[Earth II] The Crescent Wars

by **Layarteb** » Tue May 22, 2018 8:15 pm

The Crescent Wars

In the early 1990s, the Empire of Layarteb was drawn into a series of conflicts in the Eastern Mediterranean. Collectively known as The Crescent Wars by historians and academics, the conflicts developed their own inertia in Layartebian foreign policy. Set in motion by the purchase of the Suez Canal by global conglomerate Manchurian Global, Layartebian interests in the Eastern Mediterranean suddenly came to the forefront of the Empire's foreign policy. Though the Empire had been largely seeking to establish some presence in the Eastern Mediterranean, the designs of this presence had been envisioned only as an air base and a naval base on the island of Cyprus, which was achieved prior to the Suez purchase when the Empire inserted itself as "peacekeeper" in the Cypriot Civil War. The purchase changed the entire dynamic of the Eastern Mediterranean and for better or for worse, the unintended consequences of that very purchase reshaped Layartebian foreign policy.

Once it was all set in motion, the Empire had no choice but to fulfill its obligations and see the plans through. Territories fell one-by-one as the Empire annexed its way into the Eastern Mediterranean and then further into the Aegean Sea. What had merely been a line item on a checklist became the checklist in its entirety. Tens of thousands were killed, tens of thousands were injured, tens of thousands were displaced, and the shape of the Eastern Mediterranean was forever changed when the Layartebian flag was hoisted high over Cyprus, Gaza, and the Sinai.

.:.
Prologue
‹‹ The Suez Canal ››
Before it happened we'd have never thought of it
but when it happened it was all we thought about...

• • • † • • •

Sunday, July 16, 1989 | 22:30 hrs [UTC-3]
North Atlantic Ocean | 40 miles northeast of St John's
47° 52' 39" N, 52° 0' 2" W

Air Layarteb Flight 836 was riding smoothly as it left the Gander Domestic FIR and entered the Gander Ocean FIR. Cruising at 33,000 feet, the Boeing 747-121 was moving at 621 miles per hour and two hours into its ten-hour flight from Layarteb City IAP to Cairo IAP. The flight had departed on time at 18:30 and it was scheduled to put in at 10:30 local time in Cairo the following morning, Monday, July 17. The flight wasn't a full flight, there being only one hundred and ninety-nine passengers aboard with a crew of nineteen. Presently aboard the aircraft, stewardesses were tending to the dinner meal of the flight. Passengers in coach would receive their meals at their seats while those in first-class had the option to ascend to the aircraft's upper deck and eat in the lounge, a perk for paying the much more expensive fare to fly in the front of the aircraft in luxurious seating. For such a long flight, coach was not necessarily uncomfortable but first-class was the next best thing to one's own bed.

Occupying one of the four-person tables in this upper-deck lounge were four men dressed in casual, business attire. They'd dispensed with the suit and the tie for the long flight but they still wore cuffed slacks and button-down shirts with expensive cufflinks peeking out from beneath their sports coats. They ranged in age from forty-seven to fifty-four and all of them had a drink in their hand. Two wore glasses and they all had graying hair except one who was bald. They spoke like colleagues but laughed like old friends. A stewardess in a short green and white dress paired with sheer, nude pantyhose and shiny, black heels had only just refilled their drinks from a bottle of 18-year-old scotch.

Those four men were David Ferrari, Bobbie Harris, Todd Low, and Luis Walker and they were flying to Egypt on business though Cairo was not their final destination, Port Said was. These four men were high-level executives with Manchurian Global, a global conglomerate based in Layarteb City that held billions upon billions of shingrots in assets and equity. Their net profit for this fiscal year alone would be the highest of the decade, even factoring in inflation. The company was publically traded and that meant reporting its fiscal earnings every quarter but investors were rarely let down by such a vast and powerful conglomerate that had its hands in a little bit of everything. It had been founded in 1919 and it was one of the few mega-corporations to survive the Layartebian Revolution without being broken up after antitrust suits. How Manchurian Global survived was something of a mystery, especially considering the level of corruption it had engineered within the days of the Republic. A lot had changed when the Emperor came to power and Manchurian Global had taken a hit - a few hits actually - but it survived and survived well enough to keep turning profits year over year.

The conglomerate was headed by Ferrari who held the titles chairman of the board and CEO. Low was the CFO, and he and Ferrari were two of five board members of Manchurian Global. Harris and Walker were both executive vice presidents, Harris of the canal operations division and Walker of the infrastructure division. Together, the four of them represented a considerable base of power within Manchurian Global. The conglomerate owned a 4.5% stake in the Panama Canal through a series of investments and buyouts and it owned a 30.8% stake in the Suez Canal. The infrastructure division was one of the most profitable divisions in the company behind its energy solutions division, which was presently making money hand over foot building power plants and upgrading the Empire's power grid.

The reason these four men were bound for Cairo had to do with the Suez Canal. The fiscal year had only just ended less than two weeks prior and they were heading to Port Said for the quarterly board meeting. Manchurian Global had invested in the Suez Canal Company in 1972 as a way to rid itself of some excess cash and acquire a major stake in a major waterway. As an entity, Manchurian Global held more board seats than any other entity but it was hardly a controlled stake. At the time, the Republic of the Sinai was under the leadership of President Farouk Al-Banna who, unlike his predecessor, wasn't so concerned with a foreign entity having such a sizeable stake in a national asset. Al-Banna was more concerned with his slush fund, his cocaine parties, and his philandering and Manchurian Global had seen to it that, via intermediaries, a sizeable allotment of money had found its way into Al-Banna's slush fund, §20 million to be precise.

The history of the Republic of the Sinai, the Suez Canal Company, and Manchurian Global were not initially intertwined but through the way time works, it became so. Todd Low, who had more of the history down was explaining this to his colleagues as their meals arrived, carried by the stewardess named Amanda who captivated many dirty thoughts in each of these four men. They were hardly exclusive in this department and Amanda found herself warding off subtle advances from a fellow stewardess who was two years her junior and relentless in her pursuit of Amanda.

"So as I was saying," Low continued as he picked up the peppershaker and dropped a light amount on his potatoes, "the Republic of the Sinai was founded on August 28, 1945 when Ismail Nagi, an army general, led a coup. The country's borders haven't changed since then, the entirety of the Sinai Peninsula, the Suez Canal and its banks, and Port Said. Nagi was a dictator in every sense of the word and a fervent nationalist too. The thing he hated the most was foreign influence over his country, especially the Suez Canal. At the time, his biggest target was the Empire of Britannia, which had always had two seats on the board."

"That's not much considering there's thirteen," answered Harris as Low put down the peppershaker and began to cut into his pork chop. Despite being airplane food, it was juicy and tender, remarkable considering.

"Back then there were only five seats," Ferrari answered, "so they had two-fifths of the board. The family had two seats and Ostafrikanische Gesellschaft had the fifth. They acquired theirs in 1942 as part of a trade deal with the family."

"Who was the family members?"

"Arnold Ross, Lewis' father and his uncle, Peter Tilney," Low answered. "Nagi hated them. About two months after he took power, he gave this big speech about foreign influence and corruption in the region, specifically targeting the British. He threatened, openly, to nationalize the canal. Naturally this scared the shit out of the board so what do they do? They vote to appease Nagi but appeasement was just showing their weakness and Arnold was hardly weak.

"On November 5, 1945, they voted to increase the board to six members, giving a seat to the Sinai government. To Nagi, this meant three seats were held by foreigners and three, technically, by locals since the family lived in Port Said and were subject to the country's rules and laws. He took it but he wanted more."

"What dictator doesn't?" Walker asked rhetorically to nods from the other three.

"Following year, Nagi took this appeasement and struck again by beginning some reforms intended to exert more influence on the SCC. He was very patient, something you just don't see in dictators anymore. He knew that he could seize it overnight but he also knew he could bring the SCC to its knees slowly and that was his intention. On January 6, 1947, he struck big when he signed a law into effect requiring government oversight on canal maintenance."

"That's why that law exists," Ferrari said matter-of-factly.

"Precisely why it exists and SCC had no choice but to accept it; worst move they made! What happened? Five months later, the Sinai government slams the SCC with a laundry list of fines and code violations. They rewrote the code just to make sure the Suez Canal wasn't compliant. Nagi gave them two choices: they could pay the fines and fix the problems or be nationalized. So they ponied up for the fines and made the corrections. Contractors overcharged big time just because the SCC had no choice and a tight timeline.

"The fiscal year ends and suddenly SCC is in the red big time. This was Nagi's intention all along. The SCC played right into Nagi's hands and here we are, July 1948, and they're struggling. They have two options now, borrow or dramatically raise the toll price. Well, Nagi puts his foot down on the latter so they're forced to borrow from the Bank of the Sinai only the bank offers not a loan but an investment. Guess who set up that deal?" Low smiled because everyone knew it was Nagi. "It's a sour deal and the bank gets a seat on the board, which means now there's four domestic and three foreign members. This pleases Nagi and he holds back on his assault.

"He's won really. He can influence Ross and Tilney, the bank is in his pocket, and the government representative might as well be him. OAG and the British can vote no on everything and still lose, in effect rendering their positions worthless. Well, push comes to shove and the SCC gets back in the black and stays there. Code enforcement inspectors are easily bribed and much more lenient now that Nagi has his way though he continues to remind the board that he's really the one with the power. He's subtle, a fine here, a law there, a speech then, and something else now, you know how dictators work."

"Nothing really changed dramatically until 1956," Ferrari said, taking over to allow Low to eat more of his food. He'd been eating in between sentences thus far and his food was growing somewhat cold. "On August 6, Arnold Ross died unexpectedly leaving his 24-year-old son his seat. That was Lewis only Lewis didn't really care much for the SCC back then. He was a young bachelor, just graduated college, and his uncle saw an opportunity. So Tilney tells Lewis that he'll do all of the legwork and keep the company together. Lewis only has to show his face and come to meetings to vote. His uncle will tell him how to vote and he'll get a sizeable salary. Lewis says 'Sure' and goes on his merry way. He's partying, screwing every woman who'll let him, and pleasuring himself up on the rich lifestyle. Big mistake though," Ferrari said, pausing.

"In 1962," Ferrari continued, "Nagi saw another opportunity. Lewis was still living the wealthy life and largely inattentive to the SCC. So what does Nagi do? He cooks up a big infrastructure project for the Republic of the Sinai. It's really poorly planned and just a sham but on the outside it looks good. Investors are rushing to get a piece of it if just to be known for helping modernize the country and 'bring water to the desert.' Summit Capital goes further and agrees with Nagi to invest in the SCC and in the Sinai. It's one big lie and Summit Capital pays big bucks for their two seats and they've been stuck with them ever since. You know they still haven't had a return on their investment?"

"Impressive," Walker answered, "Nagi really sounds like a genius."

"Genius is right," Low said, returning to the conversation. "Nagi had a lot of dirt on Tilney and he was just waiting for the right time. By bringing in Summit Capital, he was looking to maneuver the family out of the decision-making process. Well he got that in 1964.

"Just before the end of the fiscal year in June 1964, Nagi leaks to the press all of the dirt he has on Peter Tilney. Basically, the long story short is Tilney was embezzling money from the SCC and milking Lewis out of plenty of money. Tilney was six months away from retiring and taking his money to Cyprus to live out his days. He was arrested and thrown in jail that day. The charges were pretty serious and Nagi gave a speech accusing foreign influence for corruption Tilney though he never explicitly named a country. He kept it vague.

"Push comes to shove; Tilney works out a deal with Nagi. The government dropped the charges and let him leave the country with his money. All he had to do was give up his seat to the Bank of the Sinai and voila, the bank gets a second seat and the family only has one. Now, Nagi has direct control over five of the nine seats. He's essentially cut out the family, OAG, and the British. Unfortunately, for Lewis, this was a reality shock and suddenly he had to come back and run his company. Tilney embezzled a lot of money but the bank covered it with another investment piece."

"Nagi was maneuvering himself all too well," said Ferrari. "Then it all changes when the man has a heart attack in his sleep on September 28, 1968. He was in power for twenty-three years and the people loved him. The entire region was truly at a loss and the funeral was massive, we're talking millions upon millions of people, many of them foreigners just come to see it. That's when Al-Banna took over and Nagi is rolling in his grave over Al-Banna, if just because Al-Banna is more like Lewis was in his 20s than what a leader ought to be."

"Then we entered the picture four years later. We were sitting on some sizeable cash reserves and a potentially big tax bill so we invested it in the SCC, a whopping 31% and we got our four board seats. The tax bill was obviously deferred, no more of those loopholes," Ferrari said half-jokingly.

The four men finished their meals and Amanda came to take their plates and refill their glasses. They would stay up for another two hours before returning to their seats to get some sleep. They would have a busy Monday ahead of them. They would land at Cairo, collect their suitcases for each only had a carry-on and a garment bag, and take a chopper to Port Said. Once in Port Said, they would go to their hotel to freshen up and at 16:00 they would be at the Suez Canal Company Headquarters for the quarterly board meeting. Ferrari and Low knew just how serious this meeting would be and while Harris and Walker had inclinations, Low and Ferrari had schemed ahead of time and would only be bringing Harris and Walker into the plan once the time was necessary.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Thu May 24, 2018 6:07 am

• • • † • • •

Monday, July 17, 1989 | 15:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Sinai Grand Hotel
31° 16' 15" N, 32° 18' 55" E

David Ferrari put the finishing touches on his suit as he straightened his tie and checked his cufflinks in front of a full-length mirror. Over his head, the air conditioning vent blew cool air onto the back of his neck and kept the room at a comfortable 68°F. Being on the top floor of the 17-floor hotel meant putting up with a lot of rising heat from below and the sun's intensity from above. He had initially tried to book the penthouse suite but it was being occupied presently by some member of some royal family from Europe and thus clearly blocked from his occupation. Nevertheless, the top floor contained several executive suites as they were called. Each one contained a single bedroom with either one king-sized bed or two queen-sized beds, a living room area with one couch and two love seats, a sit-down dining area with a table and four chairs, and a very large bathroom with a standing shower big enough for four people comfortably. Each of the four men from Manchurian Global was booked into such a suite, all arrayed on the seventeenth floor of the Sinai Grand Hotel.

The four of them had arrived via helicopter, a Eurocopter AS365 Dauphin, which brought them and their luggage to the roof of the building. There, they disembarked from the helicopter while a porter loaded their luggage onto a cart. Low tipped the man the moment they were in the elevator, rather than wait for him to deposit their luggage, a gesture of great importance in this hotel. The hotel's manager met them at a special check-in counter on the top floor and handed each of them their keys. He escorted Ferrari while his staff escorted the other three men, all of them women in miniskirts and form-hugging blouses. It was just after noon when the four men arrived and each one retreated to his room and ordered room service, preferring to relax after such a long trip.

Lunch was brought up to them on silver platters and they each dined quietly, reading a newspaper or watching the international news channels available in their rooms. Two climbed into their beds for an hour for a quick nap while the others unpacked or looked out of the windows at the Mediterranean or the Suez Canal, depending on which side of the cross-shaped hotel. Their meeting wasn't until 16:00 and their car would arrive to pick them up no later than 15:15. From the hotel to the SCC Headquarters was only ten minutes but their early arrival was by design. Refreshments would be served and the men would mingle with their colleagues before retiring into the boardroom for their meeting.

Ferrari looked at his watch and saw that it was 15:00 on the dot. He gave some final touches to his collar and was satisfied enough that he merely grabbed his briefcase from the couch and exited the room. He looked the door behind him but he did not put away his key just yet. Instead, he held onto it until he stepped onto the elevator, at which point he merely pressed the keychain against a panel on the elevator wall. A green light came on and he put the key in his pocket and pressed the button for the lobby. The elevator skipped every floor on the way down and made for a priority delivery right to the lobby. This wasn't the first time Ferrari had been in the Sinai Grand Hotel and he enjoyed the privilege and perks associated with being on the hotel's topmost floor.

In the lobby, Low was already waiting with his glasses on, reading the newspaper. Ferrari sat down across from his and unbuttoned his suit jacket before leaning back. "So do you think we'll be in good shape?" He asked his colleague across a small table in between the two couches.

"I think they'll play right into our hands."

"The outlook is dismal and they don't know that we've seen it already."

"Well OAG knows and certainly so has the bank."

"Is OAG going to play ball?" Ferrari asked, causing Low to look up from the paper and over the top of his glasses, which were only for reading anyway.

"With what we've offered them of course they'll play ball. OAG stands to profit far better with our deal than they do with the status quo. They'll play ball and so will the bank. The bank is more annoyed they haven't aligned with us on the matter sooner. They've been losing money for the past five years." Across the lobby, the elevator dinged and the doors opened to reveal both Harris and Walker. "Harris and Walker?" Low asked when he saw Ferrari look across the lobby.

"Yes," he answered and Low returned to the paper. The discussion was done and both men took seats with their colleagues, each one carrying a briefcase worth more than what most of these hotel employees made in a month.

Their car arrived shortly thereafter, early by three minutes. The four men were escorted to the stretch limousine by the concierge where the driver was holding the door open for them. One by one, they climbed into the vehicle and they were off, the driver comfortably guiding the vehicle through traffic along the canal's edge before pulling up to and stopping in front of the building. A doorman had been tasked with keep the spot in front of the building clear throughout this afternoon and he'd done so with brutal precision, shooing away no less than thirteen cars since noon. Now he opened the door for the four men and saw to it that each of them was out before he closed the door and escorted them into the building's lobby where a receptionist took over, escorting the men to the elevator and up to the board room.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Monday, July 17, 1989 | 16:05 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Suez Canal Company HQ
31° 15' 43" N, 32° 18' 44" E

The thirteen board members of the Suez Canal Company were in their respective, assigned seats in the boardroom. Situated centrally on the floor plan, the room did not have any windows nor did it have any walls with the exterior. This was done by design, to prevent eavesdropping and snooping by a third party. Nowadays, corporations were redesigning their floor plans to account for such a layout. The risk of commercial espionage was climbing with each day and as surveillance equipment grew more and more sophisticated thanks to the advancement in microchips and electronics, the need for physical protections mattered more than ever.

Seated at the head of the table was Lewis Ross, the legacy position. Ross' family had once had more than a single seat but over time, this dwindling truly reflected the changing scope of the geopolitical world around them. Representing the Bank of the Sinai were Hossam Bey and Mahmoud Khaled. The Empire of Britannia was represented by Robert Bentley and Edmund Norris. Hassan 'Adil Hakimi represented the Sinai government. Tariku Arendse represented OAG. Representing Summit Capital was Brandon Morales and Joshua Simmons. The other four seats were taken up by Ferrari and his "crew," so to speak.

Lewis took the floor and opened by personally thanking everyone for attending. Though these men had exchanged pleasantries and small talk during the refreshment hour, this was now a formal setting and the proper decorum meant personally recognizing each of them. From there, Lewis went into his prepared statement on the accomplishments of the fiscal year. He talked about some milestones for the Suez Canal in terms of ships transited and containers offloaded. He gave some statistics and figures, which while interesting to hear, were far from shocking or awe-inspiring. He reiterated that the average transit time was between eleven and sixteen hours at a speed of eight knots, imposed to help prevent erosion of the banks due to the wakes that the large ships produced.

Then he got to the more damning figures that he'd wished to avoid speaking of but which was required of him. "Right now, we have maxed out capacity at forty-nine vessels per day and the average waiting time prior to transit remains at eighteen hours."

"Are we having negative pushback from the shipping companies?" Morales asked.

"Yes we are," Lewis answered quickly, hoping to defer away from the topic. It wasn't to be his evening though as Arendse quickly spoke to avoid the topic being passed.

"The backlog is being felt by OAG. At a transit time of sixteen hours and a waiting time of eighteen hours, we're paying that much more in fees and expendables. Ships arriving in the waiting line have needed tanker support before just to ensure they could get through the Suez and the Med. Now we control a vital waterway that cuts the transit by thousands of miles so it is unlikely we are going to lose 'customers,' if you will but we are doing them a disservice."

"I think I would like to hear the effect this is having on our revenue." Ferrari said, taking a previously agreed upon cue from Arendse.

"It is not affecting our revenue adversely right now. We continue to receive full toll charge. There are complaints naturally," Lewis answered.

It was Hakimi's turn now and he weighed in thusly. "Unfortunately, these complaints have made it to my government. President Al-Banna is not very concerned with them on a personal level and he finds no vested interest in pursuing them but there are calls within the Al-Banna government, just as there were during Nagi's time, for nationalization of the Suez Canal."

"What are they pushing?" Ferrari asked, knowing full well what the answer was.

"Expansion."

"Yes, expansion," Lewis said, blurting in, "but I believe we'll save that topic for now. Let's continue with our situation." Heads nodded and Lewis returned to his script, "We did not have a good year. Unfortunately, we did not break even, which is perhaps the culmination of a longtime trend that we have seen over the last five to eight years. Where we are losing this money to is presently unknown however. We believe that a portion is the airfreight business but also longer supply chains across the board. Shipping companies are accounting for the delays and the frustration and - for all intents and purposes - going the long way. It costs the shipping companies more but it keeps their customers happy, a double-edged sword if I ever saw one."

"I think we ought to really discuss this expansion project."

"Mister Ferrari," Lewis said, using the agreed-upon title of "Mister" for everyone. "We have discussed this project several times already over the past many quarters."

"And each time it is shelved, tabled, and sunk until the next meeting. Then we have to start all over again. I believe that it is time to discuss that very project and in full. It is important we do this while we have the opportunity to do something about it. We've been doing independent analysis on the finances of this company. Right now, our 5-year outlook shows that within two to three years, loan repayments and maintenance fees will exceed toll revenues. Without a major increase in the toll price, which we cannot achieve without permission from President Al-Banna, there is no way we can maintain this canal as a profitable entity beyond the next five years.

"Mister Hakimi, would President Al-Banna discuss a toll hike?"

"Out of the question Mister Ferrari," Hakimi answered with some indignity, which was more than playing into Ferrari's hand now.

"See there we have it," and he extended out his arm and pointed to Hakimi, "the government continues to make our toll fee low to ensure everyone can use this canal at all times; however, it is not doing us any good and we've already discussed subsidies a thousand and one times. There's no subsidies coming unless the President has changed his mind?" Hakimi shook his head "No." "Since that is not changing, we must discuss the expansion project immediately. There is no longer any time to wait. The expansion project will increase daily capacity to ninety-seven ships, a ninety-eight percent increase in capacity permanently. It's going to take a year, maybe more to complete construction. The estimates right now are hovering around §4.5 billion for the expansion and another §2.35 billion for the critical infrastructure tunnels."

"We're going to have to table…" Lewis began. Lewis considered the expansion project a betrayal. He wanted to charge more to use the canal; he wanted the government to pony up more money to keep the SCC solely; and, most of all, he wanted a return to family ownership. Ferrari, Low, and everyone else paid him no mind.

"No," Ferrari said, tapping his pen on the table. "We're going to have to discuss it. I'd like a show of hands who is in favor of discussing the expansion?" Most of the hands went up and there was nothing more Lewis could really say. "Good, we need to begin this expansion. Is the government willing to invest and to grant us the land rights?"

"The government is not presently willing to invest further until it sees some return on its investments to date. The land rights would be easy to obtain."

"What about the Bank of the Sinai? Can we borrow more money?"

"No," Norris shook his head. "The SCC is too far overdrawn that another loan would be fiscally irresponsible."

"There you have it," Ferrari said. "The government isn't giving us money and neither is the bank. Should we try another bank? Seek out more corporate investors? Give up seats we already have and allow more outside influence? Manchurian Global is even hesitant on investing further as we would need some guarantee on return."

"You know we cannot do that," Lewis answered.

"Then we don't have many options do we?"

"I think we need a more thorough plan before we discuss this," Lewis again, sparring with Ferrari unwittingly.

"For three years we've been discussing this project. No one has presented anything feasible beyond these options. Every time we want to discuss it, you shelve or table the discussion until next time only there is never a next time."

"Mister Ferrari that tone is out of order. Due to the intense tension of this discussion, I absolutely must insist that we push this off for a future time."

"Nonsense!" Ferrari said with a much louder voice. "We're not putting this on hold for a later time. In fact, you leave me with little choice but Manchurian Global presently proposes to buy the Suez Canal Company. This has been discussed with our board of directors and we are in unanimous approval that our investment in the Suez Canal is right and just but that the management of this company has gone in the wrong direction. In order to protect our investment and the Suez Canal, we must step in and purchase this company. I would ask that we take a vote on this matter immediately."

It had been the "nuclear" option, which Ferrari had not wanted to pursue so early in the game. He and Low had discussed this with the board of directors and they were in favor of a buyout; however, Low had some reservations. Though he voted in favor in the end, Low was more worried that such a proposal would spark immediate nationalization, even from Al-Banna. Right now, the effect was stunned silence. Those who were on board with the buyout did their best to feign it while the rest were stunned speechless. A buyout of the SCC was a major game changer. It would mean that the Suez Canal was full, wholly, and completely owned by a foreign, corporate entity and perhaps - by proxy - the Layartebian government.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Thu May 24, 2018 7:37 pm

• • • † • • •

Monday, July 17, 1989 | 18:30 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Suez Canal Company HQ
31° 15' 43" N, 32° 18' 44" E

Five minutes had gone by and the room was still in a state of stunned paralysis. Shortly after David Ferrari's suggestion that Manchurian Global acquire the Suez Canal Company in a buyout, Todd Low took the floor and gave those present a preview of the conglomerate's fiscal year-end report. Nothing he said would not be public knowledge in a few weeks and the information was so advantageous to Manchurian's position that disclosing it was hardly harmful. If any of those present leaked the information, Manchurian's stock would climb a hundred points overnight. When he was done, he'd presented a picture that no one expected. Manchurian Global's finances were booming. The conglomerate had no outstanding loans, high credit, and a highly profitable business model. It could not only purchase the Suez Canal Company in cash but it could also begin work on the expansion project in full the very next day.

If Manchurian Global was required to front the money immediately, it could go to banks around the world and take out loans amounting to the §6.85 billion required for the Suez Canal expansion and the seven new tunnels. No one would refuse the conglomerate those loans since every bank in the world knew stability when it shook their hand. Everyone at the table knew it, the bank and private equity representatives more so perhaps than Manchurian's four representatives did. The shock would never truly wear off but after these long minutes of quiet, Ross looked around the room at the faces and saw the same disbelief he felt in his mind. "You can't be serious," he offered.

"Of course we are," Ferrari answered, "I would not have made such a suggestion if I was at all unserious. This is a realistic offer."

"Has this been discussed with your board of directors?" Hakimi asked, hoping against hope that Ferrari and his compatriots were acting against company direction.

"The matter was brought up on Friday during an emergency board session and we five, which includes Mister Low and myself, were unanimous in our direction. The offer I have made comes with the full approval of our board of directors. We are all fully aware of the financial situation of this company. At present, the Suez Canal Company is unable to borrow further money and unable to increase its revenue. The company is in debt.

"Last fiscal year, the SCC collected a bit over §231.4 million in tolls and it is presently over §350 million in debt. We'll never catch up at this rate without expansion. Expansion is off the table thus, there is no other choice but acquisition. Our offer stands at the following. We would cover the cost of all debt and provide a payout to all of this company's employees averaging out to §8,291 per employee, a return on investments for those at this table, and then a final incentive of just under §36 million per seat. The sum total is somewhere around §1.925 billion."

"And what of our eighty-eight thousand employees Mister Ferrari? What are they to do?" Ross asked indignantly, as if they had suddenly been cast away.

"Keep working," Ferrari offered, "we have no desire to cause a major unemployment crisis in this nation nor do we have any desire to lose the skilled labor already trained and proficient in their jobs." The table remained quiet and Ferrari could read each one's thoughts. He knew that the bank's members were giddy about the possibility of getting all of that money back. He knew Ross and Hakimi were completely opposed. He figured that the British representatives were more than displeased about being cut out of the company. Where Summit Capital fell, he couldn't guess though and he knew that OAG was onboard.

"I do not have faith in this offer," Ross said, "it is insulting to say the least."

"Mister Ross that is most unfortunately; however, as it is within my rights as a board member, I push to call for a vote. I believe any of my colleagues will second."

"A second cannot come from one of your colleagues due to board rules," Hossam Bey answered, "however as representative of the Bank of the Sinai, I will second this vote request. The Bank of the Sinai is more than apprised of the finances of Manchurian Global. Though we are not a lender, as that would create a conflict of interest in this situation, we keep close watch on the finances. Though Mister Low revealed information that is not yet public, I have no doubt what he has revealed will be made public next month and in the same capacity that it has been delivered here today."

When it appeared that Ross was going to further attempt to delay the vote, Ferrari quickly reached out to cut him off, "This means that the vote must be allowed."

"But it will require a seventy-two hour delay," answered Robert Bentley, "our protocols state that any vote for a buyout requires a seventy-two hour period from call to vote."

"This they do," Low answered, "and we are prepared to wait those seventy-two hours."

"This is absolute nonsense," answered Ross angrily, "we cannot be seriously considering this." When no answer came, Ross slammed his fist down on the table, "My family built this canal and we have seen to its management ever since. I will not…"

"Mister Ross, with all due respect, your family has had issues with the management of this canal in recent years. We all know the actions of your uncle and the current management has left this canal in debt."

"You are a part of that management!"

"And the record will show that we have consistently opposed any measure that would further us into debt without a plan for revenue generation. We do keep records of every meeting and I can attest that this is the case. We may be a part of the management of this company but we have not been a part of this current fiscal system.

"In fact, Mister Low, I believe you have an interesting fact to present?"

"Yes I do. If it concerns fiscal management, Manchurian Global has increased its usage of the Suez Canal by thirty-one percent since 1972, which so happens to also be our stake. As our ships do not get a discount for passage, you could say that Manchurian Global is among the biggest drivers for toll revenue. Our acquisition of SCC investments in 1972 has led to our increase in trade routes in this region of the world, a move which has benefitted both of our companies." Silence again. Ferrari and Low had outmaneuvered Ross expertly, largely due to their strategies. The two of them had done their homework on the interactions with Ross and it did not take very long for them to recognize his weakness. Armed with irrefutable facts and the financial information, they pounced.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Wednesday, July 19, 1989 | 22:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Sinai Grand Hotel
31° 16' 15" N, 32° 18' 55" E

The four men from Manchurian Global were seated in a spacious booth tucked away in the corner of the hotel's restaurant. They'd chosen the booth for themselves and were just waiting on their main course now. Each had a drink in his hand and they'd only just finished appetizers moments earlier. Ever since the board meeting broke up on Monday, the four men had been working feverishly. That night had been a long one, with all four men meeting in Ferrari's room to discuss the plan. Harris and Walker, now read in on the entire plan, were given parts to play. They already had their seven votes but the illusion needed to be presented that they did not and so Harris and Walker had been sent to feel out Summit Capital, the biggest mystery in the pot. Seven votes meant that the motion would carry but nine would be damning for Ross, Hakimi, and the British, who would all be voting together against the buyout.

While they handled Summit Capital, Low and Ferrari had their own meetings to attend to, ensuring that there were no loose ends ahead of the vote. Low worked with the bank's representatives and Ferrari met with Arendse. They affirmed that they were all onboard with the buyout as agreed upon prior to the meeting. They attended to other meetings as well, though these were kept hidden from both Harris and Walker for though they had been read in on the plan, they were kept in the dark on some of its more sensitive matters still. All would be revealed but they needed to play a part now more than ever.

As the four of them sat in the dining room of the restaurant, a quietness fell over them. "So are we all set?" Ferrari asked, more of Low than of the other two.

"We're set," Low answered, "and we're not going to have any trouble." Ferrari nodded in approval. "Did we get anything out of the Summit Capital meetings?"

"It's difficult to tell with them," Walker answered. "They believe there's still investments and money to be had, more than what they've put into the deal. They are looking for their return as well as more. They know they'll be cut out completely if we take over."

"Where do they expect the money to come from?" Low asked, somewhat in disbelief that Summit Capital's representatives could be so blind when it came to money. As a private equity group, their survival depended on the right decisions and this wasn't one of them in Low's opinion.

"They're confident that with enough leverage, the government will help fund the expansion project. They're of the opinion that the government will lean on the banks as well as go to bat for them with international lenders, or perhaps that the British will fork over some money for it."

"If the British were willing to fork over money, they'd have done it already and we know President Al-Banna isn't nearly as interested in the Suez Canal as his predecessor was. What are they hoping for, Al-Banna to die of old age and be replaced by Nagi's ghost?"

"Ridiculous really," answered Ferrari. "They're in for a rude awakening when it comes crashing down."

Their food arrived shortly thereafter and they put a pause on discussing business while they ate. It was only afterwards that they resumed their discussion. "So we can count on Summit Capital voting against us. That's fine for now, we have our seven votes."

"What did we have to give up for OAG to join with us?" Walker asked finally, the question lingering on his mind for some time.

"Quite a bit," answered Low, "nothing that will make us subservient to them by any means but quite a bit but in the same vein, they've given us value too, beyond this vote. Let's hold on discussing the details though, just in case."

"Right," Walker said, agreeing. They finished their drinks, had dessert, and that was it for the evening. The board was set to meet again at 16:00 the following day and there were still some last minute meetings Ferrari and Low needed to have, all of them secretive.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Fri May 25, 2018 8:00 pm

• • • † • • •

Thursday, July 20, 1989 | 16:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Suez Canal Company HQ
31° 15' 43" N, 32° 18' 44" E

After three days of backroom meetings by all parties of the Suez Canal Company's board of directors, the time had finally come to vote. The thirteen men entered the boardroom again as if they were entering a peace conference after a long and bloody civil war. Lines had been drawn and sides chosen. Territory that had been seized would be given up on through more bloodshed and though it had been a short time, the war had gone on long enough, at least insofar as these men were concerned. While David Ferrari and Todd Low worked to sure up their alliances and close up loose ends calmly, Lewis Ross and Hakimi had been working frantically to preserve their ownership of the SCC. They'd reached out to every board member for support and they had been let down early on in their attempts.

The biggest blow to the two men wasn't the fact that OAG was on the side of Manchurian Global but that the bank was. The Bank of the Sinai had achieved its two seats through government influence, particularly President Nagi's influence but President Al-Banna was not Nagi. He was not willing to put his foot down and act decisively. Lewis Ross and Hakimi even floated the idea of nationalization if it meant keeping the canal out of Manchurian's hands but they found themselves outmaneuvered at every turn. Every rejection these two men received came because ahead of them, Manchurian's representatives laid the groundwork for those rejections. The acquisition of the Suez Canal wasn't just an attempt to stave off bankruptcy, it was an attempt by Manchurian Global to purchase one of the most important revenue-generating waterways in the world but it was really beyond revenue that Manchurian Global wanted the canal. It wanted the power that came with owning the Suez Canal and the assets it would provide to the conglomerate.

It was all about power and planting the Manchurian flag in this part of the world. Manchurian Global saw itself as a sovereign entity unto itself, regardless of how the Empire of Layarteb and its restrictive laws felt. The clash between the Layartebian government and Manchurian Global was nothing short of a Clash of Titans, so to speak. To Ross, Hakimi, and the British, Manchurian Global wasn't trying to buy up the Suez Canal for their own good; they were trying to buy up the canal for the Empire to exert its influence in the region. It couldn't be further from the truth but the truth and perception rarely aligned in times such as these. As the meeting began, the usual decorum was observed. Before the vote could take place, a number of business matters needed to be discussed and as much as Ross and Hakimi tried to draw them out as long as possible, the appointed hour drew nearer and nearer with each passing topic. The Manchurian team wasn't worried nor were they impatient. They had their cards stacked and it was just a matter of when the vote actually occurred.

Naturally, the Manchurian group expected a last minute attempt by Ross and/or Hakimi to scuttle the vote and they were not disappointed. At the appointed hour, the former began by introducing the vote and the implications. Protocol required that he state, in detail, the positions of both sides of the vote. He did so in accordance with those protocols; and to his credit, he did not do so unfairly. Lewis Ross had to know that he was going to lose the vote but perhaps a piece of him refused to accept that reality. This particular piece of him was presently leading his mental thought processes. He called an end to both positions and then looked around the table. "Protocol allows, prior to the vote, the ability of any board member to present information appertaining to the vote that might be new, different, or changed since the vote was called. We will go around one-by-one starting at my right." The two bankers had nothing to offer and so they passed their turns to the next, which happened to be the two representatives of the British government. Like the bankers, they had nothing new or different to present. There was simply the matter at hand and their hopes that Manchurian did not have all of the votes required. "And so we turn now to Mister Hakimi. You have the floor."

"Thank you," Hakimi began as he straightened his tie. By the way he did his hair, trimmed his mustache, and wore his suit, he gave off the appearance not of a governmental dignitary but rather a sleazy, used car salesman. Everything Hakimi said sounded like he was running a scam and hoping someone was dumb enough to fall for his shtick. That someone was, unfortunately, Lewis Ross. "I do have some new and important information to present concerning the role of the Sinai government in the Suez Canal Company and this proposed purchase. Earlier yesterday, I met with President Al-Banna himself. He was already briefed on the purchase matter but I was called before him to speak to it at greater length. In the course of our conversation, I expressed the opinion that the Suez Canal Company remain in Egyptian hands.

"President Al-Banna expressed an interest in nationalization of the Suez Canal. What he requested of us was a stay on this vote to allow the Sinai government sufficient time to work with the holders of our debt and with lenders around the world to secure funds for the expansion project." At this, the two men from Summit Capital suddenly appeared to be in much better spirits. They knew that the opposition did not have the required votes for these were very smart men but what they didn't know was that President Al-Banna had expressed interest in the Suez Canal.

"That is very interesting," Ross answered, "and though I think nationalization is not the best policy, under the circumstances…" Ross began before he was cut off by David Ferrari.

"Mister Hakimi, I would have thought you would have played a different hand than this," Ferrari began. Suddenly, eyes were on the Layartebian and Hakimi glared away, his eyes narrowing to slits of infuriation.

"What are you inferring Mister Ferrari? That I did not meet with our esteemed leader?"

"Absolutely not Mister Hakimi for I know that you met with President Al-Banna yesterday. That is because I met with him today." You could hear a pin drop and almost immediately, beads of sweat began to form on Hakimi's hairline. "President Al-Banna met me this morning at 09:00 to discuss the proposed purchase of the Suez Canal. He discussed your request of yesterday to nationalize the Suez Canal in the interests of the Republic of the Sinai. However, what he also discussed was that he had rejected your request."

"That is a lie."

"I thought you might say that and I requested of President Al-Banna the ability to speak to him directly during the course of this vote to ensure that his words were not misconstrued or misrepresented by yourself. Are you familiar with the phone number to his switchboard?"

"I am," Hakimi answered after a few moments. He wondered if Ferrari was bluffing but his gut was telling him that he had backed himself into a corner. "I do not believe this is necessary."

"Nor do I," Ross interjected, "it would be a violation of protocol to bring in the President to this discussion."

"Perhaps but it is also a violation of protocol that a blatant lie be told. Perhaps he won't answer?" Ferrari said as he looked across at Hakimi, "Will you be dialing or should I?" A phone sat in the middle of the table, within arm's reach of Hakimi. When he didn't make a move for it, Ferrari moved to stand up to do it himself but at this, Hakimi reached out and dialed the number.

A woman at the switchboard answered and Ferrari gave her a code word. She put the line briefly on hold while she reviewed the specific list of words given to her. When she came back on the line, she apologized for the delay and routed the call directly to President Al-Banna, who picked up the phone on the first ring. "Good evening, this is President Al-Banna speaking."

"Good evening Mister President, this is David Ferrari."

"Ah yes, Mister Ferrari, I trust everything is going well for you?"

"Well Mister President, I will be honest. We have hit a slight snag and as much as I enjoyed our tea earlier this morning, I must call upon you to put yourself in the hot seat. A Mister Hassan 'Adil Hakimi is present as is the board of directors of the Suez Canal Company. I must ask, even though it is a dumb question Mister President but are you familiar with Mister Hakimi."

"Yes I am."

"Did you and he meet yesterday?"

"Yes we did."

"Did you and I meet today?"

"Yes we did."

"Good and I apologize that this is an interrogation but what is your official position and the position of the Sinai government on the matter of Manchurian Global purchasing the Suez Canal Company."

"My position is that the purchase, should it pass a vote, be allowed. I do not believe nationalization of the Suez Canal is in the best interest of this government. I do however believe that pursuant to a purchase of this magnitude, Manchurian Global would be required to honor all current toll pricing and all current restrictions on the use of the Suez Canal. I would wholeheartedly oppose any attempts by Manchurian Global to prevent the usage of this canal by legal, maritime entities of the world. I would also wholeheartedly oppose any attempt by Manchurian Global to gouge the toll pricing."

"That is understandable Mister President and, if this vote should go in our favor, we are prepared to sign a binding agreement to that very effect."

"Good. I will need to return to business now. Do you require anything else from me?"

"I do not Mister President and I presume no one here does?" No one answered, "Mister President I thank you for your time. We will be in touch." The call ended and David Ferrari leaned back in his chair. He wanted to say "Checkmate" but he did not want to gloat.

Hakimi however was still playing the fool. "How do we know that is the President?"

"Are you joking?" Todd Low said, not sure whether to laugh or throw something at Hakimi's face. "You dialed that number. Don't be ridiculous. You've been deceitful enough for one evening."

Before Hakimi could say something else, Lewis Ross raised his hand, "I think that will be enough. It's clear that we were speaking with President Al-Banna Mister Hakimi. There is nothing left to say and we shall vote. We will go around the room and request each member's vote." Lewis Ross did just that, starting with his right. The bankers voted in favor and the British voted against making it two-to-two. Hakimi voted against but Manchurian Global voted in favor leaving it six-to-three. Tariku Arendse was in the hot spot next and his vote was the decisive one. When he voted in favor that was it. The vote continued with the Summit Capital members who, in a last minute change of heart, perhaps because of Hakimi's insincerity, voted in favor.

The vote ended nine-to-four in Manchurian Global's favor, thus ending the topic. Lewis Ross had been completely shocked by OAG's vote. He had thought them a great counter, conglomerate versus conglomerate. While Manchurian Global thought of itself as a sovereign entity, OAG was actually a sovereign entity. They owned, controlled, and directed an entire country. Manchurian didn't hold a candle to them and yet OAG sided with Manchurian Global. Summit Capital's vote had been the nail in the coffin and Ross left the room dejected and depressed. He'd lost his family's greatest legacy tonight.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Sat May 26, 2018 5:12 pm

• • • † • • •

Friday, July 21, 1989 | 10:30 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Sinai Grand Hotel
31° 16' 15" N, 32° 18' 55" E

"I am glad you could come so quickly," David Ferrari said as he put out his hand to shake that of Brandon Morales before shaking Joshua Simmons' hand just behind him. "Would you please make yourselves comfortable," he offered as he shut the door to his suite. Todd Low, Bobbie Harris, and Luis Walker were all in a receiving line as hands were shaken and the five men took seats on the couches in Ferrari's room. "What can I get you gentlemen? Anything?"

"No, no we're fine," Morales said and Simmons nodded in agreement.

"Well then shall we get to business then?" Ferrari took a seat on the love seat next to Walker. "What brings you here so early in the morning?"

"Yesterday's vote was appalling," Morales began, "not from the part of the buyout but from that disgusting lie that Hakimi told. I have to think that you expected as much or else why would you have had President Al-Banna prepped?"

"It is true; we did expect Ross or Hakimi to pull some kind of trick with regards to the nationalization question. We went to President Al-Banna yesterday morning to assure him that it was not the intention of Manchurian Global to cause an unemployment crisis or block the use of the canal to any parties. In fact, President Al-Banna was more than relieved when we told him such. He was more than willing to forgo any plans for nationalization, especially given the high cost it would be to his government. The Republic of the Sinai does not generate enough revenue to cover its own debts and the debts of the Suez Canal Company; that much we all know." Todd Low explained.

"That was crafty, smart, crafty and smart," said Simmons, "the only reason we voted how we voted was because of that nonsense. Summit Capital is not at all pleased with this buyout and at present, Ross and Hakimi are presently scouring the protocols and conditions to force a revote."

"How did you come to this information?" Ferrari asked as he leaned slightly forward in his seat.

"The British representatives were contacted for their support as were we. You can bet that the British will support a revote and Summit Capital, being in these conditions, might entertain one as well. As you are aware, a revote would require a two-thirds majority to pass. Otherwise, the measure can be defeated."

"It would be unwise for such a vote to happen," Low answered. "As it stands, we have seven votes, a controlling stake. We could easily block every initiative proposed, bring the SCC to a standstill, and force an acquisition under much less generous terms. This isn't a pleasant option and one we'd prefer not to endeavor upon."

"Which is why we are here," said Morales. "It stands to reason that this acquisition is not in our best interests so in order to support it, we're going to need something in trade."

"We're prepared to offer a full return on your investment, that much is guaranteed, plus the additional sums as offered."

"That is a good start," said Morales, "but we're looking for something more long-term. We want an investment strategy. We are of the opinion that the expansion project was inevitable within the SCC. It might have taken a few more years but the situation would have grown so untenable that lenders and the government would have had no choice but to fund its development. Global shipping is bottlenecked at the Suez Canal and there is no place in the future for this bottleneck."

"I suppose that is a fair assessment," Ferrari answered, "but at this stage of the game, we are in a position to block the expansion now. This benefits no one and it certainly doesn't benefit Manchurian Global or Summit Capital. The most beneficial thing that can happen now is that this buyout goes through and the expansion gets funded, and we're not just talking the Suez Canal's expansion but the tunnel project as well. The sheer amount of money we're willing to spend is nothing that the SCC can materialize on its own."

"Summit Capital is going to need something in return. As I said, we had an investment strategy, not just an investment." Morales answered. It was corporate extortion at its best but Summit Capital had a position that could not be surmounted easily. If Manchurian Global wanted to guarantee Summit Capital's cooperation then they needed to play ball with them. The negotiations began and though they were not being made under duress, there was a bit of tension in the air. When push came to shove, Summit Capital walked away with a 3.5% stake in Manchurian Global. Hands were shaken and Summit Capital was onboard.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Friday, July 21, 1989 | 14:00 hrs [UTC-5]
Layarteb City, New York | Manchurian Global HQ
40° 42' 22" N, 74° 0' 27" W

The architecture on Manhattan Island told a varying history of Layarteb City and 70 Pine Street was as much a part of that history as the Empire State Building was. Once the tallest building in the world, the Empire State Building was built around the same time as 70 Pine Street, the fabled skyscraper race. The building, which stood sixty-seven stories and nine hundred and fifty-two feet tall, was constructed over a two-year period from 1930 to 1932 and when it opened, it was opened as the global headquarters of Manchurian Global. Amongst the tallest fifteen buildings in the city, 70 Pine Street was an homage to the history of skyscraper construction. Across three floors of the building was a museum dedicated to not only Manchurian Global as a company but also the construction of skyscrapers in the city. The museum was just one way of generating some incoming for the maintenance of the building.

The building was laid out like most corporate headquarters. The higher up you went, the more important the people. The topmost floor served as a luxurious penthouse apartment for the chairman and CEO of the company and access to any floor above fifty-nine was restricted. A keycard needed to be inserted into the elevator's control slot to provide access and only those working up on these floors had such a keycard. A private elevator provided the single point of entry to the sixty-seventh floor, outside of the stairs. That private elevator was accessible only by the chairman and CEO, as well as the building's security staff.

On this warm, summer, Friday afternoon it was unusual to see officers on the upper floors occupied. Those floors provided offices and conference rooms for the executive vice presidents and the board of directors, which was made up by David Ferrari and Todd Low as well as the Vice Chairman of the Board, Chris Ruiz, the Chief Business Officer, Mark Watson, and the Chief Technology Officer, Carl Murphy. Remarkably, those three men were in the office and all converging on the office of the former, Chris Ruiz, on the sixty-sixth floor. Connecting via satellite from Port Said were Ferrari and Low. While it was mid-afternoon in Layarteb City, it was turning on late evening in Port Said, thanks largely to the seven-hour difference. For Ferrari and Low, the time was inconsequential. This meeting was of paramount importance to them.

Ruiz was sipping on a cup of coffee when Watson entered his spacious office, Murphy only inches behind him. They came in with coffee but they were also armed with beautiful, leather-bound portfolios and gold-plated pens. Each wore a business suit costing no less than §1,000 and they took seats around Ruiz's desk. Cups of coffee went onto coasters and Ruiz pushed the intercom button to his secretary. "We'll be on an international line, please hold all of my calls and meetings."

"Yes sir."

"Thank you love," Ruiz responded. He then flipped his notebook over one page and dialed the number he had scribbled down not more than ten minutes earlier when Ferrari and Low called to set up the meeting. The phone went through the international circuits until it finally connected to the line in Ferrari's room. "David, it's Chris here and I have Mark and Carl with me."

"Good, how's the connection?"

"It's clear for now."

"All right, I'm here with Todd. We have an update on the buyout."

"Good, good, what's the news?"

"The board voted nine-to-four in favor. Thanks to some extremely duplicitous maneuvers by Hakimi, Summit Capital came aboard. Our meeting with President Al-Banna proved more than fruitful. It's nothing that I would like to say over this line but we have no resistance from the government. They'll require conditions of us that we would have agreed to anyway."

"Good."

"Unfortunately it doesn't look like this will be the end of it though. Ross and Hakimi are looking for some sort of loophole to force a revote. If they do that, the measure has to pass with a two-thirds majority, which we have so long as Summit Capital stays onboard."

"How likely are they?"

"With what we've offered, highly likely," Low cut in, "though they're looking for a stake in our company. We negotiated them down to three-and-a-half percent."

"What happens if we lose them?"

"If Hakimi and Ross forces a revote and they aren't on our side, the buyout stops dead in its tracks. We would still maintain a controlling stake with our alliance but it will require years of tense efforts to force the board back into a buyout scenario. It will require a lot of backhanded deals and a lot of tense meetings. It's not advisable."

"I'm not opposed to the stake. Carl, Mark?"

"No."

"No."

"Good," said Ferrari on the other side of the line. "So now that leaves where we stand with OAG. I think of all parties in this, OAG comes out the best."

"They'll uphold their end of the deal," Low said, "especially for what we gave them."

"What did we give them again?" Watson asked. He'd been absent on that particular conversation and though he'd been given an update, he was looking for that final confirmation.

It was Low who told him, "OAG is getting a board seat and we're signing a non-compete agreement with them. We'll have to forget a large chunk of Africa but none of those areas are where we have any development anyway." What Low and no one else would discuss over the call was the rest of what OAG received. There were a number of reasons not to discuss such details over an open line, especially as they concerned a dark past.

That dark past went back to July 16, 1956, an otherwise normal Monday. Company history had once proclaimed this day as the founding day for a new division within Manchurian Global but most of that had been erased over time. The division was a private security division and its founders envisioned Manchurian Global security guards outside of every bank in the Republic and driving every armored car. By 1968, private security just wasn't lucrative enough and so they got into military contracting. Former soldiers, especially those with special forces or paratrooper training were hired as contractors when in reality they were mercenaries. They traveled to conflicts all around the world, sometimes to assist and sometimes to antagonize.

Business didn't boom necessarily but Manchurian Global's private security division was pulling in enough money to make it worthwhile. Then 1973 came and the outbreak of the Cypriot Civil War. Cyprus was a small island and split along the lines of two ethnicities, Greeks and Turks. It had been the result of years upon years, decades upon decades, of ethnic strife and it boiled over quickly. Battle lines were drawn and before long, the ethnic Turks had retreated into the northern part of the island while the Greeks took the southern part. Casualties mounted quickly and both sides were eager for more bodies but the Cypriots on both sides were not trained soldiers nor had they any real experience in war. Thus, they turned to mercenaries and from all over the world, mercenaries flocked to both sides of the conflict. Manchurian Global was the most visible and they came to support Southern Cyprus.

Manchurian's mercenaries accounted for perhaps only a quarter of those in the conflict but it appeared as if they were ninety percent. The most visible of all the entities fighting, the conflict forced Manchurian to forgo its rigorous vetting processes and instead hire anyone who could show they served in a military. What they wound up getting were amongst the worst of the worst and as the atrocities mounted, so did the connections to Manchurian Global.

After the conflict raged for thirteen years, the Layartebian government sought to insert itself into the conflict, vying for a diplomatic ceasefire between the two parties. The largest motivator was the Emperor's desire to gain influence and traction in the region. For two years, the Layartebian government negotiated with both sides, looking for common ground and vying for that diplomatic ceasefire. The negotiations were long and frustrating and on more than a dozen occasions, they appeared to be breaking down completely until finally, October 1988 came. Both sides came to a final agreement and on October 27, it was announced. Effective immediately, the now 15-year long civil war came to a true ceasefire. Of course, the battle lines would still be manned but a buffer zone was established occupying one hundred and thirty-four square miles. In some places, it was as thin as twenty meters and in others as much as four-and-a-half miles. For the Empire, two large bases occupying just shy of a hundred square miles. As a guarantor for the peace agreement, the Empire of Layarteb agreed to enact a major anti-mercenary law. The presence of mercenaries had been a contentious issue on both sides and the biggest player had been - in their eyes - Manchurian Global. Layartebian mercenaries ultimately accounted for forty percent of mercenaries in the conflict and so they were the largest, single entity.

For the Emperor, the mercenary issue had been a major initiative of his. As a former soldier, he loathed mercenaries and he wanted nothing more than to wipe out their existence from Layarteb. Yet this served as the perfect opportunity and the trade away was more to the Empire's favor than it was to Cyprus. The Emperor had been working with the country's legislature on banning mercenaries and it took little effort to get the bill passed the unicameral house in Washington City. Officially called the Foreign Military Assistance Act, it was unofficially known as the Anti-Mercenary Law. Upon its passage on October 28, 1988, all Layartebian citizens were barred from working for firms classified as mercenary organizations. A list was published and every private military contractor made it. It disallowed any Layartebian-based company to operate a PMC. It barred all mercenary activities from sovereign, Layartebian soil; and most importantly, it stripped the citizenship of any Layartebian citizen who continued to serve as a mercenary following the act's passage. Should said person ever step foot onto Layartebian soil again, he or she would face felony prosecution and a minimum sentence of no less than five years in federal prison. The act called for a maximum of ten years.

On October 31, 1988, the Empire of Layarteb established its bases at Akrotiri and Dhekelia, one base in each part of the island, which was now formally divided into Northern Cyprus and Southern Cyprus. The Empire had its bases and the Emperor had his destruction of mercenaries. However, one major oversight was that the peacekeeping mandate was only meant to last five years with a possible extension for a further five years if all three parties could agree on the extension.

For Manchurian Global this could not have come at a worse time. The conglomerate raked in record profits from the Cypriot Civil War and the notoriety and reliability of its mercenaries meant that conflicts all around the world were suddenly open to Manchurian's mercenaries. Yet, they were forced to comply with the act. No longer could they benefit from mercenary contracts but they could not simply dissolve the division and abandon such a source of wealth. Thus, Manchurian Global was forced to sell off the business unit and Aegis Specialized Protection, LLC was born. Legally independent of Manchurian Global, on paper, the law had been followed but in reality, ASP - as it was known - did nothing without Manchurian's say-so.

OAG was interested in ASP and ASP needed a formal home. Beyond a board seat and beyond a non-compete agreement, OAG really sought out ASP. As a result of their support, ASP would move its headquarters to Nairobi to a disused air base just outside of the city. It was known as Moi Air Base but it would carry plenty of new names over the years as ASP made it their home. In additional, seven-and-a-half percent of ASP profits would go to OAG and ASP could be used as a private black force by OAG. Bringing ASP to Nairobi gave OAG the teeth to carry out the kind of dirty work that only spy agencies did. This was what wasn't to be discussed on the call and it truly showed how far Manchurian had gone to get the Suez Canal. It had gained far more than it given.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Sun Jun 10, 2018 7:03 am

• • • † • • •

Monday, July 31, 1989 | 09:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Suez Canal Company HQ
31° 15' 43" N, 32° 18' 44" E

For ten days, the business and the political worlds had been abuzz with rumors, unconfirmed reports, and speculation concerning the acquisition of the Suez Canal Company by Manchurian Global. The buyout had been formally approved by the board of Manchurian Global on the evening of July 21, when over the phone, David Ferrari and Todd Low held a vote. It was recorded and carried as unanimous between the five men in control of the conglomerate. The paperwork had begun the following morning and it had moved expeditiously since then. In short order, the purchase received preliminary approval from the Ministry of Commerce as it violated no laws and it received complete approval from the Sinai government. Leaks, always cited anonymously, from both sides of the fence had obviously fueled those rumors, unconfirmed reports, and speculations but whenever anyone or organization reached out to Manchurian Global's PR department for comment they found surprisingly strong resistance.

The wall of silence from Manchurian Global had not exactly made people question those rumors, unconfirmed reports, and speculations but it certainly cast doubt onto the matter. Manchurian Global's stock price largely remained flat on the uncertainty with the more daring traders betting in their favor when many were urging caution. There was a lot of money to be made if the bet paid off and even more money to be lost if it didn't and today was the day of reckoning for everyone. People following the situation more closely than they should have been would note that Manchurian Global's board of directors had flown to Cairo and were now to be found in Port Said. Those with that level of "inside knowledge" as it was called, quickly doubled down on their bets, if they could. Off-hours trading spiked over the weekend and financial analysts took some note that they were hard-pressed to respond.

For those coming into work on this particular, Monday morning, they found an odd mood around the office. They'd been told that something important was coming and everyone with some ear to the office rumors knew what that meant. It meant acquisition by a massive, foreign corporation and no one knew just what to expect. Manchurian Global was a name that everyone in the world had heard and it was a name that many people feared to hear. For those with enough access to news, they knew of Manchurian's mercenaries in Cyprus and for those in the business world, they knew of Manchurian's ruthlessness. Workers for the Suez Canal Company didn't know what to expect and most of them feared the worst. What they didn't know was that Manchurian had given up a lot of its power in an attempt to sway President Al-Banna to their side.

When the suited men from Manchurian Global walked in, the workers wondered just how connected these men were with any of their employees. They walked around, shook hands, asked names, commented on photographs in cubicles, and appeared to all like politicians walking around, kissing babies, looking for votes with false promise of hope and change. They did this all morning, shuffling around from office area to office area, pretending to give a damn - or so that is how the employees took it. Their presence with their expensive suits, watches, and rings made those present feel undervalued as human beings. Any one of these men had more money in their outfits than most of these employees made in six months.

As morning turned into afternoon, the executives met in the main boardroom where cameras were set up for a press conference. Seated at the table and flanked on either side by the other board members of Manchurian Global, David Ferrari announced the full and complete acquisition of the Suez Canal Company by Manchurian Global. "I just want to take this opportunity," he said after the initial announcement, "to thank all of my fellow board members and employees at Manchurian Global. This was a major decision for us as a company and it was a major decision for our partners in the Suez Canal Company.

"It is our pledge to ensure complete continuity of service. What that means to shipping companies of the world is no change to the service level. Tolls won't increase and we will work to reduce wait times and capacity limitations by funding the expansion project for the Suez Canal. We'll also be funding the construction of as many as seven tunnels underneath the Suez Canal to connect the east and the west banks easily and we'll do so without stoppages or unnecessary delays.

"We can expect a cost approaching §7 billion for these construction projects in what might be the largest construction project of the present time but the commitment to you is completion of the expansion project in no more than three years and completion of all projects in no more than six years. In that time, we will make the Suez Canal viable for the twenty-first century by nearly doubling its capacity.

"Furthermore, in agreement with the government of the Sinai, there will be no restrictions to shipping passing through the canal and no blacklists. Manchurian Global is a non-state actor and that means we are free from partisan politics that would otherwise govern the use and restrictions of the Suez Canal. Ships from all nations, flying whatever flag, will have the right to transit the Suez Canal.

"Also in accordance with our agreements with the government of President Al-Banna, there will be absolutely no layoffs of personnel currently employed by the Suez Canal Company. Benefits will continue to be paid and salaries will not be reduced. As part of the purchase plan, employees will receive bonuses commensurate with their years of service to the SCC as well as their positions. No employee will be left unawarded for his or her service to the Suez Canal Company and we welcome you all to the Manchurian Global family. Integration will take the better part of this year and several years thereafter but we pledge our complete and total commitment to these terms as I lay them out this afternoon.

"The acquisition of the Suez Canal is by far the greatest accomplishment of my time with Manchurian Global and I could not be happier presenting it to the world. We are here to ensure that the Suez Canal remains a usable and maintainable waterway to all nations of the world, thank you," David Ferrari said before handing over the floor to Todd Low who would go over some of the public details of the acquisition. This was boring, financial stuff but it was what the markets thrived on and by the time he was done talking, Manchurian Global's stock was rising at rates unpredicted by all but the savviest financial analysts. Anyone who bet on Manchurian Global that day had the potential to retire a wealthy man or women without the need to work again and there were at least a dozen such people throughout the world but hundreds upon hundreds who'd wished they had done so. These people wished they'd taken the risk because the reward was so great.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Monday, July 31, 1989 | 08:30 hrs [UTC-5]
Layarteb City, New York | Fortress of Comhghall
40° 41' 28" N, 74° 0' 58" W

The Emperor had seen the press conference live when it aired at 13:00 local time in Port Said, which had been 06:00 in Layarteb City. Within twenty minutes of its end, he had put a special call out to the entirety of the National Security Council that the day's meeting was being moved up to begin at 08:30 in place of the daily, Cabinet meeting. The acquisition of the Suez Canal was a far greater concern for the Emperor than anything else was at present. It represented a gross expansion of corporate powers that the Emperor had fought so hard to curtail. He wasn't a man who opposed corporations or aspired to any leftist viewpoints on how corporations were "evil" but he did not believe any corporation should exceed the power presented by the nation-state. Before the revolution, corporations had corrupted the nation's leaders beyond recognition and the rule of law was bought and sold to the highest bidder. A situation like that would never arise again so long as he and those from his school of thought were in power.

Manchurian Global had usurped those limitations and rightly because he and his advisors, legal scholars, and academics had never envisioned such a scenario. Thus, they'd never written laws to prevent it. When Manchurian Global's legal representatives reached out to the Ministry of Commerce for preliminary approval, they did so knowing that there were no laws on the books to stop them. The deal was as legal as any could be, so long as they paid the appropriate filing fees and made the appropriate declarations on their yearly tax audits. To this, the Emperor was furious. To have a corporate entity such as Manchurian Global control one of the most vital waterways in the world was unconscionable in his mind.

The Empire's National Security Council was an 11-man committee within the larger, 30-man Cabinet. Every member of the NSC had a vote but the Emperor did not vote unless there was a tie and decisions were carried by a simple majority. Besides the Emperor, the NSC included the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff - the highest-ranking military general in the Empire, the Ministers of Commerce, Defense, Education, Finance, Foreign Affairs, Intelligence, the Interior, and Justice, and lastly the National Security Advisor. Each of those ten men and women joined the Emperor on this Monday morning, after David Ferrari had announced the acquisition on global television and well after the ink had dried on the paper. In fact, Ferrari's announcement was the first time the Emperor and his Cabinet had heard about the acquisition, despite controls and protocols put into place to warn them of such an event beforehand.

With everyone seated, the Emperor turned first to his Minister of Commerce, an aging man named Allan Drago who, at the age of sixty-five, represented the oldest man in the Cabinet. He'd also held that position for nine years, ever since the revolution ended. A close confidant of the Emperor, he had been seen by many as one of the closest to the Emperor. Yet, in truth, he was not. He was the best man for the job and a man who'd shared the Emperor's vision on economics and commerce. He'd done well these nine years and the Empire had flourished because of it but the acquisition was a misstep that the Emperor was almost unwillingly to forgive. "Now that we're all here, let's begin. First issue is how are we just finding out about this acquisition now? We have protocols in place for all acquisitions and buyouts of this magnitude to be brought up to our attention immediately. Allan what do you have to say for the Ministry of Commerce?"

Drago was in the hot seat and he'd been here many times before but he wasn't a spring chicken anymore. "Sir, I am having the paperwork pulled as we speak to determine where the fault lay. As you are aware, our forms require specific boxes to be checked to ensure that protocols are followed. Unfortunately, they are also prone to human error. I like to think that our employees are trained and do not make such mistakes because these forms are reviewed in triplicate but mistakes can happen sir. When I have something definitive I will certainly pass this along."

"We'll have to sit and wait then," said the Emperor was obvious frustration. He wanted an answer immediately but he also knew that only two hours had elapsed since Ferrari made the announcement. "How do we respond? How can we respond?" The room sat silent, "That's a question for all of us," the Emperor said after that momentary silence. He could feel the fear in the room and he knew that he was the driving force behind it. It was the same level of fear that a new batch of recruits in Venezuela would have felt when he was training them on jungle combat.

"Sir, we don't have much standing legally," the Minister of Justice said. "In accordance with our established laws, this acquisition can go forward as planned by Manchurian Global. Due to our forbiddance of 'ex post facto' laws, there is nothing we can do sir. Barring aside some legal technicality on Manchurian Global's part, we have no leg to stand on in this instance and I would not bet on them committing such a minor error. They have an army of lawyers on their side working on this deal and little else."

"Sir, we put the handcuffs on Manchurian Global big time last year with the Foreign Military Assistance Act and this is the natural consequence," said the Emperor's National Security Advisor, saying something few would dare to say.

"Explain that to me."

"Sir, by passing the FMAA, we took away a major source of revenue and profit for Manchurian Global when they had to sell off their PMC unit. Aegis Specialized Protection, LLC is still a Manchurian entity, there's no doubt about it. Anyone who thinks otherwise is blind and stupid sir. However, the revenue stream is not linked insofar as we can find. Now the Ministry of Justice has been looking into that deeply to ensure full compliance with the FMAA but so far, it seems that there is compliance there, much to our chagrin. If there wasn't we could go after Manchurian Global with the strength of an entire nation-state but we cannot.

"That pushed them into the SCC deal. Manchurian has been involved with the SCC since the 70s but sir the SCC has been a fiercely independent entity. They could have held on for longer, despite their financial problems and we could have worked a deal with the government of the Sinai and the SCC to keep them solvent but we move too slowly. Manchurian had its revenue stream cut off and they needed something big for their investors after the FMAA. Despite the bad press, investors and traders didn't care whatsoever that the mercenaries were horrific human beings. They cared about revenue and Manchurian was swimming in money from their mercenary activities. They need that revenue stream to keep going because once you establish that kind of revenue you cannot walk backwards. You have to keep it at that level otherwise stock prices tumble and people leave, even if your company is still more than profitable. You've set the bar here," he used his hand as an example, holding it over his head, "and there's no way you can bring it down to here without suffering," he lowered it about a foot to his heart.

"This can very well be our fault, I can accept that," the Emperor said, "but I will not let us sit by idly and do nothing."

"There is little we can truly do sir, in a legal sense," the Minister of Justice answered, "we would have to act extra judiciously." At this, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs perked up because that was what generals did when they heard such phrases.

"Chairman-General, what do you suggest?"

"Sir, a coup in the Sinai to remove Al-Banna from power and put in someone who would be willing to use the power of the presidency to nationalize the Suez Canal and ensure it does not get into Manchurian's hands. In doing so, we would usurp our legal provisions entirely and use another state to achieve our goal sir."

"I don't have an opposition to it," the Emperor answered quickly, "quite frankly I love the idea. Do we even have that scenario envisioned?"

"I don't think so sir," the Minister of Intelligence answered, "in fact our Port Said station has a very small staff. It isn't one of our top priorities right now, even with the situation in Cyprus. In fact sir, I would think it would take quite some time to accomplish this."

"What are we talking, six months? A year? Two years?"

"It depends sir but I would say no less than one year."

"I can stomach this as a temporary ailment," said the Emperor, "but I do not want to see this as an indefinite entity."

"Sir if I may suggest," the Minister of Finance said and to this, the Emperor yielded the floor. "Ferrari announced his intention to fund the expansion of the Suez Canal and the construction of the tunnel system underneath it to facilitate vehicular and pedestrian passage. Sir if we push a coup too soon, these projects could be left unfinished. If we truly want to hurt Manchurian Global we let them finish these projects and go into debt for them and then we launch the coup."

"Sir, Anna is right," the National Security Advisor answered, "in fact she's beyond right sir."

"Yes, I was getting too ahead of myself. All right, do we have a consensus here? Anyone object?" There were no objections, "Then we'll work on this as a long-term strategy. Does that give you enough time Lawrence?"

"Yes sir in fact it gives us plenty of time," Lawrence Dunn, the Minister of Intelligence answered, a smile across his face.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Sun Jun 17, 2018 12:11 pm

• • • † • • •

Tuesday, August 1, 1989 | 11:54 hrs [UTC+2]
Over Greece | 5 miles east of Ioannina
39° 39' 53" N, 20° 56' 13" E

David Ferrari settled into the four-seat booth on the upper deck of the Boeing 747. He, Todd Low, and Mark Watson were heading home from Egypt following the successful buyout of the Suez Canal Company. Chris Ruiz was remaining behind to help on some of the integration and Carl Murphy had already flown home the previous evening on a redeye flight out of Athens. Staying behind with Ruiz was also Bobbie Harris, who as EVP of Canal Operators would be the main, top-level decision-maker concerning the Suez Canal. For the rest, their presence was no longer necessary and so they were booked on the first available, nonstop flight back home, which happened to be the following morning. Now they were two hours into the eleven-hour flight and flying over the Greek mainland at 34,000 feet. Their flight would fly up and over mainland Europe, through the British Isles, across the North Atlantic, and then down through the Province of Dnalkrad into Layarteb City for an arrival at 14:18 local time. Due to ATC corridors, spacing requirements, and fuel burn, they would rise to 38,000 feet at one point along their journey.

Meanwhile, in the upstairs dining area on the Boeing 747, the three businessmen in their more casual attire were about to order lunch. They had a few choices, nothing spectacular but more than adequate for them. Low and Ferrari would order beers to go along with their meals while Watson, a recovering alcoholic, opted instead for seltzer. Once upon a time, Mark Watson could not merely look at alcohol without drinking it and while he was never stupid enough to drive a car or show up at work drunk, he had a difficult time functioning without it. It was when his wife threatened to leave him for good and take the kids that he enrolled in a program and he'd stayed sober since and in such a fashion as not having an issue being around alcohol, he just knew he couldn't order it. Despite being one of the highest-ranking members of the conglomerate, he would rather his children to a beer.

Right after they had ordered, Low pulled out a newspaper and flipped through the pages until he found what he wanted to show them. Putting that on the table, he pointed to the headline of a very small article. It couldn't have been more than two or three hundred words, "Ross killed himself yesterday."

"So he did," Ferrari said, looking at the upside down headline, "well it's tragic but I can't say I'll miss him."

"I won't," Low answered, "he could have been a major impediment to this deal."

"Article says the police wouldn't reveal cause of death," Watson observed before Low took the paper back and folded it neatly beside him.

"I made a call when I saw this. He shot himself in the bathtub. He left a note too. There's a copy of it being faxed to my office sometime this afternoon. He laments the loss of his family legacy to us, he denounces the Empire and Manchurian Global, he accuses us of working with the state, and he killed himself in the bathtub because he didn't want his maid to have a hard time cleaning up the mess. It was messy; he used a .357 Magnum revolver."

"Well that's his demon to bear," Watson answered, "I surmise if he wanted to cooperate we would have worked with him?"

Ferrari shook his head, "There was no room to work with Ross. He was going to get a payout and that's final."

"What to do with his money? He had no heirs," Low asked, "we should still pay it out; give us a chance to look good on this."

"It can be a gift to the Republic of the Sinai for all I care," answered Ferrari. Their meals arrived moments later and they got to eating, suspending the business talk until they were done. "You know," Ferrari said as he swirled his beer in its glass, "the Empire of Britannia is the one really losing out here. The British have had their seats the longest out of any entity aside from the Ross family. I'm sure to them, this looks like a coup by the Empire. First, there's Cyprus and now this. How to get it through to everyone's head we're not working on conjunction with that infernal government?"

"That's a fight all on its own," said Watson, "we may be a Layartebian company but we're hardly in league with the government unless its contracts, which we do for purely profit matters. If people still wish to think we want anything to do with the government after the FMAA went into effect they're really barking up the wrong tree."

"I want to get in touch with marketing tomorrow and I want them to start working on a campaign about this." Ferrari began, "I do not want us linked to the Layartebian government anymore. I'm not looking to lock horns with the government because it's not a fight I care to take on, especially while the Emperor is in power. But we need something to distance ourselves from the government. The acquisition of the Suez Canal is not a ploy by the Layartebian government via Manchurian Global but Manchurian Global acting on its own."

"Will it work?"

"Marketing could convince an Eskimo to buy ice," Ferrari joked, "they can do this."

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Sun Jul 01, 2018 3:24 pm

• • • † • • •

Thursday, November 15, 1989 | 13:00 hrs [UTC-5]
Layarteb City, New York | Manchurian Global HQ
40° 42' 22" N, 74° 0' 27" W

At Manchurian Global's corporate headquarters, the largest conference room was on the 14th floor and this afternoon Bobbie Harris had reserved it from 13:00 to 17:00. The meeting would involve every managing director and bigwig involved with the Suez Canal. Beyond this, representatives from Aegis Specialized Protection, LLC were present to discuss the security of the Suez Canal. Manchurian Global had provided a no-bid contract to ASP for protection of the Suez Canal for a duration of twenty-five years, the maximum amount of time, ASP's corporate rules allowed for a defense contract. It was lucrative and it would look very good for ASP's income sheet but ASP wasn't a publicly traded company so it didn't matter much to the shareholders, as they all knew it would be a wash. What Manchurian paid out to ASP for the contract it would receive back in other fees and dealings, all by design.

With at least three dozen men and women seated around the conference room both at and away from the main table, the meeting began officially at 13:05. "Thank you all for coming," Bobbie began, "I know everyone has a busy afternoon. We have a lot to cover this afternoon and I want to see if we can get through it as quickly as we can without skipping over anything. We are primarily discussing the security arrangements at the Suez Canal but if we should come to something pertinent that is related to the topic at hand, we can certainly branch off and discuss but let's stay on topic as much as we can. It's going to be a long afternoon and I don't want to keep us here longer than is necessary. So before we begin let's do some quick introductions, I'm just looking for name and title." They went around the room quickly and everyone introduced himself or herself, quickly passing from one to the next.

The meeting began somewhat slowly. They discussed the basic specifications of the Suez Canal, the estimated maintenance costs, the estimated revenue, upkeep schedules, and so on and so forth, until they covered the expansion project and all of its facets too. By the middle of the afternoon, the initial matters had been discussed and Bobbie turned to a man sitting on the left side of the table, about four people away from him. "Mister James Barajas, would you please now discuss the status of the Suez Canal's defense?"

"Certainly," Barajas began. He was the chief director of planning and with that title, responsible for the planning department for ASP. No contract or operation began without his department's input. "The entire length of the Suez Canal is one hundred and sixty kilometers. Our defensive plan is the establishment of thirty-six 'strongholds' along the banks of the Suez Canal, ranging from five hundred to one thousand meters from the edge of the canal. Each one is, between four and four-and-a-half kilometers apart. Three make up a single sector for an area of approximately twelve to thirteen-and-a-half kilometers in diameter.

"Each stronghold is designed to support one to two squads. Our objective with this line is to prevent any hostile force from seizing the eastern bank of the Suez Canal. As we cannot establish any sort of defensive line on the western bank, we are focusing on the eastern bank. Our line's strongholds will be constructed in three stages. The first stage is the most basic, which will allow us to establish all thirty-six of these strongholds. Do not expect too much from the initial construction phase. Our objective here is to put these strongholds onto the ground and to man them. These are focused purely on infantry defense. They will be equipped with protected firing points, barbed wire to resist assault, and the necessary amenities to keep the personnel protected and safe.

"We believe that we can complete construction of all thirty-six strongpoints within four months. Surveying work completed approximately nineteen days ago and we broke ground this morning.

"The second phase of construction will see expansion and fortification. Each stronghold will be expanded to support armored vehicles in hull-down firing positions. It will expand the strongholds to support double the personnel as well as establish the final protective assets of each stronghold.

"The third phase of construction will be put on hold unless it is absolute necessary. It will require an expansion of the perimeter and establishment of a very large minefield along the banks of the Suez Canal. As we do not feel this is necessary at this point of time, we will hold on this phase.

"Supporting these strongholds is a series of camps. There will be twelve camps built along the banks, between five and eight kilometers behind the canal and a thirteenth camp further south. Each camp will be responsible for three strongholds and it will be in these camps that the personnel shall rotate through while on stronghold defense. Units will rotate through each of the strongholds in their sector to ensure everyone is familiar with the defensive requirements, terrain, and fire sectors of each stronghold. We will continuously rotate units through with three weeks in each stronghold before moving onto the next. They will spend nine weeks on the line followed by four weeks off the line. This will ensure much-needed downtime on a two-to-one ratio, which we have found to be advantageous based on our own studies.

"Backing up and supporting these strongholds and camps will be three sector command HQs, North, Central, and South."

"That's quite an extensive defense plan," Bobbie began. "Is ASP equipped with armored vehicles?"

"Yes we are but not very many. We'll be procuring some specifically for the purposes of this project. We're looking at older, most cost-effective equipment presently. As nations of the world upgrade their militaries, we'll be buying their second-hand equipment. Our men are well versed with this equipment as many of them have used it in their prior professions as soldiers. The familiarity is an added bonus and reduces training requirements."

"How many men are we talking?"

"Well, to present a minimal presence, and I do mean minimal, we would have no fewer than four hundred and fifty men but in an ideal scenario, we're talking three thousand men." Bobbie whistled at the figure, calculating in his head how much each man was getting paid. "It would be our largest contract but we are staffed for it. We presently have five hundred advisor-level employees and five thousand contractor-level employees, supporting by a staff of eight hundred."

"How will this affect your other contracts?"

"It will require us to hire additional contractors but this is not an issue for us."

"Very good, I like to hear the stability in this," Bobbie said, "now these are fixed fortifications, which means they're easily vulnerable to attack from artillery."

"Yes they are. The strongholds are designed to withstand nearby impacts from one thousand pound bombs, which means they are capable of withstanding direct hits from artillery and mortar rounds. For return fire, each stronghold is capable of supporting a mortar team and the camps will provide firing positions for light artillery. Two camps will be established with air support facilities for the operation of light aircraft. All camps and strongholds will be able to support helicopter operations, whether just pick-up and drop-off or basing, as in the case of the former."

"What we've got here is our own private army," commented a managing director by the name of Tim O'Henry. Tim was relatively high up on the food chain and something of a pessimist when it came to matters. His point of view wasn't always wanted but the small chuckle he gave at the end dissuaded anyone from digging too deeply into his comment.

"That is what the contract is paying for," Barajas answered. On average, contractors would be getting between §3,500 and §7,500 per month while the more qualified and experienced contractors, such as helicopter pilots and commanders, could be making as much as §13,000 per month. Low-level staffers could earn as much as §2,000 per month. With so many men, Bobbie wondered just how sustainable this would be. It would be nearly twenty million shingrots a month in salaries alone, not to mention construction costs and maintenance costs though the former had been baked into the entire price tag of the expansion. ASP would need to make a considerable amount of money on the side to continue to keep its business alive but then again, depending on the location or the conflict, those salaries could easily double, as would the costs associated. He had to assume that ASP knew what they were doing; they had come from MG after all.

"Good," Bobbie answered, "unless anyone has any problems with the present security arrangement, we can continue." Here he paused for just a few moments in case someone wanted to speak up but no one did. Beyond Tim's own observation, the conversation had largely been between Barajas and Bobbie with everyone else listen and/or taking notes.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Friday, November 16, 1989 | 08:00 hrs [UTC+3]
Nairobi, Kenya | Moi Air Base
1° 16' 41" S, 36° 51' 38" E

The city of Nairobi was a big, bustling city by any standard in the world. Though not the capital of the nation of Freistaat Ostafrika, for that honor fell to Dar es Salaam, Nairobi was a major hub for the nation. Not a coastal city, it had been established once upon a time as a trading station by the OAG and it had grown ever since and more and more people flocked to the cities from their rural abodes over the generations. Currently, the city and its surrounding areas were under the direction and the territorial boundaries of the Maasai tribe, which inhabited central and southern Kenya as well as into Tanzania. They, like those tribes who agreed to cooperate with OAG, found themselves as an autonomous entity within the wider realm of Freistaat Ostafrika. Tribes and nations that refused cooperation found themselves subjugated with little to no authority left.

Nairobi was always a busy city in the morning and this Friday was no exception but the city had taken a sort of air to it over the past four weeks that seemed unexplained, at least until now; and, this particular feeling centered on an 1,125-acre, tract of land in the middle of the city that was the former site of Moi Airport. It had been built in the 1930s, originally as a servicing field for Ostafrikan aircraft flying deep into Africa on their way from the coast. In its heyday, the DC-3 was the most visible sight over, around, and at the airfield as hundreds of them flew into and out of Nairobi on a daily basis, many of them flying deep into central Africa. In the 1950s, it became a dual-use airfield as military fighter jets operated from its runways. Unfortunately, its use as an airfield was limited in its placement. As neighborhoods grew up around its perimeter, the expansion of the airfield was effectively blocked and in 1972, Moi Airport was officially shuttered, replaced by a modern airport that was far larger and outside of the city center. More than a few accidents left dozens dead on the ground over the years, something that had made the residents of Nairobi quite wary.

With the shuttering of Moi Airport, authorities surrounded the airport's perimeter with chain-link fencing, topped with razor wire, and adorned with signs warning trespassers not to enter. What came was the rise of Moi Village. Over the years, urban explorers flocked to the site, taking photographs and exploring the decaying ruins of a former airport. Some were up to mischievous things and others were just curious. Then, as more and more people became attuned to the growing derelict status of Moi Airport, in came the vagrants, the squatters, the drunkards, and the drug addicts. They came to Moi Airport, dubbing it Moi Village, in an effort to find shelter and a place to live. From time-to-time, the authorities swept through Moi Village, arresting those inside and cleaning up the place of their effects. By and large this happened whenever the occupants grew too numerous or too problematic. More than one building had been gutted by fire from a knocked over stove or a careless drug addict who'd fallen asleep with a cigarette in his or her hand. The occupants of Moi Village knew to expect this from time-to-time and they were always prepared when the time came. Most of them offered little resistance, knowing that they could easily return once the sweeps were concluded. Some hid and were lucky enough not to be caught while others foolishly "fought the law" and the law always won.

This arrangement had gone back and forth over the years. For the authorities, having all of these lowlifes in one area was advantageous and the busts helped clear them out before they grew too entrenched. Thanks to a combination of surveillance and confidential informants, the authorities always knew what the situation was like inside of Moi Village. This is what enabled them to act so effectively against the place during the sweeps. Careful management of those CIs enabled the authorities to maintain a constant awareness of the inside situation without ever compromising a single source. It was something of a badge of honor for the local police. This knowledge truly mattered four weeks ago when the largest raid on Moi Village ever conducted took place.

They had assembled before dawn, a police force numbering over one thousand. They set up a perimeter around Moi Village with careful attention to the cuts and breaks in the fence-line. From there, they waited until every position was occupied and secured. When the perimeter was locked down, the sweeps began. For the occupants of Moi Village, this was just another raid. Moi Village had grown too big and it needed to be scaled back, which made sense, for the population hovered just around one thousand men, women, and children. Conditions were deplorable and they only grew worse as the population grew larger. Disease was rampant, the water system that they'd jerry-rigged had become too overtaxed and was now filthy and unreliable, fuel for cooking had grown scarce leading to larger, communal cooking sessions, and the drug problem had ballooned. More addicts now than ever saw on stained and soiled mattresses, shitting themselves in heroin-induced comas. Those who could contribute to the upkeep of Moi Village felt themselves overworked and "this wasn't what they signed up for," as many griped.

Only this wasn't a normal sweep, as they soon discovered. The police were doing more than just putting people in handcuffs; they were there with bulldozers, dump trucks, and small, front-end loaders. Construction crews, HAZMAT teams, and even fire units hung back, waiting for the all-clear to descend upon Moi Village and clean it of the filth. It took almost two full days to sweep through and clear out most of the occupants of Moi Village in what was an around-the-clock operation. Sections were cordoned off to allow the construction, HAZMAT, and fire units to do their jobs in what took two weeks to complete. Even during that time, stragglers who managed to evade the police were forced to come out, suffering of thirst, hunger, or disease. Of the occupants picked up by the police, thirty-nine died. Of those, seven died due to police action and the rest due to advanced diseases that had gone untreated for too long. Three people alone died from cholera. The spectre of a cholera outbreak was enough to justify the raid in its entirety.

Since then, the fence had been repaired and police had maintained a constant presence of the area. A few managed to sneak back into Moi Village but no one managed to stay longer than nineteen hours before they were rearrested and carted away. Never before had the authorities paid so much attention to Moi Village because it behooved them to keep it isolated. This is what hung over Nairobi and now everything seemed to fall into place. Moi Village was no more and if the police presence wasn't proof enough, the convoys of army trucks descending on the base on this busy, Friday morning would have been all the proof that anyone could need only these weren't army trucks from the Ostafrikan military. They all bore the logo of Aegis Specialized Protection, LLC.

As part of the deal to gain OAG's support in the takeover of the Suez Canal Company, Manchurian Global's leadership had agreed to base ASP in Ostafrikan territory, both giving the troubled mercenary outfit a base of operations not subject to Layartebian anti-mercenary laws and giving the OAG a private military force with the added bonus of deniability.

For ASP, Moi would become its headquarters and main training center. Many of the buildings present would be demolished and rebuilt, for that was cheaper than fixing them. Underground areas would be built to expand the footprint of the base and the runways would be revitalized, giving ASP a runway nearly two-and-a-half kilometers long. The smaller runway, which measured only around one-and-a-quarter kilometers, would not be replaced, as only one runway would be needed.

For ASP, this was an ideal situation. They had a home in a stable country with a ruling government that favored their presence. Manchurian Global was favorable to the idea as well, since it got them the Suez Canal Company. How the local Maasai people would feel was an unknown but ASP didn't intend to make enemies of them. Their local traditions and nuances would be respected because even if the government in Dar es Salaam were favorable to their presence, losing the respect of the local Maasai people would almost certainly mean expulsion and expulsion wasn't on the table. There was nowhere else for ASP to go. Adding onto the fact that the news outlets in Ostafrika were under government control, this occupation could be done quietly, and without any fanfare, which was what both ASP and MG wanted to avoid, they wanted to move in without a fuss.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Mon Jul 09, 2018 7:54 pm

• • • † • • •

Friday, November 16, 1989 | 20:20 hrs [UTC+2]
Mediterranean Sea | Solar Eclipse
31° 30' 00" N, 32° 22' 53" E

The Solar Eclipse was a Cypriot-flagged luxury yacht that was homeported in Limassol. She displaced some 2,300 tons and she had a length of 86 meters, a beam of 13.2 meters, and she had a draft of 4.7 meters. Powered by a pair of diesel engines, she could cruise at 17.5 knots or sprint at 20 knots as she made her way around the Mediterranean. The Solar Eclipse had yet to leave the Med though she had an 8,500-nautical mile range and that had every bit to do with her own, Yannis Machlas, a very wealthy businessman from Cyprus who had influence not only with the government but all along the Med. Machlas was a particularly loathsome character to go with it. On the surface he traded in timber, land, and precious metals but what got him his start, his money, and much of his wealth was arms and drugs.

Machlas started out hustling marijuana and then he graduated to opium and heroin from Asia Minor. From there, he branched out and started to traffic illegal arms. The Layartebian Ministry of Intelligence, unaware of his dealings with drugs, had used him on three separate occasions to bring traceless arms into theaters of operations for pro-Layartebian rebel groups. Each time, he made a killing and he secured himself a "Get Out of Jail Free" card. He kept up the charade of selling timber, land, and precious metals but he still sold drugs and illegal arms. The former was what brought him just 14 nautical miles off of the coast of the Republic of the Sinai.

His yacht was staffed by thirty-one crewmen and it held twenty-two guests in eleven suites. Machlas stayed in the master suite and the man had something of a harem onboard with four women all attending to his needs. For a man as rich and unsavory as Machlas, this was largely a given for his image and to the women, who were paid handsomely in fine clothes, jewelry, and the luxurious lifestyle that Machlas led, the harem itself was par for the course. Sometimes these women were company to his guests, other times they were solely for himself and if any one grew too obnoxious or asked too many questions, she was replaced. There was little to like about Machlas but unsavory characters such as he got a lot done in the world, especially during troubling times.

Machlas' arrival off of the coast of Port Said was hardly a surprise. He'd been sent there by David Ferrari personally and to make good on Manchurian's agreement with President Farouk Al-Banna. Al-Banna had been flown out to the yacht by helicopter and he'd spent most of the day in the company of Machlas' women until it came time for dinner. The two men dined alone and then retired to Machlas' private seating area to talk business. The women were sent inside to tend to themselves, leaving the external deck areas in the aft of the boat empty so that the two men could talk privately. Machlas didn't need anyone overhearing what he and Al-Banna discussed and partly for that reason, the two sat very closely to one another. "Let me first begin by telling you that the deal you struck with Glass was honored today," Machlas began. "Glass" was the codename that Ferrari had directed the two of them to use whenever he was being discussed. Only these two men used this codename. "The sum is as agreed and the account is as agreed."

"Wonderful, I had no doubt that Glass would pay. How was it done?"

"I'm not at liberty to go into the particulars but needless to say, my services were rendered."

"Good," Al-Banna answered, "then I will accept it. What of our other arrangements?"

"Those are why I am personally here," Machlas smiled, "there is a freighter putting into Port Said at dawn with three containers. The bills of lading will list them as containing truck parts. You will find what you requested within them."

"Everything?"

"Everything," Machlas agreed. "The Tape Measures were difficult to acquire but we made due." To this he was referring to ground-to-air Stinger missiles. He'd requested twenty missiles and four launchers to be added to his inventory. He had been told that they were simple to use, that little training would be required, and so his clandestine acquisition would be as such because he would not be letting any of his men train with or practice with them, lest it be revealed that he acquired such weapon systems. The rest of the weapons he'd requested were largely small arms for his personal guard. He was refitting their inventory and passing on their weaponry to the Sinai's small but otherwise capable military. His personal guard, on the other hand, would be fearsome.

"Well I guess this has been a worthwhile affair after all. The Layartebians get the Suez and all of the costs that go with it. They pay my government taxes and I inherit what is owed to me for not stepping on the deal. All-in-all, I believe this worked out quite well."

"For all parties," Machlas said smiling. He had made an easy §10 million on the deal, which was more than worth it for him. "Now, trusting that the conditions of this agreement are fulfilled, I must ask, pry really, what of this deal to your own people?"

"They have jobs do they not?"

"Perhaps they are looking for more than simply jobs."

"Oh that is nonsense. You might hear this from the socialists and I don't know you to be a socialist do I?"

"Hardly," Machlas laughed, "yet I think that this will be far more reaching."

"If they abide by the terms of the charter, and frankly they are legally bound to, then the people can only complain so much. So long as they have food on their tables and their electricity is on to power the refrigerator and the air conditioner, they have nothing to complain of, lest they want that to go. The Layartebians aren't in a position to up and toss everyone. It would be too costly to them to retrain the tens of thousands of workers required. They would be fools and I don't know them to be fools. Even more, with this major expansion project, my country will have no unemployment for years. Whoever is out of a job will have a job. What leader can truly achieve zero percent unemployment? Not even those communist regimes can boast such a thing!"

"I would be careful."

"Do you know something?"

"No, I've just seen this sort of business happen before."

"You shouldn't be so paranoid," Al-Banna said, poking the ban in the chest jokingly, "to think, my people would rise up against me when they have so much going for them."

"Maybe it's not the people I worry about."

"What, the British?"

"I'm not sure who. I have no intelligence or inkling that there are actors out there who are plotting your demise but I have seen this before."

"Well then, keep watching. I will show you a new story."

"I should hope so."

"Now, where are those women?" Al-Banna said playfully as he stood to leave, shaking Machlas' hand. They would fly from the boat together in the morning to inspect the cargo but until then, they had time to kill and the company of beautiful women to keep.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Thu Jul 19, 2018 7:34 pm

• • • † • • •

Monday, January 1, 1990 | 23:00 hrs [UTC-5]
Layarteb City, New York | Manchurian Global HQ
40° 42' 22" N, 74° 0' 27" W

In his penthouse apartment, David Ferrari sat atop the Manchurian Global headquarters, some sixty-seven floors above the island of Manhattan. There wasn't much to see though as the gray clouds of a snowstorm had settled in over Layarteb City and obscured his view, not that he was looking for one at such a late hour. Instead, he was seated on his sofa, casually dressed, watching yet another episode of The Twilight Zone marathon. A cable television station was airing all one hundred and fifty-six episodes, in order, nonstop with only minimal commercial breaks, five minutes for every half-hour episode and nine-minutes for every hour episode. Ferrari's favorite show when he was a teenager was The Twilight Zone and when he saw a commercial for the event, he knew he would have to watch. For the forty-six year old, this brought him back to when he was fifteen, watching the episodes air on CBS with his parents and younger siblings.

"Are you coming to bed?" His otherwise "arm candy" girlfriend called from the bedroom, distracting him from the episode momentarily.

"Right after this one ends."

"You said that two hours ago."

"I know," he said, adding under his breath, "you twit." He didn't much like her personality for she was needy, high-maintenance, and otherwise unintelligent but she was arm candy and a man of his stature needed to be seen with such a thing, especially since his wife divorced him five years earlier. She was getting plenty of alimony that he needed to make sure he was seen with this twenty-eight year old aspiring model who spent his money but looked great at public events, always attracting the eyes of everyone in the room. It was such a fickle relationship but this is what it was.

"Well come to bed, I've got something special for you," she said, only her head peering around the corner of the doorframe. He looked up from the television and smiled, the kind that one gave in acknowledgement and little else. She disappeared and the bedroom door closed gently, taking the last light from inside of the penthouse away from the living room, where Ferrari sat in the dark, with only the flickering of the television screen.

What episode they were on he couldn't name though he knew it by its plot, its characters, and the voice of Rod Sterling announcing "This is Roswell G. Flemington, two hundred and twenty pounds of gristle..." The episode was called "Sounds and Silences" and it was the 147th episode of the series. This and only nine more were remaining before the marathon ended. When it aired, it did so from 21:30 to 22:00 on Fridays from September 27, 1963 to June 19, 1964. Ferrari, though he was in college in his second year, would make sure that he watched each episode before going out for a "night on the town" as he and his friends called it. They were young, the War in Venezuela was raging, and Falcon City's bars, clubs, and women called to him and his friends. They were notorious on a small strip of pavement in the city and notoriety meant obligations, which were always fulfilled of course but not before The Twilight Zone aired.

Ferrari couldn't remember specific events anymore; that was twenty-six years ago and long since forgotten or replaced by other memories. He was sure that some form of drunken debauchery ensued and more than likely he or one of his friends went to some apartment in the city with a young, college-aged girl who happened to be prowling the scene on such a night for someone cute and perhaps charming. He didn't say "Those were the days" but he knew that he'd had plenty of fun in his time and now he just enjoyed the nostalgia of watching this show, something young Jeanine couldn't understand. She was too young for nostalgia and he doubted that anything had been as profound to her as The Twilight Zone was to him.

As the episode aired, another one came on right behind it and Ferrari was about to turn off the television when the telephone rang. It was quite late but Ferrari answered it anyway, "Evening, Ferrari here."

"David, some good news for you," came the voice of Todd Low.

"What do you have?"

"Well, the SCC ceased to exist as a company about six and a half hours ago and on top of this, the final filing just came through."

"It's a bit late for it. How did we get it through at this hour?"

"It was filed on their side, it just took some time to route over, apparently there are some people working this evening."

"Well that's it then. We have full ownership of the Suez Canal Company and the Suez Canal."

"Yes we do. It's done and now we just have to integrate it all according to our timelines."

"Well that's good news. All right thank you for the call, I'm off to bed now, I'll see you next week when you're back."

"See you next week," Low said as he rang off and returned to whatever he was doing in Mexico. He and his family were vacationing in Acapulco for the week and they would be back Saturday evening. It was one of the few times a year that Low took a vacation, opting for the Solstice to New Year's period because it was the least active in terms of work and because the quarter end was usually settled prior to the winter holidays of Solstice and Christmas. So for two weeks, starting just before Christmas, he was gone to the Caribbean where it was warm, sunny, serene, and far-removed.

Ferrari put the phone back into its cradle and turned off the television. He walked over to the bedroom door and gave the knob a twist. When he opened the door it creaked gently. The nightlight was on but Jeanine was fast asleep on top of the covers. There was a magazine by her side and her jewelry was still on her. She'd certainly prettied herself up with a very nice, silk negligee in powder blue. She was also wearing stockings to go with it and some very skimpy underwear, something she'd likely picked up for just this occasion. Shrugging, he turned off the light, put the covers over her, and climbed in beside her. She didn't stir, she rarely did since she slept like a rock. He himself was asleep within ten minutes, the late evening the night before and the long, inactive day catching up to him quickly.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Thursday, January 4, 1990| 21:00 hrs [UTC+2]
El-Qantara el-Sharqîya, Republic of the Sinai | Sinai Army HQ
30° 52' 6" N, 32° 20' 3" E

General Aki Hakim Gohar was the commander of the Sinai Armed Forces, an otherwise small military force that protected the Republic of the Sinai and until recently, the entirety of the Suez Canal. With the ownership transferred to Manchurian Global, President Al-Banna agreed that the defense of the canal could be done by Manchurian Global's PMC rather than by his own armed forces. For President Al-Banna, this suited him well. He didn't have many men in the military so he disliked the idea of them patrolling the canal. All-in-all, the Sinai Armed Forces numbered just 10,210 men or 0.5% of the population of the country. Despite their small size however, they were a potent force with three branches: the Sinai Ground Force, the Sinai Air Defense Force, and the Sinai Navy.

The Sinai Ground Force was the largest component of the force and they even had fifty main battle tanks, fifty-six armored fighting vehicles, and one hundred and sixty armored personnel carriers. The Sinai Air Defense Force operated forty aircraft though only ten of these were considered combat aircraft, which were turboprop-powered Tucanos. For surface-to-air defenses they had only a handful of mobile, short-range units and a stockpile of MANPADs. The Sinai Navy operated just two vessels, both high-speed patrol vessels with little other capabilities. The force was sizeable enough to provide President Al-Banna with a military he claimed was capable of defending the country but only against a ragtag, guerilla force at best and while there were some manner of revolutionaries in the Sinai, especially among the native Bedouins, there was hardly any organized threat from them.

The size of the force meant that General Gohar was the only four-star general in the country. There were three, three-stars who commanded the individual forces, and a handful of two-stars and one-stars who commanded the actual units. He commanded a lot of respect, despite the fact that he and no one else in the military had seen actual combat given the Republic of the Sinai's lack of any war in recent years. They were a glorified training and drilling force, forever marching, drilling, shooting, and so on and so forth.

Like many men of his stature and rank in society, General Gohar was fond of the pleasures of life. He maintained his physique but he didn't shun cigars, wine, or women. Yet tonight he wanted none of the above, rather he wanted something much less tangible but no less dangerous.

The Sinai's military force was largely a "nine-to-five" force. The barracks were quiet at night, there were only token patrols at military bases to prevent trespassers, and both the air defense force and the navy powered down and got to bed early. If there was ever a time to attack the country, it was after 20:00 when virtually one percent of the military was on duty and the rest either sleeping or away from their bases. It made holding conspiratorial, nighttime meetings a cinch and that was precisely what General Gohar was up to on this January evening.

The Sinai Ground Force stood down from the Suez Canal at midnight on January 2 and since then, the mercenaries from Aegis Specialized Protection, LLC had occupied the canal's perimeter. General Gohar saw the situation as insulting and he wouldn't stand for it one bit. Sitting inside of a conference and planning room at his headquarters, General Gohar was joined by Lieutenant General Anwar Saleh, Rear Admiral Hani Kulthum, and Air Marshal Mohamed Moustafa, the respective leaders of the ground force, the navy, and the air defense force. The four of them controlled the entire military and all 10,206 men underneath them and as such, they represented a major source of power within the country.

"Is everything in place?" He asked those around him, receiving affirmative answers, which was to his delight. "Good. The Empire has encroached too far into the Mediterranean. First they involve themselves in Cyprus with their mercenaries and their assassins and now they are here, using more mercenaries and they will soon recruit assassins. This Manchurian Global is nothing more than a front for the Emperor and his government to exert their empire on this side of the world.

"The Suez represents one of the most vital waterways in this world and I will be damned if I am going to allow those mercenaries to 'guard' it. Those are the same men who slaughtered women and children in Cyprus like cattle! Their presence is intolerable and non-negotiable to this country.

"Ismail Nagi would have never stood for this. He would have never allowed that pathetic Lewis Ross to run the SCC into the ground. He would have stopped Manchurian Global from getting any seats on that board and he would have done what was necessary to keep the Suez in our hands. Farouk Al-Banna is not that kind of man! He has been more concerned with his slush fund than he is with the running of this country. Now he is old, feeble, and spent.

"He spent years on his back or with a drink in his hand and what has he to show for it? He has lost us the most precious resource and source of economic prosperity that we had. No other country could lose such a resource and hope to survive. He hopes that we will subside on the fees and taxes from Manchurian Global but what will they do? They will show losses. They will 'prove' on their books that they cannot make money on the Suez Canal and that they cannot pay the taxes required because they will not have gained a profit.

"We know they can cook their books. What corporation as big as they are cannot? It is second nature to them and so what will we have? We will have nothing. Al-Banna will not repair the roads or keep the power current flowing because he will have no revenue. Manchurian Global will not provide for us. Why should they? They are merely owners of the Suez Canal, a most 'unprofitable' venture - they will say.

"We must act!" He concluded, finishing what was a very impassioned and well-rehearsed speech.

"Surely we cannot think that we can take on these mercenaries by ourselves. They might be mercenaries of this company but this company is backed by one of the largest fighting forces in the world. One of their marine divisions has more men and firepower than our entire military has." Lieutenant General Saleh answered, "Surely they will send their marines!"

"They will but that is why we will not provoke them. We have other plans, plans that I cannot share just yet. Rest assured though that this is a long game. Is there any opposition to launching at 23:00?" No one objected, "Then that is when we shall do this. How many men are on duty right now?"

"Two hundred at most," Saleh answered, "in an hour we will have two thousand and when we launch it will be five thousand. By the morning, we will have every man in our armed forces at their post."

"Good, this is when we are most vulnerable so let us stay sharp."

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Mon Jul 23, 2018 7:43 pm

• • • † • • •

Thursday, January 4, 1990| 23:00 hrs [UTC+2]
El-Qantara el-Sharqîya, Republic of the Sinai | Sinai Army HQ
30° 52' 6" N, 32° 20' 3" E

El-Qantara was a city that spanned both sides of the Suez Canal and as such, it belonged to separate nation-states with those on the eastern bank occupying El-Qantara el-Sharqîya, the Republic of the Sinai. When the Sinai military established its headquarters at El-Qantara el-Sharqîya, it had done so by occupying an 800-acre tract of land just east of the main bulk of the city's eastern districts. Some expansion had happened to the north but the military headquarters remained where it was. Nowadays, it was used not only as the administrative headquarters of the military but also where new recruits were trained and where the military's Special Tactics Company was based. It was also where General Gohar had, two hours earlier, finalized plans for a coup to overthrow President Farouk Al-Banna.

Since then, the executive leadership of the Sinai military had dispersed throughout the country to ensure that they were strategically placed if the coup went awry or in case it needed some additional support. General Gohar had remained at the headquarters because he intended to lead the coup from the front and to do so meant to go in with his premier operations unit, the Special Tactics Company, a 74-man force that was the equivalent to a special operations unit though they were not implicitly one. The STC mostly carried out reconnaissance missions but they could also be used for hostage situations and other high-risk operations where a more specialized unit was required. In several instances, they were employed as a SWAT-type unit for the civilian police force since there were no SWAT units within Sinai's police authority.

Tonight, they would be leading the assault on the Presidential Palace and when the sound of beating rotor blades filled the still, night air, they knew that the time to go was nearly upon them. For the residents of El-Qantara el-Sharqîya, the sound of helicopters would be an unusual sound for this hour, more so because the military was largely nine-to-five. Yet there would be no mistaking the twelve helicopters of the Sinai Air Defense Force approaching the military headquarters and landing, having flown in from their base at Bir Gifgafa Air Base, some ninety-three kilometers away. Bir Gifgafa was the only operational airfield for the Sinai military and all forty of its aircraft were based there.

The helicopter force consisted of four UH-1C Huey gunships, each equipped with a pair of 7-round rocket pods and four M60C Light Machine Guns fed by six thousand rounds of ammunition, fifteen hundred rounds per gun. This was a tremendous amount of firepower but the gunships were all eclipsed by some of the more dedicated attack helicopters that had been built since the 1960s. The rest of the force consisted of eight UH-1D Huey helicopters, each of which was crewed by two pilots and two door gunners, each operating an M60D Light Machine Gun. The UH-1Ds could carry up to twelve men each.

The STC was split into two platoons, each consisting of thirty-seven men arranged in a 2-man headquarters unit, three 9-man rifle squads, and one 8-man weapons squad. One squad went into each of the eight helicopters with the platoon leadership finding homes where it was necessary, usually the platoon leader with an infantry squad and the assistant platoon leader with the weapons squad so that leadership was dispersed throughout the unit. The assault plan would involve all eight helicopters hovering over parts of the Presidential Palace grounds and the soldiers fast-roping onto the ground. It was something that the STC had practiced many times prior, even at night, but not something they regularly employed, especially not in a hostile situation such as there could be this evening.

By and large, the military was on board with the coup and those who were iffy were kept out of the loop or put under surveillance to ensure they did not do anything foolish. General Gohar didn't want to lose men and he believed that each and every man in the military would support his coup eventually. If they didn't do it prior to the launch, they would do it afterwards and for that reason, he kept it need-to-know, for obvious reasons beyond the support of his men. Yet there was one loose element, Colonel Farid Hajjar, who led the Presidential Guard. Gohar had secured Hajjar's support early on in the planning but he did not allow Hajjar in on the planning because he did not trust him fully. He trusted him enough to approach him with the offer but not enough to show him the details and Gohar knew precisely what weapons Hajjar's men had acquired recently thanks to Al-Banna's corrupt dealings with Manchurian Global.

For that reason, Gohar turned to the STC to lead the charge, knowing that if anyone could secure the Presidential Palace it would be them. To assist them, Lieutenant Anwar Saleh was deploying the country's armored units around Port Said under the auspices of a training exercise against civil disorder. Throughout Port Said, the rumble of M60A1 Patton tanks, M113A1 Armored Personnel Carriers, and M706 Commando armored cars cast the otherwise sleepy city into a state of restlessness. They would soon be shocked into full alertness when the helicopters arrived but that was still some time away and Saleh was careful with his placement of his armored vehicles and infantry units. He wasn't looking to tip their hand early.

The helicopter force put down at landing spots around the field which had been marked with flares and into each helicopter went the designated squads. The helicopters were down for all of thirty seconds before they were airborne again, arranging themselves into an attack formation as they skimmed over the ground at just two hundred feet above ground level and moving at some one hundred and ten knots. At that speed, they would arrive at the Presidential Palace in just fifteen minutes, flying low over the Suez Canal before turning over Port Said and making a mad dash for the Presidential Palace, where the noise would certainly alert the Presidential Guard long before they arrived.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Thursday, January 4, 1990| 23:20 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Presidential Palace
31° 16' 11" N, 32° 18' 37" E

The Presidential Palace was a very well-built mansion that sat in Port Said's northeastern quarter. The entire grounds took up precisely five acres and it was fenced in on all four sides by tall, wrought iron bars. The palace itself sat almost dead center in the plot of land, built into a rectangle that was two hundred feet long and one hundred feet wide with three above-ground stories. It had a basement that fit the exact footprint of the house though there was an escape tunnel that ran to the north first where it linked up with the sewer system and then proceeded west and north again, exiting at the beach, six hundred and fifty meters away from where it began. On the palace grounds there was a dedicated lawn for a helicopter and some gardens that were tended to by an otherwise attentive and extremely dedicated staff. All of this had been built by President Nagi and had it not been for them, President Al-Banna would have let everything fall into disrepair. He had no interest in the way the grounds looked, unlike President Nagi who wanted the grounds to show the beauty of his country to the world.

President Farouk Al-Banna was hardly interested in these matters. He was more interested in his slush fund and he did as little work as he could. He normally conducted business from the hours of 09:00 to 16:00 and sometimes not even that late. If he was forced to entertain guests in the evening, he did so prior to 21:00, when he would cut off any and all meetings because by 22:00, he was in bed and asleep shortly thereafter. His routine was reliable and the same day-in and day-out such so that General Gohar did not feel the need to assign a dedicated unit to watch over and contain his target. He knew precisely where President Al-Banna would be and so it would be easy to secure him, at least so long as Colonel Hajjar held up his end of the bargain but this was the mystery.

Hajjar could not guarantee how the unit on duty that even would reach to an assault on the palace grounds. He plead that if he altered the schedules and changed the units around to one he could guarantee then his people would grow suspicious as such changes never occurred. General Gohar was most displeased with this but he also knew that though Hajjar's men had fancy, new toys, they had little - if any - training with them. He was confident that their man-portable, air-defense missiles would be unused by the Presidential Guard for fear of firing them haphazardly and missing the target with the precious few rounds they had. He was also confident that no one would move to the escape tunnel because President Al-Banna would not want to get his clothes dirty in the sewers but just in case, he had Lieutenant General Saleh station a mechanized squad at the tunnel's exit.

Riding with the helicopters, General Gohar was in the lead UH-1D Huey as it approached the city. The formation was being led by a pair of UH-1Cs flying approximately two kilometers ahead of the main formation with the other pair taking up the rear. The plan would have both UH-1Cs fly over the Presidential Palace at very low altitude and draw any fire from the ground personnel before the UH-1Ds came in for landing. The two UH-1Cs in the trail position would provide support for the assault force, as would the door gunners. Gohar knew that the most dangerous time would be the fast roping and that his men would have to clear the lines quickly. He'd had the STC install quick-release rigs on each of the UH-1Ds like other military's had so that they could drop the heavy, nylon ropes once the last man was off, thus shedding weight and removing a major obstacle.

Two helicopters would deposit men on the roof while the rest would drop men all around the grounds. The helicopter carrying General Gohar would touch down on the landing pad, the only exception to the fast roping method of insertion. The plan was to put all men on the ground in less than thirty seconds, which would require impressive coordination by all parties but it could be done. Everyone had a part to play, from the pilots who flew in and held their helicopters aloft just ten to twenty feet above the ground to the door gunners who would engage hostiles to the co-pilots who would release the ropes from a lever near them to the actual soldiers who would slide down those ropes with nothing more than six to nine feet of spacing between them and the guys below and above them with as many as three men on a rope at once, all landing on the ground just a few feet apart from one another.

The helicopter force stayed roughly two hundred feet above the ground until they reached the southern limits of Port Said, at which point they dropped even lower and skimmed over the city, passing just over rooftops and no higher. They followed the map of the city that each of them knew in their heads and continued onward, using their low altitude and the echoes of the city's structures to mask their position as best as they could. Unfortunately, they were flying without night vision goggles so the helicopters were forced to keep some of their navigation lights on but solely the red ones in hope that while they could see the lights, they would not be visible from far away owing to the nature of red light.

Two kilometers ahead of the force, the two UH-1C Hueys passed over the Presidential Palace at low altitude and high speed, peeling off in opposite directions to present two targets for the guards on the ground. At any moment, the pilots in those gunships expected to see the muzzle flashes of assault rifles firing up at them or the bright streaks of surface-to-air missiles coming their way. The two helicopters did a very quick turn and came overhead again, running in opposite directions across the palace's grounds at barely one hundred feet in the air. They banked hard, expecting ground fire again, and cleared the rest of the force into the area.

Those eight UH-1D Hueys came in rapidly, the pilots flaring the helicopters at last minute, turning them from nearly one hundred and thirty miles per hour of forward speed to just a few miles per hour so that they could walk the ropes and deploy their passengers. The helicopters rotated so that the door gunners could engage any targets and the ropes were deployed by the soldiers inside of the helicopter, pushing the weighted bags out of the cabin. The ropes unfurled before them, though in two cases, the latching mechanism broke, reducing two helicopters to just one rope each. They would have other troubles at pull out when two further ropes refused to detach on two separate helicopters, forcing them to fly higher to avoid snagging their ropes on anything.

Two-by-two, or in the case of those helicopters with only one rope, one-by-one, the soldiers poured onto the roof and the grounds of the Presidential Palace. Their M3A1 Grease Guns and shotguns, the main weapon that they were carrying, were up and ready while the machine gunners held their M60s. The UH-1Cs continued to circle overhead, looking for muzzle flashes or signs of a hostile force on the ground but they saw none, as the UH-1D door gunners saw none, and as the men on the exterior saw none.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Tue Jul 31, 2018 7:33 pm

• • • † • • •

Thursday, January 4, 1990| 23:22 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Presidential Palace
31° 16' 11" N, 32° 18' 37" E

The Presidential Guard Battalion was an otherwise small battalion with only two hundred and sixteen men arranged into a 20-man HQ unit and two, 98-man companies. Each company was further broken down into a 6-man HQ element, an 8-man anti-tank or anti-air element, and three, 28-man platoons. Those platoons were further broken down into a 4-man HQ element and three, 8-man squads. It was a mechanized unit and they were armed with M113A1 Armored Personnel Carriers as a standard. There was talk of them acquiring M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles. There would need to be some reorganization if that were to happen as the M113 only had a 2-man crew and the M2 had a 3-man crew. Further, the M2 could only hold six men while the M113 could hold as many as eleven men. At any given time, there were sixty-six men on guard duty at the Presidential Palace. There was the HQ element from the on-duty company, one 2-man anti-tank and one 2-man anti-aircraft team, and two platoons.

The insertion of Gohar and his assault force was done rapidly and without incident. Gohar would later find out that Colonel Hajjar had held up his end of the bargain by informing the company commander ahead of time about a snap, military training exercise using the STC. He explained that the transfer of the Suez Canal had made the military uneasy and the top brass was worried that the transfer was a means to a Layartebian-sponsored annexation of the Republic of the Sinai. Knowing that the Layartebian military liked to fight at night and go for command and control targets at H-hour, the brass had cooked up a readiness exercise on very little warning to test where the military's faults were. The plan would involve a helicopter assault unit move to the Presidential Palace and insert as a reinforcement force. Armored and mechanized units would cordon off the area, providing a safety net. When asked why the STC had been chosen and not the rest of the Presidential Guard, Hajjar explained that the STC was the premier shock force and they had the most capable equipment. They were also one of the few units in the Sinai military capable of nighttime operations of this nature.

So, when the UH-1Cs and UH-1Ds zoomed overhead, the two platoons of Presidential Guards were ready but aware of what was happening. Gohar's helicopter put down and he stepped out along with his men while the other UH-1Ds provided fast rope insertion. Their door gunners scanned for targets, watching the soldiers of the PGB, something which made those men uneasy. Looking at the business end of machine guns wasn't comfortable for any soldier, regardless of whether or not those barrels were friendly or not. The ropes were cut free though there were some malfunctions with the equipment. The UH-1Ds now cleared away to provide fire support via their machine gunners. As they did, the STC units formed up and began to take into custody the soldiers of the PGB, disarming them and restraining them with plastic tie wraps. This is where things seemed to be problematic and watching this, the company commander on duty, a major by the name of Adham Abdul-Razzaq Toma realized that something was wrong, that he had been lied to by his superior officer. Yet it wasn't until his eyes set up Gohar on the ground that he saw what was happening for what it was.

Quickly grabbing his radio, he depressed the transmit button on the microphone and shouted, "Defend the Palace! This is a coup! Defend the Palace! This is a coup!" Almost immediately, he dropped the microphone, grabbed his pistol and any men near him, and sprinted towards Al-Banna's bedroom. He arrived just as the first reports of automatic rifle fire echoed into the night. Bursting through the door with his pistol in hand, Toma flipped on the lights to a very aware and startled President Farouk Al-Banna who demanded to know what was happening. Toma responded curtly, quickly, and without remorse, "There is a coup! General Gohar is leading it outside sir! We have to get you out of here and to the escape tunnel now!"

"No!" Al-Banna immediately protested but not clarifying what he was protesting to, the tunnel or the coup itself. Only when he was pressed did he clarify, "I will not go into that tunnel. I am going to remain here and you and your men are going to protect me. Where are the reinforcements?"

"I will call them now sir! Get away from the windows and come with me. There is a better place for us to fortify." He issued a few orders to the men around him and Al-Banna proceeded quickly after Toma. He was taking him to an interior room with no windows but with access to the escape ladder via a closet. It would be in there that they could hold out for a lengthy time, as there was ample ammunition and the door was armored. If they were forced to withdraw, they could do so down the escape ladder. He grabbed his radio with him and issued orders to his men to reinforce the stairwells both up and down.

As he did so, the men who had landed on the roof were already in the stairwells. They had moved quickly, taking the half-dozen men on the roof into custody quickly. This included the two snipers attached to the two platoons. Their neutralization was crucial as they were the most competent marksmen in the entire bunch and the primary target for the roof teams. The other men were machine gunners and grenadiers, equipped with weaponry that could play havoc to the assault force at ground-level. Once in the stairwells however, they moved more slowly, fearful of ambush around the corner. Gunfire had erupted and so the jig was up but they'd gotten far enough via the insert that the entire assault force was combat effective.

Locking himself in the armored safe room, Toma, the President, and several men quickly broke out the ammunition and the weapons. A slot that only they could open and close was kept closed and latched but if they needed to, they could open it up and pour automatic rifle fire through it, cutting down anyone standing in front of the door. They intended to hide in there as long as possible, rather than use the door slot as an ambush tactic, fearful that it would incite assault. While doing so, Toma called for reinforcements but Hajjar had planned for this eventuality and those reinforcements were already under custody, surrounded by armored vehicles and armed soldiers. Hajjar himself was a "captive" but only because he needed to save face with his men until Al-Banna was removed from power, lest they recognize their ability to counteract the coup. The force which surrounded them was certainly large but not nearly as large as it was made out to be.

On the grounds, the battle was much more even. There was little in the way of cover for the assault force and they were forced to dive behind anything they could for protection against the defending PGB soldiers. The fusillade of both forces was deafening and men were getting hit left and right on both side. UH-1Ds orbiting with their M60 gunners opened fire and were effective but they too were taking fire. What made matters worse was that while the anti-tank team had been neutralized, the anti-air team had its whereabouts unknown, introducing that element of risk to the operation. The PGB had Stinger missiles and the UH-1s had no defense against them whatsoever. Their only defense was seeing the launching team in time and hoping to shoot them with whatever weapons were available, hopefully fast enough.

Outside, the battle had largely become stalemated quickly and it was here that the casualties would mount. Inside however, the roof teams had hit the top floor. What few soldiers were inside and able to mount a defense at the stairwells were swept aside rather quickly by the overwhelming speed and precision executed by the assault teams. With their M3s, the STC soldiers were able to maneuver much more effectively than their opposition was. Rounds flew back and forth, this way and that, and one-by-one, the defenders fell back further and further. Inside of the armored safe room, Toma and Al-Banna knew precisely what was happening and what was going to happen and yet again, Toma pushed Al-Banna to use the escape ladder and for a second time, Al-Banna refused. Toma had a right mind to force him down there at gunpoint but he didn't act on it.

For the assaulting force, the armored safe room was a known fallback location. They checked Al-Banna's private quarters to find it empty and so they moved to the safe room rapidly, being equipped to deal with the door. There was little resistance left between them and the armored safe room and what presented a target was immediately swept aside by the assaulting force until finally they arrived at the safe room. With demolition charges available to blow the door, they moved rapidly to it and Toma heard their approach. Putting aside his pistol, he picked up the light machine gun that he had within there with him and ordered one of the two soldiers with him to open the slot. As they did so, he went cyclic on the trigger, sweeping back and forth, spraying the area with high-powered rifle rounds. The occupation of the armored safe room caught the attackers by surprise and two were mortally wounded while the rest dove for cover.

Inside of the safe room, Toma quickly ordered Al-Banna into the escape exit and Al-Banna nodded. One soldier went with him while the other stayed with Toma to open and close the slit. Outside, the assault force dragged their wounded away and moved in on their stomachs, placing the charges at the bottom of the door. They cleared away quickly and as the slit opened again, the charges detonated. The explosive force was much more than the door was built to withstand and it lifted it clear off its hinges, blowing it backwards. Toma and the soldier with him were killed instantly as the heavy door threw them backwards and into the wall behind them. At the same time, debris from the explosion and the concussion wave continued into the access to the escape tunnel. The soldier, already at the bottom of the stairwell, was waiting for Al-Banna to come down the ladder when the explosion rocked the room. Al-Banna was quickly rocked by the concussion wave and he quickly lost his grip on the ladder. It was all over from there and he fell from roughly the second floor of the Presidential Palace down into the basement, a fall of well over forty feet. For the soldier below, there was little he could do but watch as Al-Banna struck the ladder several times on the way down, ultimately becoming a limp ragdoll before he reached the bottom.

For the soldier down below, Al-Banna was the goal and he caught the falling man though he was knocked backwards from it. The two fell to the ground and the soldier quickly recovered himself and assessed Al-Banna's condition but it was no use, the man's skull was cracked, having hit his head on several rungs of the ladder on the way down. He had no pulse and he wasn't visibly breathing, thus dead by accident.

Over the next twenty minutes, resistance at the Presidential Palace died out gradually. The STC hit the Presidential Palace with a force of seventy-eight men, plus aerial support, and led by General Gohar. The PGB had sixty-six men led by Major Toma and in the end, the casualties were severe for both units. Slowly, the PGB had their positions overwhelmed where some surrendered and others fought. Of the sixty-six men, thirty-nine were killed, fourteen were severely wounded, and the remaining thirteen were captured, including the sole soldier who'd survived from the armored safe room. The STC suffered nineteen killed and twenty-eight severely wounded. It was, for all of these men, their first experience with a combat situation and though the STC was victorious, it didn't feel like much of a victory when the bodies were counted. General Gohar, hoping that this would be a bloodless coup, had nothing but grief in his heart when he saw the effect of the assault. President Al-Banna's accidental death was, to say the least, disappointing in every way possible.

• • • † • • •

by **Itailian Maifias** » Thu Aug 02, 2018 2:36 pm

Heavy Sails
His Grace, Sigmund von Saxe-Plantagenet, Grand Duke of Hesse
Penthouse Suite, Sinai Grand Hotel
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai (31° 16' 15" N, 32° 18' 55" E)
July 17, 1989; 0930 Hrs [UTC+2]

"Marcus, where's my suitcase with the garment bags inside?"

Sigmund turned on his heels to try and find the black coated aide that was still fumbling out of the doors of the penthouse's elevator, his hands trying to carry a overly-large suitcase, monograms on either side with Sigmund's initials, and Sigmund watched as the man brought both over to the gigantic, blue clothed bed that Sigmund had been standing in front of and then Marcus carefully placed the left suitcase on the bed for his boss "Your black and burgundy suit and accessories for them are in here Your Grace, we're still bringing everything else up from the car."

Sigmund nodded "Excellent, and have your rooms been confirmed?"

Marcus nodded "Indeed. Apparently the executive suit below us was already taken, so we've taken some rooms on the next floor down but that won't disrupt us from getting here and assisting you."

Sigmund frowned "Well that's a nuisance isn't it, I swore the hotel manager had promised us that suite. Well, whatever, I'm going to be in the office if you need me, I have calls to make that can't be interrupted by the elevator door dinging every sixty seconds."

Marcus nodded and then left to return to his work, and Sigmund opened up the left side pocket on the suitcase that had just been delivered and pulled out the black brick looking thing; one of the newest so called cel;l phones on the market, his chief of staff had bought it for him to use on the trip as he couldn't make it and knew Sigmund would always be talking, working and on the go - his chief of staff hadn't changed in three decades and knew him better then some of his closest friends and family; Sigmund just hoped this new technology worked.

He walked across the fine sand colored marble floor and moved towards the first room that departed from the open living room/bedroom; contrasting the wide space that served as the living and bedroom, the office or den was a much more tight affair, with the floor being expertly made Brazilian rosewood, and red stucco decorating the entrance-way and roof trim all across the room. Inside, the walls were lined by handcrafted wooden bookcases, further refined with a dark stain by the Bohemian company that made it, though the cases did part at the center of the northern wall where there was a tile lined fireplace and then in the eastern corner was a large, simple desk that had Sigmund's signature black leather portfolio already placed there by his staff. He headed over to the desk and pulled the chair out from under the desk and sat down, opening the portfolio and flipping through the legal pad on the right, where he had written a number of prepared notes earlier before he had embarked on his trip last week. Finding what he was looking for on the eighth page, he reviewed some information he had copied down about the Suez Canal Company and some other associating info related to it and the phone call he was about to receive. Sure enough, within three minutes the mobiel phone began ringing and he opened up its case and flipped it down before hitting the accept call button on the keypad and placing the phone to his ear "Your Grace, Sir Edmund Norris for you."

"Pleasure to hear from your Sir, care to bring me up to speed on everything?"

"Later today, I'll be attending the board meeting for the SCC where Mr.Lewis is going to go over our financial statement for the quarter as well as how we have been doing for the year so far. As some of my staff have confirmed for me, he is undoubtedly going to mention that it continues to operate in the red."

Sigmund sighed "Any clue by how much?"

There was a slight pause, undoubtedly as Norris looked over some papers or something and then there was a reply "The company has been in the red for the last five to eight years, though it has grown more and more steadily with each year. Eight years it used to get close to the black for a few periods, now we're solidly in the red; I'd estimate a further 4% growth on the company's debt for this fiscal year, let alone quarter."

"And?"

Norris sighed "Outlook isn't great, you don't need be a teaching professor on macroeconomics to see that. Within a few years, insolvency will be unavoidable as the income won't even be enough to cover basic expenses. Furthermore, I don't like having MG on the board, haven't since the buyout. Plus some of my people tell me Ferrari showed up in town this time with a larger then usual entourage, and I'm worried he's going to get more aggressive with the expansion idea one of these times."

"Remind me why that's a bad thing."

Sigmund could hear the sigh from the other end, and figured immediately he had walked into a dead horse of a subject "It's been brought up frequently by MG, OAS, or the native representative as a means to alleve the profit shortfalls; right now, transit times are ludicrously long, so naturally an expansion would help, but the issue is the SCC doesn't have the money."

"How much are we talking?"

"By my own estimates? 6-8 and a half billion pounds, easy; and the problem is compounded further by the fact that SCC still hasn't returned on Summit Capital's initial investment, so they won't loan any money and honestly, another loan is completely fiscally irresponsible to even consider assuming we could even find someone willing to loan that kind of capital."

"Damn; I don't suppose you've talked with Bone at all about us possibly lending a hand?"

A sardonic chuckle slipped out of Norris's lips before he could manage a reply "Boney help with that kind of money? I take it you haven't watched him in Parliament lately."

Sigmund shrugged "No I haven't, to be honest I was incredibly annoyed NAP couldn't manage to beat him and the Tories in the last election and I can't stand to watch the blithering man flap his gums and then never do anything."

Norris laughed "Indeed, well suffice to say it would be an uphill battle for you, a member of the Imperial family and a noble, to convince him of the need to help here, let alone for a single professor at King's to persuade him that we need to spend nearly 9 billion pounds on a infrastructure not even in our own country. No, it isn't going to happen, and that is what concerns me, because if MG forces the issue I'm afraid of where that will lead us."

"Indeed, well I'm here in Sinai and North Africa for the next three weeks on business affairs; I'm traveling to Jerusalem later this week to meet with some contacts, and then its up to Aleppo, so hopefully I can find you an answer. Good luck at your meeting."

There was a click and the phone call concluded, and Sigmund refolded the phone back to its closed state and then turned his mind towards his notes before he made a few more phone calls to conduct, reaching out to some people he knew, and some he didn't, in country.

Lionel Sefton
Mehrjoo's Cafe
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai (31°16'11.73"N 32°17'50.99"E)
July 17, 1989; 1015 Hrs [UTC+2]

Take the road of gold, and mind the red fields The phrase Lionel kept playing over and over in his head, as he tried to keep himself calm - he knew outwardly he looked every bit the part of a European business man here on a business trip, as his nice but not flashy grey suit and polished black shoes stuck out from the local Egyptian populace that were all going about their part of the day as they walked by Lionel who had taken up a chair at the outdoor cafe here on the side of the busy A31 street. Despite it being his first time conducting his work outside of the country, Lionel wasn't worried about the operation going awry- he was more concerned that he was going to get burned by some local. After spending his first years in the trade cutting his teeth in the domestic bureau, he had a hard time liking operations placing alot of faith on locally developed contacts, but alas, it was something he didn't have a choice on.

The phrase itself to a normal person may have sounded like something out of a bad poetry book found in some bargain bin at an airport, like the one Lionel had pulled a newspaper that he had read for a few moments and then discarded, but it informed him of what to look for in his next contact. He had already been briefed on the op back home in Lyon office, but he hadn't known what his contact was to look like, or their name even. Just the code phrase, which told him they'd be wearing some form of gold or yellow shoes or arrive in a similarly colored car, and they would be wearing some form of red pants or robe.

He took an idle sip from his coffee that he had ordered earlier as his eyes kept scanning the busy road and the sidewalk, watching the number of people walking by, before he spotted someone who had who had taken a few hard stares at Lionel. He played it off and didn't stare but did notice the man was wearing faded red trousers and had a tarnished gold belt buckle that still shone in the bright sunlight that covered the whole city, and Lionel pretended to mind his business as he kept an eye on this individual until after a few moments, the man approached Lionel at his table and beckoned to chair opposite of Lionel "Are you saving this chair for someone sir?"

Lionel smiled "Only for friends of the blue sky."

The man smiled back and took a seat "It indeed is a beautiful day isn't it. Have you seen today's news by any chance?"

Lionel shook his head "I'm afraid not, I was running behind on my schedule this morning. What turns the world this new day?"

The man broke into a wide smile and pulled a folded up newspaper out from his back pocket and placed it on the table, pushing it towards Lionel "You should read the sports section, the way our footballers played yesterday was something history worthy."

Lionel took the newspaper and placed it on his lap "Indeed, I will have to read it then."

"Yes you shall! By the way, our friend Abasi told me to let you know he is still holding that lunch today at his new market. He opened it near our football stadium, he probably invited some of the players from yesterday as well so you could congratulate them on their performance while you're there!"

So he's warning me that there may be locals present and I should watch myself

"Well, I will look forward to it then, I better leave now if I hope to make it there in time; I rather hate turning up late."

Lionel stood up from the table and left behind a few bills of the local currency to pay for the drink, and his friend bade him a farewell "Indeed my friend, safe travels!"

Lionel took a few strides and took a stance along the side of the road, near a taxi stall and waited patiently before one of the liveried cabs pulled up, and he quickly climbed into the back and directly asked the driver to take him to the football stadiums in the south of the city. As the driver took off, some local music playing softly on the radio, Lionel carefully opened up the newspaper and found that a manila envelope had been inserted between the page and fell into his lap once he unrolled the paper. He looked up to make sure the driver was focusing only on the road and he quickly opened the folder and removed its contents, looking at them briefly. The first thing was a matchbox, covered in Egyptian language markings and some icons of local companies he presumed, he knew this was in realty a camera. He carefully tucked that into a pocket inside his jacket before he looked at the second item, which was a pen that he recognized from training; if he remembered correctly it would allow him to record conversations. The last two items were things he expected, one was a heavy looking sat phone that had been dressed up to look like a popular mobile phone that had come out the decade before, and last thing was a coin, which he knew was hollowed out and could allow him to store things inside. He put all the items into his coat pockets and then put the folder at the end of the newspaper, pretending for the rest of the ride like he was reading it.

It would only take his driver a little less then ten minutes to navigate through airport, port, and tourist traffic and get to the less dense southern parts of the city, where all the developments were newer houses or unoccupied, yet soon to be, cleared fields. This particular section of the city had four football stadiums and then a number of local businesses and homes around them, and Lionel had already checked the sports page of his paper where someone had written down the description of a store, to know where he was headed. The driver pulled up to drop him off by the first and smallest of the stadiums, and Lionel mumbled a thank you and handed him a few notes of the currency he had on him and then stepped out of the cab, checking towards either direction before he quickly crossed the two lane street. The store he needed to go to he found down an alleyway that bisected two sets of storefronts, the blue door being the identifying mark he was going for. He found the door and knocked on it a few times before it was opened slightly and a man's face, the brown skin and dark eyes just peeking over the edge of the door, examined him before the door was opened wide and revealed a Egyptian man, wearing blue and yellow robes that were covered in dust and dirt, and he beckoned Lionel inside. "Come in my friend, quickly."

Lionel walked up the short set of stairs that led into the house and took four steps over the threshold, placing him just inside the small foyer as the man closed the door behind him, his eyes taking note that to the right was a wall that then led into a set of stairs that would take one to the next floor while if you continued straight it went down a narrow hallway with doors on the left side. The man, presumably this Abasi, did all the locks on the door and then walked in front of Lionel and looked him in the eye "You're the one they sent eh?"

Lionel was unsure of what to make of this, so he just nodded "Indeed sir."

Abasi nodded and then gestured to the stairs "Did they tell you about this place?"

Lionel looked around with his eyes, scanning the room before he answered, and Abasi noticed this and added "Don't worry, I sweep this place a number of times every week, we're clear to talk here; reinforced stone brick, nobody is eavesdropping."

"Make contact with the network in country, and they said we'd go from there."

Abasi snorted "So that's their name for us now, 'the network'. I forget how disconnected and unemotional you Europeans can be with this kind of work."

Lionel shrugged "Big hearts don't last in this market."

Another snort from Abasi, though this time it was also joined by a small smile "Indeed they don't. Well, this will be your safe house for your time here, we made a room for you up on the top floor, tan door. Here, follow me."

Abasi moved to walk up the stairs and Lionel joined him, and within a few seconds they were up on the second floor. It was mostly just a single room that was wide open, though all windows had been covered up with either some form of boarding or curtains, or both. All along the walls were a number of desks or tables, and on them was a number of computers, printers, fax machine, surveillance equipment, radios and other various devices. There was three other men seated along various sections of this assortment of equipment; two were in front of radios with large headsets over their ears and a pad of paper in front of both as they transcribed information down onto them, while the final man was seated in front of one of the computers and was busy working on something that Lionel couldn't make out on the screen. Abasi gestured towards all of the equipment as he led Lionel to a couch placed near the wall to what Lionel assumed was the bedroom Abasi had mentioned, and Lionel took a seat with him as the man began explaining things "We've been set up here for some time; I think the last eight months or so. I've been in charge of the network here since G left to go back to Europe, and we've only grown since then. Most of our work here is monitoring signals and intercepting them, or collecting data that our hands out in the field are bringing in. Primarily, we have a number of men and women inside critical institutions such as the mail office, the port, the airport, all the major hotels here and in the big cities in Sinai, as well as some in the air force. "

"Whats all this effort for?"

"Mostly to ensure that the President doesn't live up to his predecessor's ambitions, and the same goes for any potential replacements for him down the road. The canal, as you're aware, is one of the most strategic in the world and it is important that it remains open and not controlled by some megalomaniac. Additionally, given the fractured nature of the Egyptian region these days, it behooves us to ensure that we keep things under a good watch."

Lionel nodded "So, what's come up?"

Abasi tossed a file from the end table where it had been to Lionel, who caught it with two hands and began flicking through the files, a number of them developed photographs of individuals, locations and documents. "What's the brief version of this?"

"We think something may be up with the armed forces; quiet movement of personnel, and we became aware that Al-Banna has begun seeking out new armaments for his so called Presidential Guard. Overtures were made to some companies back home, ended up falling through because of lack of funds or what I presume is DMI interference."

Lionel nodded "So what's my next step?"

"We needed a trained Sixer around, but we're going to have you have a dinner with a commander in a unit of the Sinai Army. Your cover is John Comtois, a manager of a H&K plant south of Munich. You're going to offer to slip him some basic hardware, rifles, SMG's, stuff like that, and then he is going to probably push for vehicles. You're going to need his assured loyalty, and need to explain trust needs to be built before we can progress to that stage."

Lionel nodded again "6 already secured the equipment?"

"Yes, some of your men from 4 brought it in last week ahead of time."

"What's the end game?"

Abasi shrugged "Six hasn't kept me in the loop with that, as far as I can figure, in the short term its infiltration of the government to ensure our influence here versus Layarteb, and in the long game, perhaps its something to resuming the old days ala less opaque control."

Lionel nodded "Is the dinner with this commander tonight?"

Abasi nodded "Indeed, you'll find the details in a file in your room, as well as a suitable change of clothes."

Lionel smiled "Well, I better get to it then, I have alot to catch up on."

by **Layarteb** » Fri Aug 03, 2018 7:27 pm

• • • † • • •

Friday, January 5^th, 1990 | 01:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai | Presidential Palace
31° 16' 11" N, 32° 18' 37" E

The Presidential Palace was secure and the Sinai Army was deployed throughout Port Said and the Sinai Peninsula at key positions. As dawn came, more and more men reported to their posts and their stations, curious as to what was happening. The city was restless, undoubtedly from the sounds of battle that had originated at the Presidential Palace just after 23:00 hours, when many people were asleep or lying down to go to sleep. By 01:00, the bodies had been taken away and the wounded brought to the military hospital only a kilometer away. Port Said had twenty hospitals and clinics alone but the military hospital was one of the better ones and it could support helicopter landings. The wounded were bunched together with no differences being made between the put schists and the patriots, which led to some emergency room troubles but the doctors didn't care. All they focused on was saving their patients.

At the Presidential Palace, Al-Banna's body had been raised from the tunnel and brought to the bedroom where it had been lain on the bed. Despite him being "the enemy," respects were paid since his death was unintentional. From there, the leaders of the coup convened within the Presidential Palace's Cabinet Briefing Room, a spacious room where the entire government of the Republic of the Sinai regularly met to conduct their affairs. At this late hour however, it was populated only by five men. Seated at the center of the table was General Gohar, right where the President sat. The other four sat around the table so that no one would have to turn awkwardly to see or speak to anyone else. Beyond General Gohar there were the three military chiefs and Colonel Hajjar who, for his contribution, would be the fifth member of the junta about to be formed.

"This was not how I had hoped it would go," Gohar began, addressing the others for the first time since the coup had been agreed upon hours earlier. "The casualties were great, too great if you ask me, and we lost Al-Banna. My aim was to depose the man, not see to his demise. Now he will become a symbol of resistance and this junta will be labeled murderous by our enemies, specifically by the Empire."

"They would have done that anyway," Air Marshal Moustafa said, "now we've simply given them a reason whereby before they would have been 'creative' in their denouncements."

"So now what?" Colonel Hajjar asked, having been kept out of the preplanning, "Where do we go from here? We don't have the strength to unseat the Empire from the Suez Canal and we certainly don't have the money to buy Manchurian out of it."

"We are going to make their position as untenable as possible. This is a long game Colonel," said Gohar, "we need to make sure that we are prepared with patience. The Empire is not going to let their proxy simply walk away from the most vital waterway in this hemisphere."

"The Empire has a penchant for seizing these waterways. They have the Panama Canal and the Strait of Gibraltar. I am surprised they don't also take the Turkish Straits," Rear Admiral Kulthum said, "it would not be surprising if they didn't have designs for it."

"I am sure they have designs for everything but largely because a good military does," said Gohar, again taking the discussion. "I would rather we not speculate on these matters. Simply put Colonel, we will be the largest thorn in their side and we will regain control of our national pride, which Al-Banna sold for his slush fund."

"What do we intend to do with that fund?" Lieutenant General Saleh asked.

"It will be seized and given to the people. The quickest way to secure the public's support is to buy them. There should be enough in the slush fund that we can provide a 'tax refund' to all citizens of the Sinai. We simply need to gain access to the account. I would hazard we not make promises though until we get that account. The last thing we need is to overpromise and under deliver."

"Agreed, yes," Saleh responded, "that would be a terrible mistake."

"Very well. At 08:00, I will have the entire civilian government convened in this office. It is there that we will provide information as to the succession of leadership. From now on we shall rule this country as a committee, a junta it is called in the Empire. We will give them orders to continue working. Those who wish to resign will be permitted to do so. I do not intend to purge this country of its workforce. There will be many who do not agree with our leadership and that is fine. Disagreement is not a crime, nor do I intend to make it a crime. If we do this we will simply incur the wrath of the people. Instead, those who wish to resign may resign. They will not receive any pensions or benefits however as there must be punishment for resignation. What they do with their lives is not our concern. It is my hope that they depart this land.

"What will constitute a crime however is rebellion. If those who oppose us wish to take matters into their own hands and act with violence, strikes, or other coercive means then we will act. The criminal code is strict and severe in these matters."

"That is reasonable," said Hajjar, "the people must know that we acted for their benefit, not to make enemies out of them. The Empire has encroached into our territory via a proxy and that proxy is here to suck the wealth and resources of this nation into their own economic kingdom. That is the message we deliver to the people."

"Yes and no," said Moustafa. "Let us hold short here and allow me." Gohar nodded his assent, not that it was necessarily needed. The five of these men were on equal footing now, though Gohar would be the spokesman and the face of the junta. "There is no reason to call out the Empire or Manchurian. The people know what has happened and they can make up their own minds. If we announce to the world that the Empire is our mortal enemy then the Empire will be our mortal enemy from day one. They will fund a countercoup, they will look to assassinate us, they will aim economic warfare on us via embargo or outright nationalization of the Suez Canal, a move which would be in direct violation of our sovereignty and be akin to an act of war, an invasion upon our sovereign soil.

"If we announce this, we will have no recourse. The Empire can act as they will, without handcuffs because we have declared to the world our hostile intent towards the Empire. Do you see? Now if we remain silent, if we do not specifically call them out as an 'enemy of the people' then their actions must be different. They are mighty and we are small. The world will look at them as the bullies that they are and perhaps international pressure can work to our advantage. In that regard, their action must be quiet, clandestine, covert, limited. Limited evens the playing field somewhat."

"I like this," Gohar said. Heads nodded, "Perhaps the voice of reason is indeed right. We cannot act rashly. Any public statements with regards to our enemy must be reasoned first. We must talk it through and understand the consequences. The Empire is our enemy. They know it and they know we know it. They know that we know what they know. Let's not make things easy for them."

"You know, perhaps there are other powers out there willing to support us against the Empire," said Kulthum.

"There may be but we must be careful. No one is going to support us whether under or over the table out of the kindness of their heart. They'll want something in return and we don't have much to offer. We'll trade one villain for another. I hardly doubt the major powers will be willing to support us in such a way without something in return," said Gohar, cautioning his compatriots.

"Let's keep our ears and our eyes open in case. We may be able to buy time or at least buy ourselves a more cooperative situation than what we have now," Hajjar said. That seemed to elicit agreements around the table and the men called it an evening shortly thereafter. No one would be going home to sleep but rather instead to their own barracks and offices throughout the country. Gohar remained at the Presidential Palace where he found himself comfortable in another bedroom, at least until Al-Banna's room could be given a makeover of sorts to clean the upholstery, especially where his body had been lain. It was on its way to the morgue when the meeting ended and there it would remain until it could be released for burial.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Friday, January 5^th, 1990 | 13:00 hrs [UTC-5]
Layarteb City, New York | Manchurian Global HQ
40° 42' 22" N, 74° 0' 27" W

"Well, what are we going to make of this?" Mark Watson asked from the couch in David Ferrari's office. "This is a major problem for us."

"It's a speedbump is all it is," said Ferrari. These two, along with Todd Low, Chris Ruiz, and Carl Murphy were all seated on couches or chairs in Ferrari's office. News of the coup in Port Said had been plastered all over the news stations all morning and afternoon in the Empire and Manchurian's own people on the ground in Port Said had been frantic on several conference calls. The notion of a tank outside of the Manchurian Global Headquarters in Port Said had not made anyone comfortable. "We've gotten to them, don't you understand?" He smiled, "Farouk Al-Banna was a patsy and quite frankly he lacked the strength to hold onto power. It's no wonder they murderer him."

"I thought the report said it was an accident," said Ruiz.

"If you believe that sort of thing. The military is in power, the news reporters are going to say what they're told to say. They murdered him and that is the truth of it. What we have is an opportunity. This General Gohar is a nationalist and a patriot and that was why he launched that coup. These people know that if they attack the Suez Canal, our positions along the Suez Canal, that they will bring down the wrath of the Layartebian military. They probably think we are acting as proxy for the Layartebian government and I like that perception right now because it's protecting our biggest asset."

"So do we continue to proceed?" Low asked and there was hesitation in the room, except from Ferrari.

"Of course we proceed. It's a PR gold mine for us. We're expanding the Suez Canal, we're giving jobs to a record number of people, practically wiping out their unemployment number. We'll be adding infrastructure where there was none. Gohar isn't going to stop that because Gohar can't. They don't have the money for it and that was why Al-Banna let us buy the canal in the first place and why Ross couldn't get out of the hole he'd dug into so many years ago.

"We have a monopoly on that country right now. Whatever we've lost to get here is going to be made up for ten-fold when that expansion finishes."

"Then won't Gohar attack?"

"He'll never attack Todd, why would he attack? He can't afford to build it, he can't afford to maintain it, and we'll be the favorite amongst the people. The junta can't keep people employed like we can unless they hand them brooms and make them sweep the streets. That would go over real well, wouldn't it? Whatever Gohar has up his sleeve it's going to have to outlast our resources, our determination, and our profit model. They've lost even before they've begun."

"What about the government nationalizing the Suez Canal and seizing it from us?" Murphy asked. "If Gohar threatens it enough they might just do that."

"They'll have to pony up a lot of money to make it legal. We'll need to be fairly compensated and with the revenue we stand to make after the expansion is done we might just bankrupt the government," Low answered, "that's the least of our concerns. At best they can cite the anti-mercenary act, declare the Suez Canal of 'national interest,' and put their own soldiers into the Sinai to protect it. That saves us the money of paying Aegis and if anything goes wrong we just blame the government. That's a win-win really."

"Listen," Ferrari said, leaning forward, "there is nothing to worry about here. This coup is proof that we really got under their skin and they cannot stop us. We have the upper hand on Gohar, his junta, and that entire country!"

• • • † • • •

by **Itailian Maifias** » Mon Aug 06, 2018 8:26 pm

Haze in the Print
Lionel Sefton
In the Mediterranean, north of Port Said
Port Said, Republic of the Sinai (31°31'43.20"N 32°23'21.88"E)
January 5, 1990; 2215 Hrs [UTC+2]

Boat rides he was accustomed to, having grown up to a father who loved the ocean in Hull, and choppy waters of the North Sea had also made sure he got some steady sea legs young in life, but he tried to distance his questions about the integrity of this tiny dinghy as it was slowly piloted out of the port of Said, quiet at this late hour as most of the city was sleeping and the small craft's diesel motor filled the air with it's slightly tolerable rumble that made most who heard wonder if the engine was about to die. The navigator was an local who was apart of Lionel's network he had been building for the last six months, and now he was finally starting to gather some concrete results for his efforts in region, as he had managed to set up a meeting with a officer in Gohar's army through an intermediary - an arms smuggler that MI6 had known to operate in the local area and Lionel had contacted under his alias to set up this meeting, offering a hefty sum for Machlas's efforts which undoubtedly had helped in getting the grizzled smuggler to agree to help. Currently, this dinghy was taking Lionel to Machlas's luxury yacht, the Solar Eclipse, which had anchored itself a fair distance off of Sinai's coast line and once there, Lionel was to meet a Lieutenent Colonel within the Sinai Army; if his contacts in the Army were correct, it was a Sinai man called Mina Awad. Once he managed to get through introductions, the real work began as he had to sell his cover as a new arms smuggler on the scene who had managed to get a hold of some "spoiled" product from a arms factory at Mons Altier in Israel that he could sell to Aswad for a pretty fee. Through the months, his network had been able to either get inside of or get a good enough picture of what the Sinai Army and other branches were like and it was clear their equipment was reaching the end of their good years and Lionel was banking on with a strong man such as Gohar in power, he'd take the new weapons, especially from a businessman who hated the Layartebians as much as he did. Lionel shifted in his spot on the coarse wooden bench at the back of the craft and pulled the collar on his field jacket up to cover his neck from the spray of the sea and kept processing his plan of actions and thoughts as his man guided their craft towards the Solar Eclipse.

After a few minutes of travel, Lionel could make out the form of the Eclipse coming into view just ahead of them due north and he could hear the pilot coaxing more speed out of the engine as they began to grow closer and closer. Within a short time, they were pulling up alongside the aft of the yacht, where some of the crew were directing the pilot and then secured it to the yacht with some ropes and Lionel crossed over quickly. He was taken directly to the main deck by the crew, and he found a man wearing an open flared dress shirt with a suit jacket on smoking a cigar out of a lounge chair who he took to be Machlas; he had only seen the man through some grainy photos supplied by MI4 staffers. He put on his best smile and walked up to the man's side, taking the offered hand and shaking it "Mr. Machlas, a pleasure to meet you, John Comtois."

Machlas put his cigar into his off hand and gave Lionel a big, Greek hug before breaking away to sit back down and offering Lionel the chair on the other side of him, bearing a beaming smile as he smoked and took some sips from a glass of liqour "Mr.Comtois, John if I may, quite a pleasure to finally meet you, our shared associates have much to tell of you."

John chuckled as he took a seat on the end of the deck chair "Hopefully only good things sir."

Machlas continued smiling and shrugged "Naturally; I always enjoy helping others complete successful business arrangements, and I am especially honored to help a newcomer to the area meet some new friends."

"Speaking of our friend, is he here yet?"

"Yes, he got here a few hours ahead of you and I believe was just changing in his suite and then meeting us up here for some drinks and cigars. I already had my crew inform him of your arrival so he should be here shortly."

Within a few moments, after Lionel and Machlas had discussed some trivial topics, a man that had come up the stairs to the main deck, wearing a Sinai military uniform with his hair kept cropped short in a traditional military haircut, he looked every bit as military even if he didn't have the uniform on. Machlas stood up once he saw him approaching and walked over and shook hands with the man and beckoned him over to join Lionel and himself, the three of them now sitting together in a circle on deck chairs "My friend Aswad, this is my new friend John that I've been telling you about!"

Lionel noticed Aswad carefully examining Lionel and he returned the gaze with a nod and a smile "Sir, a pleasure to meet you, Mr.Comtois."

"What brings a Frenchman this far south?"

John chuckled "Business trip I'm afraid, looking to wrap things up shortly."

Machlas prodded Aswad with a teasing elbow "And he's been looking for some help on offloading the last of his delicious products, and I said I knew a guy that could potentially help."

Aswad nodded and took a offered cigar from Machlas, letting the smuggler lit it for him and taking some drags on it, blowing the smoke in front of him and obscuring his face slightly, before replying "And what can a humble warrior possibly help a reputable businessman such as yourself with?"

John shrugged "A man of any profession is always in need of quality tools, and I happen to have come into the possession of some very durable tools that I could give to you, for a fair sum of course."

Aswad snorted "I have no need for hammers nor screws."

"How about some semi-automatic battle rifles?"

Aswad raised one of his eyebrows "And what kind of rifles do we speak of?"

John shrugged "I could potentially be able to give you some G3's, a German rifle, fires a heavy round, good capacity magazine and reputable manufacturing. Also may have some German machine guns, pistols and SMGs into my possession."

Aswad nodded "Our brethen could use new weaponry, but how would you get them to us?"

"A man by the name of Ahmad Kalb just opened a new shipping firm at Aswan, and he's recently acquired a good number of vessels that will unload at many Egyptian and Med ports, Said among them. He recently secured a contract to supply a factory at Sinai with new generators, and replacement parts. You'd find a bill of lading marking them as such from the Kalb Shipping Ltd."

"Rifles, machine guns and pistols you say?"

John nodded "I can get a few hundred in every month, and you can compensate me with a monthly fee, and we can see how our relationship evolves."

Aswad nodded "I'll inform this factory that the military will be...requisitioning these generator parts to refurbish our own facilities and sites, and he will be compensated justly in return."

John offered his hand "Good, sounds like we have a deal."

Machlas laughed and offered John a cigar "Sounds like another beautiful day in the realm of business. Let's smoke and celebrate our new success!"

Lewella Erickson
Honor Hall (MoD Building), Whitehall
London, England (51°30′ 20″N,0°7′33″W)
January 1, 1990; 0845 Hrs [UTC+1]

Lewella cracked her neck and then darted her charcoal eyes towards the leather portfolio in front of her, the book lying open on the wide wooden conference table, prepared documents on the left while a legal pad with its pages nearly completely filled with her careful, neat handwriting with various stickers put on the pages to help her quickly find material. She was eager to return to her normal business as apart of the Ministry of Defence's logistical staff here in the Honor Hall, which served as its headquarters, and she had a number of things to finalize before her meeting today with Manchurian Global so she hoped this snap meeting called by the Secretary wouldn't take too long.

She was joined at the table by some of her colleagues, Theresa Bell who came from the admin staff and then Lewella herself brought two of her assistants, Stephen and David who sat besides her. After a few minutes, the carved wooden doors into the room were opened by the Secretary's assistant, and he himself then strode into the room, taking a seat at the head of the table and pulling a number of documents out of his briefcase he had carried with him, as well as a mobile phone. "Thank you all for joining me on such short notice, but we have a highly important matter to deal with. Anyone watch the BBC this morning?"

The rest of them looked among themselves slightly confused and Trevor, the Secretary, let it continue for a few moments before he ended it by speaking "The Prime Minister called me this morning, fresh off of his own phone call with the Privy Council and His Majesty."

Trevor paused and watched everyone sit a little straighter, the seriousness of the subject suddenly setting in "For those who didn't cover the subject, Manchurian's formal takeover of the Suez Canal was four days ago and today their assets have begun working on the Canal itself. The loss of our seats in the company that controlled it is unacceptable, the King believes it to be a security threat as does the Prime Minister, and we have been directed to retaliate."

Lewella raised her arm "Sir, why do we have such a problem with Manchurian?"

"Because we believe them to be a proxy of their native government. The Layartebian presence in Cyrpus is barely tolerable as it is, but now controlling the Canal? That is too far. As such, I believe Ms. Erickson, you have been overseeing our facilities assessments for the last year?"

Lewella nodded "Yes sir, we've been making good work closing the unneeded sites or expanding those that require it. I'm meeting with MG funnily enough later this afternoon to finalize their purchase of the closed Thames Dockyard which we've been negotiating for a few months."

Trevor nodded. "Good; that meeting is cancelled. You're going to get in touch with our representative with ICC and you're going to offer Thames to them, for 1/13th of the price we asked of Manchurian."

Lewella had to resist the urge to appear annoyed, but she felt it rising inside. She had spent months putting together the multi-million dollar deal to buy the oldest shipyard on the Thames, and now they were going to lose money on it "Sir if I may, that would put the price at just over fifteen million pounds - that barely covers the debt this Ministry was running on the repairs and maintenance on that facility."

"Indeed, but the message to Manchurian is going to be clear. We will not tolerate the Layartebian government using them to undermine us in North Africa, nor will we permit this business with the Canal. You're dismissed, I want that sale finalized and on the headlines of the Guardian by tomorrow morning. Now, if you will all excuse me, I have a phone call with some people who like privacy."

Richard Bentley
Executive Suite, Sinai Grand Hotel
Port Said, Republic of Sinai (31° 16' 15" N, 32° 18' 55" E)
January 1, 1990; 1300 Hrs [UTC+1]

The peaceful calm of inebriated-induced sleep was shattered as the shrill of a phone's ring rang out through the darkness covered suite, and the noise pierced through Richard's skull, causing him to groan and roll, causing him to drop to the ground and out of the bed with a thud. Among him on the floor was a number of drained bottles of alcohol, the items of a sorrow that had been attempted to be dispelled through drink but was instead met with failure.

Richard continued to lay in pain on the floor, the ringing causing severe stabs of pain in his head and he was happy once it stopped after a few moments. He continued to lay there for an uncounted time until a pounding on his door suddenly occured "Mr.Bentley, there is an urgent phone call for you!"

Richard let out a loud groan and struggled to his feet and began slowly making his way to the door. He opened it, revealing his shirtless ragged looking appearance to a bemused hotel clerk "Sir, one Kenneth Conway from the ICC needs you to call him back urgently."

Richard nodded and then closed the door, shuffling over to the blinds and opening them just slightly enough to allow the smallest amount of sunlight in. He rummaged through the top drawer of the end table next to his bed and found the small address book of his, and through squinted eyes found the number of Conway and slowly dialed it, the line ringing just for a short time before there was an audible click and a voice carried through the line "How does that head feel Rick?"

"Conway, nice to hear from you."

"That bad uh? Well, clean up ASAP, I'm on my way to you."

Richard sat up straight on the bed; the head of North African division for the Empire's largest company, and his boss, coming into town was not a good thing and met something was underfoot "Ken, why are you coming here? The Canal? We can't do anything about it."

"Can't talk on the phone, can never trust the line in places like this. Open your door man."

The line went dead, and confused, Richard moved back the door, and opened it, revealing the empty hallway and blankly stared at it for a few moments before he heard the ding from the elevator and out of the space strode a tall man with a black beard and dressed in a fine grey suit, walking down the hallway in full stride towards Richard. Upon reaching him, he smiled at him and strode into the room, taking a disapproving look at the state of things inside and then took a seat at the end of the bed, removing his sunglasses. Richard sighed and closed the door and then turned to look at his boss "The hell is this all about Conway?"

"Well, we've lost the Canal, which is bad, bad business. Moreover, it's to one of our biggest competitors in Manchurian, and the board is not happy. So, we're here to do something about it."

Richard snorted and began picking up the discarded bottles around the room to ferry them to the trash "Conway, you and I both know the company is bound by law from interfering with the Canal. A very old one."

Conway nodded "Yes, the Act prevents us from owning, paying for, or controlling it. However, unofficial work is not mentioned."

Richard raised an eye "I thought I was going to be fired with the dissolution of the SCC, hence the liquor-fueled party last night. What on earth could we possibly do? Damage the Canal?"

Conway held up his hands "Destruction of it is bad for anybody's business, but we have learned that OMA is beginning to invest heavily in a disruption strategy, try to get people to use the airways versus the water. The board has sent me to begin the implementation of a more...direct response. First order of business, ICC recently bought a security company called Noble Security Solutions. They've been folded into our own Gladius Private Security, and we're opening an office in Arish at the airport that we're also building there. We've recently secured a contract from the Government to help secure the border on Gaza, and you're going to help us get GPS set up. You'll be named Chief Manager of the Arish Office, your years in the Commandos can really help us here."

Richard nodded. "Alright, give me ten minutes to find a toilet and a shirt."

by **Layarteb** » Sun Aug 12, 2018 8:57 pm

• • • † • • •

Monday, January 8^th, 1990 | 20:00 hrs [UTC-5]
Layarteb City, New York | Fortress of Comhghall
40° 41' 28" N, 74° 0' 58" W

While Manchurian Global saw Gohar's coup as an opportunity, the Layartebian government saw things differently. When the coup had been launched, it was the end of the working day in Layarteb City but throughout the night, duty officers relayed the information coming in from the ground in Port Said. Friday had been about finding out what happened and the weekend had been about analyzing the data. When General Gohar made his announcement, the Ministry of Intelligence watched it live, recording it for analysis and reanalysis. The tape had been watched hundreds of times since as intelligence analysts looked for clues about what happened, trying to validate the information they'd received from the ground. The Layartebian network wasn't particularly well developed in the Republic of the Sinai and the handful of case officers and operatives relayed what they could about the situation on the ground.

Now in the Emperor's office on this late, Monday evening, while the icy gusts of winter beat against the lead glass window panes. With the hundred-year-old heating system taxed on these cold nights, the fireplace in the Emperor's office was roaring with the red and orange flames of a well-made fire. The shadows its cast around the room gave a melodramatic mood to the meeting about to happen but that was for reason for on this particular evening the Special Council was meeting. In the Empire, the executive branch consisted of the nineteen-member Cabinet and within this Cabinet existed the eleven-member National Security Council. In both of these bodies, decisions were made by majority vote with the Emperor voting only in the instance of a tie. Yet within the National Security Council there existed an even smaller group, known otherwise as the Special Council, an eight-man body. In the Special Council, the Emperor would vote but the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff would not vote so that all decisions made were civilian only.

It had been a little over four days since Gohar stormed the Presidential Palace and this would be the first meeting of the Special Council concerning the matter. That council consisted of the Chairman-General of the armed forces, the ministers of Defense, Foreign Affairs, Intelligence, the Interior, and Justice, the National Security Advisor, and of course, the Emperor. It was these eight people who sat around the large conference table in the Emperor's office, a table that had been in the possession of the fortress for two hundred and nine years. It had been built by special request and assembled on site by a team of some of the finest craftsmen of the time. It was evenly built to be disassembled, for the purposes of being moved from room-to-room. This was precisely how it was moved from a room where matters of state were normally conducted to the Emperor's office, quite a hefty job that took the better part of an entire afternoon.

"Good evening everyone," the Emperor began, "I thank you all for being here this evening rather than with your families. We're meeting this evening solely to discuss the situation in the Republic of the Sinai. It hasn't been very long so information may be spotty but we need to make an informed decision this evening on how we're to proceed. With that, I'm going to ask Intelligence to lead the meeting."

"Thank you sir," answered Minister Lawrence Dunn of Intelligence. He was the country's third Minister of Intelligence and he had been in the post for roughly two-and-a-half years now, ascending to the position in 1987 when his predecessor, Brett Molina resigned due to health reasons. "We have a full and complete timeline and that is where I will begin. General Ali Hakim Gohar, commander of the Sinai Armed Forces, began planning for this coup approximately four months ago. He quickly enlisted the commanders of each branch and from there the individual battalion commanders. He moved slowly to avoid alerting any suspicions but truth be told, the entirety of the military is on his side. There may be a few platoon or company commanders who are not on his side but they are few and far between.

"With the plan put into place, he waited until the official dissolution of the Suez Canal Company to begin the final planning. Based on information we obtained, Gohar's reason for waiting had everything to do with the very visible, Manchurian presence with the dissolution of the SCC. Harvesting that sentiment, he found little resistance within the military to launch his coup.

"The coup was meant to be bloodless but it didn't work that way. Based on signals intelligence, a Major Toma in the Presidential Guards Battalion called out the coup in progress, which fouled up the plan. Our estimates are as many as forty to seventy-five killed and thirty to forty wounded in the assault, including President Al-Banna who was killed accidentally. By all rights, his death appears to be entirely unintended. The inside scoop is that he fell from the escape tunnel ladder. How that happened we are unsure but we do know that Major Toma is amongst the dead, killed during what has been described as a 'last stand' scenario.

"Since then, Gohar has reconsolidated the military's forces and he has not instituted a purge as often happens. He, along with the other military chiefs, have set up a junta. No civilians have been fired as near as we can tell though quite a number have resigned under protest."

"Resigned or 'resigned'?" The Emperor asked.

"The former sir, Gohar is not looking to build a throne of bayonets. Since the establishment of the junta on Friday morning, the government has, for all intents and purposes, been unchanged. Whoever resigned was replaced by those directly under them and all appears to be running normally."

"Let's cover Gohar's speech to his people."

"Ah yes sir," Minister Dunn began with a slight chuckle. "Gohar had little to say concerning the Empire, in fact, our analysts believe that the speech intentionally left us out of any pronouncements. Gohar however was highly critical of Al-Banna's indifference to the SCC deal. In fact, he directly accused Al-Banna of 'selling the sovereignty of the Sinai for foreign gold.' Those are his direct words."

"This is what his people want to hear," answered Minister Claud Hernandez of the Interior, "and so they will back him. Is there any initial polling?"

"None yet but our operatives on the ground have reported that there is a lot of discussion in the cafés about this and it's not all bad. Al-Banna was a playboy and the people knew it. The selling off of the Suez Canal is going to hit them hard."

"But not too hard, Manchurian has agreed to maintain employment levels, correct?" The Minister of Justice, Duane Pruett asked.

"They've pledged to hire more people for the major works project. Our estimates alone show that they can virtually wipe out unemployment overnight and still need to bring in workers, which brings us to our assessment of the situation. Gohar is hardly a fool. Our own assessment of him prior to this coup suggested that he could succeed Al-Banna as President, if he wanted the job. Al-Banna kept him as close as could be, perhaps to watch over him, perhaps to train him. Yet Gohar is a nationalist in the same sense as was Ismail Nagi. Nagi would have never allowed Al-Banna to do what he did and by all rights, he hated the man. Al-Banna was in that position as a political favor and it bit him and the country in the ass.

"Gohar will want to move on the canal and he'll want to declare it a national asset but he can't. Right now, Manchurian Global holds all of the cards. Singlehandedly, they can bankrupt that entire country and grid its economy to a complete halt. Gohar knows this and he knows that so long as Manchurian is footing the bill for construction, he can't kick them out. He'll make life difficult for them but the Suez Canal is not going to be parted with easily. Plus there is the matter of our military."

"What does our military have to do with it?" Chairman-General Mark Moore said.

"Because," said the Emperor, "Gohar is under the false belief that Manchurian Global is our proxy. He, like many others, think that this government acts through Manchurian Global, which is preposterous, especially in the wake of how they handled themselves in Cyprus but that is the fact of the matter. Nothing we can tell Gohar will likely change his mind."

"Correct sir," said Dunn, taking the floor again. "General Gohar and his military chiefs believe that the sale of the Suez Canal is analogous to an annexation and an invasion of their country by this government. They see these mercs that Manchurian hired, Aegis Specialized Protection, as the world saw Manchurian's mercs in Cyprus. For all intents and purposes, ASP is a Manchurian company."

"We've tried," said Minister Pruett, waving his hand, "we all know that when ASP was sold off it was sold off with the condition and stipulation that they would act in accordance with the wishes of Manchurian's board but the paperwork is extremely precise. On paper, the two entities are legally and financially separate, which were the conditions set forth by the FMAA. Unless we invaded the country and declared the Suez Canal a national asset, ASP has legal standing to be there. We do not control the laws in that country."

"So where do we go from here? Asked the Emperor, "What's Gohar's end game?"

"Gohar is going to let Manchurian fulfill their promises. Gohar is going to capitalize it as much as he can and ride its coattails to keep himself in power and his people believing that his overthrow of Al-Banna was worth it. Then, when the opportune time strikes, he is going to launch action against the Suez Canal. At that time, we will be faced with one of three choices. Very simply put, we can do nothing and let Manchurian sort this out on their own, we can commit forces and declare the Suez Canal a national asset ourselves and effectively invade the Republic of the Sinai, or we can ally with the government and ensure the handover of the Suez Canal as a national asset to the Republic of the Sinai.

"Number one is the most favorable action but there is an element of risk. Gohar's men versus the ASP mercenaries may just go in Gohar's favor. Number two would essentially prove everything Gohar has been saying about Manchurian acting as our proxy. Number three is difficult, it would mean actively engaging against a corporate entity of the Empire. It sets a dangerous precedent."

"Even if they've acted against us with this buyout?" The Emperor scoffed, "This buyout was precisely a kick to our teeth. Manchurian has a miniscule stake in the Panama Canal and their shipping business is growing. Owning the Suez Canal is a coup for them in the terms of ocean trade. They knew flat out how we would see this buyout."

"That may be so sir," Dunn continued, "but despite this, Manchurian is not an enemy of the Empire. They do too much business in this country and with this government to be considered one." Dunn's words, though truthful, were not striking a good cord with the Emperor. The Emperor saw Manchurian Global as an impediment to the country. Corporations as large as Manchurian Global were had developed their own political agenda and during the days of the Republic, their tendrils corrupted every facet of the government. Much of that had been put to rest with the new accountability laws but the sting remained. Many of the worst offenders were broken up and sent into bankruptcy when their boards were thrown into jail for bribery and fraud charges yet Manchurian Global survived, acting through cut outs and intermediaries who talk the fall while they remained on top.

"How long until Gohar enacts the next steps?"

"Sir it will take as long as ten years before Manchurian finishes its projects, if everything goes according to the timelines. If there are any delays however, we're looking at twelve to fifteen years."

"Will he be that patient?"

"We don't believe so sir but he'll wait until most of the heavy lifting is done so the cost doesn't roll over to the Sinai. The last thing he needs is an assault of companies coming to him with a bill. It would cause economic ruin if any of them opted to pull out of the country out of protest for not being paid."

"So when does he act?"

"Five to eight years at least, ten to twelve at most."

"Then we have time to develop a proper plan. For now we're going to sit tight. There's no need for us to inflame the situation and stick our noses where it isn't necessarily wanted. Time is on our side and if we can bide our time until its absolutely necessary to force Gohar's hand prematurely than we will be the victor. Or does anyone disagree?" There were no disagreements to be had and that was how things worked for the Special Council. The course of action was proposed and made. In the morning, the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Intelligence would begin to work out a joint plan for multiple scenarios involving the Suez Canal, Manchurian Global, and the Republic of the Sinai.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Thursday, January 11^th, 1990 | 18:30 hrs [UTC+2]
Sharm El-Sheik, Sinai Republic | Hotel Maritim Royal Peninsula
27° 56' 16" N, 34° 22' 44" E

The knock on the door was every bit as soft as he would have expected and Lieutenant Colonel Mina Aswad nodded to one of the two bodyguards standing at the door to open it. He looked every bit the businessman on holiday at the Hotel Maritim Royal Peninsula and his guests adopted an equally conspicuous appearance. They sipped on strawberry juice while Aswad, out of deference to his guests' sensibilities, drank water instead of scotch. The door opened and the bodyguard allowed two men in a smart casual dress to enter. As per protocols, they were frisked and Aswad rose to greet them, shaking their hands and showing them to another couch. The five of them were seated in a U-shaped arrangement of comfortable couches with a glass coffee table in between them. The air conditioner was raised slightly and the two bodyguards took seats, no longer expecting any guests.

"So, thank you for coming," Aswad began, speaking in Arabic. "Please understand that General Gohar wishes that he could be here as I am sure your leaders wish the same. We five are representatives of the men we serve and as such, we should understand that we are here to discuss, not to decide." Heads nodded and Aswad skipped forward. "You know who I am but I do not believe you know one another. Representing the Autonomous State of Gaza are Hakam Husseini and Bassam al-Khatib and representing the Republic of Northern Cyprus are Rahmi Sahin and Mehmet Nasir.

"Before we begin is everyone comfortable? I thought that we could talk some business for about thirty minutes before we sat down for a meal." Everyone agreed that they were comfortable and Aswad began, turning his charm up as he spoke, "It is no secret what has happened in my country as well as in yours. On the island of Cyprus, a bloody civil war has left the country split along ethnic lines. Gaza is all that is left for your people what with the Empire of Britannia completely dominating the land. In my country, the Layartebians have stolen our greatest source of economic freedom. In Cyprus, it is the Layartebians again and surely what difference is there between the British and the Layartebians?

"This is a fight that is centuries old. The Temple Mount, a sacred site for three religions has been desecrated by the British. It was in 1565 that they committed to reconstructing the site with the removal of the Dome of the Rock. For one hundred and eighty years your people watched as they systematically ruined this sacred shrine. Then, when on the four hundredth anniversary your people rose up in protest what happened? For eight years, until 1973 the tensions boiled and did the British give your people anything that they were owed? That they were promised? No! No you received nothing except bloodshed. Thus the Intifada began on November 1, as it should have. You did your duty to the Prophet and waited until the end of Ramadan. What more could be asked of your people?

"From there arose the only true voice of the people of Palestine and the Islamic Brotherhood of Palestine should know how much the Sinai Republic supports it."

On the opposite couch, Husseini nodded, "It goes without saying that the Sinai Republic has been a true protector of our cause but we have to wonder why the late President Al-Banna was indifferent towards us?"

"Unfortunately, the late President Al-Banna was concerned with upsetting the British, perhaps because he appreciated his lifestyle as a playboy more than as a defender of the region against the West. General Gohar is the opposite of our late President Al-Banna.

"For four years your Intifada ravaged Judea and what do you have to show for it? A peace agreement in Heraklion on March 14, 1978. Gaza as an autonomous sovereign and what, a pledge by the British to leave you alone?" Here, Aswad shook his head. "Leave you alone they did. They severed your utilities, they walled you in with fences and armed guards, they established fishing limits, and they handed you a fraction of the land. Poverty is widespread, basic services are unreliable, and British meddling prevents your legislature from achieving anything." In truth, the IBP was the most corrupt element in the country, essentially extorting the people for their resistance to the British. It was true that the British completely cut Gaza off from the rest of Israel but the IBP did nothing about it. Instead, they blamed the British for the poverty and the failures of their government, using the people to fight the British. The British, for their part, simply let Gaza exist as an ever-growing slum, happy to let the IBP sink the microstate into further ruination. Aswad wasn't going to say this though, he was there to court friends.

"The British have been nothing but malicious to us from the start," said al-Khatib, "but they are hardly alone. We have no doubt that they receive support from the Layartebians."

"Ah yes, them," Aswad said, "let's talk about how they have affected the region. Have they not been instrumental in prolonging and perpetuating the war on Cyprus?"

"They have," said Nasir, "the Layartebians want to exert influence in this region. Ever since their 'revolution' they have allowed a warmonger to lead their country. This region has been a stronghold of the British for centuries and this warmonger cannot have it. So what do they do? They cast my island, my nation, and my people into civil war and reap the benefits. They send their mercenaries to slaughter women and children and then act as if they had 'no control' and that these were 'private entities.' If that isn't a lie I do not know what is!"

"You are right my friends!" Again, Aswad wasn't going to say the truth. The truth of the matter was that the island was populated by ethnic Greeks and ethnic Turks and neither group had any love for the other. In the 1950s and the 1960s, socioeconomic instability began to rear its ugly head in the unified Republic of Cyprus. The Greeks were simply better off than the Turks were and resentment grew, chiefly amongst the Turks. This led to a growing nationalist movement but because the Turks were so spread out, they have virtually no say in the government due to the way the voting districts had been arranged. They felt powerless and soon the calls for a split state came.

Parliamentary elections in May 1966 led to a major shock. The Turkish Nationalist Movement grew in strength, capturing eighteen of eighty seats while the Greek Democratic Party held only thirty-two, losing their majority for the first time. Yet they carried with a plurality followed by a coalition. In response to the Turkish Nationalist Movement there arose a corresponding Greek movement and they secured fourteen seats. Calls for a two-state solution further intensified that summer and autumn with both nationalist parties calling for it, each wanting to see the other ostracized. Then, in 1968, elections for President of Cyprus were held. There was no clear winner in the first round with the Democratic Party nominee Georgios Kasapis receiving 39.5% of the votes and the Turkish Nationalist nominee Temel Tek receiving 26.8% of the votes. That was January 28 and one week later, on February 4, the second round was held between these two. Kasapis took nearly 70% of the vote, which was largely split along ethnic lines. The Turks called for a recount and levied accusations of voter fraud but independent observers noted none, they were simply sore losers.

Kasapis was inaugurated at the end of the month to widespread protests for what would be his first, five-year term. Nationalism surged in those five years from both sides but not helping anything was widespread corruption of the Cypriot Parliament. During this time a record nine parliamentary ministers were arrested on charges of corruption to be replaced in hasty elections. The Democratic Coalition maintained its majority however.

Then, in May 1971, another vote for parliament was held. Talk of a national referendum concerning the two-state solution had been had by everyone except the Democratic Party and the election went overwhelmingly in their favor with forty seats going to them. Once again, they aligned with the center-right party for a forty-four vote majority. Their first order of business was to kill the referendum and again, accusations of fraud were levied by the Turkish nationalists. A week of protests, civil disobedience, and major demonstrations by the Turkish nationalists paralyzed the country. Clashes between both sides almost always turned violent.

Things would only go from bad to worse. On January 28, 1973, Kasapis won re-election against Tek with 51.9% of the vote to Tek's 42.1% of the vote. No second round would be required. Voter participation surged to 89.5%, a record. Kasapis would have been re-inaugurated at the end of the month but he was killed the day before on February 27, 1973. Turkish ultranationalists attacked his motorcade in Nicosia in a carefully coordinated ambush. Using RPGs, light machine guns, and grenades, they were able to force Kasapis out of his armored limousine where he surrendered. Two gunmen put thirty rounds each into him with their Kalashnikov rifles and left his shredded body in the street. In response, Greek ultranationalists launched reprisal attacks, looting and burning Turkish-owned businesses, killing dozens in heinous attacks.

Over the next fifteen years, the Cypriot Civil War raged through periods of unrestrained violence and periods of ceasefire-brokered calm. No ceasefire held for very long and the battle lines were drawn very early in the conflict. Ethnic Turks had their homes and businesses attacked, looted, destroyed, and burned to the ground, forcing many to flee to the eastern or northern side of the island where the Turkish nationalists and ultranationalists consolidated their control. Within a year of the outbreak of hostilities, few Greeks were left in the north and few Turks in the south. Nicosia, split between the two, suffered the most. Urban fighting left the city a mere shell of its former self. Both sides quickly exhausted their forces and thus entered the mercenaries. None were more prominent than the thousands fighting for Manchurian Global. They fought exclusively for Southern Cyprus but in all truth, they fought for themselves. Their crimes were so heinous that the Empire passed the FMAA, barring activities in mercenary groups by Layartebian citizens. The most visible face of the conflict was the atrocities committed by the mercenaries, especially by Manchurian Global.

Aswad knew that this would strike a chord with the Cypriot representatives and so he pushed it there. "Look what the Layartebians did to you with their 'mercenaries' though they call them 'contractors.' It is a lie to tell themselves so that they can sleep at night while women and children are being machine gunned in their villages. Cyprus was their battleground for this region and look what it has brought us. They control how much territory? For their bases! So that they can influence the region.

"Now look at the Sinai. They have taken the Suez Canal through Manchurian, their proxy. Manchurian Global sent the mercenaries to Cyprus on behalf of the Empire and look now. They do the bidding of that filthy warmonger."

"What you say is true but how can we resist?" Sahin asked, "We have tried, Allah knows we have tried."

"We have tried," Husseini said in agreement. "Have we not tried hard enough?"

"Nonsense," Aswad said. "Of course you have tried hard enough but this foe is mammoth. Combined we could not take it head on but that is why you do not engage with such a beast head on, you attack it from the flanks. General Gohar has a plan he would like for me to share with your leaders but it will require patience and sacrifice. The battle against the Empire is not a battle to be won overnight or even in large victories. We will nip at it, piece by piece, strike it from this region where it is overstretched and we are home. The Layartebians have enemies in this region just the same as they have enemies of us. Yet for this plan we need commitments. We must act equally and for the duration of time. There can be no withdrawals. It may take our generation and it may take our children but the plan to unseat the Empire from this region is tangible and I have it here."

Silence entered the room. Aswad had given a very impassioned sales pitch but truth be told, he didn't need to do so. "In preparation for this meeting our leadership gave us permission to act and decide upon their behalf in certain matters," said al-Khatib, "and as such, one of those matters was cooperation against our foe. Yet we do not wish only to strike at the Layartebians but the British as well."

"That is only natural," Aswad answered, keeping secret that the British Empire was now a clandestine benefactor to General Gohar's junta against the very same enemy that these men were discussing, the Empire. "What about you gentlemen?"

"Our leadership would like to see the Layartebians bloodied and bruised for all that they have done to us," answered Sahin.

"Good," Aswad said with a clap of his hands, "good, good, good. Let's leave matters here for now and eat. When we are done let our conversation continue fruitfully."

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Sat Aug 18, 2018 1:08 pm

.:.
Chapter One
‹‹ Cyprus ››
We just woke up one day and wham!
We were in the middle of a war we never wanted.

• • • † • • •

Thursday, April 1^st, 1993 | 07:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Pyla, Cyprus | Camp Pyla (C-FOR)
35° 0' 57" N, 33° 41' 5" E

A violent crack of thunder shook the area, rattling windows and announcing the thunderstorm that had otherwise settled in over Cyprus. Rain fell in sheets and wind gusts visibly swirled across fields and bent trees. This thunderstorm would be gone soon but not before it had an opportunity to drop a fair amount of rainwater onto the island where the risk of flash flooding was present in some of the lower lying areas, especially those in valleys and along rivers. The thunderstorm's most intense part would pass right over Pyla, a village of twenty-eight hundred people located within the Buffer Zone established by the Empire of Layarteb as part of its peacekeeping mission. The Cypriot Civil War had gone unchecked until the Empire nosed into the conflict with a few thousand men to establish an uneasy peace. Truth be told, the Cypriots were happy enough killing one another that they didn't really want peace but the Empire didn't necessarily give them a choice about it.

In doing so, the Empire established a Buffer Zone between Northern and Southern Cyprus that spanned an area of approximately 134 mi². They also established two areas, one in Southern Cyprus and one along the Buffer Zone and into Northern Cyprus with a combined area of 98 mi². These were known as the Sovereign Base Areas (SBAs) of Akrotiri (Southern Cyprus) and Dhekelia (Northern Cyprus). Pyla was adjacent to Dhekelia and enjoyed relative peace. Since the establishment of the Buffer Zone and the SBAs, the Empire had poured recovery funds into Pyla, amongst other villages in the Buffer Zone and the SBAs where it had administrative control. Recovery funds were also provided to both Northern and Southern Cyprus, equal amounts to both so that the Empire was not seen as favoring one side over another.

Within the Buffer Zone there were three military camps and several, smaller outposts. Each camp could support a battalion-sized element while the outposts were for platoon-sized elements only. The job of the camps was simply to establish a presence in the Buffer Zone while the outposts were there to enforce the Buffer Zone and the truce between the two sides. Per the agreement negotiated by the Empire, there would be an initial, 5-year mandate, which could be extended for five years once every five years. The Empire wanted a much longer mandate but neither side would agree to more than 5-year periods, renewable indefinitely so long as a series of conditions were met. Truthfully, the two sides looked at the 5-year mandate as a chance to regroup, resupply, rebuild, and replan for when hostilities broke out again. Neither side wanted to concede any territory to the other.

At this point, the Layartebian mandate was four-and-a-half years old and due up for renewal in six months. The Empire was, naturally, pushing for renewal but it was getting resistance from both sides. Both sides wanted new terms and conditions placed on the Layartebian SBAs and the mandate, some of them entirely unreasonable. Negotiations were proceeding but very slowly, which was what today was about.

The meeting would see representatives from all three parties sit down in Camp Pyla and attempt to negotiate a renewal to the Layartebian mandate. Camp Pyla was an ideal location because, not only was it within the Buffer Zone but it was also a special forces camp. From the 1073rd Special Forces Battalion, 5th Special Operations Group, Operational Detachment 3310 was deployed. There were eighty-three men from ODB-3310 deployed along with elements from battalion HQ. Overall, the population of the camp was around one hundred and eighty men. It was secure, it had aviation facilities for helicopter support, and it was between the two belligerent countries, neutral ground if you will. This meeting, scheduled for 13:00, would be an "all hands situation," meaning that no one was going to be off duty. ODB-3310 had six, 12-man ODA teams and each one would be deployed around the area to provide security. One ODA would secure the helipad, another meeting location, a third and forth the camp itself, and the other two would secure the perimeter outside of the camp's wire.

It so happened that today, ODA-3313 had drawn one of the short straws. They were tasked with securing the perimeter of Camp Pyla, which meant aimlessly looking for landmines and a very boring patrol. They would take their four Humvees - each ODA had four - and establish a field rally point to the north and west of the camp while ODA-3316 secured the south and east of the camp. Each ODA would split into two, 6-man teams to allow them to cover more ground, putting twenty-four men on perimeter security, twenty-four men on internal security, twelve men at the helipad, and lastly, twelve men at the meeting site.

ODB-3310 was led by Major Mike Torrez, a mustang who'd joined the military and the Green Berets to fight in Venezuela. At forty-three, he was one of the oldest majors in the military but that wasn't because he'd started out his military career as an enlisted man. He joined in 1968, on his eighteenth birthday, and from there he did one tour in Venezuela, advancing all the way up to corporal. As a bonus for signing up for another tour, he was promoted to sergeant but rather than take just another tour with an infantry outfit, he signed up for special forces training. Nowadays, Q course was anywhere from a year to two years long, depending on your specialty but back then it wasn't nearly as long. Torrez had seen combat first hand, and he'd even been decorated for it during his first tour. What he needed to be taught, essentially, was how the Green Berets fought and how they worked with the local populace. He spoke Spanish so there was no reason to learn another language, significantly cutting down his time.

He did a tour as a radioman, hefting the heavy, 14-lb AN/PRC-77 in combat and during that tour he'd been awarded a second Bronze Star and a second Purple Heart. That particular ODA was especially tightknit but things were difficult after eight months into their combat tour. During a patrol, the ODA's leader, a captain named Mark Anderson stepped on a landmine and blew off half of his leg. They'd essentially walked into an ambush and over the next thirty minutes, they fought a particularly brutal battle at less than twenty meters. During the fight, Anderson hugged a grenade and killed himself but he saved a half-dozen men. He was awarded the Medal of Honor thereafter and three of the twelve men, not including Anderson, lost their lives. The rest were all wounded. They'd killed forty-five men and the ambush team, whatever was left of it, retreated into the jungle.

Now, years later, Torrez had gone mustang, applying for officer candidate school and receiving a commission. He'd been in Venezuela, fought at home during the revolution, and now he was in Cyprus. He didn't want to advance past major and it was unlikely he would unless he attended Command and General Staff College, which he had no intention of doing. For a man with a Silver Star, four Bronze Stars, six Purple Hearts, and a dozen other awards and decorations, the brass wasn't able to push him too far. He wanted to be with the men because he was one, just with a major's star instead of a sergeant's chevrons. This morning, the commander of Camp Pyla stood before his seventy-two Green Berets and called for quiet. Everyone had hit their morning PT, showered, and eaten breakfast already, getting a soldier's regular start to the day. Torrez had beat them all up by rising at 04:30. It was an old habit, born out of Venezuela. The best time to strike was right before dawn, when soldiers were virtually all asleep or so exhausted they could barely keep their eyes open. By waking up well before dawn, Torrez and his ODA had managed to thwart six separate attacks because they were alert and ready when the enemy struck them.

"All right, all right," he said from the front of the room in a voice that was as normal as any other person, hardly that of an overbearing major who needed to prop himself up to get respect. "Let's settle down and get through this." The room hushed. "At 13:00, we're going to be hosting a major meeting between delegations from Northern Cyprus, Southern Cyprus, and ourselves. There is no time limit on the meeting and it could last twenty minutes or eleven hours. So long as that meeting is taking place we are on one hundred percent alert.

"Intel does not have any credible or actionable threats against the meeting but tensions between the two parties has been steadily rising for the past six months. With six months left on our mandate, Intel believes that both sides are getting itchy to start killing one another again. The Greeks want the entire island to themselves, the Turks want the Greeks dead. There's nothing that we can do except sit here in the middle and prevent them from achieving these goals and we're doing an adequate job of it.

"Our delegation is expected to arrive via convoy at 12:00 followed thirty minutes later by the delegation from Southern Cyprus, also by convoy. The Northern Cypriot delegation will arrive at 13:00 via helicopter. Sweeps have been made of the Buffer Zone to make sure there aren't any triple-A emplacements hidden out there to shoot down this helicopter but we have to be vigilant. We can expect a very arduous meeting and on building security, you might hear a lot of yelling. Do not be alarmed, remember how much these two sides hate one another and perhaps us. The Northern Cypriot government has been alleging lately that the Empire is 'favoring Southern Cyprus' with reconstruction money.

"Truthfully gentlemen, that's a big load of horseshit. Both sides get the same amount of money, the Northern Cypriots are just more corrupt than those in the south so that money never gets to where it's going. That's politics though and beyond us. Our job is to protect the meeting and to keep it safe. If either side attempts an assault on this camp you can guarantee that they mean harm to the delegation and us.

"Right so, rules of engagement. It goes without saying that if tracer rounds are incoming, we have them outgoing. If any patrols encounter armed soldiers or even unarmed groups of military-aged men acting in a manner unbecoming civilians you will block them from gaining access to the perimeter. Our perimeter remains the same, one klick to the north and the west, three hundred meters to the south, and five hundred meters to the east. MPs at the camp will be looking for snipers but don't rely on them. Stay in contact and remember your regular check-ins. I don't want anyone getting lost and an ambush developing. Any questions?"

"I've got one," asked Captain John Earle, team leader of ODA-3313. Torrez nodded to him and he continued, "How well known is this meeting?"

"It's public knowledge and it's been all over the news for the past week. Suffice it to say everyone knows about it. Any others? Yeah Stanley?" Torrez looked to First Sergeant Reggie Stanley, from ODA-3311.

"Intel doesn't have any credible or actionable intelligence against plans on the meeting but has there been increased activity along the Buffer Zone?"

"None," Torrez said, "I asked specifically about that yesterday." The words satisfied most of the men and though a few more questions came, they were largely operational in nature and specific to the day's meeting.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Thursday, April 1^st, 1993 | 12:55 hrs [UTC+2]
Pyla, Cyprus | Camp Pyla (C-FOR)
35° 0' 57" N, 33° 41' 5" E

The mood at Camp Pyla was tense. The two representatives from the Empire arrived from Nicosia in a convoy of armored Humvees. They had flown into Nicosia International Airport, which sat in the Buffer Zone. During the war, the airport had been repeatedly shelled and it changes hands no less than eight times, leading to its ruination. However, in the months following the establishment of the Buffer Zone, Layartebian construction firms restored it to working order very quickly. It was the only airport that served both sides of the conflict. A second airport had been built at Paphos and the Northern Cypriots were in the process of building one just on the other side of Nicosia but corruption had led to major delays as construction firms pocketed money and bought substandard labor or supplies leading to many "Mulligans," as the term was. Northern Cyprus was thus entirely dependent on the Layartebian-administered Nicosia International Airport.

Representing the Empire was Carla Gibson and Michael Ballantyne. Carla was the Empire's head of mission to the Cyprus Peacekeeping Force and a civilian. Michael Ballantyne was a civilian as well but he was a retired general, having served for forty years with the Layartebian Army and the Imperial Layartebian Army. They made an effective duo in maintaining the status of Cyprus and overseeing the efforts to constitute a long-lasting peace but they had signaled a growing unwillingness by both sides to come to arrangements. This meeting, which had been on the calendar since the beginning of the C-FOR mission, had been rescheduled twice, once by each side and for nonsensical reasons. Finally, they were forced to take the meeting, which then led to several weeks of squabbling over the details. The representatives from Southern Cyprus originally had an issue with the table selection, claiming that to use a round table meant that all parties were on equal footing and they did not accept this. In the end, a rectangular table was arranged with the Empire taking the two ends. Neither side was accepting of this but they had fewer reservations. Then there were issues with the location, the time, et cetera, et cetera.

Thirty minutes after Carla and Michael arrived, the representatives from Southern Cyprus arrived, having driven all the way from Paphos, also in a column consisting of armored Humvees. The Empire had supplied Southern Cyprus with second-hand Humvees, which they refurbished and were now using as the main armored truck of the nation. Northern Cyprus had balked at an equal offer and so they drive around in unarmored, dangerous Jeeps mostly. Despite their refusal to accept second-hand Humvees, they continued to complain that they were being treated "differently" than Southern Cyprus. Southern Cyprus was represented by George Kalemis and Dimitri Bibas, two former cronies of the late President Kasapis. They were in their sixties now and particularly onerous. When they arrived, their first order of business was to meticulously check the arrangements to make sure that everything was in place. Had one pen been out of place they would have tried to use it as an excuse to further delay the meeting. To call how these two sides behaved as childish would have been an insult to children.

With those arrangements all in place and everyone on time, the sound of an approaching helicopter came right on cue. Over the radio channels, the helicopter was reported as incoming and the status of the helipad confirmed as secure. The helicopter was an AS332 Super Puma, relatively new, only ten years old. Against the blue skies, now that the thunderstorm had rolled out to sea, the helicopter was easily visible and certainly audible enough. It was coming in low, perhaps two hundred feet above the ground but moving very quickly, likely near its top speed. The Green Berets remarked that something had either spooked the pilots, they were being cautious, or they were just impatient.

That helicopter flared for landing and set down on the helipad in one smooth movement, the pilots obviously the best in the Northern Cypriot military. The engines were powered down to idle and the delegation exited. There, they were greeted by Major Torrez, who escorted them out of the rotor wash and to a camp Jeep. It was a little over two hundred meters to the meeting site from the helipad and the delegation had already signaled - as part of their arrangements - that they did not wish to walk but rather be driven. It was another power move, it made the Northern Cypriot delegation feel as if the Layartebians were their servants but this was hardly how the Layartebians saw it. Northern Cyprus was represented by Ahmet Yemni and Omer Kulin. They were half the age of their counterparts from Southern Cyprus but they were ardent nationalists and not in the business of compromise.

The meeting was less a meeting and more a mediation between the two sides. Once again, Northern Cyprus levied a claim of "disproportionate" assistance between the funds the Empire gave Southern Cyprus versus Northern Cyprus. It was their standard line. They habitually complained but Carla quickly informed them that the disbursements of funds was visible to both parties as part of the peacekeeping agreement and thus a false allegation. Ahmet, the older of the two, retorted that the Empire was providing funds under the table to Southern Cyprus, which naturally both parties denied. It was at this moment that things went a little south until Carla could rein back both sides. Dimitri quickly harped on Northern Cypriot corruption and touted two recent news stories about corruption at the airport, which both Ahmet and Omer dismissed as propaganda.

Only inciting matters, Michael brought up investigations conducted by C-FOR into disbursements and he specifically cited a report calling into question how Northern Cyprus was spending the money. As part of the peacekeeping effort, C-FOR had authority to investigate how the disbursements were being spent. Southern Cyprus was siphoning money, and the report called that into question, but not to the detriment of the reconstruction effort. Northern Cyprus was taking most of the money into corruption, spending the rest poorly, and then complaining it had no money left. To both Ahmet and Omer, this was intrusive and they claimed bias in the C-FOR report. Neither side wanted to negotiate anything and both sides truly wanted to get back to killing one another but Carla and Michael weren't having it.

The meeting stretched on throughout the afternoon and into the evening. Breaks were taken for cigarettes and for refreshments. Lunch was served as was a light fare for dinner. Carla and Michael split their presence with both delegations as neither would consort with the other such was the depth of their mutual animosity. In the end though, nothing was accomplished and the meeting was, for all intents and purposes, a setback for the peace process. Carla and Michael had both had discussions concerning the mandate. They knew another five years were needed but that even more would be needed, that the peace process would be indefinite so long as neither side wanted to negotiate and compromise with the other. De facto, the country would remain separated along the Buffer Zone with the Empire the only factor in maintaining the peace between them. The moment the Empire left, the Cypriot Civil War would resume but with even greater intensity for the fact that they had to make up for all of those years of peace.

Throughout the course of the afternoon and into the evening, the Green Berets kept a vigilant watch. They rotated through their watch positions as the day wore on and at both the helipad and the vehicle park, they conversed with the pilots and the vehicle drivers in the spirit of camaraderie but the two sides were kept separate. The pilots were kept near the helipad while the vehicle drivers were kept near the car park, lest the two come to blows over something trivial as who looked sideways at the other. The evening quickly began to wear on and both Carla and Michael could see that neither party was interested in negotiations, that the conditions laid out during the meeting were designed to be rejected. It was as if both sides were colluding on this but in reality it was that both sides had the same objectives, which was what aligned their murderous goals.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Thursday, April 1^st, 1993 | 18:45 hrs [UTC+2]
Pyla, Cyprus | Camp Pyla (C-FOR)
35° 0' 57" N, 33° 41' 5" E

The meeting had ended at 18:30 with nothing achieved. Further complicating matters, the two sides would not even so much as shake one another's hands and the Southern Cypriot delegation stormed out and to their convoy, which departed in haste for Paphos, where Southern Cyprus had moved its capital. Carla saw them off, wondering to herself if the meeting's shenanigans had been orchestrated between both parties. Michael felt the same way and they would both voice their opinions afterwards. He, instead, saw the Northern Cypriot delegation off by riding with them to the helipad. The AS332 Super Puma had been refueled during the long wait and the pilots and the crew chiefs had seen to a little maintenance. Once it appeared that the meeting would begin, they had powered down the helicopter, having kept it on idle just in case the delegation stormed out because a chair was three centimeters too far to the right.

Powering up, the AS332 Super Puma came to life in the dusk of the evening sky. The two delegates boarded with a handshake from Michael and everyone else stepped away as the pilots applied power. The helicopter lifted off the ground and climbed before turning in a 180° semi-circle to head back to the north, back to North Nicosia. The helicopter climbed to about one thousand feet and assumed a northeasterly course. The Green Berets watched as the helicopter's blinking collision lights twinkled in the colorful, sunset. It was flying slower and higher on the outbound than on its inbound flight, whatever having spooked the pilots on the inbound clearly no longer present, if they were spooked even at all.

The Super Puma was, to these Green Berets, something of an ugly helicopter. They preferred the sleekness of the Black Hawk and also its higher speed and smaller targeting profile. Of course, the Super Puma offered double the number of passengers and significantly more range for the tradeoff of being a bigger target. Green Berets didn't like being targets, which was why they all loathed the big Chinook. Plenty of Chinooks had been shot down in Venezuela over the years of conflict there that it was seen as an RPG magnet more than a reliable way to get somewhere. The older Hueys were deathtraps when they crashed but they were far more maneuverable than the Chinooks were. The Black Hawk was better. It was designed to fulfill the Hueys role while also being designed to be survivable in a crash. Naturally people died and were injured in crashes but at far lower rates than in the Hueys.

As for the Super Puma, its crash survivability was unknown to these Green Berets who had never traveled in one. They watched it depart, passing one, two, three, and then four kilometers from the base. In the fading light, it was becoming less and less visible the further away it flew, the twinkling collision lights being the best indicator on its position. By then, most of the Green Berets stopped watching it but for the 6-man team from ODA-3313 on watch on the northern perimeter, there was nothing else to watch except the helicopter. The threat of ground attack, as unfounded as it was, never materialized and with both Cypriot delegations gone, there was no more objective striking at Camp Pyla. Insofar as the Green Berets were concerned, the delegations were someone else's problem now.

The Super Puma kept to the Buffer Zone because the Buffer Zone was safe. Incursion by either Cypriot force was blocked and a violation of the peace deal. While both sides wanted to harm one another, neither side wanted to pick a fight with the Empire, knowing that it would be the last fight they picked. This much had been made clear by the Layartebian forces present on the island. So it was unsurprising to these six men that the Super Puma was spending so much time over the Buffer Zone. On its ingress, the Super Puma had spent most of its time over Northern Cyprus, entering the Buffer Zone only to come in for the landing.

"You think he's taking his time this time around?" Captain Earle asked the fireteam's weapons sergeant to his right, Sergeant First Class Joe Brent.

"You see, my theory is he gets paid by the hour. So he rushed in here to be on time, you can't be late you see. Now he's just working his way home."

"Yeah could be," the two of them were standing against the grill of the Humvee, watching the helicopter. The other four men were scattered around the immediate area. Sergeant First Class John Collins was standing with Staff Sergeant Lou Noble by the other Humvee. Collins was the medic and Noble was the radioman. That just left Sergeant First Class Jay McArthur and First Sergeant George Martinez, the respective engineering and operations sergeants about fifteen meters away, watching the camp to their south.

"Could also be that he was running from his wife and he ain't in the rush to get back," Brent said jokingly. He had plenty of dark humor towards wives since he was fresh off a divorce not six months prior. It was the usual story, soldier goes to war, wife can't wait, wife is unfaithful, et cetera. It was a bad story but one that played out all too often in the ranks of the military.

They watched further as the helicopter continued until something caught their eye. It was a streak of sorts, a cloud of sorts that originated from the ground and began to climb upwards at a rapid rate of speed. Being so far away, they could truly watch the entire picture and they did and after two seconds, Earle spat out his gum and cursed aloud, "Oh fuck!" Two seconds later, the object, which was nothing less than a surface-to-air missile. The missile tracked on the helicopter's heat signature but its proximity fuse detonated just behind the tail rotor. The warhead immediately severed the tail rotor of the helicopter and forced it into a corkscrew as it lost the counter-torque of the tail rotor.

Everything - for the helicopter - happened so rapidly thereafter. The violent corkscrewing pinned everyone inside and though the pilots issued a mayday call it would be useless. Four seconds after impact, parts of the helicopter were flying off in every direction. There was a small explosion and part of the main rotor assembly snapped off, flying in three different directions. From there, the helicopter's fuselage simply plummeted to the ground, impacting in a brilliant fireball. By then, Earle was already behind the wheel of the Humvee and Brent was climbing behind the gun cupola. The other Humvee was loading up too and both McArthur and Martinez were sprinting towards the two trucks, Noble calling in the crisis over the radio. Before either Martinez or McArthur got their doors shut, the Humvees were sprinting towards the crash site at full speed.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Sun Aug 26, 2018 9:12 am

• • • † • • •

Thursday, April 1^st, 1993 | 18:45 hrs [UTC+2]
Cypriot Buffer Zone, Cyprus | Observation Post Cedar (C-FOR)
35° 1' 41" N, 33° 39' 23" E

The Empire's deployment for C-FOR was a brigade-sized element built as a composite unit. It included two infantry battalions, one medical battalion, one support battalion, an aviation attack and reconnaissance battalion, and a light aviation battalion. All told, the force numbered approximately fifty-five hundred men and they were spread out across the buffer zone and the Layartebian Sovereign Base Areas. Throughout the buffer zone, dozens of outposts ranging in size from simple bunkers to larger OPs were used by these forces to keep watch over the two fronts, ensuring that neither side broke the truce negotiated by the Empire. Each of these larger OPs were named after trees while the smaller, bunker fortifications were largely numbered based on their grid square. The OPs were big enough to hold platoon-sized elements while the smaller bunkers were built for squad-sized elements instead. At any given time, at least one battalion was deployed into the buffer zone. New units rotated in every twelve months while the others returned home, its members subsequently decorated with the C-FOR Deployment Ribbon.

Third Platoon, Alpha Company was holding OP Cedar on this particular evening. They were five months into their tour and they had been at the OP for only two days now, rotating in at the end of March. Every thirty days, units rotated to ensure no one grew too complacent and so when 3rd Platoon arrived, they found an entirely foreign landscape before them. They had previously rotated in from another OP in the mountainous areas to the far west. That particular 30-day deployment had been rough, requiring a lot of foot patrols over rough terrain with the threat of landmines and unexploded ordnance all too prevalent. None of their members stepped on any mines or were injured by any UXO but the platoon before them had seen two casualties from a bounding mine that had been inadvertently triggered when a soldier lost his footing and slid a few meters down a hillside. The area around OP Cedar certainly offered a lot of the same threats but the terrain was much more forgiving and friendlier.

Beyond these passive threats, there was little other threat to the C-FOR deployment. The Greek Cypriots and the Turkish Cypriots kept to their sides of the buffer zone and though they were constantly pointing artillery and machine guns at one another, no one was particularly trigger happy enough to start shooting. For the Layartebians caught in the middle, this was preferable. Thus it was a major surprise when the Super Puma passed not only overhead but was struck by a SAM moments later and crashed just over a klick from the OP. From their elevated position, the soldiers on duty watched the Super Puma spiral into the ground and crash in a fireball that undoubtedly killed everyone within the cabin. It was in these first few moments that Second Lieutenant Shawn Walker was alerted to the crash, which prompted him to stop eating and to immediately step outside his CP.

"All right, let's get a patrol organized and get down there," he said as he looked to see which squads were on duty. As a rifle platoon, he had three rifle and one weapons squad, each with ten men. His platoon consisted of forty-eight men, including himself and ten M1026 HMMWV tactical trucks, six armed with .50-caliber M2HB Heavy Machine Guns and four with Mark 19 Mod 3 40-millimeter Grenade Launchers. "Second Squad, mount up and get down there. Fourth Squad, get an MG team down there and bring the medic with you. Where's First Sergeant Garcia."

"Right over here sir," answered 1SG Jose Garcia, the platoon's ranking sergeant.

"Go with Fourth Squad and bring your radioman, that should max out the Humvee."

"On it L-T." In short order, the ten men of 2nd Squad, the platoon's sergeant, medic, and one of its radiomen, and one MG team were all mounting up into three Humvees to head down to the crash site and provide whatever aid and assistance they could muster, though it would likely be little. At the very least, they could secure the crash site and prevent anyone from getting too close to it. Nights were dark in Cyprus, especially in the buffer zone and the glowing fire of the crash site was like a homing beacon for miles upon miles upon miles.

Walker didn't know about the Green Berets racing through the buffer zone to get to the crash site simply because he wasn't looking to the southeast. All he knew was that an incident had erupted in his sector and he was getting men on it right away only he would have little chance. Before the first vehicles could leave, the snaps and the cracks of bullets startled everyone at OP Cedar. Then came the tracer rounds and everyone knew that the OP was taking hostile fire, which sent everyone for cover. Walker, knowing his ROE, ordered his men to return fire while he dove into the command post, or CP, to make a radio call that OP Cedar was under attack. When he was asked to clarify, Walker nearly cursed into the radio that they were being shot at but he measured his voice and informed his superior officer that they were being fired upon from positions along the northern front and that his men were returning fire.

Moments after this, the Green Berets speeding along towards the crash site came over the radio to report that they too were taking fire from the north. In the background, the hammering of their .50-caliber HMGs firing to the north made listening to the radio that much more difficult. The OP was well enough equipped to hold out from a sustained assault but the fire that these men were taking was suppressive in nature. Whoever was shooting at them did not want them to leave their positions and for all of their efforts, they were successful. Walker canceled the relief force and the Green Berets were forced to turn away and return to Camp Pyla as the intensity of the incoming fire increased the closer they got to OP Cedar.

At OP Cedar, the entire platoon was firing back in measured shots. Assault rifles were on semi-automatic and automatic gunners were firing off quick bursts, just as they'd been trained. No one was going cyclic on their weapons. Night spotting scopes helped identify targets and tracer fire by squad and section leaders let everyone else know where to shoot. The platoon's three designated marksman were by far the most effective though. Using their semi-automatic rifles and night vision scopes, they were able to engage individual targets versus sighting and firing on muzzle flashes, which was what most of the platoon was doing.

In essence, an armed and hostile force had crossed into the buffer zone from the north and they were moving towards the crash site, shooting at OP Cedar to prevent them from doing the same. Fixed positions in the north engaged the Green Berets with the same ferocity, using longer-range, heavy machine guns, which could easily penetrate through the thin armor on the Humvees. Forced to allow this to happen, the Layartebian soldiers in immediate contact with the hostile force continued to fire until there was no more incoming fire but by then, a large force had assembled at the crash site with armored fighting vehicles and scores of infantrymen.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Thursday, April 1^st, 1993 | 15:30 hrs [UTC-5]
Layarteb City, New York | Fortress of Comhghall
40° 41' 28" N, 74° 0' 58" W

When Minister Bryant had phoned three hours earlier with news of a "major incident" in Cyprus, the Emperor had quickly ordered the Special Council convened by the end of the working day and 15:30 was the appointed time for that meeting. Convening in the War Room deeply buried under the Fortress of Comhghall, eight members of the Special Council settled in quickly and turned their attention to Minister Bryant who laid out the situation. "Shortly after today's peace talks, unknown forces engaged and shot down the Northern Cypriot delegation over the buffer zone. Immediately upon seeing this, C-FOR personnel at both Camp Pyla and a nearby OP named 'OP Cedar' attempted to reach the crash site. It was during their attempts that they came under suppressive fire from the northern front. In both instances, our personnel were forced to abandon their attempts to reach the crash site and either return to Camp Pyla or bunker down at OP Cedar. Our personnel, in both instances, returned fire against the OPFOR. Despite the incoming fire, none of our personnel sustained any injuries. Estimates are between ten and fifteen KIA for the OPFOR."

"Marion," the Emperor turned from one side of the table to the other to address Minister Bailey of Foreign Affairs, "what are both sides saying about this one?"

"Well sir they're both blaming one another and us even."

"Us?"

"Yes sir, Northern Cyprus claims its forces witnessed the attack originating from OP Cedar and that they recovered a missile launcher unit five hundred meters from the OP."

"Well clearly five hundred meters isn't the OP or can they not figure out how to read a map?" The Emperor asked both rhetorically and angrily. "That's just nonsense to justify firing on our OP. It's a line of diplomatic crap. What did they find?"

"Sir, it was a Stinger system made by us. They provided the serial number and we confirmed it is manufactured by us in 1990 and sold to Mexico. How it wound up in theater is anyone's guess."

"Well we never could trust Mexico City to keep a handle on its hardware. It's why we haven't sold them a lot of things. What about Intel, what does Intel have to say about this?"

"Well sir we don't have much. We're scouring through our SIGINT right now to determine if there was any radio traffic pertaining to this incident. If there wasn't sir I suspect this was a major setup by the Northern Cypriots."

"Shooting down their own delegation," the Emperor shook his head, "then blaming us and the Southern Cypriots. It's just the kind of justification that they can parlay throughout the island to justify restarting the war and nullifying the C-FOR mandate. We have six months left on that mandate and I'm not willing to let go of Cyprus. We've already invested too much there."

"Sir, looking at the situation right now," interrupted Eric Mook, the National Security Advisor, who had replaced Donald Cook the previous year, "we should tread very carefully." Mook had a PhD in public policy and he had been a professor for the past twenty-five years, tenured and well respected. He taught at Georgetown in Washington City, opting to come on as the Emperor's NSA after being recommended by Cook. Mook was shortlisted and one of three candidates. His interview secured him the job and so far he'd done a good job though there was some suspicion that he wouldn't last as long as Cook did as it appeared he seemed uncomfortable out of academia.

"I'd rather hit them with a sledgehammer but I understand," the Emperor said before turning to Chairman-General Mark Moore, "we sustained no casualties?"

"None sir, just some superficial damage to the OP and some damage to three Humvees. Nothing that we cannot repair or replace sir."

"I do not want this to go unanswered. Let's step up our patrols along the northern front. I want the Northern Cypriots to know we're there and we're not going to leave. We've previously given them a buffer of ten percent of the width of the buffer zone, correct?"

"Yes sir, ten percent on either side is considered something of a 'DMZ' sir."

"Good, violate it. Let's get up close and comfortable, cut that in half and bring them as close as we want to their positions. I want our soldiers to walk past their bunkers and be able to count how many people are in there without so much as a pair of binoculars."

"Yes sir," Chairman-General Moore answered. Minister Bryant wasn't opposed to the idea either and he voiced no objections. Truthfully, no one voiced any objections because this was as measured a response as the Empire could offer. In truth, they were fully justified in striking back at the offending positions with full force, as negotiated in the peace talks. It was put in that document that while both sides would refrain from engaging one another, there was absolutely no justification for attacking Layartebian forces without provocation and concocting this sort of twisted scenario was hardly any form of provocation.

"Now, as I understand it, Northern Cypriot forces crossed into the buffer zone."

"Yes sir," Minister Bryant affirmed.

"Have they departed?"

"Yes sir, they were only in the buffer zone for about two hours, long enough to secure the crash site and clear out the bodies. The wreckage is still there."

"Let's get there and investigate it once the sun comes up, we don't need anyone stepping on a landmine. We'll need to make sure our men are cautious. For all we know, they could have booby-trapped the area with mines. It wouldn't be beneath them at this point."

"Yes sir," Chairman-Genera Moore answered.

Then the Emperor turned back to Minister Bailey, "Let both sides now that this is an absolutely unacceptable situation. If either side wishes to open fire on the other, they will find the incoming fire from our positions far more destructive. That also goes in case they feel like shooting at our installations and any incursions into the buffer zone will result in their personnel being captured and held in contempt of the agreement. We can respond in ways that do not involve mortar and artillery strikes but that envelope is limited. If they want to act foolishly then they're going to find out just how much we are willing to 'keep the peace' in Cyprus."

"Yes sir."

"Good, this is the end of this crisis. If either side wants to perpetuate it, they won't be happy with the results. Cyprus isn't going to become a quagmire for this country, it's going to become a success in the exercise of peacekeeping or as a Layartebian-annexed territory, it is that simple," said the Emperor as he looked at the faces of those seated around the table. Cyprus was a major piece of Layartebian foreign policy in the Mediterranean. The Emperor had somehow gotten into a battle or competition of sorts with the Empire of Britannia and Cyprus was the plan's centerpiece in the region. It hadn't been intentional but the Suez Canal purchase by Manchurian Global showed the administration just how influential the British were in the region and how much the Empire lacked any powers of persuasion in the Eastern Med.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Sat Sep 01, 2018 10:41 pm

• • • † • • •

Saturday, April 3^rd, 1993 | 05:25 hrs [UTC+2]
Kato Koutrafas, Southern Cyprus | SC Army Outpost
35° 6' 42" N, 32° 58' 26" E

The sky was trying to lighten over Cyprus but it was fighting against a thick canopy of gray, storm clouds. The island had been battling against intermittent rain throughout the hours since midnight and while the rain was holding off for a bit, it didn't appear that it would remain that way for too long. As such, the morning was about 10°F colder than it should have been with temperatures hovering in the low to mid 40s. There was little quite like waking up to a cold and damp morning, especially for soldiers hunkered down at any of the outposts and observation posts along and inside of the buffer zone. It only added to the feeling of misery as tensions remained elevated following Thursday's shoot down of the Northern Cypriot Super Puma. The back-and-forth from Northern Cyprus and Southern Cyprus wasn't helped by the Empire's insistence that both sides stand down and return to talks.

Northern Cyprus' blaming of Southern Cyprus seemed way too convenient for the situation but at the same time it was well known that the nationalism in Southern Cyprus that ultimately led to the civil war hadn't gone anywhere. Both sides still wanted at each other's throats so it was just as likely that a commando unit from Southern Cyprus shot down the helicopter as it was that the Northern Cypriots shot down their own helicopter as a justification for attacking their enemies. What was constant and known however was the failure of the Layartebian-administered buffer zone to prevent the crisis. Both sides were now poised to attack one another with the Empire caught in the middle. Further complicating matters was the fact that Northern Cyprus had fired upon Layartebian positions already and in response, the Layartebian military in Cyprus was squeezing Northern Cyprus. Aircraft and vehicle patrols came up to the edge of the buffer zone and Northern Cyprus had already raised a protest, which fell on very deaf ears.

Yet all of this was on the grand scale of the geopolitical situation. On the ground, soldiers didn't care much for that sort of business as it was way above their pay grade. What concerned them really was whether or not the enemy was going to choose today, of all days, to reignite hostilities and both sides truly believed that the other was planning such a measure. It wasn't a matter of if but rather when and where. Both of those questions would be answered on this very morning as Southern Cypriot soldiers lazily awakened to the morning at OP Kato Koutrafas, just a few hundred meters away from the village where it took its name.

Kato Koutrafas straddled the buffer zone like its counterpart on the other side, a village now named Taşpınar but which had once been called Angolemi. During the civil war, both villages saw heavy fighting to the point where they were abandoned. In the years since peace had been established, Taşpınar's population was set at one hundred and twenty-seven. Its high had been two hundred and twenty-two in the years prior to the outbreak of the civil war. Kato Koutrafas on the other hand had not recovered and fewer than twenty people occupied the village. On both sides, soldiers used abandoned homes as places to rest when they weren't manning the outposts. Aptly titled, OP Taşpınar sat on the Northern side of the buffer zone.

The two OPs were entirely representative of their respective nations. OP Kato Koutrafas was a proper combat outpost. There was a clearly defined perimeter of HESCO barriers complete with protected firing ports, watchtowers, concertina wire, and entry/exit points. Within the perimeter there were concrete and cinderblock structures, a vehicle pool, and the associated areas for recreation and training. The perimeter ran one hundred and eighty meters in length with an area of half an acre, more than enough for a platoon and fifty-six men occupied the outpost for rotations of six to nine months. OP Taşpınar on the other hand looked like something from hunger. Sandbags and ammunition crates made up the walls and though there were firing ports, they were not as clearly defined as those at OP Kato Koutrafas. There were no permanent buildings, only 20-foot Conex containers to serve as the barracks, headquarters, and associated need structures. Portable toilets had been brought in and never removed, the shower area was prone to flooding, and to top it all off, the place was littered with trash. The Northern Cypriot soldiers that had occupied the outpost at the ceasefire were the same ones still holding it today. There were sixteen fewer men at OP Taşpınar but they had mortars.

More or less, the situation between the two OPs was simple. They were separated by eight hundred meters of distance and both sides had the other zeroed in for machine gun and mortar fire. At OP Taşpınar, there was a preset firing routine that would bring mortars all around the OP before bringing them inside, forcing everyone to hunker down and then pummel it with effective fire, trapping those inside. At OP Kato Koutrafas, the focus was mainly on preventing incursion into the buffer zone by soldiers from the other side. Regardless, they had artillery on call less than five klicks away that had OP Taşpınar completely zeroed for fire missions.

The sun was set to rise at 06:30, still an hour away. Most of the soldiers were still sleeping except for those on perimeter watch and they would soon be switching. Both platoons were made up of three rifle and one weapons squad, the latter controlling either the mortars and machine guns in the case of OP Taşpınar or just the machine guns at OP Kato Koutrafas. At any given point in time, one section from the weapons squad and one rifle squad was on watch duty while the others were either sleeping or conducting training or admin tasks. If something went haywire however, everyone would be up, alert, and ready to go in seconds and that was put to the test on this particular morning.

All seemed quiet until the first echoes of tubing rolled across the otherwise flat terrain of the buffer zone. Due to the distance, the sound took about two-and-a-half seconds to travel from one OP to the other and by then it was a much fainter but still distinguishable sound. For the soldiers on perimeter duty, sitting in their protective holes or up on watchtowers, the sound of tubing was a surprising sound to hear so early in the morning. Over the years, the soldiers at OP Taşpınar had conducted training sorties firing mortars outside of their OP into a designated area on their side of the buffer zone about five hundred meters away from it. They almost always did it in the afternoon though, never so early in the morning as they did today. Needless to say, the sound got everyone's attention who was awake or in a position to hear it.

The fire mission, as they counted it, was six rounds in rapid succession, two salvos of three. From the moment the sound went past OP Kato Koutrafas there was quiet. For the type of mortars being used, the flight time to five hundred meters was one second longer than the flight time to eight hundred meters since the angle was over 10° steeper to engage at five hundred meters. Then there was also the charge number used. More than likely it would be Charge 1, providing a muzzle velocity of approximately 105 m/s but limited range to about one kilometer. From the watchtower, soldiers perked up and pointed their binoculars downrange at the Northern Cypriot OP to see men scurrying around. It was maybe ten to twelve seconds after the sound was first heard that soldiers in and around OP Kato Koutrafas recognized that the fire mission wasn't a training sortie but something much more sinister.

Soldiers in the watchtowers quickly dove for cover behind the sandbags placed there and men on the ground ducked deeper into the holes. Five seconds later, the rounds impacted with thunderous explosions. Anyone who wasn't awake would be immediately. Those first six rounds landed outside of the perimeter in a pattern around the Southern Cypriot OP so that it compressed the OP with blast waves from three sides. A forward observer looking through binoculars quickly adjusted and called for the next salvo while Southern Cypriot soldiers scrambled to action. The platoon leader, a young second lieutenant, quickly put out a call for help that was picked up not only by his own military but also by Layartebian forces thirteen klicks away at OP Fir, which happened to be at a higher elevation and thus in a good position to receive transmissions from that particular sector.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Saturday, April 3^rd, 1993 | 05:30 hrs [UTC+2]
Akrotiri SBA, Cyprus | Akrotiri Air Force Base (C-FOR)
35° 6' 43" N, 33° 27' 21" E

Akrotiri Air Force Base was about fifty-eight klicks due south of OP Kato Koutrafas and much too far away to hear or to know about the incoming mortar rounds but radio waves were much better than sound waves were. From OP Fir, radio operators relayed the transmissions down to Akrotiri AFB and many other locations all around the island of Cyprus, specifically, the Layartebian Sovereign Base Areas and outposts. Every OP went on immediate alert per SOPs and at Akrotiri, the klaxon in the ready room began to blare at an ear-piercing level of volume. That immediately sent pilots out of their bed, if they happened to be in them, and into a scramble mode.

Akrotiri was home to an expeditionary wing of six squadrons now, each one tasked with a different purpose. At this juncture in time there was the 25th Tactical Fighter Squadron with its twenty-four F-15C/D Eagles, the 49th Tactical Fighter Squadron with its twenty-four F-16C/D Falcons, the 13th Tactical Fighter Squadron with its twenty-four F-111F Aardvarks, the 62nd Tactical Air Support Squadron with its fourteen OV-10A Broncos, the 109th Tactical Airlift Squadron with its sixteen C-130H Hercules', and 89th Air Refueling Squadron, Heavy with its fourteen KC-135E Stratotankers. All told that meant there were one hundred and sixteen aircraft based at Akrotiri and at any given point in time, twelve of them were on quick alert, their pilots sleeping in the ready room located right next to the flight line.

The QRA area had twelve revetments, one for each aircraft and those revetments were clearly delineated by tall, profiled, steel walls. Those blast walls were designed to ensure that if one aircraft were destroyed by either hostile fire or mechanical failure that the others would not be affected and they worked well. At any given point in time, eight of those revetments were occupied by F-15C Eagles and F-16C Falcons, the Eagles loaded purely for an air-to-air engagement with four AIM-7M Sparrow and four AIM-9M Sidewinder missiles and the Falcons loaded for an air-to-ground engagement with a mix of AIM-9M Sidewinders and air-to-ground ordnance, chiefly iron bombs or Maverick missiles. The other four spots were normally occupied by two F-111F Aardvarks equipped solely with air-to-ground ordnance in the form of laser-guided bombs and two OV-10A Broncos equipped with air-to-ground spotting rockets and illumination flares for the forward observer mission. This array of aircraft meant that all twelve aircraft could scramble, get airborne, and provide a rapid, punishing response to any situation.

As the klaxon sounded, each of the thirty-two pilots jumped out of their beds and darted into the briefing room where the duty officer would give them the rundown on what was happening. He'd already been given a quick briefing of the situation by his superior and he would relay the few details that he knew and could relay, namely that a Southern Cypriot OP was taking mortar fire from a Northern Cypriot OP in the vicinity of Kato Koutrafas - coordinates were given - and that a scramble order had been issued to an OV-10D Bronco flight to get up there and get eyes on what was happening. The two OV-10D Bronco pilots did a quick game of Rock-paper-scissors, the best way to determine who would get the flight. The winner was First Lieutenant Manuel Brazelton and his observer, Second Lieutenant Robert Morgan and they hustled out of the ready room and off to their awaiting aircraft, where grounds crewmen were already readying the spotter plane for flight.

As part of QRA duty, the aircraft were already preflighted and inspected so that the pilots had only to jump into the cockpit and begin the startup sequence. Brazelton did just that while his observer did much of the same, though his checklist was smaller. It involved, quite simply, making sure his radio was working, his binoculars were present, his maps were present, and his M16A1 rifle was present along with the necessary magazines. Brazelton's checklist was more extensive but in two minutes he had the engines started, running, and at idle, and within five minutes, he was already beginning to taxi to the runway just 375 meters from his revetment where he had priority clearance to go into an immediate takeoff roll. This he did and with that CLOVER 1-1 was airborne less than ten minutes after the first calls for help were relayed to Akrotiri.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Saturday, April 3^rd, 1993 | 05:48 hrs [UTC+2]
Kato Koutrafas, Southern Cyprus | SC Army Outpost
35° 6' 42" N, 32° 58' 26" E

OP Kato Koutrafas had been under attack for twenty minutes now but it was only in the first few minutes that OP Kato Koutrafas sat idle. As mortar rounds continued to land around and even inside of the perimeter, the OP fought back. First, machine gun teams occupied their covered positions and began to fire bursts of three to five rounds downrange against OP Taşpınar; however, due to the relatively even elevation between the two OPs, their rounds mostly impacted against the walls of OP Taşpınar rather than affect inside of the OP. The platoon's marksman, occupying a position on one of the watchtowers within two minutes of being woken up had already fired several rounds against the hostile OP. His first round had killed his counterpart, the primary target due to the sniper's ability to negate his own effectiveness. From there he searched for, found, and engaged the forward observer, killing him too. This had largely negated the corrections to the mortar teams but they continued to fire anyway.

A few minutes thereafter, the platoon leader at OP Kato Koutrafas obtained permission for his own fire mission and so he called in a salvo of artillery fire against OP Taşpınar. That fire was provided by a battery of 105-millimeter howitzers located five kilometers behind Kato Koutrafas and about only 650 meters further away from OP Taşpınar. The firebase there had three such howitzers and they had been trained, elevated, and let loose for the initial fire mission. Those rounds landed short and so a correction was made. It took two more corrections to put those specific rounds onto target and from there, the guns let loose a punishing salvo of fire, blanketing OP Taşpınar with a combination of smoke and high-explosive rounds, the former to obscure their ability to see their own mortars and also everything else at their base and the latter to kill them.

By this point, the Bronco was on its way to get an idea of what was going on, speeding towards the battle area at 300 knots. The Bronco was overhead and circling at 6,000 feet by 05:48, roughly twenty-three minutes after the first mortar rounds were fired. By then, OP Taşpınar was smoldering with considerable casualties. The 105-millimeter guns had gone quiet and the mortaring had ceased. OP Kato Koutrafas was working on their own casualties, which included only six wounded men, none of them seriously. OP Taşpınar on the other hand had eleven killed and most of the rest wounded, eight severely and in need of immediate medical attention. The effectiveness of both the Southern Cypriot sniper and their artillery had rendered OP Taşpınar a shattered mess.

"CLOVER 1-1 to COACH, we've over the target area now," said Morgan into his radio once they commenced their orbit. "It looks pretty quiet down there right now, NC OP has taken some heavy fire with significant damage. SC OP is largely intact, I can see where the mortars landed. They took some direct hits."

"Roger that CLOVER 1-1, remain on station and report resumption of hostilities. We have a patrol en route from OP Fir now, ETA is thirty mikes."

"Ten-four COACH," Morgan said and cut out his transmission. The Bronco had quite a bit of endurance and she was lightly loaded, weighing less than 9,300 lb. at takeoff, which gave the aircraft an endurance of at least three hours on station before Brazelton would have to bring it back to Akrotiri. He settled in at 5,000 feet above ground level and a cruising speed of just 140 knots, slowly and lazily doing a figure 8 over the battlefield.

The sky was beginning to lighten more rapidly now and he was on station for approximately twelve minutes before Morgan noticed any activity down at OP Taşpınar. The Bronco was equipped with a pair of 7-round, LAU-32/B rocket pods, each equipped with 2.75-inch rockets carrying white phosphorous warheads for target marketing. It was also equipped with a pair of 4-round dispensers for parachute flares, which would provide illumination during nighttime fire missions. For offensive weaponry however, the aircraft was equipped with four, 7.62-millimeter M60C light machine guns. These could be used on strafing runs and the guns were loaded two thousand rounds, enough for quite a few strafing passes.

From his backseat, Morgan observed the activity at OP Taşpınar and called over the intercom, "We've got some activity at Taşpınar, bring it in closer. I want to see what's going on down there."

"You got it, coming around now," Brazelton answered as he pulled the aircraft from its easterly course up and around to a direct course with OP Taşpınar. They overflew it at a slight bank so that Morgan could get a better look. "You need another pass?"

"Definitely," Morgan answered and Brazelton flew the aircraft for about thirty seconds before turning around for a second pass. What they never saw was that on the ground, a team of men were unpacking a surface-to-air missile launcher, which they would use to down the Bronco. The Northern Cypriot army had obtained most of these systems illegally via the black market and so they were not expected in the theater at all. The OV-10A Bronco lacked flare dispensers, a gross overlook on the design of an aircraft such as the Bronco. There were retrofitting programs in place to fit in two AN/ALE-39 dispensers onto OV-10A and OV-10D aircraft but none of the aircraft from the 62nd TAS had gone through the program yet. Until the downing of the Super Puma, the presence of the MANPAD threat was nonexistent as the Empire saw to it that neither side received MANPAD systems. Even still, with the downing of the Super Puma there was no reason to believe that a Layartebian aircraft would be engaged and shot down by either side.

Coming around on the second pass, the OV-10A Bronco kept a steep bank and Morgan looked down with his binoculars. He could see the activity but with the smoke from the smoldering fires, it was impossible to see for certain what was going on so he asked for a third pass. Brazelton came around and passed a third time. On the ground, the MANPAD team waited until the Bronco passed them overhead at a slow and lumbering 140 knots and 5,000 feet. Then, they fired, the missile locking onto the heat signature of the aircraft's port engine. In the cockpit there was no warning because there was no missile warning system fit to warn them. Furthermore, Morgan's view was obstructed and so the launch was never caught. He was looking for a forth pass when the missile struck the engine and exploded.

"Holy shit we're hit," Brazelton yelled as the aircraft shuddered and was violently thrown off course. The Bronco was mortally wounded with the single strike and veering to the north. With the port engine out, the starboard engine pulled hard and yanked the aircraft around violently. Knowing that they were doomed, Morgan quickly issued a Mayday call that they'd been struck and were veering northward. Seconds later, they initiated their ejection sequence as the fuel lines caught fire. Both men were thrown clear of the cockpit and seconds later, the Bronco went into a spiraling nosedive, crashing into the ground with a large explosion. The WP warheads on the rockets detonated shortly thereafter, filling the air with the acrid smoke of white phosphorous.

By then, Morgan and Brazelton were separated by about three hundred meters of distance and descending on their parachutes into Northern Cyprus right over the town of Taşpınar. Because of the relative darkness still, it was difficult for the men at OP Kato Koutrafas to see that the two pilots had ejected but it didn't matter. Morgan, quickly deducing that this was his best opportunity to radio for help due to his altitude, grabbed his survival radio from his vest pocket and transmitted into it that he and his pilot were both alive, they'd had a successful ejection, and that they were landing near Taşpınar. He had little else to get out before he had to control the parachute for descent, during which time he inadvertently dropped his radio. It would not survive the fall.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Fri Sep 21, 2018 7:43 pm

• • • † • • •

Saturday, April 3^rd, 1993 | 06:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Cypriot Buffer Zone, Cyprus | OP Fir (C-FOR)
35° 4' 56" N, 32° 50' 5" E

"Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! This is CLOVER 1-1. We are down. I repeat, we are down. Current position is under canopy over Taşpınar. Two pilots alive and under canopy. CLOVER 1-1 is down…" And that was all there was for a transmission. Morgan dropped the radio moments later when he reached for the control lines as a gust of wind threaten to throw him sideways and collapse the canopy, which would have been a promptly fatal failure.

At OP Fir, there was a 4-man radio team on duty with Sergeant First Class Ryan Reese on duty as the section chief. The tension in the radio room was high upon hearing those first three words. The mere concept of a Layartebian aircraft downed over Cyprus was more foreign than the land itself was. A state of shock came over the room and as one of the radiomen reached to transmit, Reese stopped him. "He's given us one transmission, told us his position, and a vague idea of what happened. He could be nearing hostile forces. Hold on that transmission until he reconnects with us. We know they're alive."

"Roger that Sergeant," said the young private first class, a nineteen year-old conscript who'd just completed his basic training six months earlier.

Reese quickly began a relay over channels he knew were secure, passing on information back to C-FOR's headquarters that two pilots were down in Northern Cyprus. The uninitiated might have asked what "down" really meant. Did they have mechanical issues? Did they lose control of the aircraft? Was hostile intent involved? In reality, insofar as air force vernacular went, "down" had only one meaning. Any aircraft and its crew who were "down" were down because of hostile action, whether that was anti-aircraft fire or air-to-air engagement. Down was merely shortened from "shot down" and nothing further. Politicians would play with these words as much as they could because that was what they did but the military knew precisely what Morgan was conveying. He had been shot down by an unidentified, hostile force in and around the area of Taşpınar, right where combat activity had been reported. Something was definitely amiss and for C-FOR, the downing of CLOVER 1-1 was being seen very much like an omen of what was to come.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Saturday, April 3^rd, 1993 | 06:08 hrs [UTC+2]
Taşpınar, Northern Cyprus | Mehmet's Farm
35° 7' 3" N, 32° 56' 48" E

Morgan hit the ground first, finding himself in the worst possible area, a plot of farmland with no natural cover. Worse, the farmland had been tilled and there wasn't even any crops to use as cover. There were some trees thirty meters away but they offered little in the way of cover and thirty meters the other way was the road. Time wasn't on his side and he quickly got his bearings, having scouted the area after losing his radio. Brazelton was approximately five or six hundred meters northwards, having been caught by some wind after ejection and blown further away. What this meant for Brazelton though was landing in an area with even less cover than where Morgan was because where he landed had once been a wadi but which was now essentially nothing but dry land. There were some animal farms around him and if there was something both men knew, they weren't going to be received kindly.

Morgan, knowing he needed to get away from the area, immediately set off north, moving quickly. He aimed to meet up with Brazelton, circle off to the east or the west and then southwards for the Buffer Zone. They both knew that once they crossed into the Buffer Zone they would be all right, they just needed to escape and evade Northern Cypriot force until they could do so. The Buffer Zone was only about a mile to Morgan's south and just a little further for Brazelton. He could have perhaps made it there on his own, setting off quickly and trying to run the entire way. He figured he could do it in seven or eight minutes but he also knew that he couldn't leave Brazelton alone. Without a survival radio, he simply had to go on his gut feeling that both men saw one another's general vicinity and would be working their way towards each other. Together, they would stand a good chance of survival.

Working northwards, Morgan crossed the edge of the farm's plot of land, having covered about seventy meters quite quickly. There were homes to his left but they appeared abandoned and he didn't bother getting close to them. What this meant, unfortunately, was that Morgan stuck to open land and anyone with a good set of eyes or a mediocre set of binoculars could have seen him. He made his way through three hundred meters of terrain very quickly, moving into some vegetation around an abandoned area only to find that he was nearing a road. He'd have to cross it and from there he would be in the wadi. Using his binoculars, he scanned the area and looked specifically to the north. Brazelton's parachute was there, blowing in the wind but there was no sign of him. Morgan opted to wait. The sun was only going to be rising higher and he had precious little time on his side but he didn't want to miss the chance of passing his fellow comrade inadvertently.

It was while he was waiting that Morgan was captured. A Northern Cypriot patrol had seen Brazelton and him eject and they'd been closer to Brazelton so it was he who they picked up first. Brazelton landed and within minutes, he was surrounded by a platoon of men with drawn rifles ordering him to his knees. Brazelton rapidly pulled out a laminated card that stated, in three languages, that he was a C-FOR pilot and subject to immediate repatriation. A reward would be offered for his safe return and that any act of interrogation, torture, or violence against him would result in a violation of the peacekeeping agreement.

When Brazelton offered it to the Northern Cypriot commander, the man took it, laughed, and threw it aside. Brazelton was handcuffed and thrown into the back of a canvased Jeep and ushered off while that same group began working their way, on foot, towards the second pilot, towards Morgan. They surmised that he would likely be on foot, possibly heading to the Buffer Zone or possibly heading towards Brazelton. Another platoon would be converging from the south, sweeping northwards while they swept southwards. The idea was to lock him in the middle and capture him, which was precisely what happened.

Morgan saw the incoming soldiers as they moved through the wadi and set their sights on the roadway. He was in cover but not particularly good cover. It was adequate and little else. So he began to crawl backwards, slowly and carefully, trying not to arouse anyone's attention. He backed through about eighty meters before he was faced with a decision. He would have to go back into open terrain or he could wait it out and it was there that he saw the next group coming towards him. Cursing under his breath, he opened to wait it out, to hide in the underbrush in hopes that they would pass him by.

He had no such luck and he was quickly found. Like Brazelton, he produced the card and like what happened with Brazelton, the commander took it and cast it aside. He was restrained and carried back to the road, where he was tossed into the back of an armored personnel carrier and sped off, his eyes blindfolded, a gag over his mouth, and his hands restrained. If he could talk he would have cursed their very name, asked them why they shot him down, asked them why they were treating a C-FOR pilot so poorly and against the rules established in the peacekeeping agreement. He'd have no such opportunity though and neither had Brazelton who would have been just as salty with these Northern Cypriots.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Saturday, April 3^rd, 1993 | 06:15 hrs [UTC+2]
Cypriot Buffer Zone, Cyprus | OP Fir (C-FOR)
35° 4' 56" N, 32° 50' 5" E

"Gear up! Let's go! Let's go! Let's go!" Shouted Second Lieutenant Tim Gebhard as his platoon frantically rushed to get their kit together. His platoon was a 48-man force consisting of an 8-man platoon headquarters element, three 10-man rifle squads, and a 10-man weapons squad. They had ten Humvees between them and they were going to be using each and every one of them. Men were rushing to their vehicles, those responsible for using the guns quickly getting into the cupola rings. Between the eight vehicles, they had six .50-caliber machine guns and two 40-millimeter grenade launchers, quite a bit of firepower.

With the news of the downed pilots, Gebhard had been ordered to assemble his platoon and get into the Buffer Zone around the area of Taşpınar. Unfortunately, they were not authorized to cross the Buffer Zone into Northern Cypriot territory without permission from command unless they physically saw the downed Layartebians and could render assistance. Of course, if they were waiting there and the enemy opened fire on any rescue attempt, they were under orders to return fire immediately. For all intents and purposes though, they were restrained from what they could do. They all wanted to cross in and begin a search for Morgan and Brazelton, the names of whom they did not know but this was strictly disallowed.

As he stood there rallying his men, Gebhard noticed his platoon sergeant standing near the hood of a Humvee looking at a map. Gebhard walked over and looked down at the map, "How far is it?"

"Well, the way we're going to have to go sir, about twenty-five klicks."

"Then we'd better get a move on because it's going to take us a while to get there."

"What about a Black Hawk sir?"

"Out of the question," Gebhard shook his head, "command doesn't want a third aircraft shot down this week. Mount up! Let's go people!" He yelled once more as he looked down at the map a final time, "Lead us out there."

"Yes sir."

They were on the move or "oscar mike" within the next five minutes but they were looking at an ETA near to 07:00. By now, Brazelton was already captured, a POW, and Morgan was soon to be captured. They started off heading southwards, out of the OP and down the hillside before crossing over to the east and getting on one of the access roads through the Buffer Zone. However, the road was windy and it cut through areas that were marked by trees and others marked by fields. Ambush points could be anywhere so the gun operators were always looking around in their assigned sectors. The going was somewhat slow too because of changes in elevation and grade forcing the drivers to slow down to avoid tipping over in some of the hairpin turns.

Making progress through the Buffer Zone, the 8-vehicle convoy was maintaining an average speed of around 40 km/h and soon enough, they were nearing their rally point, a position identified as the likely crossing point for Morgan and Brazelton as they made their way into the Buffer Zone. Command assumed that they wouldn't take the shortest possible way, which was towards the east because that would lead right into OP Taşpınar and also be the most likely place the OPFOR would place its patrols so they assumed they would go west or directly south, keeping as far from OP Taşpınar as possible. In this regard, they were right, this would have been Morgan and Brazelton's plan had they managed to evade capture.

That position was approximately 1,100 meters south-southwest of OP Taşpınar with relatively flat and open terrain all around. It was an ideal spot because it offered a commanding view of the surrounding area with no hindrances to fields of fire. It also meant that the convoy was easily visible long before they reached the area and as they approached to within five hundred meters, the area just north of the Buffer Zone erupted in hostile fire.

The first rounds were tracer rounds, fired by light machine guns. Then as the vehicles moved closer, the volume of fire increased as now assault rifles were brought to bear. One RPG was fired and it struck short of the third vehicle in the convoy, peppering the vehicle with shrapnel and wounding both the driver and the passenger behind him though not seriously. Without the need for permission, everyone facing the border with Northern Cyprus opened fire. Guns banged out their rounds as the Layartebians moved more to suppress the OPFOR and force them to break the attack. This was only partially effective and the Humvees got to within just two hundred and fifty meters of their intended rally point when they were forced to retreat amidst heavy, incoming fire. Calls for support from OP Kato Koutrafas would go unanswered as the OP once again came under incoming mortar fire from the northern side of the Buffer Zone.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Fri Nov 23, 2018 9:22 pm

• • • † • • •

Saturday, April 3^rd, 1993 | 06:40 hrs [UTC+2]
Doğancı, Northern Cyprus | 7th People's Militia Battalion CP
35° 7' 47" N, 32° 54' 51" E

OP Taşpınar was one of six OPs under the control of Colonel Sunay Kurtiz, commanding officer of the 7th People's Militia Battalion, a 525-man outfit that was operating in the vicinity of OP Taşpınar and charged with protection of this particular sector. There was another battalion to his west that covered from Lefke west to the end of the Buffer Zone. To Kurtiz's northeast was yet another battalion and so on and so forth across the entire Buffer Zone. Each of the battalions had three companies, each of which had three platoons. Then there was a battalion mortar battery, an anti-tank platoon, an air defense platoon, and a grenade artillery platoon beyond the standard elements of the Headquarters and Headquarters Company. The organization of the 7th People's Militia was highly professional but that was where the professionalism stopped. They were a ragged bunch, stationed on the Buffer Zone for years with little contact from their families, if they even had any left, beyond letters, some short leave requests, and the occasional telephone call.

Most of the men of the battalion were stationed at OPs like the one at Taşpınar and like the one at Taşpınar, they were dingy places to live, no matter how much the soldiers spruced them up to make them more like a home. Yet for Kurtiz, life was not along the Buffer Zone but rather in a command post in Doğancı, just a few minutes' ride from the Buffer Zone. Kurtiz had seized about 1.25 hectares of land in Doğancı, which included two sizeable homes, each one with over 350 m² of floorplan on their main, above ground levels. A tent city had been erected all around the open land to serve as bivouacs for the men and working areas for the rest of the battalion. At any given point in time, a company was occupying the CP area along with fifty-seven men from the HHC. Men rotated in and out here and there but by and large, those who'd been assigned to live at the CP stayed at the CP.

When the Bronco had been sighted, targeted, and shot down, Kurtiz seized upon the opportunity and ordered his most experienced and most disciplined platoon out to the crash site. The 28-man platoon, equipped with three, four-wheeled APCs set out immediately and shortly thereafter, they captured the two Layartebian pilots. Per instructions, no radio calls had been made because Kurtiz knew that the Layartebians were listening, they were always listening and the last thing he wanted to announce was two prisoners. If he did that, C-FOR would be rapidly on his case to turn them over unharmed. He wanted to use them as a bargaining chip but he always wanted to teach C-FOR a lesson.

Kurtiz was fifty-four years old and an ultranationalist. He wanted to steamroll right through Nicosia and capture it for his people. He was unapologetic and he had no qualms about burning towns to the ground. He'd started the 7th People's Militia Battalion when the civil war began and he'd made a name for himself with the Northern Cypriot military for the efficiency with which he operated. He'd also acquired a nickname that spoke of how ruthless he was and it was a nickname that suited him well, which was "The Butcher."

Despite being no stranger to combat and to the gruesome nature of warfare conducted without attention to any moral code, Kurtiz was rather uneasy about the Bronco shoot down. If they were dead, they would be a simple bargaining chip since the Layartebians would want the bodies back. If they were alive however, that would complicate matters. They could not be released back to the Layartebians to tell what happened and to tell what kind of treatment they'd received, which was a clear violation of the ceasefire. Further complicating matters was the fact that the Bronco was an observer plane, not necessarily a combat plane, though to Kurtiz there was no difference. Any aircraft flown by a military pilot was, in his estimation, a combat plane. In fact, as it stood, he had his men working on a press release of sorts that would justify his men's engagement of the Bronco. Nothing was yet written into it about the fate of the pilots.

Kurtiz had set up his "office" in what had once been the homeowner's master bedroom. It had a private bathroom with a stall shower that he'd found particularly useful and since the room was so big that he could have his desk and his bed, he'd basically turned it into his main area of occupation, except when he made his rounds, except when he needed to be briefing his officers, and except when he was engaged in other activities, such as visiting a mistress he had moved into town, seizing someone's house to do it. Kurtiz clearly had little regard for any law but his own and the town of Doğancı was basically his fiefdom. Dozens had fled already because of him but he didn't care much. The fewer people around, the less people to get in his way.

From his second-story window, he watched the road and when he saw one of the three APCs returning, he knew it had to be bringing news. Quickly, he made his way down the stairs and outside just in time to see the APC pull through the front gate, which was flanked on either side by heavy machine guns in sandbagged emplacements. Two men manned each gun but they were at ease. He shouted at them to keep a sharp eye and they snapped to and took a less lackadaisical approach to their duty.

The APC parked right in front of the house that acted as the main CP and stood there idling while the platoon leader climbed out of a side door and lowered himself to the ground. A short-barreled Kalashnikov hung around his neck and he wore the uniform of the militia. There were no flags on his uniform and no indicators to his name or his rank but everyone who operated with him knew who he was, Kurtiz's right-hand man. "What did you find?" Kurtiz asked the moment the platoon leader came up to him.

"We found the wreckage. I've left two squads there to search for anything of value."

"Was the aircraft armed?"

"There are rocket launchers and flare dispensers but no bombs or missiles. They were probably smoke rockets. We did not get very close."

"Well there is no way for us to know that," Kurtiz smiled, "smoke rockets are used by artillery observers. They could have easily been 'spotting' for the firefight. This is good! What of the crew?"

"Alive."

"Alive?" Here Kurtiz put his head in his hands and shook, "Are they with you?"

"Yes we have them inside."

"Let's get them inside and into the basement quickly. I don't want too many people to see them. This is the last thing I need."

"We can do it discretely."

"Good, do it quickly then," Kurtiz ordered. The APC was backed up to the door of the house with just enough room that its rear doors could be opened without smashing into the exterior walls. Men inside quickly hurried the two airmen into the house and then down the steps into the basement where a wine cellar had once been located. The cellar, which had been broken into two sections - one for red wine and one for white wine - served as a suitable location for the prisoners though the wine had long since been drunk by Kurtiz's men.

To his platoon leader and right-hand man, Kurtiz requested the largest and meanest men in the outfit to be brought forward. One was a vehicle mechanic who was known for his temper and the other was a machine gunner from the platoon leader's very own squad. Kurtiz briefed both men out of earshot of the prisoners, wanting them to deliver a tremendous beating to the two men. He wanted them to appear to have died in the crash and not by execution. A bullet would not be easily explained but two bodies beaten by the "impact" of a crash would be, or so he hoped. Kurtiz had little understanding of what autopsies could reveal.

In the meantime, Kurtiz returned to the main control area, ignoring the screams, cries, and whimpers of the two men being beaten to death. There, he tailored the press release that he would have transmitted to C-FOR. In it, he accused them of actively attacking OP Taşpınar by using the Bronco as a forward observer plane. He called the men of OP Taşpınar brave heroes for resisting the incoming fire laid upon them by the C-FOR outpost. Furthermore, he called the incident a dangerous provocation and a complete violation of the ceasefire agreement. Hoping to stoke the nationalist tendencies of his people, he claimed only a few casualties at OP Taşpınar and called their deaths "murders" rather than the byproducts of combat action. He made no mention of course of the fact that his men were the ones to blame for everything. The truth wouldn't look very good when he was trying to accuse C-FOR of restarting the Cypriot Civil War.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Fri Dec 14, 2018 9:36 pm

• • • † • • •

Sunday, April 4^th, 1993 | 00:10 hrs [UTC+2]
Taşköy, Northern Cyprus | Abandoned Village
35° 6' 35" N, 32° 54' 21" E

Before the start of the Cypriot Civil War, there had been just over nine hundred people living in the village then known as Petra but which was now referred to as Taşköy. Taşköy was abandoned now and largely in ruins still from the conflict that had ravaged the island nation. What had once been a Greek Orthodox Church now had a gaping hole in its roof so large that there was barely anything remaining to call a roof. Most of the homes had been burned to their foundations and what few had remained standing were now considered unsafe because of the state of decay. This made Taşköy a perfect place to hide the bodies of two Layartebian pilots who'd been beaten to death on Kurtiz's orders.

It was just after midnight and it would have been much darker had it not been for the nearly fully moon poking through the openings in the clouds passing over Cyprus. It was warm, in the low 60s, and the wind was calm but ever present. The sun had gone down about five hours earlier and the moon rose about three hours afterwards. To say that it was a nice evening would be to betray why a squad of men were standing in a copse of trees in the abandoned village with shovels. The men were under the strictest of orders not to betray their presence, which meant no radio communications, no flashlights or headlights, and no cigarettes. The last thing Kurtiz wanted was a dozen cigarettes bouncing in the dark to be found by a Layartebian patrol in the buffer zone.

The men had taken turns digging the two graves. They would be burying the pilots especially deep, over two meters, to ensure that they were not located in any fashion. Kurtiz knew that eventually his government would have to let the Layartebians search the area where the plane went down and they would surely bring dogs, who could pick up the scent and perhaps even track it all the way to Taşköy. He wanted to be overly cautious in this regard. He'd already spoken via an intermediary to the leadership of the country and they were on board with what he'd done and how he was operating. There was a big picture involved here and Kurtiz was one of its architects. They weren't going to let something like the Bronco's downing stand in the way of their designs and plans against Southern Cyprus.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Sunday, April 4^th, 1993 | 09:00 hrs [UTC-5]
Layarteb City, New York | Fortress of Comhghall
40° 41' 28" N, 74° 0' 58" W

It was the early morning at the Fortress of Comhghall but that didn't stop the press briefing room from filling up from end-to-end. The Emperor had made a late night decision to give a press briefing concerning the incident in Cyprus. The press had already gotten wind of it and they were running a million and one stories, each one more sensational than the last. He hoped to put some water on the flames before they could consume the entire forest. Preparing ahead of time, the Emperor knew what he wanted to say and it was just a matter of whether or not Northern Cyprus would be listening and he was sure that they would be.

Ahead of his arrival in the room, a production assistant laid out the ground rules so that everyone knew them, not that they hadn't heard them before. It was done simply as a matter of routine and not to insinuate that people did not know the rules. The Emperor would enter, people would stand, he would seat them, and he would go into his prepared remarks. When he was done, he would field a few questions from the press pool and then he would end the briefing. From start-to-finish, the production assistance estimated only about twenty-five minutes. The Emperor would give a few short words and leave more time open for questions.

When he entered, on cue, everyone stood. He took his place at the podium and straightened his tie. His appearance was immaculate. "Ladies and gentlemen of the Empire and of the world," he began, "yesterday morning, an incident occurred on the island of Cyprus. As I am sure many of you are aware, a Layartebian aircraft was brought down over the Buffer Zone. At this time, C-FOR is piecing together the incident and they cannot say, definitively, who engaged and brought down the aircraft, which was a type OV-10D Bronco with a two-man crew.

"The Bronco is a reconnaissance aircraft used for a variety of roles. This aircraft operated under the 62nd Tactical Air Support Squadron, which is based at Akrotiri, in Southern Cyprus. It is one of several aircraft based there in support of C-FOR.

"Yesterday morning, the Bronco was launched to a Layartebian outpost in the area of Kato Koutrafas in response to hostile action from the Northern Cyprus side of the Buffer Zone. This aircraft was unarmed and it was not equipped with defensive flares. Based on eyewitness reports from this outpost, both pilots ejected from the aircraft but their fate is presently unknown.

"Which leads me to my next point. These two men are operating lawfully in accordance with the terms, conditions, rules, and regulations set forth by the C-FOR agreement. These pilots will be returned immediately, unharmed, and without duress. Furthermore, C-FOR personnel will be allowed access to the crash site and the surrounding areas as part of an evidence collection team. This government will regard any attempt to hinder the return of our pilots and the evidence collection as an admission of guilt.

"Let me advise you in the strongest possible terms. We will retaliate and we will get our pilots back. The aggression committed along the Buffer Zone the past few days is completely unwarranted and contradictory to the peace process. The Empire will extend its C-FOR mission if the security situation does not improve and we shall do so unilaterally if we must. The Empire is committed to peace, stability, and a coexistence between the two Cyprus'. If either party wishes otherwise, they would be doing a great disservice to the efforts made already.

"The engagement of a Layartebian aircraft is inexcusable and we shall not accept 'mistake' as an excuse. Our aircraft are clearly identifiable over those of either side in this conflict. As such, we will be regarding this as a deliberate and a premeditated act committed by individuals aiming to thwart the C-FOR peace process. We will find those people and bring them to justice. Thank you."

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Sun Jan 06, 2019 1:57 pm

• • • † • • •

Tuesday, April 6^th, 1993 | 07:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Akrotiri SBA, Cyprus | Akrotiri Air Force Base (C-FOR)
35° 6' 43" N, 33° 27' 21" E

ODA-3315 was led by Captain Mike Stuck and this morning, it had been tasked with a security mission for a team of investigators going to the Bronco crash site. Northern Cyprus had finally relented to Layartebian pressure that they were going to allow investigators on-site to examine the wreckage. They were still sticking to their story that the two pilots were killed in the crash as they continued to be unaware of what the Layartebian military knew. What the Layartebian military did not know however was that the two pilots were dead and buried, having been beaten to death on the orders of Colonel Kurtiz. The military still believed that their two pilots were alive and in captivity, likely being tortured to reveal information on C-FOR operations. It was a hope that they were keeping their mouth shut, just how shut was certainly going to be a surprise soon enough.

At Akrotiri Air Base, Captain Stuck was sitting in on a pre-op briefing. There would be seven investigators and his twelve men, plus the two helicopter crews that would bring them to the crash site. The pilots and door gunners brought the total Layartebian contingent to twenty-seven men though there would be far more than that available to support the mission. Two AH-64A Apaches would be on QRF waiting a few klicks from the Buffer Zone, armed and ready to strike if the need arose and aerial support would be provided by an RQ-2A Pioneer drone being operated by the navy. The drone was equipped with an EO/IR sensors and a relay so that it could be used to provide real-time intelligence to the team on the ground of a wide area around their mission zone. The RQ-2 was mainly used for artillery targeting and its primary platform were the Montana-class battleships, which had been in service now for nearly fifty years. However, he ones being operated would be flown from Akrotiri, not the battleships.

Takeoff was set for 07:30, which meant that the flight crews were the first people out of the briefing, choosing to get out there as soon as possible to preflight their aircraft, a pair of UH-60A Black Hawks. The twelve men from ODA-3315 remained in the briefing area with the investigation team going over some ground rules to how they operated and what the investigators should expect. The investigators weren't armed and in the event that someone went wrong, they were to hightail it to the nearest Black Hawk and get on while the Green Berets covered their egress. If the situation was too hairy, the Black Hawks would lift off with the investigators and come back for the Green Berets, who would have - at their fingertips - two Apaches and plenty of artillery support from the nearest outpost and/or camp.

In going over "what to expect," Captain Stuck let the investigators know that they were "not welcomed" by the Northern Cypriots. They could expect intimidation and sleight of hand tactics. The Northern Cypriots, he explained, were the enemy and they would do everything in their power to obfuscate and hinder the investigation. Having the Pioneer on hand would, he explained, go a long way to backing them up with live footage of the operation. In addition, The Green Berets and the investigators would be wired into a real-time communication system that meant everyone would have their own headset, allowing anyone to communicate with the rest of the team, and command, at any given time. Captain Stuck walked them through usage of the throat mics too, which would allow them to speak quietly if someone was over their shoulder.

It was about sixty kilometers or so to the crash site. The nearest observation post was manned by Southern Cypriot forces at OP Kato Koutrafas. ODA-3314 was on site there along with a mechanized platoon from C-FOR, ready to venture into the Buffer Zone - and beyond - in the event of trouble and the two Apaches would be waiting in a field approximately fifteen kilometers due east of OP Kato Koutrafas. Such was the setup for this morning and such was the operation that C-FOR was undertaking in Northern Cypriot territory.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Tuesday, April 6^th, 1993 | 07:45 hrs [UTC+2]
Taspinar, Northern Cyprus | Bronco Crash Site
35° 6' 54" N, 32° 56' 37" E

"Five minutes," came the call over the intercom as the two Black Hawks neared the crash site, which was located in a field just west of the ghost town of Taşpınar. There, Kurtiz's men were already waiting for the Layartebians, having gotten there a few hours ahead of them to stake out their positions around the wreckage of the downed Bronco. Because the town was largely abandoned except for militia forces, there had been very little looting of the wreckage, leaving a relatively whole and intact crime scene, under the circumstances. Kurtiz knew a few things about crime scene investigations but not enough to do things correctly. He'd ordered his men to traipse around, in hopes of disturbing evidence and otherwise hinder the efforts of the investigators but what he'd fail to realize was that the shoe prints of his men would be fresh and uniform, something the Layartebian investigators could seize upon instantly. Furthermore, Kurtiz did not think to have the ejection seats replaced. Instead, his men had buried them in an effort to hide the evidence, a truly amateur mistake.

With that call, the Black Hawk's door gunners swung their M60D Light Machine Guns out of their windows. The Green Berets, having already checked their gear before boarding, did final checks on their assault rifles before opening the cabin doors. Opening the doors provided much needed relief from the fumes of lubrication oil and burning jet fuel. For the seven investigators of the Joint Investigations Unit or JIU, the interior of the Black Hawk was a far distant cry from their normal work environments. This wasn't to say that the JIU didn't travel in helicopters, they just didn't do it very often, preferring instead to drive. Flying in the Black Hawks would limit what they could bring whereas driving to a crime scene was entirely different.

The JIU was a huge unit nonetheless. It had been established in 1982 after a consolidation effort of each branches' individual investigation units. As a result, JIU handled everything from criminal investigations to court martial hearings to casualty repatriation to wartime incidents such as what happened with the Bronco. The differences between them and the Black Hawk crewmen and the Green Berets were striking. The JIU investigators were clean shaved, their uniforms fresh, and they wore M10A1 Pistols (SIG Sauer P220 in .45ACP) at their hips while the Green Berets were outfitted in all manner of body armor, kit, and they carried both their primary weapons and M45 SOC Pistols at their hips. The Black Hawk crewmen were armed with a mix but they bore the otherwise unclean appearance of people perpetually working on and around machinery with dirt and grease so thoroughly staining their skin that in some places it looked as if they suffered from pigment disorders.

On the ground, Kurtiz's men could hear the incoming helicopters first as a vibration in the air and then as the helicopters got closer the slapping of the rotors changed over to the sound of the turboshaft engines. Kurtiz was not present but he'd given clear and concise instructions to his men ahead of time. Except for one officer, no one was to speak in English, even if they knew it. His enlisted men were told to be a complete hindrance to the Layartebians. They would act stupid, speak only in their own tongues, and they would trample on evidence. They would need to hold up the charade that they were merely "inept" and nothing else. To his officers, he designated only one as the translator to the Layartebians and he instructed the rest to obfuscate and hinder the Layartebians in any ways possible.

What he didn't count on however was the fact that everyone would have communications gear. The Layartebians could communicate with one another and even eavesdrop on the conversations of his men, which would be translated back at C-FOR headquarters.

"Two minutes," the co-pilot said and in the far-off distance, the pilots could see the crash site as a black stain upon the otherwise greenish land. When the Bronco had crashed, it had burned for a few hours before the jet fuel had been completely extinguished. It had only stopped smoking and smoldering twenty-four hours earlier thanks to a bit of a thunderstorm that had rolled over the island.

"Comms check, this is Charger Actual, how am I coming through Charlie Foxtrot?"

"Five-by-five Charger Actual," C-FOR responded. In the cabin, CPT Stuck gave a thumb's up to the investigators. He unplugged himself from the intercom system and flipped his weapon from "SAFE" to "AUTO" as he aimed it out of the window. If the Black Hawks came under ground fire, not only would the door gunners return fire but the Green Berets would as well, providing enough firepower for an egress out of small arms range. If that happened, the Apaches would be airborne at the first sound of distress. It wouldn't go well for the Northern Cypriot militiamen though as the ROE for the Apaches was unrestricted. It was bad enough that they had fired on a Layartebian aircraft that attacking the investigation party would bring upon them the full fury of C-FOR's assets.

The Black Hawks arrived on scene but rather than flare for immediate landing, they did a few circles around the area so that the Green Berets could get a good look at the ground situation. The Layartebians would be grossly outnumbered as there was an entire company on the ground, along with their armored vehicles and trucks. In doing so, the pilots also saw the designated landing zone that had been earmarked for them, which was five hundred meters away. This didn't make them comfortable so, as they circled, the pilots of the Black Hawks designated their own landing site, two hundred meters from the crash site. Circling over that area, they could see that it was free of debris and more importantly, free of Kurtiz's men. The two helicopters flared and set down at their improvised landing area, much to the chagrin of the Northern Cypriots, who began to wave off the helicopters. Rushing forward, they could only get so far before being held back by the wash from the rotors and the pilots intentionally kept the wash high until the militiamen retreated some.

"All right we're down, let's go," CPT Stuck said into his radio and he stepped out of the aircraft followed by the rest of his men, the JIU investigators coming out last. In the other aircraft, his second-in-command did the same. The Black Hawks powered down to idle while the lead investigator, and CPT Stuck, approached who they thought would be the man-in-charge. In fact, he was not and though he perfectly understood them, he had his part to play. Their contact was in fact a major named Seyyid Arap who was waiting for them at the designated landing zone.

What this resulted in was a wait period and Arap took his time coming down to the other landing site, first wasting 10 minutes trying to convince, via radio, the Layartebians to take off and land at his site. Then he and his driver came down leisurely, taking a roundabout way on the excuse that the more direct route had mines. When he finally arrived, he went on a long tirade about landing in an "unsafe area," which CPT Stuck further questioned him on given the fact that his men were in company strength and surrounding it. He had little response to this and Stuck pushed him into ending his tirade much earlier than he'd intended. This put the JIU investigators at the wreckage at just before 08:30, after wasting nearly forty-five minutes on the theatrics.

It would not be long before Kurtiz's men truly began to live up to their potential. They trampled on areas the investigators were working on, showed them to the wrong parts of the wreckage, and they even went so far as to contaminate the areas by urinating right where the investigators were working. All of this came over their headsets. After two hours of working, the JIU investigators and their Green Beret minders huddled together near one of the Black Hawks. It was there that the lead investigator, a lieutenant colonel named Joshua Blackmore revealed the most startling piece of evidence. "There's no ejection seats or parachutes. The cockpit shows the kind of focused burns that you would expect from an ejection but there are no seats here." They all knew that the pilots had ejected but they couldn't be fully sure that the Northern Cypriots weren't eavesdropping so they kept up the charade that they did not know about the ejections.

"All right let's press that with them," Stuck said, suppressing his desire to call them out on their idiocy. They were certain that Kurtiz's men would have covered up for their error but apparently they had not. During this conversation, the investigators reported something else that they'd noticed. Certain things that they had said had brought about slight reactions from Kurtiz's men, which led them to believe that many of their words were being understood but the men were forcibly ignoring them. The JIU investigators made a few cheeky jokes that brought about slight smiles from some of the troops.

To this, Stuck nodded, "Yes they understand what we're saying. Maybe not all of them but most of them. They're twitchy, they are hiding something big and they don't want us to find it."

"Let's press them then, let's press them hard," Blackmore answered and just as they prepared to, Arap was seen approaching. "This'll be good," Blackmore said to Stuck who nodded.

"We must leave!" Arap was shouting, waving his hands in the air, "We must leave now!"

"Why?" Stuck didn't buy it.

"Troops are moving this way from the south."

"Troops from the south? You got that right? From the south?" Stuck pressed.

"Yes, troops, we have seen troops moving this way."

"Nonsense," Stuck said and he looked at everyone, "wait here." He climbed into the Black Hawk and to the cockpit where he plugged into the more powerful and also more secure radio that the Black Hawk had. "Charlie Foxtrot, this is Charger Actual, we've got a potential situation here."

"Roger that what do you have?"

"Our minder here says there are troops to our south moving this way."

"Uh that's a negative Charger Actual, we've got nothing moving and our men at Kilo-Kilo are reporting nothing."

"Thought so, Charger Actual out," Stuck grunted and left the cockpit of the Black Hawk and returned outside. "There's no troops coming."

"But we have seen it!"

"Tell your men to get their eyes checked. No one is coming."

"Yes they are!"

"No they aren't," tension built.

Arap looked at them and dug in his heels, "We must depart, I cannot allow you to return, it is too dangerous."

Stuck smiled and drew close to the Northern Cypriot, "We're going back to that site Major Arap and if you stop us you're going to have to do it with force, which isn't going to go so well for you. There are no troops coming, quit the games. We know your men speak English and we know you're here to hinder us finding out what happened. We're going to be finding out whether you like it or not so I advise you in the strongest possible terms to quit this nonsense before something you cannot take back happens. You understand me? Now shoot us if you want but you'll have precisely sixty seconds to vacate here before our bombs start raining down on you."

"Bombs?"

"We have fighters patrolling nearby with laser-guided bombs. Go ahead and test us." Arap considered it; he considered it because he'd have to answer to Kurtiz but he didn't know for sure if the Layartebian was bluffing and he had seen the glint of the Pioneer in the sky, unaware that it was simply a drone. In the end, he relented, stood down, and the Layartebians returned to the wreckage site. The mood of the militiamen was tenser and they were more anxious but they stuck to their scripts, more because they feared their commander more than they feared the Layartebians.

• • • † • • •

by **Layarteb** » Sat Feb 16, 2019 10:28 am

• • • † • • •

Wednesday, April 7^th, 1993 | 02:40 hrs [UTC+2]
Akrotiri SBA, Cyprus | Akrotiri Air Force Base (C-FOR)
34° 37' 5" N, 32° 56' 33" E

The Sovereign Base Area of Akrotiri had seen a significant amount of construction since its initial establishment but that was no secret since that could easily be observed. Yet, building an air force base and an associated ground forces base was hardly something that Southern Cyprus objected to since that was within the confines of the C-FOR agreement. The agreement itself was very broad in certain aspects and very limited in others. For example, the Layartebians weren't allowed to stockpile any special ordnance at the base nor were they allowed to base bombers out of the base, which had caused some consternation with the arrival of the F-111s. Their designation as a fighter-bomber was put forth as a justification for their presence, though some special considerations had to be given.

What would not go over well though would be if Southern Cyprus learned there was an active numbers station at SBA Akrotiri or that there was a major listening post established there. The geodesic radomes that served as the protective covers for the receiving and transmitting equipment was off-limits to Southern Cypriot personnel and many Layartebian personnel too. It was explained that they were radars for weather, air traffic, surveillance, and fire control. This was partly true as these radars did exist but there were also sensitive receivers and transmitters for the monitoring of signals. Signals intelligence had come in its own in the past fifty years and the Layartebian Ministry of Intelligence had adopted this method of intelligence collection.

Near some of these radomes was a small complex of buildings, protected on all four sides by walls, and explained as the main control nerve center for the Layartebian operation at Akrotiri. Once again, foreign personnel were disallowed entry and so were many Layartebians. It was in these buildings that the sensitive processing equipment of the radars and the intelligence-gathering equipment was kept and it was in these buildings that the information they gathered was analyzed. The operational centers, of which there were a few, were manned 24/7 by military and intelligence personnel. It was from here that weather reports were transmitted and civilian jetliners tracked as they flew through the flight information region (FIR) and air defense identification zone (ADIZ). It was from here that air activity over Cyprus was monitored, specifically helicopter activity on both sides of the border and around the buffer zone.

On this particular early morning, the staff at the site were eavesdropping on radio communications in mainland Europe mostly and also in Northern Africa but owing to the lateness of the hour, there wasn't much activity. It was during this lull in activity though that operators in Room 14, which was the main SIGINT room, were alerted to activity on a very specific cell phone number, one that had been identified by double agents as the number for General Halil Marangoz, commander of Northern Cypriot military forces. Immediately clued into the activity, they dialed in the channel and listened in their headphones, while tape run, recording everything being said. "It is late," said the general, "who is this?"

"It's me," said the other voice in a hoarse whisper.

General Marangoz recognized the voice but said little else to identify the man, "Should we talk over this line?"

"I am on a mobile phone. We are not on open radio. We are safe."

In Room 14, one of the operators quipped, "That's what you think," before ordering a voice print analysis to begin.

"What are you calling me for then?"

"We are moving the bodies."

"Good, the Layartebians must never find them. How could your people be so stupid?"

"It is part of the plan General, the plan you blessed."

"Yes I know it was. The Layartebians have been on our soil for too long and the only way we're going to get back to our land the way we want it is to kill them. This agreement has gone on long enough."

"Yes it is has General but will our compatriots on the south be cooperative?"

"We'll discuss that another time. Just get those bodies hidden."

"Yes sir." The call ended. Immediately, work began on translation but the operation who'd been listening spoke Turkish and he could relay the gist of what was heard. Still, despite this, C-FOR wouldn't be able to react quickly enough to capture the Northern Cypriots relocating the bodies of the two pilots. Analysis would also need several hours to process the voices to confirm that General Marangoz was the one called and who had called him.

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Wednesday, April 7^th, 1993 | 15:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Akrotiri SBA, Cyprus | Akrotiri Air Force Base (C-FOR)
34° 35' 11" N, 32° 58' 49" E

In terms of hierarchy, Carla Gibson was the head of C-FOR. As the head of the peacekeeping mission, she represented the face of C-FOR to both the governments of the island of Cyprus. Underneath her, Michael Ballantyne was effectively in charge of the civilian contingent, a sizeable force of diplomats and bureaucrats who worked tirelessly on the island to maintain peace. Then there was Lieutenant General John McGowan who was the military commander of C-FOR, in charge of the brigade of ground troops, the massive array of aircraft, and a small fleet of patrol vessels that maintained the fisheries and maritime boundaries of the two nation-states. He effectively had a division of men underneath him but a division that represented almost every uniformed service within the Ministry of Defense, save of course for the Imperial Layartebian Strategic Force, of which there was no need for their rockets and cruise missiles.

Gibson, Ballantyne, and McGowan operated within the strict and sometimes restrictive language of the C-FOR agreement, perhaps McGowan more so than anyone else. Being in charge of a military operation whose mission was peacekeeping, until now he'd largely had to deal with casualties from landmines and insubordination from drunkards who'd managed to get their hands on a case of beer or some whiskey. Yet, since April 1, the tempo of operations for C-FOR had increased dramatically. No longer were they acting merely as babysitters but rather they had been upgraded to fighting soldiers again. In just the past week, two aircraft had been brought down killing several prominent individuals in Northern Cyprus, two Layartebian pilots had been executed, and numerous firefights left dozens dead along the buffer zone. C-FOR looked at the situation and wondered if it was about to boil over sooner rather than later, and then how soon?

McGowan had been apprised of the phone call that General Marangoz had received and he had been notified when the caller was identified as Colonel Sunay Kurtiz. Kurtiz was rapidly becoming public enemy number one to C-FOR. His men had been involved in the shoot down of the Bronco and in numerous firefights and likely in the shoot down of the Super Puma as well. Analysis of the wreckage of the Bronco revealed that it had been brought down by a Stinger too, the same as which took out the Super Puma. The belief in C-FOR was that Kurtiz's men were operating under different orders than the rest of the Northern Cypriot forces, that they were being used to reignite the Cypriot Civil War. To make matters worse, his men had deceptively hindered the Layartebians at the Bronco crash site, which firmly put the colonel within McGowan's and C-FOR's crosshairs.

With the revelation of the phone call, McGowan knew that the self-defense clause of C-FOR was applicable. Sitting at his desk, he picked up a secure phone that led directly to his boss, Gibson. She too was in her office when the phone rang and the call was quickly routed to her from her secretary. "Carla, it's McGowan," the general said, "did you get today's top secret memo?"

"Just dropped off to me nine minutes ago, what does it mean?"

"It means what we've been thinking, that the militia are acting on a separate plan contrary to the C-FOR mission. They're not looking for peace, they're looking to restart the killing."

"And they've directly attacked our troops."

"Yes ma'am they have."

"What do you want to do?"

"Arrest him," McGowan said, "I want to set up a raid and arrest him."

"Arrest as in handcuffs?"

"Yes for interrogation. He's no use to us dead."

"It falls within the boundaries, that much is clear. We've discussed this with the National Security Council directly before."

"Yes we have but I still need your approval."

"Well you have it and I'll put that in writing shortly and have that rushed down to you. When do you go?"

"Night only, we need this to be quiet."

"All right McGowan, make it happen then and minimal contact on this one. Get in, get the target, and get out, keep it minimal. I stress that."

"I'm not looking to make a statement with this one."

"I'll brief Layarteb City, they'll want a plan once the Northern Cypriots know we have him and take to the airwaves to denounce us."

"Release the tapes," McGowan said, "propose that we release the damn tapes! We've been sitting on them for too long. We have the radio tapes between the crew and we have this morning's phone call. Release the audio and back them into a corner. It's time we made use of it. Northern Cyprus has to know that what they've been trying to get away with the past week just isn't going to fly."

"I'll make the suggestion, in the meantime, make sure this goes off clean."

"Yes ma'am, I will, goodbye."

"Goodbye," the call ended. Carla had an uphill battle but so did McGowan who'd need to utilize the Green Berets to launch a risky operation "behind enemy lines" to capture the colonel and bring him in for interrogation. Kurtiz was clearly deeply involved with the plan and potentially even a mastermind given his tone with his superior. He was needed alive.

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by **Layarteb** » Mon Mar 18, 2019 8:07 pm

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Wednesday, April 7^th, 1993 | 21:45 hrs [UTC+2]
Pyla, Cyprus | Camp Pyla (C-FOR)
35° 0' 57" N, 33° 41' 5" E

Major Mike Torrez sat on the edge of a desk as the twelve men of ODA-3313 piled into what was an otherwise small briefing room, which would have been much smaller had they had their gear with them. The reason Torrez had chosen this particular room was because it was well off the beaten path of foot traffic and suitable insulated to have a private conversation. It was a room that team leaders used to dress down their men secretly and it was a room that no one dared knock on if the door was closed, which it now was. Folding chairs provided places for the men to sit and each had a pad and a pen with him. Sitting to the front were John Earle and Rick Freeman, the latter being the assistant squad leader and commander of Fireteam Bravo.

"All right, we're all settled in then," Torrez began. "Right then let's get going. You men are launching a black mission tonight in Northern Cyprus. The target is Colonel Sunay Kurtiz, leader of the local militia unit on the opposite side of the Buffer Zone. The colonel has been the main commander responsible for the current situation though he is by no means acting alone. Regardless, we want to capture him alive and I do stress the 'alive' part as this is not an assassination mission. He is far more valuable to us alive as an interrogation source than as a corpse.

"The colonel's men were directly involved with shooting down the Super Puma and the Bronco. Furthermore, his men executed our two pilots, which we've recently learned through a signals intercept. Given this information, C-FOR has placed a warrant on the colonel. His whereabouts are currently unknown but that is temporary. In about thirty minutes, JSOC is having an RC-12 begin an orbit over the area in an attempt to geolocate him through his cellular phone. Apparently JSOC can send a low power signal to the phone that allows it to connect to towers and transmit a signal but not enough that it appears to be on and functioning. It makes you think twice about conducting nefarious activities with your phones. I for one would be removing the battery myself.

"They'll be able to ascertain his position to within two hundred meters, they could do better but they would have to fly lower and that would give them away. In a normal operation, JSOC would also use radio triangular on the ground but we just don't have the capabilities for that right now. This thusly won't be easy. Once the signal is located, the general vicinity will be relayed down to you and it'll be up to you to find him. The colonel is a creature of habit so it may be easier done than said but I don't want to blow sunshine up your asses.

"This mission needs to be quiet. It needs to be black. And it needs to succeed without any evidence whatsoever of our presence on the other side of the Buffer Zone. Now, any questions?"

"Do we have a photograph of him?" Earle asked and Torrez nodded.

"We'll get that passed around in a few minutes, we're running some additional copies right now so you can have them on-hand for the mission."

"Where do we think he is or do we not know?" Sergeant Chris Lash, a comms sergeant in Bravo asked.

"The militia battalion CP is in Doganci, about seventy klicks from here but intel suspects he's in Denizli, a small village along the coastline. They believe he has a mistress there who he visits regularly. It's a coastal village and if that's where he is, we're better off for insert and egress."

"What's the insertion plan?" Martinez, the operations sergeant, asked.

"If he's in Denizli, we're going to insert by boat. If he's not, then we'll need an alternative. We are thinking Little Birds to the vicinity because they're quiet and a patrol over land to the target. Secondary location could be in the vicinity of Çamliköy. Intel believes that's where his main residence is, a house he probably appropriated during the civil war for his own benefit. JSOC is going to try these two locations first before expanding their search."

"Rules on non-combatants like the mistress or a wife?" Collins, the medical sergeant asked.

"If they witness the situation, they come along. If they become a problem, they're disposable but the bodies come back to us. I know that sounds cold but we have political contentions to deal with and witnesses would not be in our favor. Let's hope there aren't any children, we're going to be up shit's creek with children. All weaponry is suppressed, no flags or name tags, sanitized uniform, no dog tags, et cetera. No lucky charms either; we're not looking for intel, it cannot look like he's been snatched. The colonel has two children, use that to your advantage to keep him quiet if you must. Any other questions?" No one had any further ones and so the briefing ended. Photos of the colonel came out about twenty minutes later as the RC-12K was being checked for takeoff from Akrotiri. It would be airborne less than ten minutes later, ascending to an altitude of 25,000 feet, where it would be able to orbit lazily and not attract any attention to people on the ground.

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Thursday, April 8^th, 1993 | 03:00 hrs [UTC+2]
Çamliköy, Northern Cyprus | Colonel Sunary Kurtiz's House
35° 7' 0" N, 32° 52' 44" E

Stacking up on the rear door of Colonel Kurtiz's house, the twelve men of ODA-3313 capped off their near three-hour trek through Northern Cyprus. They'd been inserted by MH-6H Little Birds just north of the Buffer Zone in an otherwise empty area. For the Green Berets on the skids, the Little Birds were deafening but beyond five or six hundred meters, certainly out to eight hundred meters, the Little Birds were barely audible, even in the still, quiet, night air. The insertion point had been chosen because the nearest friendly or hostile output was over a kilometer away and the Little Birds had flown a very specific flightpath to avoid overflying any outposts on the Southern Cypriot side of the border. Of course, that was only for the insertion. Following the insertion, they flew to the nearest C-FOR outpost, set down, and refueled. They took JP4 just like ground vehicles did and so the common fuel went far in these helicopters.

The Green Berets, carrying a light load of mainly ammunition and equipment rather than long endurance supplies, trekked several kilometers into the eastern half of the town of Çamliköy. Overhead, the RC-12 vectored them to a line of houses along the eastern half of a tertiary road that ran north-to-south. The technicians in the RC-12 were able to pinpoint Colonel Kurtiz's phone to one of three houses but it was impossible to say which from twenty-five thousand feet overhead. For the Green Berets however, it was far easier. The northernmost house had a very large farm plot of olive trees that was simply too well tended to be the colonel's. He would have had to have a sizeable staff on employment to do so. The southernmost house was boarded up and abandoned, likely because its family had fled southwards when the civil war began.

This just left the middle house and it had a small plot of olive trees that were not necessarily overgrown but not well tended either. A Land Rover sat in the driveway and it bore the symbol of Kurtiz's militia. It was this house that the men now waited besides. Bravo Team, with the exception of Jeremy Gilley, the engineering sergeant, waited around the perimeter of the house, their suppressed CAR-15 Commandos shouldered. Gilley, an electrician, had swapped places with Alpha Team's engineering sergeant, Jay McArthur who was now positioned along the perimeter. Gilley and the rest of Alpha had scoped out the house itself, looking for an alarm system and Gilley was convinced there was none based on his observations. However, they had to know for sure and so the men stacked up alongside the rear door, which led into the kitchen.

Gilley picked the lock and together, the six men held their collective breaths as he pushed the door open slightly, keeping the door in contact with the frame. Through his night vision goggles, with the aid of an infrared flashlight, he searched for any contact points but he saw none and so he pushed the door open slightly further, just enough to break its contact with the frame. Had any alarm gone off, the six men would have bolted for the tree line and hid. Of course, there could have been a silent alarm as well, which was why Gilley made a very quick exam of the doorway once he entered the kitchen. There was no alarm and he signaled as much to the men and the six of them entered the house, shutting the door - but leaving it unlocked - behind them.

The house itself was fairly large, almost 4,000 square feet. The kitchen had beautiful, marble floors, granite countertops, and new appliances, looking as if it had been remodeled in the previous five years. Being a militia commander certainly had come with its perks but in the same vein, Kurtiz had probably "stolen" the house after its previous owners fled - or worse. The men moved in through the kitchen and into the dining room and the living room. Both were spacious and well furnished with both furniture and artwork. In the living room, the electronics were state-of-the-art. The office was their next destination and it was full of expensive furniture just the same. It was from here that Kurtiz ran his militia though he certainly had his own office/apartment in the militia's HQ.

The first floor was empty and so the men quietly moved upstairs to the second floor where they found multiple bedrooms, one of which would be the master. They moved into the other ones first, expecting to find sleeping children but they were all empty though they showed signs of recent occupation. Colonel Kurtiz evidently had both a son and a daughter, the son likely under the age of eight and the daughter a preteen, just based on the way the rooms were decorated. The larger of the bedrooms, for his daughter, had its own bathroom while the smaller did not though there was a full bathroom just outside of it in the hallway. The house had a collective total of six bedrooms, five full bathrooms, and one half bathroom.

With the children's rooms cleared, the men stacked up against the master bedroom. Martinez, the ops sergeant took point followed by Earle, Noble, and Brent. Collins and Gilley would cover their rear. Martinez first checked the doorknob, moving it just enough to ensure that it wasn't locked. From there, he waited for Earle to squeeze his shoulder and when Earle did, Martinez entered the room, his suppressed pistol drawn with his CAR-15 hanging in front of him and easily accessible. All four men would enter with their pistols drawn because of the close quarters of the bedroom. They moved quickly and yet almost silently as they entered the room and cleared it in only a few seconds. In doing so, they startled Kurtiz awake but before he could reach for his pistol, he had four pistols drawn on him by men clearly at the advantage.

Putting his hands up, the nearly naked colonel smirked and said, "Look what we have here," his English flawless enough, "C-FOR has come to get me?"

"Keep your hands up," Earle said, "cuff him and put something on him." He ordered. Noble grabbed a bathrobe, checked it for anything, and tossed it to Kurtiz who got out of bed, stood up, and put it on, tying it tightly around his waist. Brent quickly handcuffed Kurtiz's hands behind his back, put a gag around his mouth to keep him from screaming, and shoved a black bag over his head. It was barely ninety seconds from the moment they entered the bedroom. Collins entered and administered a tranquilizer and Kurtiz went limp shortly thereafter. "All right let's exfil." He said and the men left the house, careful to lock the door behind them as they exited the kitchen. Brent, the largest man of Alpha, threw Kurtiz over his shoulder and carried the colonel.

They immediately began to head east and then south, snaking through overgrown and untended fields alternating with farming plots, some well-tended and others entirely overgrown. They had a mile and a half to go for their pickup point, which was just on the southern side of the Buffer Zone. They would enter the Buffer Zone at a point approximately four hundred meters from a Northern Cypriot outpost but said post was fairly small, capable of supporting only a squad-sized element. Recon on the outpost routinely turned up lackadaisical personnel who often slept during the night. There were no known minefields in the area and the terrain was rather forgiving, thus making the trek as easy as any could be. It allowed the Green Berets the ability to stealthily leave hostile territory, which was the most important mission parameter.

The sun was set to rise at 06:23 but it would start brightening around 04:58 when astronomical twilight kicked in, which was precisely what these men aimed to avoid. They moved quickly through hostile territory. The hour of the morning guaranteed that no one was around and though they kept a vigilant eye in all directions, their escape out of Northern Cyprus was one that they made quickly, pausing only when they had to cross pathways and roadways. They took those two men at a time to ensure that they would not be spotted should a car appear somewhere in the distance yet none did.

By the time they crossed into Southern Cyprus from the Buffer Zone, the Little Birds were already waiting for them, their engines silent and the pilots waiting for takeoff. Copilots set up a perimeter with their submachine guns and waited. Once the Green Berets entered the AO, it was a quick process to get everyone onboard and strapped in, as well as to get the colonel inside of the helicopter and strapped in as well. The helicopters lifted off and headed straight for Akrotiri, an otherwise long flight to be made strapped to the benches but a necessity for the Green Berets. They'd catch a Black Hawk back to Camp Pyla, which was a far more comfortable way to travel distances.

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[Earth II] The Crescent Wars

[Earth II] The Crescent Wars

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