Chapter 12

I awoke at six AM local time, as I had set the alarm. My body clock was so screwed up that it didn't know what day of the week it was or even what month it was. The girls woke up with me and Lisa advised me, "We can stay until tomorrow. If you can't get done by then, we have to go home. They need the plane. You'll have to ride commercial or find another charter."

We were eating breakfast when a duty man came by to pick me up. At the station, the team leader for this operation briefed me. The Strike Force team was already here and was assembled and waiting for instructions at a local National Guard armory.

John walked into the station, said "good morning" and came to me and shook my hand. He said, "I didn't think you would be here until tonight?"

"Wanda hitched me a ride with the Navy and had our regular charter service waiting for me in San Diego. I got here a little after midnight."

"Great, have you had time to think of a plan?"

I said to the team leader and to John, "Let's get the Strike Force team leader and go out and look at the buildings and layout real quick. I want a plain Suburban or passenger van, nothing fancy that will give us away."

We went out to the site in a black Suburban. The windows were tinted so dark that it was difficult to use binoculars from inside.

There were four two story buildings arranged in a square, about a hundred fifty yards from the border fence. There was a huge section of fence torn down. The opening was big enough that vans kept going back and forth from the border to the building. While we watched, a fancy Mercedes came through the fence and stopped at the buildings. A couple of well-dressed Spanish looking men got out and went inside the farthest building. I said, "Mark that one as being the headquarters. See if your spotters can define what is in each building and let me know."

The Strike Force team leader said, "Since we don't know what's behind any of the walls, a straight on attack will be difficult. What do you think?"

"Here's my plan. I want some big bulldozers, backhoes, and some mobile cranes, all with bulletproof cabs brought out here. I want holes scooped out where the fence should be and concrete fence planted where it's been torn down. We'll fix it later. I want the bulldozers to dig a huge ditch around the buildings. This will have two uses. First it will tell us if there is a tunnel and second it will be a place where our troops can fight from".

I looked at the Strike Force team leader. "I want your best snipers divided into four groups to be spaced equally around the buildings. Their orders are to fire at anyone seen with a gun. They are not to shoot to wound, they are to shoot to kill."

I told the team leader from the station, "Make sure you advise your men that if they have to shoot, to shoot to kill. If they don't think they can do it, replace them with border people or anyone who is willing to protect our country and squelch this terrorist group."

"John, your job is to brief any observers and to advise them to keep their heads down. Make sure you advise them that we will only fire at men with weapons and that throughout the confrontation we will be announcing the opportunity to give up and live."

"All of you, the one thing you will do; anyone coming out of the buildings with their hands on their head will not be shot. Let them keep coming until you have them in cuffs."

The ACE had accompanied us out to the site, so I said to him, "Your job is to get two Spanish speaking men to continuously announce to the occupants of the houses to give up and live, to come out unarmed, with their hands on their heads."

"Now, let's get those concrete fence partitions and heavy equipment out here and get this show on the road."

John said, "Are you going to do this during the day?"

"You bet. All the better to see who's shooting at us. I'm going to put snipers on the tractors to return fire while we work. Hopefully I'll cull a few shooters before things get crazy."

While we had been looking at the location, calls were being made for heavy equipment and the concrete panels.

When a big truck was pulling up that had two big bulldozers on the trailer, I had the ACE drive over to it to see if it was for us. When I found out they were ours, I told them to get them off the trailer in a hurry.

Turning to the ACE, I asked, "Do you have any rifles in this Suburban. I need one until you can get some snipers out here."

The ACE opened a hatch in the rear to show me some MP5s and a stack of loaded magazines. I looked at the team leader and said, "Want to shoot from a big tractor for a while? I'd like to box that Mercedes in while we can. I'll take the tractor that will dig between the buildings and the fence and you take the tractor that will be digging between the buildings and the road. Shoot anyone who comes out with a gun."

I told the ACE, go back to the station and get everything else moving fast. Send the rest of the Strike Force out here. We'll get started here. I told John to hustle up the announcers and to send all of the borrowed troops out as soon as possible.

John grumbled, "Christ, you don't even give a group a chance to get ready, you just push ahead."

"Only way to take them is by surprise, John. We can't let them get prepared."

I told the two bulldozer operators what I wanted to do and I climbed into one cab while the Strike Force team leader climbed in the other. The big tractors moved pretty fast in getting to where I wanted to start digging our trench. He first dug down about a foot but took a long swipe before having to dump a load of sandy dirt between the trench and the buildings. We were on the next part of the trench when four men came out of the house and got into the Mercedes. I began firing at the Mercedes, trying to hit the tires before they could get far.

A rear window of the car opened and a guy began shooting a handgun at the tractor. Too bad, I put a round into the window right into the guy. Another stood up in the sunroof and fired at the tractor. He lurched forward as the Strike Force team leader hit the man from where he was.

The car spun his flat rear wheels in the sandy road trying to head back toward the opening in the fence. I had the tractor back up to try to block the car but didn't have to worry as the car dropped into the low trench and was hung up, not being able to get out the other side. Instead of shooting at the tires, I fired into the rear window of the car. It must have been effective as the car stopped and the person in the passenger seat got out with his hands up. Using the tractor as a shield, I got out and had the man come to me where I searched and cuffed him. I made him lie face down while I checked the Mercedes. There were two dead men in the back seat and the driver was seriously wounded in the shoulder. I pushed him over while he screamed and drove the car out of the ditch and parked it by the road. I went back and told the tractor operator to continue digging the trench until it was about five feet deep then to do the sides.

I used the cuffed man to shield myself from the buildings and walked toward the crippled Mercedes. A duty team had pulled up next to the Mercedes, so I gave them my prisoner and told them to get the other to some medical help, but keep him in custody.

Borrowing one of their radios, I called the Strike Force team leader to ask if he had seen anyone trying to snipe at us yet. He said he had not, but he was watching the border fence as he could see several men with rifles standing in the fence opening.

Just as he was saying this, a group of six men with rifles began walking toward the buildings and were approaching the ditch that was being built. I radioed the Strike Force team leader telling him to put his bulldozer between the advancing men and the buildings. I went to a big pile of dirt and lay across it, getting a good firing position. These guys were on my side of the border now. I was protecting the homeland.

The other bulldozer rumbled across the ground between the men and the buildings, causing all six of the men to raise their rifles. The Strike Force team leader didn't wait, and I didn't either. We began picking off the men one at a time. I started yelling to give up, to put down their weapons, and put their hands on their head.

When all six were down, dirt began flying up next to me from rounds being fired from the other side of the border fence. I didn't know what kind of trouble I would get into if I fired into Mexico, but they were firing at me. It took me a couple of seconds to find the guy firing and I shifted around, aimed, and knocked him down. Now there were rounds coming from the direction of the building.

I rolled off the pile of dirt into the trench where I hoped to find a place that would give me cover from both directions. From on the outside of the pile of dirt, I rose to look at the building. In the second building back, I could see a man in the window with a scoped rifle. I flipped up the scope on the MP5 and peered through it. The guy was sweeping the area back and forth. The shot would be a long one, but I settled down, aimed carefully, and squeezed off a round. The man pitched backward, whether out of action or not, I had hit him.

The announcers had arrived. They were announcing on each side of the buildings, but no one came out. I could see John keeping some people back from the area. They must be the ACLU observers.

I was startled by two backhoes that were starting to dig by the border fence. I could see both of them had a man on board to protect them. I heard a bunch of crack, crack, cracks, and looked around. One of the observers that John was with was down. It also looked like he might have been hit.

Crouching low, I ran back toward the group as fast as I could. In order to stay out of the line of fire, I had to circle around to the back of the group and come up behind them. John was holding a compress on the guy's gut while trying to hold his own arm.

I ripped the sleeve off John's shirt, folded up part of it, then used the rest to wrap around his arm and tie it off. Then I checked the ACLU guy's pulse to find it thready. Using the borrowed radio, I called for an ambulance. The duty man that answered said the driver was afraid to get close, so I told him to drive the ambulance himself.

As soon as the paramedic began working on the ACLU representative, another one was hit, but this time only in his thigh. While I quickly worked on the guy, I told all of them, "Move, get back, all of you. Move behind that big flatbed back there about a hundred yards."

The paramedic and I loaded the badly hurt ACLU rep and I insisted he take John and the other rep out to the field hospital to get properly patched.

I couldn't figure out how someone could be shooting with all of the men scattered around to stop that sort of thing. I sat beside the Mercedes and looked at the roofs of the building and saw a part of the roof actually rise up. They had a trap door up there to keep us from seeing them.

Leveling off, using the bumper for a brace, I sighted in on the area where the trapdoor was and waited. Sure enough, the trap door opened and the shooter poked his gun out and rose up. That's when I put four rounds into him as fast as I could.

I was wishing for a 308 instead of the MP5 for long distance accuracy.

The announcers were giving me a headache. I know it was necessary, we had to give them sufficient warning. Turning to see how the fence area was doing, I watched a giant crane lift a concrete panel from a truck then slide it into place. The crazy thing was I could hear rifle fire coming from the other side of the border. They were apparently shooting at the concrete panels or the steel and bulletproof cabs of the equipment.

I watched the roofs of all four buildings to make sure there wasn't another trap door. I didn't see anything, but noticed now that several of the second floor windows were now open that had not been earlier.

We were now at a stalemate. Men were now in the trenches around the buildings, ready to engage if anyone came out. What we had to do now was to take each building one at a time. The longer I looked at the buildings, the easier it became to make up my mind.

I radioed for the Strike Force team leader to meet me in the trench near the building where the Mercedes had parked. I went to the nearest bulldozer and had him give me a ride to where the team leader was waiting.

I told the man, "Let's take one building at a time. I think the best way would be to avoid the doorways. Let's use a bulldozer to make a big hole in the side and go in that way. We'll clear one building then go to the next."

"Good idea, we can use the equipment for cover like any other track. Let me assemble my men and we'll get it done."

As we approached the building, I was watching at the windows to make sure no one would lean out to shoot at us. The bulldozer tore a big hole into the side of the frame structure but didn't knock the building down. When we began going into the building, people were coming out of the front and back doors with their hands on their head. These people were directed where to go and were cuffed and searched quickly.

The team cleared the building, piling several weapons up at the hole that was torn in the side. I had the bulldozer operator back up and head for the next building. We weren't even to the building yet when people, men and women, began streaming out the doors. We directed them where to go and entered the building through the doors, clearing each room on both floors.

The next building in the sequence was the building that had the trap door in the roof. We went around to the side of the building and were getting close to it when men with rifles appeared at three windows and began shooting at us. I got one, the team leader got one, and another man got the third. By the time we tore a hole in the side, two more snipers had presented themselves and had been put down. The team leader and I went in first, using our knowledge of how to protect each other's back as we moved through the room to the hall door.

As we approached the door from each side, the door exploded sending big splinters of wood throughout the room. One of the men following us got a big splinter in his thigh. This told us the bad guys had grenades or explosives, so the game had changed. I motioned for everyone to get out of the building and get behind the tractor.

I told the team leader, "Get the two backhoes and the other tractor. We'll start on each corner and tear the building down. They'll either come out or be buried alive."

He nodded and dispatched some men to retrieve the equipment. I told our tractor operator what I wanted and he grinned. He suggested, "Go back to the trench and let us take the building down. These guys will come out quick. If they're firing, you'll be protected"

We assembled in the trench and watched the building closely. I began making my way around the building to make sure people didn't move between buildings. John was in a trench watching.

"Thanks, John, this was a weak link. They used a grenade in the building so I'm going to tear it down. They'll come out. How are you doing? Are you doing all right?"

"Just a little wound. No big deal, I've had worse."

"See, that's what happens when you're in the field."

"Yeah, right. I don't need this shit."

The four machines were literally tearing the building down at the corners. As one of the sides of the building sagged, four men came running out of the front of the building firing wildly. They didn't make twenty feet before all four were down.

Apparently something similar was happening at the rear of the building as we heard more firing.

The last building was the one nearest to where the ACLU people were being hidden behind a truck. I had our tractor brought around to the side of the building so we could tear a hole in it if we needed to. Just as we approached the building, a man came out of the building, holding what appeared to be a young blonde girl. He had a knife at her throat telling everyone he was going to kill the girl if he didn't get a car to get out of there right away.