The unconscious form of Sergeant Lopez danced around to what used to be the bottom of the door. Flint fired two rounds down range, ducked under the tail boom and ran over to his dangling Marine, “Push him out, push him out!” He turned to fire three more rounds.
Sergeant Lopez fell. Flint broke his fall with his left shoulder, grimaced and began dragging Lopez by his equipment webbing behind his neck, while holding the M-16’s black strap with the same hand. The Huey belched fire. Flint saw the lance corporal’s hand vanish in smoke and flames.
Moments later he heard the welcome “whap, whap, whap” of a Cobra’s rotor blades beating the air into submission. It hovered between Flint and the schoolhouse. Flint dropped Lopez to point his rifle in the direction of the enemy and fire several rounds. The Cobra rose about 20 feet and let loose with its 20mm Gatling gun. The entire wall of trees spit bark and wood. Great chunks of sod were thrown into the air. The Cobra took on more altitude and fired a barrage of 70mm rockets into the trees. Tree limbs were blown apart and a thick smoky dust began to rise from the area that probably once held 30 men.
Flint turned to drag Lopez to safety. He wondered how the rest of his unit was doing. He felt a blast of heat on the back of his neck and lost consciousness as his face was kicked into the grass by the explosion.
“Colonel Flint, Colonel Flint! Hey, Doc, the Colonel’s awake!” It was a naval Corpsman. Flint was under a clean set of sheets and aboard the USS Belleau Wood.
“What happened? Ow, my head is killing me! What day is it?” Flint demanded, his voice picking up steam as he spoke.
The doctor, Lieutenant Colonel Myers walked over, “‘What happened?’ You got shot down. You broke your arm, cleanly and in one place. You got a concussion from the Huey as it exploded. I guess that also takes care of ‘Ow, my head is killing me.’ As for ‘What day is it?’ It’s Tuesday, February the 14th.”
The doctor’s attempt at banter bounced off of the wounded Flint, “How many dead?”
The doctor’s smile vanished, “12. Five in your aircraft and seven Marines from the BLT. The Thai weren’t so lucky. They lost 86 men.”
“How many…”
“…wounded? 35 Marines. 34 should make it for sure. One is touch and go. We’re also caring for 23 wounded or shell shocked Thai soldiers.”
“When can I get out of here?” Flint fixed his eyes on the doctor.
“You can’t. Not for a day anyway because of the concussion and the burns to the back of your neck. However, I have made provisions for you to visit with your wounded.”
Flint choked up, “Thanks Doc.”
Donna Klein saw the early morning report on the heavy Marine casualties on MSNBC. She sat atop her exercise bike and reviewed the likely fallout to U.S. policy in East Timor and Indonesia at large. Too much momentum now to stop it, too much at stake, just like in Vietnam. She paused, ashamed at having thought first of policy implications rather than the tragic personal meaning of 12 Americans losing their lives in service to their nation. Was this sacrifice necessary? She asked herself, already knowing the answer in her heart.
14
Massacre
Indonesia was at a crossroads. The nation was an artificial construct built out of the ashes of the Dutch Empire following its collapse brought on by World War Two. For 55 % of the Indonesian population, one overlord (the Javanese) simply replaced another (the Dutch). And that overlord, no longer constrained by the bounds of Western civilization, proceeded to throw away its moral mandate of leadership. As long as the price of oil kept the economic skids greased, the corrupt leadership of President Suharto could survive. In the midst of economic ruin the end came quickly, and with it, the last of the government’s ability to keep a lid on the growing turmoil caused by an economic system that rewarded the families of those who already had it made. President Suharto was followed by a transitional figure, and, after an indecisive election in 1999, another figurehead with even less power.
This weak and tottering government could do little to stem religious and ethnic strife.
In the Indonesian town of Kupang on the western edge of Timor, not far from where the infamous Captain Bligh landed in 1789, a mosque full of worshippers was set on fire. The fire setters were not Christian, neither did they hold traditional beliefs. What mattered next was that a rumor was planted that wealthy Chinese businessman paid for this act of religious terrorism — a rumor intensified and spread by the virtually instantaneous passing out of handbills that reinforced the “fact.” Within three hours, the town’s business district was in flames as were all the town’s churches. Dead littered the streets. The Indonesian police and military were nowhere to be seen.
In the city of Ambon on the island of the same name, some 300 miles to the north-northeast of Dili in East Timor, a similar outbreak of violence occurred. Only four hours later, almost 600 were dead.
In the province of Aceh, 1,090 miles northwest of Jakarta, on the northern tip of Sumatra, separatist rebels seized the provincial capital and began broadcasting from the local radio station. Civilian casualties were light, but the Indonesian military and police lost more than 200 men.
In Irian Jaya, the former Dutch colony in western half of New Guinea, pro-independence rebels attacked armories in Sorong and Manokwari, taking weapons and killing 54 security personnel.
Within a day, the government in Jakarta was reeling from strife, violence and military reverses across the length and breadth of its 13,600 islands. Under pressure from hard-liners, the military and police began to lash out.
Two days later, the nationwide death toll stood at more than 10,000 and rising. Churches were in flames and the Chinese minority, particularly hit hard, was on the move, fleeing out of the country any way they could.
Western news crews descended on the nation of islands in force (many of them coming from their East Timor assignments). It was only a matter of time before dramatic, live footage would make its way to America and move that nation closer to a large and forceful intervention. That footage arrived, as no other television news footage before, on Sunday, March 12, from the central Javanese city of Bandung.
A news crew had been filming a large demonstration of at least 30,000. The crowd had been enraged by the false rumor that a group of local Christian Chinese businessmen had made disparaging remarks about Islam. Further, they had supposedly paid a large sum to a crime boss to burn down the city’s three most prominent Mosques.
The crowd advanced on one of the city’s largest churches. Inside the church a Sunday service was being held for more than 800 frightened worshippers.
Someone in the mob noticed that the cameraman for the news crew was wearing a small cross. A stone was thrown. The news crew hastily retreated into the church.
The news crew’s equipment was transmitting to their unmarked van parked less than half a mile away. From the van a satellite link fed the raw footage directly into the studios. Indonesia’s propensity to produce dramatic stories caused the studio to shift to live coverage. It was 10 PM on Saturday night on the American East Coast.
The reporter, a veteran stringer from the Asia beat, seemed strangely detached. He let the cameraman pan the crowd in the church and kept his commentary to a minimum. The strained hymns and prayers in the church contrasted with the growing fury outside.
A brick crashed through a stained glass window. Then another. A few seconds later a Molotov cocktail sailed through the broken glass and burst in the aisles. The fire spread up a curtain. As the church was modern and in a good part of the city it was equipped with fire sprinklers. They soon came on and doused the fire. The congregation cheered and praised God.