Trial by Fire

12

Moving far too fast to observe anything along the route, the lead Humvee of Sergeant Jimmy Sullivan's scout section raced along the deserted highway to their assigned observation post. Two hundred meters behind, the second Humvee of the section, an armored Humvee armed with an M-60 machine gun, was pushing it to keep up with Sullivan. Were it not for an occasional reminder from Private Tod Alison, who normally drove Sullivan, Sullivan would have gone faster and lost the heavier and slower vehicle. Losing the second vehicle, however, was the least of his concerns.

With both hands gripping the steering wheel, Sullivan ignored the speedometer and leaned on the accelerator in an effort to make up the time they had lost getting ready back at the battalion's base camp. In the backseat, Andy Morrezzo, a scout observer, held onto his map with one hand and the radio mike with his other, keeping track of their progress and calling off checkpoints as they went whizzing by. While he was doing so, Morrezzo hoped that no one back at the battalion was noticing that they were hitting the checkpoints rather fast.

There were any number of excuses Sullivan could use, if necessary, to explain why they had started late. After all, this was only their third day on the border, using equipment that was relatively new to them, and working as a section for the first time. Even under the best of circum stances, it took the men of the ist Battalion, 141st Infantry, most of the first week of annual summer camp to get into the groove of tactical operations. After all, you simply cannot jerk eight hundred men from their homes scattered all over central Texas one day and expect them to be up to speed, working as a battalion, the next.

To say that the conditions they were working under were far from the best would be an understatement. To start with, instead of going to Fort Hood, where their equipment was located, the battalion had assembled at Camp Mabry in Austin, Texas. There, they were reorganized and issued a mix of Humvees and ancient M-151 jeeps instead of their armored vehicles. The wheeled vehicles, which were cheaper to operate and more suitable for patrolling the vast stretch of border which they were responsible for, were nonetheless new to the men and required some retraining as well as rethinking on how to employ them. In the case of Sullivan's section, this meant reorganization as well as training. At Camp Mabry, Sullivan found that his scout section, authorized at five men and one M-3

Bradley fighting vehicle but consisting of four men and one M-113 armored personnel carrier since it was short personnel and modern equipment, now consisted of six men and two Humvees. One of the Humvees he was issued was a stripped model with nothing but a radio. It could carry four men and their equipment. The second Humvee, borrowed from an MP unit, was an armored version with a roof mount for the M-60 machine gun. The FM radios in both vehicles, VRC-64S, were built in the 1960s and had a planning range of twenty-five kilometers, or sixteen miles, which would be woefully inadequate for what they would have to do. Sullivan still wasn't sure how best to use this combination of equipment when they were moved to their sector on the border.

Sullivan's personnel status was just as bad. Of the three men assigned to his scout section before the call-up, one announced on the day everyone reported to the armory that he was nondeployable due to his job with the state police. This cut Sullivan's section down to three, including himself. To make good this deficiency, three new men were assigned to his section after they had arrived at Camp Mabry. One man, the best of the lot, had just left active duty. Although he had been an artilleryman while in the Army, he at least was trained. Of the other two, one had not yet had a chance to attend basic training while the other, Jack Lyttle, Sullivan suspected, was a dud transferred from one of the infantry companies.

Jack was a nice enough guy, anxious to please, but seemingly incapable of doing anything without close supervision. Sullivan thought that Jack's nickname, Gomer Pyle, gave him too much credit, since, as Sullivan put it, at least Gomer knew how to wear his uniform properly.

With this mix of new equipment, men, and mission, with almost no time to organize and train properly, Sullivan didn't have to fabricate a reason for not making their start time. In the words of his first sergeant, the scout platoon was an accident waiting to happen.

While Sullivan knew he could get away with such excuses, he didn't want to if he didn't need to. To do so at this early stage would be unwise.

The good ole boy system had no place in the 1st of the 141st. Instead, both the company commander and the battalion commander judged their people on their performance, not who they were or who they knew. Those who performed were rewarded, those who didn't got extra training or the boot. The day would come, Sullivan knew, when he would need a favor, such as a couple of days off to go home and see his family. When that time came, the last thing he wanted to have was some officer pull out his notebook, flip to a page, and inform Sullivan that on 29 August he and his patrol had been thirty minutes late getting into place. And Captain Terry Wilkes, his company commander, was just the kind of guy to do that. So Sullivan told his normal driver to hop in the passenger seat, took the wheel, and made a beeline for the site where they would set up their first observation post that night. Along the way, he decided to reduce the number of stops to check crossing points from six to three and make a visual inspection of the other three as they went by. It was a gamble that Sullivan thought was worth taking.

The truth was, it didn't make any difference. Even had Sullivan stopped at each of the six crossing points in his sector, neither he nor his section would have found any traces of Lefleur and his team. They, like all the other teams, were already north of the border, preparing to operate from new locations in the United States, not Mexico.

In a stroke of real genius, Delapos had ordered his teams to go north and-find base camps on the U.S. side of the Rio Grande before the Texas National Guard was able to close on the border and replace the U.S.

Border Patrol. The advantages of doing so were numerous. By operating in the United States, Delapos's men could avoid the need to sneak through the increasing Mexican patrols, crossing a border that was coming under intense scrutiny by human and electronic surveillance on both sides, and then, when finished, come back after everyone was alerted. Their earlier operations, against the border patrol, had more than established the idea in everyone's mind that the raids were coming across the border. There was, therefore, no need to reinforce this. What was necessary was to maintain a high success rate without compromise or loss. Actions by both the Mexican government and the state of Texas were making this harder.

Capitalizing on the fact that the Americans were becoming both frustrated and mesmerized by the ability of the raiders to move across the border without detection, both Delapos and Childress suspected that each success would cause the Americans to panic, redoubling their intelligence efforts at or south of the border, not north of it. If this in fact happened, Delapos figured that their operations would become easier as more troops and efforts were piled up on the border and drawn away from the interior.

Besides being able to avoid crossing the border, Delapos would be able to supply, pay, reinforce, and communicate with his people with greater ease. In the days after June 29, it had not been a problem to move men, weapons, and money about in Mexico while the Purification was decimating Mexico's police and intelligence agencies and causing panic among those that remained. Deployment of the Rural Defense Corps, movement of regular Army units to the border, and acceptance of the Council of 13 by the people, however, had made operations south of the border hazardous.

Coupled with an increase in the odds of being discovered while operating on the border itself, was the fact that the Council of 13 was beginning to gain a firm grasp of Mexico's institutions and systems. Banks, now under control, were limiting the amount of funds that could be transferred in and out of the country. The purge of customs officials, as well as of the police at seaports and airports, was over. Those who remained took the lessons of the Purification to heart and were, at least for the time being, incorruptible. To ensure that they remained so, the customs officials and police were being rotated to other assignments randomly and at irregular intervals, making it difficult to bribe them and allow arms and military supplies to be smuggled in. Against such moves, there was little Alaman or Delapos could do. Even communications and movement were becoming more difficult. The comings and goings of strangers were being tracked and reported. The telephone system was susceptible to being tapped. And roving roadblocks, set up without notice and at random intervals, were making movements of equipment difficult to plan.

The situation in the United States, however, was different. If anything, the shifting of operations north simplified matters. Despite the fact that the raids had created a panic in Texas and the National Guard had been called out, no one, not even the governor of Texas, was prepared to suspend civil liberties by declaring martial law or restricting movement of civilians. It was therefore possible for Delapos's men, especially those who were North American or European, to travel near the border in pickup trucks and scout out their next ambush sites and watch the National Guard as it deployed and maneuvered. Some, like Childress, actually went up to the National Guard observation posts. Striking up a conversation with the guardsmen, Childress would share beer he just happened to have in a cooler in the back of his pickup, telling them how glad he was to see them on the job, and swap war stories. And while the guardsmen drank his beer, Childress carefully noted how they were equipped, asking seemingly innocent questions about their unit and mission, and listened to their reporting procedures. That they were being set up was the last thing on their minds. After all, he spoke the language, looked like them, and had been in the Army himself. The enemy, according to the commanders, were sneaky little Mexicans. As far as the soldiers were concerned, Childress was just another good ole boy who really knew how to support the troops.

Not that Childress really had to do this. To ensure that the border was properly covered, and that military operations did not interfere with civilian operations, all American patrol plans, roadblocks, and OP locations had to be determined well in advance, coordinated with state and local authorities, and approved. If an OP was to be located on private property, the owner of the land had to be notified. In this way, a great deal of detailed information was available and passing through many hands on a daily basis. It was therefore not difficult for Alaman to energize his own intelligence network. The fact was, some of the state and local officials who were handling the military information were already on Alaman's payroll, holdovers from when Alaman's efforts had been simply to facilitate the movement of drugs and illegal aliens.

Movement of new personnel, funds, and even military hardware, was no problem. In fact, using Alaman's connections, it was surprisingly easy. Secondhand weapons no longer needed by the Nicaraguan and Cuban governments were purchased by Alamdn's agents and shipped to Colombia. There they were combined with regular drug traffic organized and run by Alaman's associates in that country and sent on flights being made into the United States. Once in the United States, the new personnel, funds, weapons, and equipment were moved by road using a trucking company owned by another of Alaman's associates. In this way, Delapos was able to provide antitank guided missiles and portable surface-to-air guided missiles to his teams within a matter of weeks.

Though outdated, the new heavy and precision-guided weapons gave Delapos's teams an edge that the National Guard was unaware of. When they did find out about it, and American intelligence began to look into the matter, they would find little useful or conclusive information, be cause the Nicaraguans were providing the same weapons to the regular Mexican Army. Even this effort was planned in such a way as to reinforce the confusion within the American intelligence community about whether the Mexican government, through intent or ineptitude, was implicated.

By using the same Nicaraguan colonel who was handling the movement of weapons to the Mexican Army, Alaman could avoid duplicate systems. Both he and the Mexican Army were drawing from the same stock of weapons. The Nicaraguan colonel, for his part, ensured that weapons and ammunition provided to either the Mexican Army or Alaman did not have consecutive serial numbers, but were mixed. For example, a shipment of surface-to-air missiles was arranged so that the Mexican Army received weapons with serial numbers one through three, while Alaman received the missile with serial number four, the Mexican Army numbers five and six, Alaman seven and eight, and so forth. In this way, if the Americans were able to obtain the original manufacturer's serial numbers, and track them through Nicaragua, there was the possibility that some would be found to be in the hands of the Mexican Army while others, with consecutive serial numbers, were found conveniently discarded at ambush sites in the United States.

There was little, therefore, from Delapos's standpoint, to fear from the National Guard. With the Guard in place and settled into a discernible routine, and his own teams rearmed and set north of the border, Delapos was more than ready to open the next phase of Alaman's reign of terror.

From the seat of the division commander's command and control helicopter, Scott Dixon watched the two Humvees below for a moment before returning his attention to the border to the south. This was his third trip to the border in ten days and, with pressure increasing for the federal government to take an active role in securing the border, he knew it wouldn't be his last.

The recons, by Dixon and other key members of the division, were meant to prepare them for what some called the inevitable deployment of the division south. Rather than increase his knowledge of the area and better prepare him, however, each successive recon only served to heighten Dixon's sense of foreboding and apprehension. Even Jan, during their brief reunions, noted that Dixon was treating the entire subject of the use of American military forces on the border with great trepidation.

In one halting discussion over dinner, he kept pointing out that unless someone came up with what he called a "war-winning strategy," they were not only wasting time and manpower, but were leaving them selves open to a situation that had no definable goal and little direction other than the perceived need to "teach the Mexicans a lesson." In his heart, Dixon knew that if the Army deployed to the border, someone, for some reason, would find an excuse for using it in Mexico. And once that happened, there would be no peace for years, on either side of the border.

With a heavy Hispanic population throughout the southwestern United States and a strong anti-American sentiment in Mexico and Central America, the resulting mess would make the Israeli-Palestinian problem in the Middle East look like child's play.

Turning his thoughts away from the politics of the problem, which were not his concern anyway, and back to the immediate military situation, Dixon looked out the open door. The terrain below, the area where the 16th would be operating, was a real horror story. Looking down at his map, Dixon tried to figure out where they were. In the process of trying to solve the problems of the world, he had lost track of his location. When he couldn't relate the terrain he was looking at to the symbols on the map, he flipped the map over and refolded it to uncover the next sheet, taking great care to hang on to it as he did so lest the wind rip it from his hands and out of the helicopter. To lose one's map was the nightmare of every officer, the supreme moment of embarrassment. As a young company commander, leading his tank company on his first major tactical exercise in Germany, Dixon had lost his map doing just what he was doing now.

The image of his wayward map, lazily floating away down the long column of tanks after being ripped from his hands, was burned into his mind as one of the three most embarrassing moments in his life. Though he didn't take the precaution of tying his map to him with a string, like they taught at the infantry school, he was always extremely careful and very mindful of what he was doing whenever he handled his map while on or in a moving vehicle.

It therefore came as a surprise when, after refolding his map, he looked up and saw a UH-1 helicopter flying parallel to them south of the border.

Running his hand along the intercom cable until he found the intercom button, Dixon pressed the button and blurted, "Who's that?"

The pilot, a young warrant officer, responded without thinking. "It's a helicopter, sir."

Taken aback by the comment, Dixon tried to decide if the aviator was trying to be a smartass or didn't understand what Dixon wanted. Either way, he decided that he should have gotten a better answer. He therefore decided to give the young warrant a verbal shot in the head. "No shit, Sherlock. You figure that out on your own or did the co-pilot help?"

There was a pause while the pilot figured out that Dixon was not pleased with his first response. In a more respectful and less flippant tone, he corrected himself. "Sorry, sir. It looks like a Mexican Air Force Bell 212. It came up from the south, from our seven o'clock position a few seconds ago and began to parallel us. He's still on his side of the border, traveling at approximately one hundred knots."

Dixon only grunted in response as he looked across the open space between the two aircraft in an effort to find any distinguishing marks or equipment that would help him identify it later. The Mexican Air Force helicopter, like his, had its doors wide open. He could clearly see its pilot and co-pilot, the crew chief, and the door gunners. On the right side of the cargo bay, a lone passenger sat. He, like Dixon, held a map on his lap and was watching Dixon watch him. No doubt, Dixon thought, the lone passenger was an officer, like him, making his recon in order to prepare himself for the deployment of his forces to the border. The irony of the situation did not escape him. Keying the intercom again, Dixon instructed the pilot to slowly increase their air speed. Dixon wanted to see how badly the Mexican, whoever he was, wanted to play chicken.

Colonel Guajardo had no doubt that the American UH-60 helicopter his helicopter was paralleling was a command and control aircraft. The symbol of the 16th Armored Division, painted in bold colors, was all over it.

That, and the lone passenger seated before a huge radio set in the cargo bay, left little doubt that the anonymous American was doing the same thing that he was. And the presence of door gunners, on the American aircraft as well as his own, told Guajardo how seriously both sides took the current situation.

As he watched the American door gunner that faced him, Guajardo noted that he held the spade grips of his M-60 machine gun with his right hand angled down and away from Guajardo. Guajardo knew, however, what the American gunner was thinking. Even with the American's sun visor down, Guajardo could almost feel the eyes drilling a hole through him as the gunner mentally noted range and computed the angle of deflection he would need to apply in order to hit Guajardo's helicopter.

Such thoughts, Guajardo knew, were expected. In fact, only a poor soldier would have been thinking of other things. And the odds were nonexistent that a poor soldier would be part of the crew on a command and control helicopter.

The thought of flying in such close proximity to a group of men who were prepared to kill him without hesitation, on order, was sobering.

How easy, Guajardo thought, it would be for the American door gunner to pull his weapon over into firing position and engage his aircraft. A simple pulling in of the right arm until the spade grips were in front of the door gunner's chest, a lifting of his left hand to the spade grips, a pause to sight the gun, and a downward motion with his two thumbs were all that was necessary for the gunner to engage Guajardo's helicopter and start a war. So simple, so easy. Yet the American would not do it, at least not yet. There were still a few hands left to be played out by the politicians and the diplomats. Until these hands were played, it was the task of Guajardo, and no doubt of the unknown American officer in the other helicopter, to keep stupid mistakes from starting something that would cost both sides more than either could possibly imagine.

An increase in the vibration of his own helicopter rattled Guajardo back to the present. He looked to the American helicopter and noted that it seemed to move forward slightly. Then there was an increase in the vibration of his own helicopter as the pilot pushed the old Bell 212 to keep up. Looking toward his own» pilot, he noted that First Lieutenant Blasio's head was turned toward the American helicopter, watching its every move and matching it. Guajardo, realizing that the American was intentionally increasing his speed, knew that Blasio could not possibly match the speed and performance of the American. The American was only playing with him, egging Blasio on until he couldn't keep up. The American would then kick in whatever power he had left and leave Blasio behind. In order to spare Blasio such an undeserved humiliation, Guajardo ordered him to stand by to execute the sharpest left turn he could, telling Blasio that he wanted to show the American the backside of a Mexican Air Force helicopter.

This order was greeted by Blasio with great pleasure, for he also realized that he must soon fall behind the American. This way, at least he could show the American some of his skills as an aviator. When he was ready, he informed Guajardo, warning everyone to hang on. "Very well then, Lieutenant. On the count of three. One… two… three…"

As he finished three, Blasio jerked up on his lateral, twisted his collective to get whatever power he had left, and threw the stick to the left as hard as he could. The American helicopter, and Guajardo's view of the ground, disappeared in a flash as the helicopter practically stood on its side in a violent power turn. Guajardo could feel himself being forced back into the seat, as if by a giant hand, throughout the turn, by the increase in speed and climb. By the time the helicopter was back in level flight, the American helicopter was nowhere in sight.

Satisfied that Blasio's pride had been saved, Guajardo instructed him to come around and back onto their heading for Nuevo Laredo. Guajardo was anxious to arrive at the garrison headquarters there and talk to the officers of the cavalry units before they moved out for their nightly patrols. As with the other units along the border, Guajardo wanted to impress upon his officers and men the gravity of the situation. Common sense, tempered by healthy discretion, were the order of the day. Although every man was expected to do his duty, investigating anything and everything of note during their patrols, they were to do their utmost to avoid provoking the Americans. In order to rally world support and opinion in the event of a confrontation, Mexico had to be the offended party.

Standing alone, Lieutenant Augustin Marti watched the colonel's helicopter lift itself through the cloud of dust created by its own rotors and jet engines. Even after the helicopter was aloft and on its way to its next stop, Marti continued to stand there, almost as if he expected Colonel Guajardo to turn around and come back. But Marti knew that would not happen. There was much that the colonel needed to do and so little time.

Such an important man could not afford to explain everything in detail to every lieutenant in the Mexican Army. It was not up to the colonel to explain everything, for if that were the case, there would be no need for lieutenants. No, Marti thought, it was his task to understand what the colonel had said and act accordingly.

Still, as Marti turned and headed back to his platoon, he wished that he were clever enough to grasp exactly what it was that the colonel expected of him and his men. That the situation along the border was serious was well understood. One only had to listen to the news, both from Mexican sources and Spanish-speaking radio and TV stations in America, to know that there was a great deal of mistrust and tension between the two nations. Even the dullest peasant in his platoon felt a sense of foreboding as they approached their duties. All of this was known. All of this was understood.

Why, then, Marti kept asking as he slowly shuffled through the dust, did the colonel, a member of the Council of 13, feel it was so important that he take time from his busy schedule to come all the way from Mexico City and personally deliver a message such as the one he had just given?

Did he doubt the ability of the Army to act in an appropriate manner? Or was there some hidden meaning in what he had told them? Perhaps that was it. Perhaps, Marti thought, the colonel wanted them to do their duty, but not too well. Or was it that he wanted them to do their duty only so long as it did not interfere with the Americans? And what was he to do if the Americans did do something that violated Mexican territory? Marti understood the need to avoid provoking the Americans. That was simple.

But did that mean avoidance to the point of surrender? What was he to do if the Americans provoked him? And what, he thought, constituted provocation?

Stopping just short of his platoon, Marti turned and looked back in the direction that Guajardo's helicopter had disappeared. Why hadn't he asked Guajardo his questions when he had the chance? Why had he stood there, like a lump, and nodded dumbly, acting as if he understood when he didn't? Marti wondered if his pride was so important that he was willing to sacrifice himself and his platoon rather than ask questions that should have been asked, regardless of how elementary they were. Was that it? A simple question of pride?'.

Shaking his head, he turned and looked at his platoon. His sergeants I were already gathering their men in preparation for his return and final instructions. Well, Marti thought as he shook his head, the colonel is 1 gone. It is now up to me to do what is necessary. After whispering a short prayer to the Virgin of Guadalupe to watch over him and his platoon, he stepped off with a confident pace in an effort to mask the doubts he felt, and prepared to execute his duties as he saw fit. After all, what else could he do? It was him, and only him, that was left. In the end, Marti thought, that must have been the way it always was. The pride and security of a nation entrusted to the hands and judgment of a junior officer and his 1 men.

Coming to the officers club had been a big mistake. Nancy Kozak knew that now. Not that it would have made any difference where she went.

Her feelings of loneliness, self-doubt, and inadequacy would have followed her wherever she went. She just thought that perhaps, at the officers club, she could escape them or, at least, submerge them for a while.

She couldn't do that in her small one-bedroom apartment, a place that she had yet to be able to call home. It was a place to sleep, a place to store her things, a place to shower and change her clothes. But it was not a home, a place where she could go and leave the world behind, where she could let herself go, where she could relax. Instead of being a nice little cozy niche, a safe haven, it seemed, at times, to be a vise, its walls closing in on her and accentuating her loneliness rather than offering an escape from it. So, instead of being a refuge, her apartment became another place that she needed to escape from.

Escape, what a thought. As Kozak stared mindlessly down at her plate, poking her chicken with a fork, she wondered what she was trying to escape from. Loneliness, yes, she wanted to do that. Everyone wanted that. But escape did not solve the problem. It only delayed resolution.

That's what she wanted. That's what she needed. A solution. But in order to have a solution, you need to have a definable problem to deal with.

And that, Kozak knew, was the crux of the matter. After being at Fort Hood for two months, she had never taken the time to sort herself out, to stop and absorb what she had learned and come up with an effective means of dealing with her new world.

The Army, she had found, was far different from what she had experienced at West Point. Although everyone had known that the real Army would be different, few of her classmates had really understood how different it would be. Though 2nd Battalion, 13th Infantry, was a disciplined unit, its discipline was different from West Point's. At times, rather than acting as a single, coherent entity operating under a hierarchical system of command, her platoon appeared to be a loose association of sergeants and soldiers who functioned as crewmen, squads, and platoon through cooperation and mutual consent. In some cases, the junior soldiers seemed to be more influential and capable than their sergeants.

This should not have been a surprise to Kozak — but understanding such things and dealing with them were two different matters. This, in itself, was a challenge that she had still to master.

Then there were the people themselves. No amount of reading, no role-playing in leadership classes, could possibly prepare a person for dealing with real people with real problems. From the sergeant who had bouts with alcoholism and wife-beating to the married soldier who went to pieces every time the platoon rolled out to the field, Kozak found herself facing things she had never dealt with before. And each situation, each member of her platoon, and each of their problems, demanded a solution that was correct and appropriate to the individual.

On top of all this came the warning order to be prepared for immediate deployment to the Mexican border. How, Kozak thought, could she possibly deal with her own problems and those of the world at the same time.

Looking up for a moment, Kozak scanned the room. There were officers, some in uniform, some not, scattered about in groups or with their spouses. Their age, their deportment, and the company they were in made it easy to identify their rank. There were young company-grade officers, lieutenants and captains, who sat together in groups. Their laughter and conversation was free and unrestrained. Their faces and manner betrayed a certain arrogance and cockiness born of innocence and youth, an innocence Kozak herself could identify with. At the other extreme were the lieutenant colonels and colonels. They sat quietly with their wives, and their manner, just as much as their looks, spoke of maturity and wisdom gained through experience and endurance. Their wives, graceful ornaments, complemented them, as good Army wives should. A third group, senior captains and majors, were liberally scattered about the room, filling the spaces between the colonels and the lieutenants and providing a buffer, both real and psychological, between the two groups. These officers were in transition. No longer young and innocent like the lieutenants, this last group had not yet achieved the qualities, loosely referred to as maturity and experience, that allowed them to face the world with the cool, calm demeanor that the colonels displayed. The senior captains and majors were in training, eager to please and do whatever was necessary to prove themselves ready to join the colonels. For they knew, even in this setting, that they were on display, being watched by both superiors and subordinates. If, in their hearts, they might still feel the urge to join the laughter and light conversation of the younger officers, the majors knew they had to demonstrate to the colonels that they were like them in every way, mature, socially competent, and cool.

While all of this was very interesting to speculate on, it did little to relieve Kozak of her own feelings of loneliness and inadequacy. Had the colonels, she wondered, felt the same things at one time that she was feeling now? Had they been overwhelmed by dealing with the hail of pressing problems of leading while learning? Was the reason they sat there, quiet and subdued, because the attrition of years of dealing with such problems had worn away their youth and drive? Kozak wondered if someday she too would be sitting there quietly, looking at the world with an unemotional, almost placid face.

As she finished scanning the room before returning to a dinner turned cold, Kozak noticed Captain Cerro enter the room with a woman she assumed was his wife. His appearance caused Kozak to take heart. Of all the officers she had dealt with to date, Captain Cerro was the only one who had come across as professional, honest, and sincere in his dealings with her. Only he seemed able to break through the glass barrier that kept other infantry officers from dealing with her in the manner she thought was appropriate for an infantry second lieutenant. Though a couple of their run-ins had been less than pleasant, they had been open and, in retrospect, appropriate for the situation. Not even her own company commander, Captain Wittworth, could overcome what Kozak perceived as hang-ups in his dealings with her. Too bad, she thought, there weren't more officers like Captain Cerro. Maybe some of the problems that she lugged about wouldn't be problems.

But he wasn't her commander. That was not reality. Whatever solutions she developed, whatever methods she devised to deal with her problems, had to be based on reality, not wishes and dreams. Time for that was over. Her dream of becoming an infantry officer had been fulfilled. Now it was time to make it work.

In an instant, she realized that she had hit upon something. She had to make it work. She would be, and in fact always had been, the one who had to make it work. That's what Captain Cerro had tried so hard to tell her, in his own way, every time they had crossed each other's path. She was alone, and perhaps she was supposed to be alone, somewhat aloof and above the nitty-gritty. Was that why the colonels sat alone? Was it that they, in order to deal with their world, distanced themselves from part of it? The idea was intriguing and worth considering, Kozak thought.

Definitely worth considering.

As she watched Cerro and his wife move to their table, Kozak considered catching his attention and saying hello. She paused, however. Not knowing the protocol for such an occasion, and unsure who the woman was, Kozak decided not to. If the woman was a date, Kozak's attention might not be appreciated. No doubt Captain Cerro's wife, or girlfriend, felt safe in the knowledge that he, as an infantry officer, worked in an exclusively male world. Such a thought, Kozak knew, was a comfort to some wives who feared the danger of their husbands becoming involved with a woman while away from home in the field. Kozak's appearance, in the flesh, might shatter that illusion, which, surprisingly, continued to exist, despite the presence of Kozak and her sisters in other combat units.

So Kozak let the moment pass, turning her attention back to her meal.

Better, she thought, to settle her own problems before creating problems for other people, especially people who were sympathetic to her efforts to become the best infantry officer that had ever pinned on the crossed rifles.

While seating his wife, Cerro noticed Lieutenant Kozak sitting alone at a table in the corner of the dining room. For a moment, he considered going over and saying hello, perhaps even introducing her to his wife, Ann.

But he didn't. Not knowing how Ann would react to a female infantry officer, he decided against it. Had it been the wife of another officer that he knew, sitting there and eating alone, Cerro wouldn't have hesitated to bound across the room and invite her to join them. This situation, however, was different. There would be many problems, even if he had simply introduced-Kozak to Ann. Having been associated with the Army for years, and well indoctrinated in the protocol and military etiquette, Ann knew how to deal with other wives and other officers. Each, she had been taught, required a different touch, appropriate to the rank of the officer or the officer's wife. Dealing with female officers, however, was still difficult, at best. It was doubly so for an officer and his wife who had spent their entire career, up to that point, in the comfortable company of airborne or air assault units.

Though there were many women even in those elite combat units, they had always belonged to someone else, another unit, another comr mander. So Harold and Ann Cerro had never had to confront the issue and develop an appropriate set of rules.

This, Cerro decided, was not the time or place to start doing either.

When he finished seating his wife, Cerro moved around to his own chair and seated himself. As he did so, Ann leaned over toward him. "Something wrong, dear?"

Cerro looked at her, thought for a moment, then shook his head. "No, nothing, why?"

Ann leaned back and gave him a sideward glance. "Don't give me that, Harold Cerro. I can tell when your mind has left the here and now.

Are you going to share your deep dark thoughts with me or not?"

While still looking into her eyes, Cerro picked up the menu and opened it. He smiled. "Dear, I'm sorry. It's all highly classified and hush-hush. If I told you, I'd have to kill you and that, my dear, would spoil my appetite." Without another word, he looked down at the menu.

Slouching down in her chair, Ann reached out with her leg under the table and kicked him in the shin. "I'll give you something that'll spoil your appetite."

Doing his best to ignore the kick, Cerro looked up. "Did you say something, dear?"

Leaning over in order to get close, Ann squinted her eyes, wrinkled her nose, and whispered, "Harold Cerro, sometimes you can be a real asshole."

Smiling,

Cerro pinched Ann's cheek. "I try, dear, I really try."

Despite the fact that the sun was well on its way down, it was still hotter than hell. Jan Fields, standing in the shade of the American customs building, was still sweating. Her bright yellow short-sleeved cotton blouse was streaked with dark spots from the perspiration that ran down her back. Even her tan walking shorts were soaked at the waistline. God, she thought, how she hated to sweat. Deciding to toss out all thoughts of feminine poise and charm, Jan reached up behind her head and untied the yellow cotton bandana that was holding her hair back. Carefully folding the bandana on her right hand, she began to mop the beads of perspiration on her forehead and cheeks, finishing with wide sweeps along the sides of her neck. Turning to Ted and Joe Bob, she called out to see if they were finished. Ted, who had his back to her, merely lifted his right hand and waved. Joe Bob, who was facing Ted, looked over Ted's shoulder at Jan and yelled, "Hey, Jan, Ted wants to know if there's something really important you need to do or if it's just one of those woman things."

Putting her hands on her hips, with her chin stuck out, Jan shot back,

"Okay, you guys. How 'bout moving your male bonding back to the hotel pool. I hear water spots is all the rage now with the guys."

Joe Bob just smiled a big toothy grin as he continued to hold a white panel Ted was using for judging light conditions. "God, Jan, you're really sweet when you're angry."

Ted, who had had his head bent over reading a light meter, looked up into Joe Bob's eyes. "Cute, really fucking cute. Now how about holding the bloody panel still so we can all get out of here."

Looking from Jan to Ted, Joe Bob's expression changed to mock surprise. "Oh, what do we have here? Sympathetic PMS syndrome?"

Without looking up at Joe Bob, Ted continued to fiddle with his light meter. "Joe Bob, if you don't hold that panel still and shut up, I'll stick this meter up your backside and see just how true it is that the sun never shines there."

Sighing, Joe Bob lamented to himself, but loud enough so Ted could hear, "Jeez, I really hate it when this time of month comes around."

Unable to hear what Ted and Joe Bob were saying, Jan turned her attention to the story that they were to shoot tomorrow. It was already decided that the opening shot would be here, on the bridge that separated Mexico from the United States. Preliminary surveys showed that this was the best place in Brownsville for getting, in a single shot, a picture of Texas National Guardsmen and Mexican Army soldiers, each on their own side of the border, facing off.

She would start the piece by referring to the speech President Ronald Reagan had given in the early eighties in which he warned the people of America that unless they did something to stop the spread of communism in Central America, Brownsville, Texas, would become the front line.

Jan had learned from Scott to use historic quotes that appeared to be applicable. It gave people, he said, the impression that you had done some research and, therefore, knew what you were talking about. His comment was only half in jest. Though Jan loved to spend as much time as possible on research, there just wasn't time to learn everything about a story that was really necessary. Time, and the pressing demands of the network, simply did not permit a correspondent the luxury of becoming an expert on every subject she covered. So Jan, like most of the people in her field, did the best she couldwith the time and resources available, and winged the rest.

Pulling out a small pad and pen from her pocket, Jan jotted down a few quick notes. On the bridge, they would talk to the soldiers on duty and get their impressions and comments. From there, they would go to the headquarters of the 1st Brigade, 36th Infantry Division, and interview the brigade commander. After that, downtown to city hall for an interview with the mayor, then out onto the street in the shopping district for some opinions from the people of Brownsville. Jan was hoping to get comments from both the Hispanic citizens and the Anglos, or what Joe Bob referred to as "real Americans."

Scanning the shooting schedule before putting it back in her pocket, Jan noticed that the sweat running down her arm and hand had left a damp thumbprint on the page of the pad, smearing the ink. Looking up at Joe Bob and Ted, she called but, "Will you two stop playing grab-ass in public and get a move on."

Joe Bob smiled and waved, whispering to Ted as he did so, "Better hurry there, friend. Her highness is overheating. Whatever it is you need, buddy, you can get tomorrow. There'll be plenty of time."