Globall War of Terror: Consolidation 2
Dec. 21st, 2017 08:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
drewkittyThe post incident planning was going well. We had rearranged the schedules, thickened the perimeter operation, planned for discreet observation of the new convoy arrivals ("Don't ever trust, always verify!" is our motto), and even arranged for most of the Reaction Team to be released from duty to get some sleep to resume their day jobs as coders tomorrow.
Then I got a call on radio.
"This is Sarah. We have a serious problem."
Sarah is not in the habit of making overstatements. Her ability to panic has been permanently burned out.
I paused with my finger halfway to the "REACT" button. Picking up on the cue, the duty dispatchers got busy on cameras.
"Type of issue?"
"Manifests do not match the items. Not even close. I think the Major is going to stroke out on us."
A logistics problem. But maybe a fatal one.
I wheeled my wheelchair towards the exit while saying over my shoulder, "I need a duty manager from Logistics, Site Ops and Finance -- yes, all three -- to meet me at the motor pool time now. And alert the VP and SLE that we have a potential discrepancy and we are investigating."
I was accompanied by one of our teams in full battle rattle. Apparently someone had decided - reasonably - that since I was chairbound I needed to be guarded.
Fortunately for all of us, I'd once spent a month in a wheelchair thanks to someone running over my foot with a box truck, some years ago back in peacetime when that meant an ER visit and a cast. So I was in danger of outracing my protection as I went out into the hall, down a ramp, to the double doors (where I jammed the HANDICAP buttons each in turn) and then across the tarmac to our Logistics area.
On arrival I saw the trucks, the precious trucks, with the Major and Sarah going from truck bed to truck bed and tearing open boxes.
"This is fucking trash!" he shouted when he saw me.
I knew what was supposed to be loaded. I had a detailed manifest, carefully corrected for items 'confiscated' or 'taxed' or 'donated' during the trip. Electronics and facilities parts. Medical supplies. Two precious 3-D printers. A laser lathe. Some metal parts about which I was prepared to know nothing. Firearms. Ammunition. Cameras. Digital video recorders. Alarm keypads. Wire. Lock shop parts.
I could see that one of the spilled boxes appeared to contain ... crushed beer cans. A thin layer of bubble wrap plastic, some spilled cardboard boxes with carefully printed labels, and beer cans for weight.
Another spilled box contained six bags of IV solution, just enough to cover the apparent top of the box, and then gel ice packs. Not that we couldn't use those -- but each of those IV bags was life and death, and ice packs were just ice packs.
The load had been doctored. Badly and comprehensively.
"Start a video log," I ordered. "Start with the last truck as a three-team. New label for each box, numbered 1, 2, 3 etc by truck. Video and describe the contents on the video. Inventory the entire fucking convoy." I paused. "NOW."
They moved. The Major was still ripping through boxes and Sarah was still keeping up with him.
Frank from Facilities showed up. "Site Ops sent me."
"Frank, you want nothing to do with this. Get Site Ops down here and do it now."
He turned as pale as his complexion allowed and got busy on his mobile phone. All authorized phones on the property are wi-fi only and only work on our network. But he was very authorized and he was burning up the phone.
I had received encrypted and very specific instructions about a particular item. I motioned to one of the horrified Logistics people.
"I need a siphon. Empty the right Diesel tank on the 2nd tractor to a separate tank. At once."
Then I paged Mo. Destructive vehicle search was well within a bomb tech's capabilities, if a little overkill.
My team leader finished with the first truck.
"Sir, every box does not match the labeled contents. The top or first layer is the items indicated. Underneath is debris or junk with approximately correct weights."
He held and displayed a box newly labeled Truck 1 Box 13 that purported to be 5.56mm ammunition. It was mostly red fire brick.
The company had spent millions of dollars on this convoy. People had lost lives for it. I had lost lives for it.
"Sharon. Major." I spoke quietly but loudly into the radio. Sharon encouraged the Major to trot over. I drew them some distance to the side.
"Major, at what time was the convoy left unsecured?"
"Never. I slept in the bed of Truck #4 myself. This is as packed in Reno."
"Then you got fucked in Reno." I used the obscenity deliberately, testing for a reaction. Then I said something else, as if by chance, "Goddamn it!"
He flinched. Mormon for sure.
"By what authority do you hold your rank, sir?"
"Utah National Guard."
It was not the kind of thing I really expected anyone to lie about.
"Did you see the shipment prepared?"
"No. I was released from my unit to command the convoy."
"Who with the convoy saw the shipment prepared?"
"I selected my team myself. Only a handful are from the site."
"Separate them out. Identify any that are dead, or injured and in infirmary."
The balance of power had shifted. He might be a Company manager, and a Major, and I was neither a client manager nor a military officer. But this was a cluster fuck and I was going to take charge until it was unfucked.
I made a tiny motion that drew the alertness of the other two Security teams now guarding the convoy. Then I made a tiny motion with my left and right pinkie fingers. Crossing them.
The team members sighed, stretched a little, stood loosely, flexed a little. Touched their equipment a little.
The convoy members did not notice. Our Logistics people did and started sidling their way away from the vehicles and towards the exits from the yard.
The Major's men were on one side and six he would or could not vouch for were on the other side.
I pointed sideways with a thumb.
"DOWN! ON YOUR KNEES! HANDS ON YOUR HEADS! DO IT NOW! NOW!"
My teams were guns up, very ready to shoot, fearsomely aggressive and used to this drill. They took their opposition by utter surprise... they complied.
The six presumed hostiles secured, my team searched them and removed their weapons, then zip tied their hands behind their backs and their ankles together.
"Gentlemen," they were all men, "you are under private arrest for commercial burglary and cargo theft in interstate commerce. You will be interviewed individually, right now. If I don't like what I hear, you will be turned over to Homeland Security for internment. If you bullshit me, you will get half a helicopter ride."
The American military practice in China of interrogating prisoners by taking them up in a helicopter and returning with the craft empty was unofficial but now well known to all.
We set up three interrogation teams: the Major or one of his men, myself or one of my supervisors, and a site manager on each.
It only took ten minutes for the first one to break. My preferred technique was the handshake. Try it sometime. Take a pencil and interlace it between your fingers. Then have a friend give you a nice firm handshake. Forgive him after you stop screaming.
Local Company management had decided the convoy movement was too dangerous and they did not want to lose stuff. So they had packed lightly and not told anyone.
They had fucking killed us all. And they were in Utah so I could not return the favor.
One by one the stories were confirmed. They had been very afraid to tell anyone. Now they grasped that they had not been afraid enough.
"You are all disarmed and temporarily reassigned to Labor detail. Red and black badges. If you violate Security rules, you're fired. That means you do whatever you are told. When we fire you, we strip you to your underwear and send you back out the gate. We usually hear the screams for a day or two. If you touch a weapon, you attempt murder and we will kill you. We'll make some calls and revisit your status in a day or two. Badge 'em and escort to Labor barracks."
By then the SLE and VPs had arrived. The Major and I briefed them.
Company politics are bad enough when all that is at stake is a stock option.
The calls began. We finished the video inventory and started separating the layer of wheat from the truckloads of chaff.
Mo arrived.
"In that tank over there, there is supposed to be a safe package of weapons. I trust nothing. Check."
He did, after clearing a short radius and using a fiber optic camera on a pole. Then he fished it with some small brass chain -- fishing line would melt -- and unwrapped it.
A neat pile of Diesel soaked rebar. Not barrels. Certainly not receivers.
Craptastic.
"Let's start tearing down the trucks. Look for wear and tear, sabotage, booby traps, any issues."
Mo resigned himself to losing a night of sleep. But he had junior techs to push the nitty gritty onto. Good training.
The Executive Briefing Room was now occupied, with SLE and VPs and managers trying to decide how to handle the bad news.
The Major and Sharon and I went for a walk instead.
No one was going to like this. I radioed in and advised that I would be off net for a bit, and had Sharon do the same. Now the kicker.
"Sharon, the Major is going to search us -- and the chair -- for electronic devices. You are then going to search him for the same."
All cleared, we went for a two person walk and one person wheel.
One of the Major's men watched from a hundred yards with a scoped rifle. That was OK. H5, which he didn't know existed, was dialed in on him in turn.
Our backs to the site, it was time to have a discreet chat.
"This is a net drain on our resources. The supplies you brought don't even make up for the supplies we used. We have five days of food left, right now. I don't even want to think about ammo. We were counting on the reloading supplies. Your thoughts?"
"I think we were set up to get killed. I think they never expected us to make it at all."
"Exactly. I think Homeland fucked us. Spread juicy rumors about a convoy, draw out all the bad apples, fuck them up. So sorry about the Company. Next step is a visit from them."
The Major paled. Sharon and I did not. Death was death.
"We're going to re-vet everyone you brought in. Laborers unless you can vouch for them. Junior assignments until they prove themselves. As for you personally, I was going to give you site command and go back to security forces leader. I cannot possibly do that now, my own people would shoot me. Any ideas?"
"I want to go back and bust heads. But that's not possible, is it?"
"No, you would get killed along the way or shortly after arrival. In fact the safest thing I could do with you is help you desert and send you down to Watsonville Ward. They need people with your skills and they can trust you."
Unspoken: I can't.
"To heck with safe."
"Take up internal security, especially personnel. I've tried to vet as much as I can but I'm still a contractor. You are genuine Corporate Security Management and you can jack people up as much as you like. I'll report to you on paper but I still own the wire and the security force, the convoy operations and anything inside I don't like."
"OK." We shook hands.
As the Major walked away, Sharon asked, "Was that a good idea?"
"Probably not. The alternative is to shoot him."
We might still work our way around to that. The evening was still young.
Then I got a call on radio.
"This is Sarah. We have a serious problem."
Sarah is not in the habit of making overstatements. Her ability to panic has been permanently burned out.
I paused with my finger halfway to the "REACT" button. Picking up on the cue, the duty dispatchers got busy on cameras.
"Type of issue?"
"Manifests do not match the items. Not even close. I think the Major is going to stroke out on us."
A logistics problem. But maybe a fatal one.
I wheeled my wheelchair towards the exit while saying over my shoulder, "I need a duty manager from Logistics, Site Ops and Finance -- yes, all three -- to meet me at the motor pool time now. And alert the VP and SLE that we have a potential discrepancy and we are investigating."
I was accompanied by one of our teams in full battle rattle. Apparently someone had decided - reasonably - that since I was chairbound I needed to be guarded.
Fortunately for all of us, I'd once spent a month in a wheelchair thanks to someone running over my foot with a box truck, some years ago back in peacetime when that meant an ER visit and a cast. So I was in danger of outracing my protection as I went out into the hall, down a ramp, to the double doors (where I jammed the HANDICAP buttons each in turn) and then across the tarmac to our Logistics area.
On arrival I saw the trucks, the precious trucks, with the Major and Sarah going from truck bed to truck bed and tearing open boxes.
"This is fucking trash!" he shouted when he saw me.
I knew what was supposed to be loaded. I had a detailed manifest, carefully corrected for items 'confiscated' or 'taxed' or 'donated' during the trip. Electronics and facilities parts. Medical supplies. Two precious 3-D printers. A laser lathe. Some metal parts about which I was prepared to know nothing. Firearms. Ammunition. Cameras. Digital video recorders. Alarm keypads. Wire. Lock shop parts.
I could see that one of the spilled boxes appeared to contain ... crushed beer cans. A thin layer of bubble wrap plastic, some spilled cardboard boxes with carefully printed labels, and beer cans for weight.
Another spilled box contained six bags of IV solution, just enough to cover the apparent top of the box, and then gel ice packs. Not that we couldn't use those -- but each of those IV bags was life and death, and ice packs were just ice packs.
The load had been doctored. Badly and comprehensively.
"Start a video log," I ordered. "Start with the last truck as a three-team. New label for each box, numbered 1, 2, 3 etc by truck. Video and describe the contents on the video. Inventory the entire fucking convoy." I paused. "NOW."
They moved. The Major was still ripping through boxes and Sarah was still keeping up with him.
Frank from Facilities showed up. "Site Ops sent me."
"Frank, you want nothing to do with this. Get Site Ops down here and do it now."
He turned as pale as his complexion allowed and got busy on his mobile phone. All authorized phones on the property are wi-fi only and only work on our network. But he was very authorized and he was burning up the phone.
I had received encrypted and very specific instructions about a particular item. I motioned to one of the horrified Logistics people.
"I need a siphon. Empty the right Diesel tank on the 2nd tractor to a separate tank. At once."
Then I paged Mo. Destructive vehicle search was well within a bomb tech's capabilities, if a little overkill.
My team leader finished with the first truck.
"Sir, every box does not match the labeled contents. The top or first layer is the items indicated. Underneath is debris or junk with approximately correct weights."
He held and displayed a box newly labeled Truck 1 Box 13 that purported to be 5.56mm ammunition. It was mostly red fire brick.
The company had spent millions of dollars on this convoy. People had lost lives for it. I had lost lives for it.
"Sharon. Major." I spoke quietly but loudly into the radio. Sharon encouraged the Major to trot over. I drew them some distance to the side.
"Major, at what time was the convoy left unsecured?"
"Never. I slept in the bed of Truck #4 myself. This is as packed in Reno."
"Then you got fucked in Reno." I used the obscenity deliberately, testing for a reaction. Then I said something else, as if by chance, "Goddamn it!"
He flinched. Mormon for sure.
"By what authority do you hold your rank, sir?"
"Utah National Guard."
It was not the kind of thing I really expected anyone to lie about.
"Did you see the shipment prepared?"
"No. I was released from my unit to command the convoy."
"Who with the convoy saw the shipment prepared?"
"I selected my team myself. Only a handful are from the site."
"Separate them out. Identify any that are dead, or injured and in infirmary."
The balance of power had shifted. He might be a Company manager, and a Major, and I was neither a client manager nor a military officer. But this was a cluster fuck and I was going to take charge until it was unfucked.
I made a tiny motion that drew the alertness of the other two Security teams now guarding the convoy. Then I made a tiny motion with my left and right pinkie fingers. Crossing them.
The team members sighed, stretched a little, stood loosely, flexed a little. Touched their equipment a little.
The convoy members did not notice. Our Logistics people did and started sidling their way away from the vehicles and towards the exits from the yard.
The Major's men were on one side and six he would or could not vouch for were on the other side.
I pointed sideways with a thumb.
"DOWN! ON YOUR KNEES! HANDS ON YOUR HEADS! DO IT NOW! NOW!"
My teams were guns up, very ready to shoot, fearsomely aggressive and used to this drill. They took their opposition by utter surprise... they complied.
The six presumed hostiles secured, my team searched them and removed their weapons, then zip tied their hands behind their backs and their ankles together.
"Gentlemen," they were all men, "you are under private arrest for commercial burglary and cargo theft in interstate commerce. You will be interviewed individually, right now. If I don't like what I hear, you will be turned over to Homeland Security for internment. If you bullshit me, you will get half a helicopter ride."
The American military practice in China of interrogating prisoners by taking them up in a helicopter and returning with the craft empty was unofficial but now well known to all.
We set up three interrogation teams: the Major or one of his men, myself or one of my supervisors, and a site manager on each.
It only took ten minutes for the first one to break. My preferred technique was the handshake. Try it sometime. Take a pencil and interlace it between your fingers. Then have a friend give you a nice firm handshake. Forgive him after you stop screaming.
Local Company management had decided the convoy movement was too dangerous and they did not want to lose stuff. So they had packed lightly and not told anyone.
They had fucking killed us all. And they were in Utah so I could not return the favor.
One by one the stories were confirmed. They had been very afraid to tell anyone. Now they grasped that they had not been afraid enough.
"You are all disarmed and temporarily reassigned to Labor detail. Red and black badges. If you violate Security rules, you're fired. That means you do whatever you are told. When we fire you, we strip you to your underwear and send you back out the gate. We usually hear the screams for a day or two. If you touch a weapon, you attempt murder and we will kill you. We'll make some calls and revisit your status in a day or two. Badge 'em and escort to Labor barracks."
By then the SLE and VPs had arrived. The Major and I briefed them.
Company politics are bad enough when all that is at stake is a stock option.
The calls began. We finished the video inventory and started separating the layer of wheat from the truckloads of chaff.
Mo arrived.
"In that tank over there, there is supposed to be a safe package of weapons. I trust nothing. Check."
He did, after clearing a short radius and using a fiber optic camera on a pole. Then he fished it with some small brass chain -- fishing line would melt -- and unwrapped it.
A neat pile of Diesel soaked rebar. Not barrels. Certainly not receivers.
Craptastic.
"Let's start tearing down the trucks. Look for wear and tear, sabotage, booby traps, any issues."
Mo resigned himself to losing a night of sleep. But he had junior techs to push the nitty gritty onto. Good training.
The Executive Briefing Room was now occupied, with SLE and VPs and managers trying to decide how to handle the bad news.
The Major and Sharon and I went for a walk instead.
No one was going to like this. I radioed in and advised that I would be off net for a bit, and had Sharon do the same. Now the kicker.
"Sharon, the Major is going to search us -- and the chair -- for electronic devices. You are then going to search him for the same."
All cleared, we went for a two person walk and one person wheel.
One of the Major's men watched from a hundred yards with a scoped rifle. That was OK. H5, which he didn't know existed, was dialed in on him in turn.
Our backs to the site, it was time to have a discreet chat.
"This is a net drain on our resources. The supplies you brought don't even make up for the supplies we used. We have five days of food left, right now. I don't even want to think about ammo. We were counting on the reloading supplies. Your thoughts?"
"I think we were set up to get killed. I think they never expected us to make it at all."
"Exactly. I think Homeland fucked us. Spread juicy rumors about a convoy, draw out all the bad apples, fuck them up. So sorry about the Company. Next step is a visit from them."
The Major paled. Sharon and I did not. Death was death.
"We're going to re-vet everyone you brought in. Laborers unless you can vouch for them. Junior assignments until they prove themselves. As for you personally, I was going to give you site command and go back to security forces leader. I cannot possibly do that now, my own people would shoot me. Any ideas?"
"I want to go back and bust heads. But that's not possible, is it?"
"No, you would get killed along the way or shortly after arrival. In fact the safest thing I could do with you is help you desert and send you down to Watsonville Ward. They need people with your skills and they can trust you."
Unspoken: I can't.
"To heck with safe."
"Take up internal security, especially personnel. I've tried to vet as much as I can but I'm still a contractor. You are genuine Corporate Security Management and you can jack people up as much as you like. I'll report to you on paper but I still own the wire and the security force, the convoy operations and anything inside I don't like."
"OK." We shook hands.
As the Major walked away, Sharon asked, "Was that a good idea?"
"Probably not. The alternative is to shoot him."
We might still work our way around to that. The evening was still young.
