Domestic Enemies: The Reconquista (30 page)

Ranya picked up and shouldered each rifle in turn, hefting them, looking through their scopes, working their bolts with her right hand. “These are all fine for what you want.  I think that these can hit a man at a thousand meters if you have match-grade ammunition, but we’ll need to shoot them to know for sure.  But we should sight them in at 400 meters, or even 500.  That way, your counter-snipers will only have to make a smaller elevation correction, if they need to shoot at very long range.  If somebody is shooting at you from 800  or 1,000 meters, your rifles need to be set up to get right on them fast.  In my opinion, 200 meters is too close to zero-in these rifles.”

“No, I think 200 meters is better for now,” said Ramos.  “I don’t think it’s likely that our counter-snipers will have to shoot past 500 yards, so let’s zero them in at 200 meters.  It’s more realistic for my men.  Maybe later you can train them to be better marksmen, at longer ranges.”

“Well, it’s not usually how this is done.  That’s all I’m saying.”  She caught herself: why was she actively helping these men to become better snipers?  To ingratiate herself with Basilio Ramos, and to gain his trust, of course. Even then, there had to be limits to her assistance.  She just didn’t know where the limits were. 

“But you can do it, can’t you? Sight them in so that they’ll hit precisely where the crosshairs are aimed, 200 yards away?”

“Yes, of course I can do it, if that’s what you think is best, Comandante.”

There was the sound of a shrill whistle blast from over the rise, which was immediately swallowed by the much louder sound of a solid fusillade of rifle fire.  The unbroken volley from one hundred M-16’s tapered off after a few seconds, then regained its full volume, tapered off and rose again, and then died off, the final bursts finishing suddenly with another whistle blast.  The three men and Ranya grinned at one another.  

The Falcon Battalion had just test-fired and broken-in their “new” thirty-year-old rifles, with three magazines each, just as she had suggested. These nine thousand rounds had also been fired as a morale-boosting “mad minute” for the Falcons, demonstrating to them the fearsomeness of their combined firepower.

It also boosted Ranya’s confidence, to know that Ramos and his battalion were accepting her advice.  She smiled back across the table at them and she said, “Well, those old M-16s aren’t virgins anymore,” and they laughed with her, nodding approval at their Arab rifle expert Ranya Bardiwell,
la ejecutora
, the executioner.

“Now,” she said, “Let’s forget those M-16s, those little dog shooters. Let’s see what some real rifles can do.”

***

As a security precaution,
the battalion left the range by an alternate route, returning to the city from the northwest.  The convoy was preceded by a scout vehicle driving a mile ahead: a small gray pickup truck with four troops keeping a low profile in the back.  In keeping with Ramos’s personal preference from previous conflicts in other countries, it had a radio call sign named for a dangerous creature, in this case “Scorpion.” 

After five miles, the two-lane blacktop made a right turn to the east and ran ruler-straight back towards Albuquerque.  The convoy only rarely passed a private sedan or work truck on these barren high desert outskirts of the city.  Ramos’s black Suburban was once again embedded in the middle of the column.

For the return trip, Ranya arranged to be sitting against the passenger side door of the middle seat, staring out through the armored glass while the others spoke in rapid Spanish, discussing the day’s training evolutions. Often it was too fast for her to follow.

“
Primer Sargento
, I think it went well,” said Ramos.  “I was pleasantly surprised to see that most of the men qualified at the expert level.  You’ve done a fine job of training them.”

“Thank you sir.  All they needed were good rifles.”

“Well, they seem to be satisfied with them.”

“Yes sir, especially with the new ammunition.  The rifles shoot very well, that’s true, and we want the men to be confident with them.  But even so Comandante, out here in this kind of open country, the M-16’s are marginal at best.  Even with the special ammunition, we’ll be outranged. The fact is, past a few hundred meters, the 5.56mm is just too light to do much damage, and the desert winds will push the bullet off target. We really need to get some serious battle rifles—7.62mm rifles.  If there is any way we could obtain M-14s from the same armories which supplied the M16s, well, that would be very beneficial.”

“M-14’s? With the wooden stocks?  They’re even older than our M16s.”

“That’s true, but it doesn’t matter.  They can hit targets much farther away than our rifles, and with a much heavier bullet.  Old or not, they’d be better for us in the plains and the mountains.  This is not like the jungle fighting you were accustomed to in South America.”

“Hmm…  I see your point,
Primer Sargento
. I’ll pass your request up the chain, but I don’t know if we’ll be able to get them, or not.  I don’t even know if such rifles as these M-14’s are available.”

“And some real machine guns, belt-fed machine guns, to protect our vehicles.  I don’t have to tell you how vulnerable we are, with the troops in unarmored vehicles.”

“Belt-fed machine guns will have to wait.  For now, M-16s are all we will be allowed to use.  It’s a delicate balance…a matter of appearances. It’s a political matter.”

“
¡Malditos políticos!
  It’s always the politics over the soldiers!  When I hear that, I want to line those politicians up against a wall!”

Ramos laughed, as did the other men in the vehicle.  “I understand how you feel,
Primer Sargento
. I feel the same way, at least ten times a day.  I’ll keep pushing for heavier weapons, but you know how the politicians are.
Pendejos políticos
, all of them.”

“Well even if we can’t get better weapons, we should look into armoring more of our vehicles.  It’s simple enough to put steel plates inside the backs of the trucks.  The extra weight will slow them somewhat, but on balance, armor is…”

The ceiling-mounted radio above Ramos crackled with sudden urgency, and he grabbed the microphone from its clip.  

“Falcon leader, this is Scorpion, we’re taking fire…”

Immediately another voice came over the radio: “What the hell? Falcon Leader, this is Falcon 1, we’ve been hit!  We’ve been hit!”  Falcon 1 was a Dodge crew cab pickup, the first vehicle in the actual column, not counting the scout far out ahead.

Ramos grabbed his radio and spoke into it.  “Scorpion, Scorpion, report, over?”

“Falcon leader, this is Falcon 1—Scorpion is off the road, it’s rolled over, it’s on its back, on its back, over!”

“Falcon 1, this is Falcon Leader, do you have casualties, over?”

“Negative, no casualties.”

All of the men and Ranya slid down in their seats as they passed the area where the first vehicle in the column had taken fire moments before. They were already nearing the location of the overturned advance scout. “Falcon 1—keep going, keep pushing, let’s get up there!”  Next Ramos contacted their on-call Piper Supercub, call sign
Avispa
, or wasp.  “
Avispa
,
Avispa
, do you read me?  Get airborne, we have contact on Paradise Road, one mile east of the turn, over.”

“Falcon Leader, this is
Avispa
. We’re rolling now; we will be over your location in five minutes.”

“Roger
Avispa
—Break—Scorpion, do you read me?”

There was no reply from the scout vehicle.  The front of the column was drawing even with the wreckage.

“Falcon 1, cover Scorpion from the front and take care of his casualties—we’re going ahead.  All forward vehicles, stay out of the left lane, we’re going past you.”  In the black Suburban, Ramos said, “Get down everybody; we’re going to swing into the front.”

They passed the overturned gray Toyota pickup that had been their scout vehicle at 60 miles per hour, traveling in the oncoming lane.  Falcon 1, the point vehicle of the column, had stopped in front of the scout, which was lying wheels-up in the ditch on the right side of the road.

They briefly noted bodies on the road and the shoulder as they blasted by, the rest of the convoy following close behind them, swerving and barely missing colliding with the vehicles that had stopped to render aid to the scouts.  They all hunkered down low, fully expecting to hear and feel bullets tearing into the Suburban, wondering if its three-inch-thick Lexan front windshield would stop rifle slugs.  Even the driver was down so low, that he was peeking out from the level of his steering wheel.

Ramos spoke into his radio and to the passengers in his own truck at the same time.  “Okay, get ready, get ready to stop, we’re pulling off to the right, keep control everybody, drivers, both sides, contact front, okay now, STOP!”

The black Suburban braked and hit the shoulder at a slight angle, tearing through the dirt and creosote bushes and bouncing off the rocks, negotiating the transition from asphalt to scrubland and sliding to a halt in a thick cloud of dust at a 45 degree angle away from the road.  As soon as the Suburban was halted, the passengers leaped out of the right side and rear doors with their weapons.  Ranya went to the open back doors of the Suburban and pulled out a rifle case, they were still loaded from the range for this type of contingency.  She grabbed a tan range bag and crouched behind the SUV’s back wheels near the shoulder of the road, where she could see straight up the pavement.  In a moment the .300 Winchester Magnum was uncased, its gleaming black barrel lying across the range bag for support, and then she was prone on the dirt behind the rifle and seeking the enemy sniper through her own scope.

On both sides of the road, the other vehicles had disgorged their troops.  They were kneeling or sitting with their rifles across their knees for support where the grass and weeds were taller, or lying prone where there was less cover.  The riflemen with their M-16s began laying down suppressing fire, peppering likely enemy hiding places ahead of them. Some of the Falcons on the forward perimeter were in Ranya’s likely line of fire, but she saw no enemy targets and thus had no reason to shoot.

Comandante Ramos was standing hunched over behind the Suburban with First Sergeant Ramirez; both men were scanning ahead through binoculars.  Ramos said, “There he goes, look at his dust trail.  Ahh, he’s already gone. Have the men cease fire.”  A rough dirt road angled away to the right, a half mile ahead.  The road ran in a straight line, but over rolling terrain and through cuts where the rocky ground was broken with small escarpments.  Occasionally at the front of the dust trail, the helmet and shoulders of a man could just be seen—he was on a motorcycle and already well out of range.  Through magnified optics, he could be seen riding southeast toward the Albuquerque suburbs on the western bank of the Rio Grande, traveling through the uninhabited volcanic badlands of the Petroglyph National Monument.

The stocky middle-aged First Sergeant blew his silver whistle and bellowed “Cease fire!  Cease fire!” and the shooting abruptly stopped.

Ramos said, “He’s gone.  Shit! He’ll disappear before the plane gets here.  How many casualties do we have?”

Another sergeant, in his full camouflage BDU uniform and pistol belt, reported.  “Two dead, three injured Comandante. One of them needs to be evacuated immediately.  He may die—not from bullet wounds, but from the crash.  Our
medicos
cannot do anything more for him here.”

“Yes, yes. Let’s get the helicopter—call the state police, have them contact the air ambulance and get it here.  Do it!”

“Yes Comandante!”

Ramos’s Lieutenants and Sergeants gathered around him to hear his orders.  Ranya was still on the ground behind her rifle, almost at their feet. Ramos said, “If he left on a
moto
, then he arrived on a
moto
. If he carried his rifle on a
moto
, then he must live nearby.  We can find this bastard, if we move quickly.  Chino!”

“At your orders, Comandante!”

“Take the Zetas up to the dirt road cutoff, look for his firing position. Check for booby traps, see what you can find.”

“Yes sir.” Chino left at a trot and jumped into the front of a brown Toyota 4X4 pickup, which immediately peeled out with a hail of dirt and gravel, and then tore up the paved road.  The rest of the troops fanned out in a circular perimeter around the vehicles, their rifles pointing outward.

Ramos pulled out his cellular phone, and checked it.  “
Teniente
Almeria, we have cellular coverage, thank God. Find out about any calls handled by nearby cell towers in the last two hours.  The shooter was probably informed about our presence on the rifle range, and then he put himself into position in case we returned to the city this way.  These calls may lead to the conspirators. Find out, get the records.”

“Yes sir.” Lieutenant Almeria was sitting in the back of a gray Toyota Land Cruiser that was bristling with antennas. The Land Cruiser had traveled behind Ramos’s Suburban in the convoy, and had pulled up close behind it when they stopped.

“Also, there may have been other ambushes placed on the roads we used to come to the range.  If there were, then those shooters might be leaving their positions now.  Contact Milicia headquarters, have them put flying roadblocks on all of the Interstate 40 interchanges, looking for weapons.  They might get lucky.”

“Yes sir. Right away.”  Almeria, the Falcons’ young communications officer, was round-faced, and wore gold-rimmed eyeglasses with dark sun lenses clipped over them.  Besides Almeria and the driver, two other Falcons also were busy on radios and computers in the Land Cruiser.

The walkie-talkie on Ramos’s belt crackled, and he pulled it off.  The handheld radios were digitally encrypted, so he spoke freely.

“All secure up here, Comandante.  We located the position, and we found fresh shell casings, over.”

“Excellent. What kind of ammunition, over?”