Scorched Earth

11

In the red light of sunset, vultures feasted on the bodies of the soldiers who had died on the high ridge. The squat black creatures, their heads and necks glistening red with gore, paused in their feeding to look up at the helicopter. One vulture pulled its head out of the chest cavity of a naked corpse, a torn mass of lung tissue flopping in its beak. The vultures flapped their blood-splashed wings to drive off the huge mechanical insect descending onto the ridge.

Dust gusted. The rotor storm swirled red in the sunset as the chopper settled on its skids. Inside, Colonel Gonzalez, Lieutenant Colomo and a squad of soldiers looked through the Plexiglas of the sliding doors as the mountain wind carried away the dust. Without speaking, they watched as the dust-grayed vultures returned to the dead men.

The lieutenant threw open the door. Jerking out his autopistol, he fired at the vultures, the rapid-fire popping of the 9mm cartridges insignificant in the vast expanse of shadowy mountains and red sky.

Awkward, their gullets heavy with Mexican flesh, the vultures flapped away, squawking into the canyon.

Except one. The lieutenant's wild shooting had broken the wing of one vulture. Flailing the disjointed wing, the crippled carrion bird screeched and waddled away, its good wing fanning swirls of dust. The lieutenant rushed the vulture and executed it with three point-blank shots to the head, then launched a vicious kick at the gore-splashed headless creature.

Cursing, muttering prayers to their Catholic saints and God, the soldiers jumped out of the helicopter. They moved through the dead, groaning at the sight of vulture-mutilated faces with empty eyesockets and torn-away noses and lips. Soldiers shouted out to one another as they found dead friends.

Men forgot their machismo, their curses and obscenities becoming sobs.

Snapping his riding crop against his jackboot, the colonel finally took command. "Search the area! Perhaps someone survived and is hiding. Look for the bodies of the ones who did this. Look for weapons. Anything. We cannot take revenge until we know who committed this massacre and find them. Now! Soon it will be dark."

"The gringos did this!" the lieutenant declared. "We will search the mountains and make them pay. They will wish they were never born."

"It could not have been them," the colonel told his junior officer. "Sergeant Mendoza reported the gringos in the canyon, down there..."

Walking to where the ridge ended, Colonel Gonzalez pointed with his leather crop into the darkness of the gorge. "The ambush trapped the DEA men there. Sergeant Mendoza reported fighting between the gringos and Sergeant Orlando's platoon. Then Mendoza opened fire. The helicopter went down to make the kill. That is when the others attacked here."

The two officers looked at the twisted, gory bodies scattered around them on the ridge. The colonel continued his analysis. "The gringos could not have done this. Someone else. A force that came down from there..."

Like a professor lecturing, the colonel pointed to the mountain engulfed in shadows behind them. "They came from there. That would also explain how the pilot was wounded. Perhaps another group helped the gringos in the canyon."

"But how is that possible?" the lieutenant asked. "After we shot them down, they had no time to send for help."

Colonel Gonzalez surveyed the range of mountains. In the east, the night already held the Sierra Madres in its dark, cool grip. In the west, patches of red sunlight glowed from peaks.

"We have enemies here. Enemies of our organization and of our New Order. But they will not survive. Nothing will be allowed to resist the International. We have the helicopters, we have the soldiers, we have the bombs, the napalm, we have the satellites of our allies in Washington. They cannot escape. We will find them and exterminate them!"

An hour later, the helicopter returned to the asphalt airfield of Rancho Cortez, the temporary garrison facility commanded by Colonel Gonzalez. While his superiors in the capital completed the ouster of the army and federal officials who refused to swear allegiance to the New Order, the elite International Group occupied the sprawling ranch on the Pacific coast. The complex of dormities, warehouses and air-craft hangars that dotted the ranch had been used throughout the century for a succession of causes. First came the free enterprise of the Yankee sugarcane processors, then the revolutionary forces of General Emilio Flores. Mafia bootleggers followed during Prohibition and, decades later, the airborne commandos of Operation Condor found a hospitable home. Every user had contributed improvements to the facilities of the Rancho.

Generators powered electric lights and machines and air conditioners. Wells pumped water. Concrete roads linked the Rancho to the highway and railroad. Docks provided for the transfer of cargo to and from ships. The paved airfields offered the convenience of year-round air travel, regardless of weather or politics or international laws. The dormitories could house thousands of soldiers or campesinos.

Now Rancho Cortez housed the hundreds of soldiers and officers and technicians of the International Group. Every man had been screened for racial purity and political beliefs. Every man had sworn an oath of loyalty to the New Order. Though still serving in the army of the Republic of Mexico, they had been assigned from their original units to create the elite International Group.

Advisors from El Salvador, Argentina, Chile and Paraguay instructed the Group in the ideology of the New Order. They taught organization and counter-insurgency. The advisors also served as liaison with the special units restructuring the heroin trade in the states of Sonora, Sinaloa and Chihuahua.

When the special units in Culiacan or Hermosillo or the Sierra Madres required military assistance, the group provided reinforcements and aircraft. Sometimes the soldiers went to battle in the street clothes of gangsters. Sometimes they wore the uniform of the army of Mexico. But they always served the International Group.

The Group and the special units had succeeded in destroying or defeating every drug gang in western Mexico. All state and federal opposition had been bribed, liquidated or politically neutralized.

Los Guerreros Blancos now controlled all heroin flowing north from the western states of Mexico. Every American dollar from the addicts and the drug enchanted of the United States went into the transnational banks of the International.

However, difficulties still arose from time to time. The escape of the North American DEA agents and the annihilation of two Group units represented the single most alarming incident since Colonel Gonzalez had assumed command. If he did not counter the threat presented by organized and deadly resistance in the mountains, his promotion to general would be uncertain.

From the landing field, Colonel Gonzalez went first to the hangar where technicians repaired the damaged helicopter. A worker scrubbed crusted blood from the cockpit as others replaced the Plexiglas windshield. The staff sergeant in charge of the technicians immediately reported to the colonel.

"It appears to be a bullet from a thirty-caliber weapon."

He gave the colonel a misshapen lump of copper-jacketed lead. The nose had been smashed flat by impact, but the base remained circular. Rifling marked the diameter.

"A machine gun fired this?"

"I don't know, sir. Perhaps an expert with a microscope would be able to tell."

The colonel hurried directly from the airfield to the communications room of Rancho Cortez. He dismissed the technician on duty and unlocked the sophisticated radio linking the Group to his superiors in Mexico City.

The radio had been manufactured by the United States National Security Agency and donated to the International by associates in Washington, D.C. The computerized unit not only encoded messages entered by keyboard or microphone, but also transmitted them in high-speed screeches. Even if the American NSA or the Soviet KGB or the Mexican federalesmonitored the frequency, the communications might be mistaken for bursts of electronic disturbance from space.

At the keyboard, Gonzalez typed in his identification number and a sequence of acronyms requesting the immediate attention of Colonel Jon Gunther. Three keystrokes transmitted the request to Mexico City.

Seconds later, the video monitor displayed the computer code acknowledging the reception of the transmission. More than a thousand miles away, in an office somewhere in the world's largest city, the technician on duty summoned Colonel Gunther of the International.

Colonel Gonzalez waited. In the phosphor-green glow of the radio unit's video screen, he lit a Marlboro and sucked down drag after drag. Minutes passed.

Another message flashed onto the screen. Colonel Gunther would respond soon. The message requested that the Mexican colonel please stand by.

As Gonzalez lit his third cigarette, the electronically disembodied voice of Colonel Gunther spoke from the audio monitor.

"Are they dead?"

Gonzalez choked on his smoke. Colonel Gunther's question surprised him. But then the Mexican colonel realized that the International headquarters would know everything concerning the DEA flight south. Information from the United States went first to Mexico City, then to Culiacan and Rancho Cortez. His superiors in Mexico City had issued the order for the destruction of the jet and its passengers late the previous night. Though he had received instructions from Los Guerreros Blancos headquarters in Culiacan, the orders would have come from Mexico City. Of course they would now expect a report. He carefully considered his words before he spoke into the microphone.

"Their jet was shot down. Some North Americans killed in crash. But survivors joined unknown gang in mountains. Request information on gang allies of North Americans."

After a pause, in which circuits of the radios encoded and decoded the messages flashing between the two units, Colonel Gunther's voice answered. "What? What allies? Repeat."

"Gang unknown. We have no information. A gang ambushed soldiers searching for the North American survivors of the crash. Request information from sources in United States before we mount search-and-destroy operation."

Seconds passed. In his imagination, he saw the blond barrel-chested Gunther conferring with an aide. He hoped he had correctly phrased his request to imply criticism of his superiors in the International command for exposing his soldiers to a devastating surprise in the Sierra Madres. Finally Gunther replied. "All opposition in region has been liquidated. No gangs are now opposing the organization. We know nothing of any gang in the mountains. What do your officers report?"

"No survivors of ambushes found. Night stopped search of area of combat. We will resume the search for our soldiers in the morning. Will immediately launch search and destroy of North Americans and gang. We request headquarters consult with sources in United States for information on gang in mountains."

A minute passed. The disembodied voice spoke. "Please wait a moment."

Now Colonel Gonzalez knew Gunther consulted with others in Mexico City. The Mexican lit another cigarette with the one he'd been smoking, now an inch long stub.

After Gonzalez had a few more cigarettes, the voice came from Mexico City. "Command cancels secondary missions in support of organization. All Group soldiers will prepare and stand by for operation in mountains. All liaison staff will stand by to participate in operation. Command Headquarters will provide additional aircraft, weapons and troops. I will fly to Cortez to join you in operation named Scorched Earth. We must find and destroy all opposition."

"I understand."

An acronym on the video screen cut the voice exchange. Colonel Gonzalez switched off the radio's power and locked the console.

Excitement and nicotine made his hands tremble. Not only had he not been blamed for the slaughter of his soldiers and the escape of the gringos, he had also gained the full support of the International.

Now he would command a combined force of Mexicans and International soldiers. His Group would be joined by troops from all the allied nations: Argentine patriots expelled by the Alfonsin Communists, Chilean veterans of the Pinochet victory, Salvadorians and Guatemalans hardened by generations of war against socialism.

Images came of when he had met the White Warriors at receptions given by the glorious ex-president of Mexico. In the splendor and pomp of the past president's mansion, the White Warriors of the International had told him of their long-range reconnaissance and patrol training in the Andes by privately employed American ex-Green Berets. They had talked of the wars against the Tupamaros cadres in Buenos Aires, the never-ending campaigns against the savages of the Amazon and the pursuit of the Sendero Luminoso in Peru.

Now Colonel Gonzalez of the International Group of Mexico would command those warriors.

The glory of this victory would be his.