The Miernik Dossier

80. INTERCEPTED TRAFFIC FROM THE SOVIET TRANSMITTER (14 JULY).

1. Two companies of parachute troops equipped with automatic weapons and mortars will depart Khartoum by air during night 15 July. Destination El Fasher for quote routine maneuvers unquote.

2. Disperse all ALF personnel immediately. Abandon your headquarters.

3. Cancel rendezvous with Richard. Richard will contact Qemal 15 July at time and place of Richard’s choosing.

4. Suspend all operations until consultation with Richard. Hide all arms and ammunition. Destroy all documents.

(Note: This message was not acknowledged by the ALF transmitter. The Soviet transmitter rebroadcast the message at hourly intervals on 14-15 July. It was not unusual for the ALF transmitter to fail to acknowledge messages. Only Ahmed and Firecracker were trained to operate the radios. On date of message Ahmed was already dead. Therefore only Firecracker would have been able to receive the Morse signal, decode it, and understand the Russian in which it was written. At 0732 and again at 1932 on 16 July, the Soviet transmitter repeated this message in clear, in the Arabic language. This final attempt to contact ALF headquarters evidently failed. There was no acknowledgment.)