The Kill Zone Read online

  CONTENTS

  The Kill Zone

  Copyright

  Acknowledgements

  Kill Zone (noun)

  Glossary

  Prologue

  25 June

  26 June

  27 June

  28 June

  29 June

  30 June

  1 July

  2 July

  3 July

  4 July

  5 July

  6 July

  7 July

  Epilogue

  THE KILL ZONE

  Chris Ryan

  www.hodder.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain in 2010 by Hodder & Stoughton

  An Hachette UK Company

  Copyright © Chris Ryan 2010

  The right of Chris Ryan to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

  Epub ISBN 978 1 444 71027 4

  Book ISBN 978 1 444 71024 3

  Hodder & Stoughton

  An Hachette UK Company

  338 Euston Road

  London NW1 3BH

  www.hodder.co.uk

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  To my agent Barbara Levy, publisher Mark Booth, Charlotte Haycock and the rest of the team at Coronet.

  Kill Zone (noun)

  1. The area of a military engagement with a high concentration of fatalities.

  2. An area of the human body where entry of a projectile would cause death.

  GLOSSARY

  AQT Al Qaeda Taliban

  CAT counter-attack team

  CO19 Specialist Firearm Command branch of the Metropolitan Police Service

  Det (the) 14 Intelligence Company, a covert surveillance unit trained by 22 SAS for deployment in Northern Ireland

  det cord detonating cord

  FOB forward operating base

  frangible ammo soft rounds that break as they hit walls, reducing ricochets

  GCHQ Government Communications Headquarters

  gimpy general purpose machine gun (GPMG)

  green zone the fertile area surrounding a river or wadi

  Hesco flat-packed containers that are infilled with dirt or sand to create protective barriers

  Icom intelligence communication

  ICU intensive care unit

  IED improvised explosive device

  IR infrared

  JSIW Joint Services Interrogation Wing

  JTAC Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre

  klick kilometre

  LASM light anti-structures missile

  LTD laser target designator

  LZ landing zone

  MoD Ministry of Defence

  MRE meal, ready to eat

  NBC suits nuclear, biological and chemical warfare suits

  OP observation post

  PE plastic explosive

  PIRA Provisional IRA

  REME Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers

  RPG rocket-propelled grenade

  RUC Royal Ulster Constabulary

  RV rendezvous

  SBS/shakyboats Special Boat Service

  SOCO scene-of-crime officer

  SOP standard operating procedure

  UAV unmanned aerial vehicle

  UMP Universal Machine Pistol, a Heckler and Koch submachine gun

  wadi a dry riverbed

  All warfare is based on deception. When able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy think we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near. Hold out baits to entice the enemy. Feign disorder, and crush him.

  Sun Tzu, The Art of War

  PROLOGUE

  Iran. Somewhere near the border with Afghanistan. 1980.

  A fire crackled at the mouth of a cave.

  It was not a large fire, because it was not a large cave. Just big enough for the four black-robed people who used it as a dwelling place: an old man, an old woman and two children, nine and eight. And even though it had been scorching that day, the fire was as welcome for its heat as for its light. These desert-dwellers knew that the temperature could drop to below freezing as the night wore on.

  The orange flames danced in the blackness. And as they danced, they reflected on the metal of a gun. It was not a new gun, nor a particularly expensive or desirable one. Just an old AK-47, its wooden butt burnished and worn. The old man would tell people it was Russian-made but in truth it was as much a mongrel as the wild dogs that ran in packs around these parts, a gun cobbled together from different weapons made in different countries. Hungarian, Chinese . . . It lay on the lap of the old man, who sat cross-legged by the fire, one gnarled finger placed gently – tenderly, almost – on the trigger.

  He spoke. Stories of war and death that somehow suited his harsh, weather-beaten face. And as he spoke, the two boys listened, the reflection of the flames flickering in their wide, dark eyes.

  ‘Az sheytan-e bozorg bar hazar bashed,’ he announced in his native Farsi. ‘Beware of the Great Satan – America. And beware its lapdog, Britain. These are the homes of the infidels and the ungodly. It is your duty, as Muslims and followers of the Prophet, may peace and blessings be upon him, to fight a righteous and holy war against these sinners. The time will come when all who are true to the Prophet will be called to rise up and fight against them. My time on earth is not long, but you . . .’

  He looked at each of the boys in turn.

  ‘You must be ready to answer that call.’

  A clattering noise. The old woman placed a pot near the fire and stirred its contents with a spoon. ‘You should not fill their ears with such things,’ she said. Her skin was leathery with age, her voice croaky. ‘They are too young.’

  The old man scowled. His eyes were flinty under his bushy eyebrows. ‘You don’t know what you say,’ he rasped. ‘No one is too young to understand their purpose.’

  ‘Your purpose,’ the woman mumbled. ‘Not theirs.’

  ‘Silence!’

  His hands trembled slightly on his Kalashnikov. It took a moment to subdue his anger.

  ‘What would a woman know of such things?’ he said after a while. ‘It is men who understand the ways of the world.’

  ‘They are not men,’ the old woman insisted in a low voice. She sounded both scared to speak and compelled to do so. ‘They are children.’

  The old man rose instantly to his feet, letting the rifle fall to the ground. He stepped towards his wife, raised his hand and, with the force of a much younger person, dealt her a sharp blow across the side of the face. The woman cried out, but the man hit her again. She tumbled to the dusty floor, a trickle of blood oozing from her nose. As she lay there, her husband spoke in a firm voice.

  ‘As for those women from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart; and scourge them!’

  Holy words from the holy Koran, and familiar to the old woman’s ears. She’d heard them enough times throughout her life. Keeping her head bowed, she pushed herself to her knees and dabbed away the blood, then picked up her spoon and continued to stir the food in the pot while the man turned back to his grandchild
ren.

  ‘Will you be ready to answer the call?’ he demanded in a loud voice.

  ‘Yes, Grandfather,’ the two boys said in unison. ‘We will be ready.’

  Young Farzad sat close to the fire. He and his brother had seen their grandmother beaten before. Many times. He admired his grandfather. Admired his strong words. Admired his devotion. Grandmother was always interfering. Whenever she overstepped the mark, she was punished, as was right and proper. She had been beaten before, and she would be beaten again. Farzad was more interested in what his grandfather had to say. In what he had to show them. Like the Kalashnikov that lay in the dust by the fire. And he could tell his brother felt the same way.

  The old man gave an approving nod and sat down next to them once more. He picked up the gun and started to dismantle it, carefully laying each of the parts on the ground in front of the two boys. First, the magazine. When this was detached, he pointed the gun out of the cave mouth and pulled back the cocking lever, making sure there was no round left in the chamber. Satisfied it was empty, he removed the cleaning rod, the receiving cover and the recoil spring. He noticed with pride that his grandsons were watching and absorbing his every move. With expert hands he removed the bolt carrier and gas tube, and when the weapon was fully stripped down he handed the shell of the Kalashnikov to the elder of the two.

  ‘Farzad,’ he said. ‘You are nine years old. I was your age when I first learned how to manage a weapon. You will rebuild this for me now.’

  Farzad felt a quiet thrill. ‘Yes, Grandfather,’ he said and, following the old man’s quiet, patient instructions, started to reassemble the rifle. The clunky noise of the metal pieces slotting together echoed around the cave. In only a few minutes, the AK-47 was reassembled and ready to fire.

  ‘Good,’ the old man said, and his hard eyes turned to the younger boy. ‘Adel,’ he announced. ‘You will shoot first.’ And he led the two boys out of the cave.

  The desert night was already beginning to grow cool. In the distance they could see dots of light – dwellings much like their own, scattered around the foothills of these mountains and the plains beyond. He placed the Kalashnikov in Adel’s hands and helped him press the butt firmly into his bony shoulder and aim out into the blackness. ‘There are three positions,’ he explained to the boys, and he moved the selector lever from safe to the middle position. A tinny click. ‘Automatic. The weapon will continue firing until you release your finger from the trigger, or you fire all the rounds from the magazine.’ Another flick of the selector lever, down to the lowest position. ‘Semi-automatic,’ he announced. ‘The weapon will fire only once. You need to release the trigger and pull it again to fire a second shot.’ With a sharp tug, he pulled back the cocking lever, knowing that it would be too hard for Adel. Then he stepped back. Twenty metres from where they stood there was a low mulberry bush, no more than a couple of metres high, and they could just make out its outline in the darkness. ‘Aim for the bush,’ he said, ‘and fire when you are ready.’

  Some children might have been hasty, but not Adel. He was careful. Meticulous. He breathed calmly and did not shoot until he was ready.

  The noise of the discharge echoed across the desert. In the distance, a frightened yelp – a wild dog, scared by the sudden bang. The recoil was strong for the small boy, but he absorbed it well before lowering the weapon and handing it wordlessly to his brother. Farzad took the AK-47 confidently and did not need his grandfather’s assistance in positioning the gun and firing a round into the black night.

  ‘Good,’ their grandfather announced once Farzad had lowered the Kalashnikov. ‘Very good.’ He walked up to them and put his arms around their shoulders. For a moment they were silent, just standing there, looking out into the darkness. ‘Who knows what war will be like when you are men,’ he murmured. ‘When you are called upon to fight – and do not doubt that you will be called – it is important that you know your weapon, and that you know it well. But remember this. Your weapon is not the most important thing.’

  The old man tapped on his skull with two fingers and the boys watched him attentively.

  ‘It is with your weapon that you win the battle,’ he stated, ‘but with your mind that you win the war.’

  A silence.

  And then, prompted by his grandfather, Farzad raised the weapon once more. This time, he flicked the selector lever to automatic. He adopted the firing position and squeezed the trigger. As many novices do when they first fire an automatic weapon, he gripped too hard. The recoil threw the barrel of the gun upwards and to the right; the night air filled with the thunder of rounds being quickly discharged. As he released his finger, a huge grin spread over Farzad’s young face.

  In the years that were to follow, Farzad never forgot the events of the next few seconds. He wanted to know if the end of the barrel was hot, so with the butt still pressed into his shoulder, he stretched out his left hand to touch the metal. It was hot, and his discovery pleased him. He turned, ready to explain to his grandfather what he had learned.

  But his grandfather looked alarmed.

  ‘The safety!’ the old man said harshly. ‘Make it sa—’

  He never finished his sentence.

  Farzad’s thumb was still over the end of the gun barrel when his finger slipped; the gun was pointing just to the left of his grandfather. There was a short burst of fire as the 7.62 mm rounds blew his thumb away and, as the gun lifted to the right, pumped into his grandfather’s stomach and ripped a seam along his chest.

  Farzad screamed in pain. His brother cried out. ‘Grandfather!’

  The old man opened his mouth too, but no sound came out. Just a sudden gush of foaming blood. He collapsed.

  Farzad fell to his knees, blood oozing fast from his own hand, and in the confusion he could sense Adel doing the same. Adel shook their grandfather, as if that would do something to bring him back from the brink.

  It did nothing, of course.

  His final breath was long and choking; blood seeped from the wound in his belly, saturating his robe and oozing on to the ground.

  The boys fell silent. Farzad’s body was shaking.

  ‘Is he dead?’ Adel whispered finally.

  Farzad laid his good hand on his beloved grandfather’s head. ‘Yes, Adel,’ he managed to say, gritting his teeth through the pain. ‘He is dead.’

  And then he started to moan as blood pumped from his wound.

  Suddenly their grandmother was there. She took in the scene and started to scream – a panicked, hysterical scream.

  Farzad looked towards her. She was silhouetted against the flames. Her shrieks had silenced his own, and now they filled the air. His lip curled, half because of the pain in his hand, half because he felt a burst of uncontrollable anger towards her. ‘Silence!’ he said, doing his best to imitate his grandfather. But the old woman failed to obey him. Instead, she strode up to where he and Adel were crouched and, seemingly unaware of the dreadful wound to his left hand, started to rain blows down on him, her frail old fists surprisingly forceful.

  Farzad stood up and raised his bloodied hand to protect himself from his grandmother’s anger, but still she swiped at him.

  ‘What have you done? What have you done? What is this wickedness? You are an evil child! I saw it in you when you were born. There has always been something wicked about you, and now . . . now this!’

  Adel strode the few paces to where the old lady was beating his brother, stood behind her and pulled her roughly away. She tripped and hit the ground, but the screaming didn’t stop. If anything it grew louder and more desperate.

  ‘Be quiet!’ Farzad hissed, pressing his wounded hand against himself in a vain attempt to stem the bleeding. ‘People will come. They will see what has happened.’

  ‘What have you done? What have you done?’

  Farzad was now shaking with anger rather than pain. He looked at his grandmother and then back at his brother.

  Something passed between them. Nothing spoken; ju
st a silent agreement that there was something they needed to do. If their grandmother continued to scream, people from all around would come to see what had happened. They would find their grandfather, and they would learn that Farzad had killed him. The local mullah would try them and they would be stoned to death. As males, they would be buried only up to their waists – it was customary for women to be buried up to their shoulders so their arms were not free – but then the locals would hurl rocks at them. The tradition was to let a family member cast the first stone, to try to knock out the victim so that he would suffer less. But grandfather was their only male relative and he wouldn’t be throwing stones at anyone.

  The time will come when all who are true to the Prophet will be called to rise up and fight against them.

  Farzad knew his duty: to keep himself and his brother safe so that they could fight their holy war, just like their grandfather had urged them. Satisfied that he had his brother’s approval, he didn’t hesitate. Their grandmother was standing between him and the fire, no more than three metres away, with her hands pulling at her hair in anguish. He pointed the AK-47 at his grandmother’s head. Her eyes, closed with grief, noticed nothing, and she continued her desperate howling.

  There was only enough ammo in the magazine for a short burst of fire. But it was enough to silence her.

  The rounds slammed into her head. Farzad watched with detached curiosity as it collapsed in on itself, as her limbs twitched for a few short seconds before falling still. He barely noticed that part of his grandmother’s brain matter had spattered on to their faces, warm and sticky.

  They stood there, surrounded by the sudden silence of the desert, and the bleeding corpses of their own flesh and blood.

  It is with your weapon that you win the battle, but with your mind that you win the war.

  Farzad and Adel had to think carefully and clearly. It would be stupid to leave the corpses there, ready to be identified by anyone who passed. Their grandparents were well known in this area. Unanswerable questions would be asked. The brothers made their decision with only a few brief words.