Couture’s brow went up, but he immediately regained his composure. “This is presently a hostile village, Skelton. While it may be predominantly Tajik under normal circumstances, you may rest assured there are hundreds of Pashtuns living there now.” He took his eyes from her and addressed the entire room. “Remember, people, this is first and foremost a rescue operation. Our primary goal is to recover Warrant Officer Brux, but this is also an excellent opportunity for us to eliminate a large number of HIK fighters… all in one fell swoop.”
CHAPTER 43
Gil and Forogh were dropped off well south of the Panjshir Valley by a British Special Air Service helicopter shortly before dawn, both of them wearing the robes of Tajik goat herders. The significant difference between them, of course, was that Gil wore a combat harness loaded with ammo, grenades, and incidentals beneath his disguise. He carried a .308 Remington Modular Sniper Rifle with a folding stock and Schmidt & Bender optics, rail-mounted behind a PS-22 Night Vision Scope with infrared illuminator. The rest of his loadout consisted of an M4 carbine, a Kimber Desert Warrior model 1911 pistol, and his father’s Ka-Bar fighting knife. He carried ten magazines of ammo for each weapon: 100 rounds for the sniper rifle, 300 for the carbine, and 80 for the pistol. Both the Remington and Kimber were fixed with suppressors. Gil wore no armor other than an integrated ballistic helmet (IBH) fitted with attachments for his night-vision monocular and infrared strobe light. All of this was concealed beneath the heavy, bulky brown robe.
They both carried AK-47s over their shoulders to make sure they looked the part, and though Forogh wore the traditional pakol on his head, Gil wore a shemagh to hide the fact that he was Caucasian. Anyone observing them at a distance would assume they were Tajik or Pashtun. Anyone who encountered them closely enough to identify Gil as a white man would likely catch a round from a silenced 1911.
They hiked all morning to reach the foot of the mountains ringing the Panjshir Valley to the south.
“I feel like a Tusken Raider in this getup,” Gil remarked, sucking water from his CamelBak.
“What’s that?” Forogh said.
Gil chuckled. “The Sand People from Star Wars. Ever seen the movie?”
“Yes,” Forogh answered glumly. “On a DVD in Pakistan a long time ago.”
“In a galaxy far, far away?”
Forogh didn’t even come close to catching the joke. He stopped to lean against the walking stick he had picked up during their hike to reach the mountains. “Is that how you see us? As ugly, wild creatures who live in caves?”
“No,” Gil said, realizing why Forogh might take exception with the comparison to Sand People. “I was talking about myself. You gotta remember, man, Americans lead sheltered lives. We don’t mean nothin’ by it when we say stupid shit like that.”
“It’s not the stupid things you say,” Forogh said, starting off up the mountain. “It’s the lack of thought before you say them.”
Gil chuckled as he fell in behind. “I don’t reckon I can argue with that.”
The climb up the back side of the mountain took an hour, and they stopped just shy of the summit. Gil took out the map, orienting it with a compass and using the GPS in the hi-tech iPhone he’d gotten from Joe to pinpoint their exact coordinates. He had marked on the map the precise locations of all the enemy’s mountain gun emplacements, intelligence that Pope had been able to supply him with over a secure internet connection with encrypted software.
“Okay, we’re right at the eastern opening to the valley,” Gil said, folding the map away. “The closest enemy emplacement is a full five hundred meters to the west of us. Once we crest this ridge, we should have an unfettered view of the valley without having to worry about anybody spotting us.”
Forogh’s thin lips drew into a tight smile. “You could have just asked me where we were.”
Gil busted him on the shoulder. “You’re sure you can get into that village without those HIK pricks giving you any shit?”
Forogh gestured with the sack of extra AK-47 magazines he carried over his shoulder. “This gift should be enough to convince them I don’t like Americans. Beyond that, my uncles will vouch for me.”
“And you’re sure they’ll help with the extraction?”
“They fought beside Massoud against the Russians in this very valley.” Forogh beamed with pride. He pointed eastward. “My uncle Orzu was wounded right over in that pass. They were Mujahideen then, but they fought in the Northern Alliance against the Taliban with your CIA. Then Al Qaeda murdered Massoud. My uncle Orzu and Massoud were friends. I told you before, there’s no chance they will not help. But they won’t be able to help you inside the village. There aren’t enough of them now. But they will secure the extraction zone and help us escape into the mountains once the woman is safe.”
“Where’s the trail they’ll use to leave the village?”
“I will show you.”
They crawled to the crest and lay on their bellies looking out over the valley floor.
“It cuts up the side of the mountain there above the village to the north.” Forogh indicated with the knife edge of his hand. “My uncles harvest timber for a living now. The HIK isn’t interfering with the villagers’ lives. They can come and go as they please.” He then pointed down into the valley where the village men were playing buzkashi on horseback. “See? The Taliban outlawed buzkashi, but the HIK like to play with us.” Buzkashi was a game similar to polo, only it was played with the headless carcass of a goat, and there were virtually no rules. “The HIK doesn’t like the Taliban. They take advantage of them.”
Gil watched the riders playing buzkashi through the sniper scope, a patch of nylon stocking stretched tightly over the lens, held in place by a rubber band, to prevent the sun glinting off the lens. He watched the horses carefully, seeing that they were strong, most of them just fine for what he had in mind. He noted the strange padded helmets many of the riders had on their heads and took his eye from the scope. “Are those Russian tanker helmets their wearing?”
“They are.”
“Where’d they get ’em?”
Forogh gestured at the rusted hull of a Russian T-34/85 tank at the bottom of the mountain. There were many such hulks dotting the valley floor, though not all of them as dated as the T-34. “From the Russians.”
Gil put his eye back to the scope. “Stupid question, I guess.”
Forogh put his hand on Gil’s shoulder. “I should leave you now. We’re too close to the village to risk being spotted together.”
They crawled back from the crest, out of sight.
“Got the marker?” Gil asked.
Forogh knocked on the hollowed-out stock of his very beat-up AK-47 where he had hidden the infrared strobe against the possibility that he would be searched for a satellite phone on his way into the village. The rifle’s fore-grip was split and held together with a very sticky, sap-coated twine wrapped many times around. He had selected the battered rifle to make sure that no one from the HIK would attempt to trade weapons with him.
They shook hands. “Good luck down there.”
“Good luck to you,” Forogh replied. “You’re going to need it much more than I will.” He got to his feet, dusted off the front of his robe, and walked up over the crest of the mountain.
Gil waited awhile, then crawled back to the crest and lay watching as Forogh slowly worked his way down the rocky slope. There was a white pickup truck down on the road with four heavily armed HIK sentries. Two of them sat in the back of the truck napping. The other two lolled against the fender talking. They were watching the road coming into the valley, and so far hadn’t spotted Forogh trudging down the mountain above them.