South China Sea

deciding factors in the U.S./U.N. Vietnamese decision to have the American and U.N.-led force pull back was the lack of good radio communication between dispersed Vietnamese positions, creating the ever-present danger of a unit of withdrawing Vietnamese running into allied or their own units in the thick jungle.

Freeman could have easily rationalized his forces’ pullback, as press officer Boyd advised, by pointing out the inferior Vietnamese communications ability, which posed the greatest danger of a blue on blue. Instead, Freeman, in a CNN interview that night, explained the pullback as a joint tactical decision made by him and General Vinh. It was a face-saving gesture for the Vietnamese which General Vinh would not forget. Freeman’s pullback of his EMREF spearhead, however, received less than fair treatment in most of the world press. It became an opportunity for all those who either disliked and/or were jealous of Freeman’s reputation as one of the most, if not the most, aggressive U.S. field commanders since George Patton.

“Will you be withdrawing any farther south, General?” a British news pool reporter asked. With Vinh looking on, Freeman hedged his bets. “We may find it necessary to regroup to Bac Ninh, ten miles farther south, but—” He turned to General Vinh. “—I don’t expect anything more than that.”

General Vinh nodded his agreement immediately, which told Freeman the Vietnamese general knew more English than his interpreters had led the U.S.-U.N. team to believe. Freeman held up his right hand to signal that the press conference was over. “Cam on rat nhieu.”

Press officer Boyd, surprised, looked at Major Cline. “I didn’t know the old man could speak Vietnamese.”

Cline smiled. “There’s a lot you don’t know about the old man. He does his homework.”

“Well, do you know what he said?”

“Some form of thank-you, I think. But he sure didn’t like that limey’s question about maybe pulling back farther. Apart from Skovorodino, it’s the only time I’ve seen him pull back. It’s against his religion.”

“Which is?”

“His creed is Frederick the Great’s. ‘L’audace, l’audace— toujours l’audace!’ Audacity, audacity, always audacity!”

“Maybe,” Boyd said, “but he didn’t get off to much of a start.”

“Stick around,” Cline advised. “He’ll surprise you.”

“For instance?” Boyd challenged.

Robert Cline thought for a moment. “Freeman was in a winter battle once, leading U.S.-U.N. forces. One of the many wars that’ve erupted since the Berlin Wall came down and we got the ‘new world order.’ Anyway, Freeman gave the order to withdraw his armored corps of M-1 tanks — retreating from Russian-made T-72s. Everybody thought he was nuts— cracking up.” Major Cline paused to light a cigarette.

“And?” Boyd pressed.

“And,” Cline continued, “as the temperature kept dropping — minus fifty degrees, minus sixty — Freeman kept pulling the M-1s back. Until it got minus seventy with windchill factor — then he suddenly orders all the M-1s to stop and attack the T-72s.” Cline took a deep drag on the cigarette. He liked this part, wanted to tease it out a little, show how the Freeman legend had grown, that it wasn’t all bullshit like some of the Johnny-come-latelies thought it was.

“So?” Boyd said, anxiously awaiting the outcome. “What happened?”

“M-1s slaughtered the T-72s. Knocked out over ninety percent of them.”

“I don’t understand,” Boyd said.

By now Marte Price had come in on the fringe of the conversation. “I remember,” she said. “The oil in the Russian tanks froze at minus sixty-nine degrees, right? And the waxes separated out in the hydraulic oil lines — clogged the lines like lumps of fat in an artery. Russian tanks couldn’t move. Seized up, and Freeman’s tanks knocked them out.”

Major Cline blew out a long stream of smoke. “Thanks for ruining my story, Ms. Price.”

“Call me Marte.”

“All right. Thanks for ruining my story, Marte.”

“You’re welcome, Major,” she answered impishly. “You’re not the only one who knows Freeman’s a stickler for detail.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

The truck carrying Danny Mellin, the Australian Murphy, and a dozen or so other POWs, including several Vietnamese and Caucasian women, abruptly stopped, the prisoners told to get out by the two AK-47-toting guards.

Once down on the crushed coral road, the prisoners, despite some of them limping and showing other signs of wear and tear, were ordered to start marching down the whitish road toward a clump of trees from which the noise of construction issued forth, along with Chinese shouts. The stubby trees were more like tall brush, and soon through gaps in the trees the prisoners, most of them Vietnamese with two Australians and three Americans, could see a long line of men in black pajamas, about fifty or so, passing what looked like variegated stones on a fire- dousing line.

As Mellin and Murphy got closer to the gaps in the scrub, they could see that cement powder was being passed as well, and was being used to build hut walls about ten feet high.

Up to this point Mellin, like most of the other POWs, thought he was somewhere on the southern coast of China. But then, rounding a bend in the road, Mellin, Murphy, and the others were astonished to see an endless expanse of ocean.

“Jesus,” Murphy said. “We’re on a friggin’ island.”

“Up shut!” shouted one of the PLA guards, jabbing the Australian in the ribs with the Kalashnikov.

“Okay, mate,” the Australian said with a conciliatory smile. “Don’t get your balls in an uproar.”

The guard smashed him in the back with the rifle butt, sprawling the Australian on the crushed coral road, his arms lacerated and bleeding. Mellin bent down and, despite the fierce headache he was suffering from his earlier altercation with the same guard, helped the Australian back to his feet. “Be quiet,” he whispered to Murphy. “They’ll kill you.”

The next second there was what sounded like an enormous underground explosion, the crushed coral road beneath them trembling momentarily, and now the sound of the detonation hit them in a series of gut-punching waves. The guard who had hit them, and who would soon be known to the POWs as “Upshut,” was laughing, calling out to the other guard at the head of the line and pointing to the stunned disarray of the prisoners.

Mellin and Murphy, like the rest of the POWs who had been landed by the destroyer, would find out the next day, after spending a very uncomfortable night in the open, that the explosions, which were underwater and offshore, were part of the PLA’s plan to use the blown-up coral to add height to what was essentially a reef island, one of the many in the Nansha or Spratly Islands, which at high tide was covered with several inches of water, large parts of it becoming visible only at ebb tide.

But building up the island reef and maintaining it with a company of over a hundred PLA marines was only part of the PLA’s plan to occupy all islands in the Spratly and Paracel islands. A more pressing purpose was at hand, but it was one neither Danny Mellin nor Mike Murphy would discover until the sun rose on another perfect tropical day. It would be a day that would turn into a nightmare for all those taken prisoner by the PLA’s invasion and occupation of rigs and islands scattered throughout the two strategic groups of South China Sea islands, cays, and atolls.

For Mellin it was like being back in ‘Nam, and as he lay there beneath a bloodred moon, caused by the pollution of rig fires, he became disgusted with himself, for his hands were trembling and he feared that the guard’s brutality had not yet reached its peak. It was the only thing he was sure of; everything else — why they were here, for instance — was an open question and laden with anxiety. He’d given up smoking years ago, but right now he craved a cigarette, the stronger the better, to calm his nerves. Incredibly, next to him Mike Murphy was fast asleep and snoring, “to beat the band,” as the Aussie would have said, but then the Australian hadn’t been in a war before, and as yet hadn’t suffered the soul-breaking loneliness of the POW in solitary. Perhaps the PLA wouldn’t separate them — and perhaps when you’d finished doing whatever they wanted you to do, they’d shoot you in the neck. He