go after them, mi coronel!'
Busch, liking the officer's fighting spirit, calmed down. 'The Ejercito Falangista is not yet at full strength, Comandante Cappuzzo. At this time in our struggle we cannot afford to take undue risks.' He paused and gripped his hands into fists. 'This battle is over. But the war is not lost. As soon as we ascertain the exact situation of those perros, we will attack again!'
Chapter 15
FUERTO FRANCO
1 JANUARY
THE Falangist headquarters bunker, Centro de Administracion, had suddenly improved after the previous day's surprise delivery of up-to-date office machines. The misappropriated shipment came in via a rerouted Chilean Air Force CH-149 Cormorant transport helicopter. Two Honda generators, a Dell computer, a Lexmark Optra E312 printer, and a Spanish Duplicador-Extra copying machine were included in the cargo that arrived unexpectedly at the site.
All this was now being used by Suboficial Ignacio Perez in his job as adjutant and quartermaster. He worked feverishly inputting the old records into the new system so that everything was on the computer's hard drive. After printing hard copies of some of the more interesting documents as samples, everything was transferred to floppy disks.
In addition, the pallets the equipment arrived on had been broken apart and rebuilt into floorboards for the headquarters bunkers by three of the convicts detailed to the task. Ignacio's desk, filing cabinets and office machinery no longer sat on dirt.
These improvements came about from complicated arrangements that included three separate bribes and the blackmailing of an officer in the Chilean Air Force Intendance Department. Comandante Adolfo Tippelskirch arranged everything at the behest of Generalisimo Castillo. The Falangist leader wanted a detailed record kept of all activities and field operations during this founding period of the Dictadura Fascista de Falangia. This included the minutes of staff meetings, and he looked upon all this as good reference material for future historians. Castillo pictured a multivolume publication that would be a definitive and flattering history of the founding of the movement while concentrating particularly on the genius of its leader.
Castillo was also following in his idol Adolf Hitler's footsteps by writing a combination autobiography and manifesto he had titled Mi Lucha. This was based on Hitler's well-known publication, Mein Kampf. The Spanish and German names of these books translated into English as My Struggle, and Castillo thought the name of the book appropriate. Ignacio was expected to put the handwritten manuscript into the computer's Word 97 processing system as the work progressed.
The little man also received extra work from the intelligence officer, Comandante Tippelskirch. The Chilean's activities seemed to grow more complex with each passing week. Additional informants, operatives, reports and activities had begun to flood Tippelskirch's office in an unexpected abundance. He decided to take advantage of the word processing and copying capabilities now available in Ignacio's bailiwick. The diminutive accountant dutifully made all the necessary copies plus extras. These additional documents, of which Tippelskirch was unaware, went into a rucksack Ignacio kept concealed under his desk.
THE SEAL DEFENSIVE POSITION
SELVA VERDE MOUNTAINS
10 JANUARY
LIEUTENANT Wild Bill Brannigan had taken great care in the selection of the SEALs' mountaintop defensive perimeter. He had studied both maps and satellite photographs before leaving the base camp, determining that the best area to defend was at the apex of a small but steep mountain that rose nine hundred feet above the Lozano Grasslands. Thick jungle growth stretched from the top in a heavily treed forest that ran all the way into the lush savannah. After they hid the piraguas in the thick brush along the banks of the Rio Ancho, he led the detachment in a difficult forced march up the slopes to the chosen spot. No time was allowed for a breather to recover from the climb, as the SEALs immediately went to work setting up a compact defensive circle. The concealment and defensive capabilities of the site were superlative. This was the most important reasoning behind Brannigan's choice, since he realistically expected to come under attack by a numerically superior enemy.
When the perimeter was laid out properly, the Skipper reconfigured the detachment for the deadly task ahead. He decided to keep only James Bradley and Frank Gomez with him in the Command Element. All the riflemen would be needed on the defensive line.
James was tasked with organizing a central place to treat casualties as well as to take care of the patient he already had. Connie Concord's wound was bad enough that he was considered hors de combat, and needed to be monitored closely and often. Frank was close by where he could tend the AN/PSC-5 Shadowfire radio that kept them
