“Do you know any Kurds in this area?”
“No. None.”
“Do you have friends in any of the villages along your route?”
“No. I just drive and deliver my goods so I can get home to my family in Yerevan as I have done for over twenty years.”
“I think maybe you are sympathetic to Kurdish rebels, no?”
“No, not at all. Kurds are no friends to Armenians.”
The tall captain stood quietly in the dark night air studying the older truck driver. He wore no winter jacket, just his standard field tunic. The lights of his sedan lit up the left side of the truck. “We will inspect your cargo.” Again, it was a statement, not a request. Arsadian was quickly learning to detest the IRG. This was the first time in his two decades that he had interacted with any of them. “Open your doors.”
“At your service,” replied Arsadian. The officer caught a hint of sarcasm in the driver’s response even though Hamak was consciously trying to avoid that. The driver went to the rear and opened his trailer doors as the driver of the captain’s sedan drove past the truck, executed a three point turn in the middle of the curved roadway and came back up the road behind the truck, shining his lights into the now open trailer.
The captain signaled his men and they began removing cartons of Charmin toilet paper onto the road. It seemed the IRG officer had a hunch and was determined to follow it. The soldiers unloaded the first couple of rows of cartons which gave them about six feet of trailer floor to work with. The IRG officer stood next to the Armenian driver, alternately watching him and his men. Finally he broke the tension. “You appear nervous.”
Arsadian turned to the Iranian. “This is my livelihood, Captain Samadi. This shipment is my responsibility. I have never failed to deliver.” His nervousness was rapidly being replaced by anger. He decided to play offense. “Why is this roadblock here? Why do you treat me this way?”
The captain did not respond. He next issued orders to his men, telling them to pull out a single column along the side until they reached the wall at the front of the trailer. His men complied with their orders, carefully pulling out cartons along the right hand sidewall. The captain was waiting for the void that his gut told him would turn up in the trailer.
When his men reached the front wall of the trailer, creating a lane that stretched from the back door 44 feet to the front wall, the captain became agitated. He walked among the now displaced cartons of Charmin stacked haphazardly on the mountain road. He grabbed several cartons and lifted them, judging the weight of each to determine if it approximated what he expected. After he returned the third carton to the ground, he ripped the carton open, pulling out its contents. Then he climbed on board the trailer, telling the few men still inside to move out of his way. He walked along the thin corridor created by the removed cartons and picked a row about a third of the way from the front. He pulled a carton from the top of the next column and yelled at his men to grab the cartons that he kept pulling out, working his way in from the corridor to the opposing sidewall. He kicked cartons on either side of this new perpendicular corridor, certain that he would find weapons or explosives hidden in the cardboard boxes. When he made it to the other side he realized that his hunch was wrong. The officer had to swallow his pride that night. He had not caught a Kurdish spy.
The IRG officer walked back out the corridor to the rear of the trailer and jumped down to the road pavement below. He barked orders to his men to repack the trailer as it was and started to walk to his sedan.
Hamak Arsadian interjected. “Is everything in order Captain?” The driver was rubbing salt in the man’s wounded pride.
The captain paused. He had grown up in an upper middle class household in Tehran. He suddenly remembered the teachings of his mother and grandmother regarding Persian t’aarof, or hospitality. They would be displeased with him right now. He turned toward the driver. “My apologies. My men will return your cargo to the trailer.”
Arsadian bent over and picked up the single carton that the IRG officer had opened moments before. “I understand that you are doing your job. Please take this box as an offering of respect for the job you do. I think your men will enjoy its contents.” The Armenian knew that the contents would not wind up in the hands of the soldiers, but also knew that the captain would not accept the carton under any other pretense.
Samadi pondered for a moment before signaling for one of his men to carry the box to the trunk of his sedan. “For my men,” he said. With those words the officer turned and was in the back of his sedan in moments. As soon as the trunk lid was shut, the sedan drove off up the mountain and past the roadblock. Arsadian had still not received an answer about why the roadblock was in place. Over the next twelve minutes the half dozen men remaining repacked the boxes into the trailer, now short two cartons from when Arsadian left Yerevan.
The soldiers left the Armenian standing behind his trailer and headed quickly back up the road, each one desperate to find some warmth. Hamak closed his trailer doors and walked 50 feet along the left side of the rig until he reached the driver side door. He began to reach for the handle when he stopped and walked another 20 feet further up the road to speak with the man who was driving the car in front of him. He learned that they had arrived about 15 minutes before Arsadian. The soldier who checked their papers told them that Kurdish rebel fighters had been operating in the area and that they would probably be able to pass in a couple of hours. The man and his family then offered water to Arsadian, but the truck driver politely refused and returned to his cabin to wait and get warm.
Arsadian pulled down the bed that stretched across the tractor cabin just behind the driver and passenger seats. He figured he might as well try to rest. The next few hours resulted in fitful periods of sleep, his eyes opening every half hour or so to check the dashboard clock that glowed red in the otherwise dark cabin. Finally he opened his eyes to see that midnight had arrived. During the prior two hours several cars had started up, only to turn around and head back down the mountain away from Dezli, each one waking him in the process. But like the straight truck driver that was waiting about 70 meters in front of him, Arsadian had no such option. He would wait out the IRG and their roadblock.
As he lay there wondering when he could proceed to Point Kabob, only a few frustrating miles further along Road 15, he noticed a blinking light on his navigation system panel. Arsadian quickly swung his legs over the edge of the bed and lowered himself into the passenger seat, from which access to the navigation system was easier. He turned the system’s display panel on and pressed several buttons in combination. A menu appeared and the Armenian pressed the screen to cause a message to appear. The message said nothing, but only contained four digits. The simple code told Arsadian what he needed to do once he was free to continue his journey.
38 — Insertion
“One hour out,” shouted the chief as the formation of helicopters passed north of Baiji, Iraq and turned due east toward the drop zone. The local time was 9:36 p.m. Outside was complete darkness. The Night Stalkers were operating in their natural environment. Captain Ben Zeev pointed to two of his men, who each pulled out a device that looked like an iPad, only with a thick antenna attached and a rubber frame that was the tipoff that this device had been “ruggedized” to survive the rigors of combat. Each man powered up his unit and waited for about 30 seconds while the unit came to life. The man sitting next to the captain pushed several buttons on his screen and then handed it to his commander. The man with the other device, sitting on the opposite side of the helicopter, looked up at his commander and raised his right hand to give a fast thumbs up. He then turned his unit off.