By the Rivers of Babylon (20 page)

“I don’t think so. I used to debrief Army Intelligence men back from Iraq. A lot of Iraqi villages are primitive beyond belief. Some of these people don’t even know they are Iraqi citizens. They live like the first Mesopotamian peasants who began civilization here five thousand years ago.”

“Then we’re not near any type of modern transportation or communication?”

“Hillah to the south. But I wouldn’t count on their knowing we’re here.” He paused and seemed to remember something. “There
is
a small museum and a guest house in the south part of the ruins by the Ishtar Gate.”

Hausner turned his head quickly toward Dobkin. “Go on.”

“The Iraqi Department of Antiquities built both structures about twenty years ago. I know the curator of the museum. Dr. Al-Thanni. I saw him in Athens only six months ago. We write via a mutal friend in Cyprus.”

“Are you serious?” Hausner began pacing. “Could you get there?”

“Jacob, we are what is called in military siege terminology, invested. That means surrounded. Just as we have sentinels and firing positions up here, you can be sure they have the same around this entire mound.”

“But if you could slip through—”

“The chances are that Dr. Al-Thanni won’t be there until the end of April when the tourist season begins.”

“There must be a telephone.”

“There probably is. And running water. And I’ll give you one guess where Rish’s command post must be.”

Hausner stopped pacing. “Still, if you could get there—to the
guest house or the museum—it’s a link with civilization. Al-Thanni may be there. You may be able to get a jeep. Or the telephone might be unguarded. What do you say, Ben?”

Dobkin looked south across the uneven landscape. He could make out the silhouettes of some excavated ruins. It was at least two kilometers to the Ishtar Gate excavation. There would be only a thin line of sentinels surrounding the hill. Still, he’d want to see it by daylight at least once. “I’m game. But if I’m caught they will make me tell them all I know about our setup here. Everyone talks, Jacob. You know that.”

“Of course I know that.”

“I’d have to have a pistol to . . . to make sure I didn’t fall into their hands. Can we spare that?”

“I don’t think so, Ben.”

“Neither do I.”

“A knife,” offered Hausner.

Dobkin laughed. “You know, I never understood where our ancestors got the balls to fall on their own swords. That takes a bit of nerve. And it must be very, very painful.” He looked off into the distance. “I don’t know if I could do that.”

“Well,” said Hausner, “let’s ask around and see if anyone has some kind of medicine that’s fatal in an overdose.”

“I appreciate the pains you’re taking to facilitate my suicide.”

“There are over fifty people—”

“I know. Yes, I’ll go. But only after I’ve seen it in the daylight. I’ll leave at nightfall tomorrow.”

“We may not be alive that long.”

“It’s worth the wait. I’ll have a better chance of success. If I go tonight, I’ll only be throwing my life away. I don’t want to do that. I want to succeed.”

“Of course.”

Isaac Burg approached, puffing on his pipe. He walked heavily like someone who has just completed a disagreeable task.

Hausner and Dobkin walked to meet him. Hausner spoke first. “Did he talk?”

“Everyone talks.”

Hausner nodded. “Is he . . . ?”

“Oh, no. He’s alive. Actually, I didn’t have to lean on him very hard. He wanted to talk.”

“Why?”

“They’re all like that. Dobkin will tell you. You’ve seen it yourself at Ramla. It’s a mixture of bragging, shock, nervousness, and fright.” He studied his pipe for a second. “Also, I promised him I’d send him back to his friends.”

Dobkin shook his head. “We can’t do that. Military regulations. Anyone who sees the inside of a defensive area can’t be repatriated until hostilities are ended. It’s the same here as anywhere else.”

“Well,” said Burg, “in my world—spies and secret agents, I mean—we do things differently. I promised. And you can make an exception for medical reasons. Besides, he hasn’t seen much. There’s no use letting a man die just because we don’t have medical facilities.”

“I’ll think about it,” said Dobkin.

Hausner listened to them argue. It wasn’t a heated argument but purely a disagreement over the interpretation of the rules. Burg was, at best, an enigma, thought Hausner. One minute he was prepared to torture a man to death and the next he was trying to save his life. And if he did let the Arab go, and they came back and took the hill and captured Burg alive, the Arabs would make certain that Burg died very slowly. If he were Burg, reflected Hausner, he would kill the man and bury him deep. And Dobkin—he was the perfect soldier. Loyal, intelligent, even inventive. But he
did
like his book of regulations. Hausner became impatient with their argument. “Never mind this. What did he
say
?”

Burg knocked his pipe on his shoe. “Say? He said lots of things. He said his name was Muhammad Assad and that he was an Ashbal. You know the word. A Tiger Cub—a Palestinian orphan of the wars with Israel. In fact, that outfit down there is all Ashbals. They were all raised by Palestinian guerilla organizations. Now they are all grown up. And they don’t like us.”

Dobkin nodded. “War leaves many legacies. This is the worst.” He thought about the Ashbals. How many hollow-eyed, tattered waifs had he seen sobbing over the bodies of their parents amid the rubble of Arab villages? War. Now they were all grown up, these young victims. They were nightmares that came back in the day. “They don’t like us at all,” agreed Dobkin.

“Quite right,” said Burg. “They are a dangerous lot. They’ve been indoctrinated with hate since the day they could comprehend. They reject all normal standards of behavior.
Hatred of Israel is their tribal religion.” He patted his pocket for his tobacco pouch and found it. “Also, they’ve been taught military skills since they could walk. They are a damned well-trained group.”

“How many?” asked Dobkin.

“A hundred and fifty.”

There was a silence.

“You’re certain?” asked Hausner.

Burg nodded.

“How can you be certain?”

Burg smiled. “That’s one of the things all soldiers lie about, isn’t it, Ben? How many. At first, he said five hundred. I didn’t buy that. That’s what all the screaming was about. Finally, we agreed on a hundred and fifty.”

Dobkin nodded. “Heavy weapons?”

Burg shook his head. “They weren’t expecting resistance. Almost all of them are armed with AK-47 rifles, however.”

“They must have a base close by,” said Dobkin.

“Not so close. In the Shamiyah Desert. That’s on the other side of the Euphrates. A good hundred kilometers from here. The Iraqi government suffers the existence of the camp for a variety of very familiar reasons. Anyway, they came here in late January by truck, before the floods. They have been waiting for orders ever since. Then a few hours ago, Rish flew in and called them on the radio. The rest is history—in the making.”

“Rish is the boss, I take it?” asked Hausner.

“None other. And his lieutenant is a fellow named Salem Hamadi, another old friend. Hamadi is both a Palestinian and an Ashbal. In fact, he was in charge of the Ashbal program. Rish, as you know, is neither an Ashbal nor a Palestinian. He is Iraqi. His village is not far from here. Anyway, some time ago, they joined forces and began culling both male and female orphans from various camps. About twenty of these Tiger Cubs are tigresses. Muhammad says they trained for years in the Shamiyah Desert for special assignments that never seemed to come off.”

“Did they know what they were here for?” asked Dobkin.

“They were told only when Rish’s Lear began to make its final approach. There was some confusion as to whether there would be one Concorde or two.” He paused as he remembered 01. “They were told they would keep us hostage here for a variety of political reasons, some of which were not too clear to Mr.
Muhammad Assad. He admits they were pretty shaken up by our antics. I suspect that they were not psychologically prepared to fight and lose men. They were prepared to push around two planeloads of Israeli civilians. Then all of a sudden, they had people getting killed.”

“But they’re crack troops,” said Hausner. “That’s what you said.”

Burg shook his head. “I didn’t say they were crack troops. I said they were well trained. There is a difference. None of them has ever seen combat.” He seemed to be thinking. “You know, this is not the first time that orphans have been trained from childhood as soldiers. There are a lot of cases of that in history. And you know what? They were never really better or worse than regular draftees. In fact, many times they were much worse. These orphan soldiers, like institutional children everywhere, were a little duller than their peers raised in a home environment. That is the case with the Ashbals, I’m sure. They do not make especially good soldiers. They lack imagination and they have virtually no personal goals in life. They lack any experiences outside of military life, and their emotional development is arrested. They have only a vague conception of what they are fighting for, since they have no home outside the barracks. I’m sure they would fight to the death to defend their comrades and their camps, but outside of that, there’s no notion of family or country. Everything is vague when they go beyond their squads, their platoons, and their companies. There are a dozen other reasons why they don’t make ideal soldiers. I could see it in our young friend, Muhammad.” He looked at Dobkin. “Ben?”

Dobkin nodded. “I agree. But there are still over a hundred of them, and they outgun us. They are not going to pack their tents like your proverbial Arabs and steal away in the night.”

“No,” said Hausner. “They are not. Because they have two good leaders.”

Dobkin nodded again. “That is the key. The leadership.” He seemed to be remembering the old fights and nodded to himself several times. He looked at Hausner and Burg. “Here is what I know about the Arabs as soldiers. First, they are romantics whose mental picture of warfare is of men on white Arabian stallions charing across the desert. In truth, the Arabs of today are not known for their successes on the offensive. The days when they carried the banner of Islam across half the civilized
world are long gone.” He lit a cigarette. “But don’t get me wrong. They are not such bad fighters as they are made out to be. They are generally brave and steadfast, especially in a static defensive situation. Like many soldiers from low social and economic backgrounds, they will endure the most extreme hardships and deprivations. But they have flaws as soldiers. They are reluctant to press an attack. They are unable to shift tactics with changing situations. Their officers and sergeants, while not the best, are critical for control and discipline. The average Arab soldier will show little initiative and less discipline when his leader is killed. Also, the Arabs have not completely come to grips with modern military equipment. The Ashbals in particular, from what little I know of them, seem to fit into this description. And further, they are so blinded by hate propaganda that they are not very cool or professional as soldiers.”

Burg nodded. “I agree. And I think they
might
run off if they lose enough leadership or if the losses in the ranks become unacceptable—which I admit isn’t very likely in this case. On the other hand,
we
can’t run anywhere. We are fighting for our lives. All losses are acceptable to us. There is no alternative.”

Hausner spoke. “There is an alternative. They’ll ask for a conference.”

“But not before they try one more attack,” said Dobkin. He looked into the sky. “We’ll have a chance to see if we can inflict unacceptable losses on them in a short while. The moon is setting.”

Brin saw them first, even before the two-man OP/LP—Outpost/Listening Post—halfway down the slope saw them.

They came like shadows, wearing tiger fatigues and carrying their automatic rifles. The starlight scope amplified the smallest amount of natural night light so that Brin could see things that even night creatures could not see—things that the men could not even see on themselves. He could see their shadows, cast by starlight. He could see the white skin under their eyes, symptomatic of fear. He could see the most intimate movements made in what was believed to be a shroud of darkness—the lips murmuring prayers, the quick urinations brought on by fear, the pulling of hair locks. A girl squeezed a young man’s hand. Brin felt as though he were peeking through a keyhole.

He put down the rifle and whispered to Naomi Haber. “They’re coming.”

She nodded, touched his arm, and ran off to give the alarm.

The long meandering defensive line on the eastern slope of the hill became alert as the warning moved more rapidly than the swift runner.

On the western slope there was silence. The luminescent Euphrates would silhouette anything moving up that slope. Men and women pressed their faces to the ground at the crest of the slope to try to pick out a moving form. But there was only the silver-gray Euphrates flowing silently southward.

Dobkin, Burg, and Hausner stood on a small knoll—one of the covered watchtowers—near the middle of the eastern crest, about fifty meters in back of it.

The knoll had been designated as the CP/OP, the Command Post/Observation Post. From that vantage point, they hoped to direct the fight along the five-hundred-meter eastern slope.

A long aluminum brace from the Concorde’s tail section, bent and twisted, was stuck in the hard clay earth atop the knoll. From the top of this unlikely standard flew a more unlikely banner, a child’s T-shirt, salvaged from one of the suitcases, an intended gift for someone in New York. The T-shirt showed a cityscape of the Tel Aviv waterfront painted in day-glo colors. The purpose of the CP/OP was to establish command control in the dark—a place where runners could go to impart information and collect orders. It was also to be the last rallying point, the citadel within the citadel from which the last stand was to be made in the event the line was broken or penetrated. It was an old tactic, one that belonged to an age before radios, telegraphs, and field phones. The three commanders took their places on the high knoll, under their flag, and waited.