The Fifth Season (41 page)

With the collapse of Communism, alliances had changed and political terrorists such as Osama bin Ladam had suddenly found themselves out in the cold. He could no longer count on the support of the Iranians, nor the Afghanistan tribal groups who had once sworn loyalty to his cause.

The bloody confrontation between the Iranians and Taliban groups in Afghanistan had thrown bin Ladam's camp into confusion. The American strikes against his training facilities, and the constant satellite surveillance which had severely crippled his mobility, caused him to reconsider his place of domicile. Then, when Afghanistan's purist Taliban militia had insisted that he move his base of operations, the terrorist leader had contacted Haji Abdul Muis.

Bin Ladam had decided to test Indonesia's soil to determine whether he might move his operations to the fertile, untapped Moslem community.

Tempted by the Saudi's commitment to place at least one nuclear warhead at his disposal, Abdul Muis had been most receptive to the idea, and eagerly assisted Osama bin Ladam to re-establish his base of operations in Java at the
Mufti Muharam
provincial retreat.

* * * *

Their vehicle gained speed as traffic thinned, bringing the powerful duo to their destination. To the untrained eye, the high-walled compound could have been the home of a wealthy, religious recluse. From a distance, the dome-shaped mosque's minaret provided a Taj Mahal quality to the setting, the tall spire in fact was an observation post and had never been used to call the faithful to prayer.

‘You have done well,' bin Ladam complimented, as they drove through the second security gate manned by heavily-armed, dedicated troops, their weapons concealed under long, white, flowing robes.

‘You will find that my retreat is totally secure,' Muis boasted but not without good cause. The complex had been constructed entirely by local labor, all sworn members of the
Mufti Muharam.
A three-meter high, cement-block perimeter fence had been erected around the ten hectare property, the top of the wall strung with razor-sharp, rolled barbed-wire to discourage even the most foolhardy from violating the camp's security.

Bin Ladam took note of the secondary observation posts discreetly disguised amongst coconut tree stands around the complex, pleased that Muis had taken his advice and further camouflaged the armed positions.

They drove directly to the main building, past the ten-man accommodation blocks and training facilities, where specialist courses in front-line terrorism were conducted for the few, select personnel recruited from Muslim minority groups in Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines and other parts of Asia. Their driver eased the Mercedes into the underground garage where Muis and his guest were warmly welcomed by staff, and stone-faced security. A group of men stood in line, off to one side, and bin Ladam viewed them critically.

‘Will they be ready in time?' he inquired, casting his eyes across the line of recruits who, within weeks, would be asked to give their lives for the cause.

‘They'll be ready,' Muis promised, and ushered his guest inside.

* * * *

The delivery van turned off Wireless Road and propped, waiting for the Marine guard to wave him through. After a cursory inspection, the driver eased the vehicle forward slowly, following the route he had covered a hundred times before, down the side of the embassy to where he was expected. Bangkok's power supplies had never been reliable, the sensitive equipment housed inside the United States Embassy necessitating the constant electricity supply produced by the twin five hundred KVA machines installed to the rear.

The maintenance staff stepped out of the small building housing the powerful generators and waved to the familiar face delivering the drums of diesel fuel to the fuel store. The engineer walked to the rear of the van, just as the Thai Moslem driver whispered
‘Allahu Akbar'
and died, his sweaty, trembling hands simultaneously activating the primary explosion required to ensure the effectiveness of the more powerful, and secondary detonation.

In Kuala Lumpur, a van similar to that used in Thailand for the attack crossed into Jalan Tun Razak, the traffic congestion delaying the deadly cargo's delivery by more than half an hour. When challenged at the U.S. Embassy's gates by Marine guards, the driver panicked, and attempted to charge the steel gates and, in so doing, failed. Shot twice, he was dragged from the vehicle, then taken into custody by local police.

The army bomb disposal squad was called, the soldiers successfully deactivating the two explosive devices within minutes of their arrival. The seriously wounded fanatic was kept under guard at the military hospital and interrogated by American officers the following day. Before he died, the young Malay confessed to being a member of the
Mufti Muharam
sect, admitting the existence of organized cells established to attack American interests throughout Malaysia.

He and his companions had all been trained in a pleasant rural setting, not two hour's drive from Surabaya, in East Java.

The villagers had taken them to the isolated clearing where another of the local women had been interrogated, then murdered by the Javanese soldiers. Evidence of their methods caused both Anne and Mary Jo to pale as their escort explained the use of their gruesome discovery. The bloody length of water-pipe remained where the soldiers had placed it, the snake they had inserted to further intimidate their prisoner, long gone.

‘How can they be so cruel?' Anne asked, her face reflecting the agony she felt for the dead woman. She wiped tears with a sleeve, stifling a sob.

Mary Jo could see that her assistant was still shaking from the experience.

Anne placed her head in her hands and leaned forward in the seat. Then, without warning, she launched herself from the jeep and threw up. Mary Jo slipped out of the vehicle quickly and went to her side.

‘It's okay Anne, it's okay.' She placed one arm around the shorter woman, and held her firmly. After a few minutes passed, she steered Anne back into the jeep and opened the cold thermos.

‘Here, this will help,' she said, passing a plastic cup filled with sweet, iced tea.

‘Thanks Mary Jo,' Anne smiled apologetically, embarrassed at having broken into tears. She drank, then passed the cup back. They spent some minutes composing themselves, then thanked the villagers. They gave their guides one of the small food parcels the women had become accustomed to carrying wherever they went.

‘We'd better get going Anne. I don't think we should hang around here.

The soldiers would be very angry if they found us here.' Mary Jo agreed. The driver swung into action, and they sped away from the grim scene as quickly as the narrow trail permitted. Three, back-breaking kilometers later, they rejoined the gravel road they had taken earlier and continued along this until reaching the broken asphalt road which would take them back into Dili.

Mary Jo had wanted to visit the police detention centers in the East Timor capital but had been refused permission by the local authorities.

Although Jakarta had withdrawn the bulk of its
Kopassus
and other troops from the former Portuguese colony, these had been replaced with an equivalent number of hand-selected Javanese police. Locals she had spoken to days before had insisted that the Special Forces' torture chambers remained, urging her to visit Bairo Pite and Komoro for proof of their claims. The police commander had denied the existence of such centers. As Mary Jo prepared to return to Surabaya by plane empty handed, a member of Fatalin, the sole surviving East Timorese separatist movement offered to show them evidence of police brutality. Now, armed with proof that the terror campaign continued, Mary Jo wished only to get out of the dangerous town before the authorities discovered what they had seen and photographed. With four days left in their itinerary, the pair flew north to Menado, where they visited camps outside the city, then departed, flying across the Celebes Sea to Tarakan.

Three hundred miles west of Menado, and a similar distance south-west of the Philippines provincial city of General Santos, the pilot suddenly turned to the women and pointed, their aircraft now clear of cloud.

‘We'll have to detour,' he said, tapping his headphones.

‘What's happening, Anne?' Mary Jo wanted to know.

‘Why are we changing course?' she asked the pilot. He tapped his phones again, raising his voice for her to hear.

‘Can you see those ships over there?' he pointed again and this time Anne searched the sea to the horizon, locating a number of ships in the distance. ‘I've just been warned not to approach those ships,' he announced.

‘Whose are they?' Anne asked, having relayed this information to Mary Jo.

‘American,' he answered, ‘it's part of the Seventh Fleet.' When Mary Jo learned this she expressed surprise.

‘I wonder what they're doing in Indonesian waters?' and grabbed for her binoculars. In the distance she saw a number of ships, amongst them a destroyer and cruiser but she was not sure.

‘Perhaps we should give Tarakan a miss anyway, Anne,' Mary Jo suggested, ‘and go straight to Balikpapan, then back to Surabaya.' Her assistant spoke to the pilot who nodded, made the necessary course corrections having checked his maps, and they continued on their way towards Borneo's western seaboard, Mary Jo preoccupied with the presence of U.S. warships sailing through Indonesian waters.

The following day, they returned to Surabaya. As their twin-engine Cessna flew low over the Madura Strait, Anne drew her attention to an unusually large number of fishing-boats gathered along the coast.

‘Refugees?' she asked, guessing that this was probably so.

‘Must be,' Anne replied, ‘but I've never seen so many this far down the Strait before.' Mary Jo reached over and retrieved her camera bag, extracting her Nikon as she prepared to document the massive build-up on the flat, sparkling sea below.

‘How many would you say there were?' she asked Anne.

‘Many hundreds, perhaps even a thousand in those three groups,' she answered, pointing at the separate, floating communities anchored in the shallows.

‘Ask the pilot if he would mind flying lower and around the fishing-boats,' Mary Jo requested, then changed batteries in her camera and reloaded.

Moments later she braced herself with one arm strapped firmly around her seat as the Cessna banked abruptly, losing height as the pilot changed course.

Mary Jo waited until he had positioned the vessels on the aircraft's port side, then she snapped what seemed to be a continuous line of wooden boats, all tied to each other to create a huge, floating, city. As they flew closer to the outer line, she could see terrified children scrambling for the safety of their mother's arms, whilst the more seasoned of the sailors stood motionless on deck, observing the small plane's interest as they flew past.

‘Where do you think they're going?' Anne considered the question and slowly shook her head.

‘These are Javanese boats. They wouldn't want to go too far to the east as that would take them towards the Timorese refugees' camps.' She thought awhile longer. ‘Australia?' Anne asked, shrugging that she really had no idea as to their destination. A dry smile crossed Mary Jo's lips.

‘How many people would you guess are down there?' she asked. Anne looked back at the congested fishing fleets and raised her eyebrows.

‘I've seen those boats carry as many as a hundred on short journeys.' She glanced at Mary Jo. ‘If they're only carrying say, fifty, and there's a thousand ships altogether, then,' she paused, calculating the number, ‘there would be as many as fifty, possibly a hundred thousand refugees down there.'

‘And you don't think the Australians might have had enough?' Mary Jo's forced, cynical laugh caused Anne to rethink the earlier question. She did so but came up with the same answer as before.

‘That must be their plan. Others have done it. Where else could they possibly go?' she asked, but Mary Jo was still unconvinced. She was aware that the Australians had become increasingly hostile over past weeks, having towed more than two hundred fishing-boats back out to sea and fired over their heads. There were reports that a number of Indonesian boats had been sunk by coastal patrols, and Australian warships were becoming increasingly aggressive towards boats carrying the illegal migrants. Warnings that the navy had been instructed to sink offending vessels had been broadcast throughout the region, and Mary Jo believed the government to be serious in its threats to stem the massive flow.

‘There's only one way to find out,' she said, pointing at the pilot. ‘Ask him how far is the nearest airfield, and can he put down there.' The pilot partially removed his head-set again and listened as Anne leaned closer to make herself heard above the engine noise. They discussed Mary Jo's request, and she could see that the pilot was not too enthused with her idea.

‘He says that he can put down here,' Anne said, pointing to the map the pilot had pulled from somewhere around his legs.

‘Probolinggo?' Mary Jo asked, ‘how far will we have to travel by road to get back here?' Anne placed her hand on the pilot's shoulder and asked.

‘He says it's about a hundred kilometers.'

‘We should be able to cover that in a couple of hours,' Mary Jo said, assuming they could hire a vehicle at the airport.