Okay, a quickie, Clancy style, with some Larry Bond and some Richard Marcinko mixed in, and maybe a lot better then that Delta force story. afcourse I had to make some stuff up to make the story run better. And no, I'm not a member of any branch of any armed services. I'm not to sure if there is an American consulate on Aruba though.
1: the red phone
Fort Bragg, North Carolina, USA
The red phone rang. Trouble came a calling to the main command centre of the JSOC. The duty officer picked up the receiver and listened. After a few moments he acknowledged the message and turned to a nearby sergeant. "Call the ranch." The sergeant picked up another phone and made a call.
2: the ranch
The Ranch had it all. From workout equipment and an Olympic sized pool, to ranges for everything up to an M82. Captain Jeff Hunter was on the pistol range, trying out his handy work with the good old M 1911a1, when his pager started to beep. A quick look showed the number on screen to be that of the briefing centre. "Oh shit." Hunter looked out to his left to see his troop sergeant, Silevski, hosing a target with an M9, his weapon of choosing. When the sergeant ceased fire, Hunter waved him over.
"Get them together Si, we got us a job." Silevski nodded and secured his weapon before heading for the range exit.
The ranch, briefing room
"All right boys, your eyes and ears are mine for a moment. We got us a situation. At 0900 local time, a number of unknown persons took over the United States Consulate on the island of Aruba. At this time they have made no demands. Since this is an American installation, the Dutch government has already declared that if the United States wants to handle this, they'll be perfectly happy to see it happen. Now to the current situation."
A screen displayed a road map. "The consulate is located here." Hunter illuminated the building with a laser pointer. "I'm not too worried about any collateral damage or about locals getting in the way. Once we're ready to go, the Dutch Marines present on the island will form a perimeter. After that, the hostage takers will all ours." There was a brief pause.
"Any questions so far?" There were none. "All right, grab 'em and at 'em."
3: the island
Three hours later, Island of Aruba, Kingdom of the Netherlands
Despite wearing Nomex coveralls, Hunter found himself sweating. He drank some water from his canteen before returning his attention to the building. It was odd that no demands had still been made by the hostage takers. But then again, who ever said hostage crises were the same all over.
It was a classic two story colonial building, white painted and large windows which had now been closed. The only thing that made this stand out, where a couple of satellite dishes on the roof, and the minor movement of a shadow. It was on that shadow Hunter had planted his binoculars.
There was a brief crack in his headset. "Charlie five has eyes on." This was the third sniper pair. Armed with M21s, they had been positioned straight across from the building. "Slugger one to all Charlies, hold your fire." Not much later, Sil showed up to tell his boss that he was wanted at the command post.
4:Crisis command post
Captain Thomas Warnier of the Royal Netherlands Marine Corps looked up to see the American commander enter the room. "Over here please." Hunter went over to the Marine captain who was positioned near a tape recorder. "They've made their demands." Warnier pushed the play button on the recorder "This is the United Liberation front. Unless Ricardo Elisar is not set free within 24 hours, we will begin executing hostages on every hour." with that, the phone connection was terminated.
Hunter remained silent for a moment. Then he turned to Warnier. "ET phone home, Thomas. I'll be right back."
5:Near the consulate
Everywhere they went, Delta force had satellite communication equipment with them. Hunter's troop was no exception. In the corner of their own command post, Silevski had a sat phone connection set up. He had a near instant connection.
6:JSOC operations centre, USA
by now the commanding general had arrived, along with some other officials. Naturally the general had briefed the officials and vice versa. It was then that Hunter's call arrived. The general switched on the phone and answered
" Go ahead Jeff, we're all ears here."
" Yes sir. They've just made their demands. They call themselves the United Liberation Front and they want a Ricardo Elisar to be released by midnight." from the corner of his eye, the general caught one of the officials flinching. "Captain, hold on a minute."
The general gave the official named Shawn his full attention "Okay Shawn, who's Ricardo Elisar?" Shawn sighed for a moment before taking out a folder and handing that to the general. "Ricardo Elisar. South America's most a typical drug lord. This gentleman sees him self as the next Simon Bolivar and all his profit of the drug trade has gone into this. Most of the data concerning that so called United Liberation front tells me that this is the armed resistance wing of his operation." The general nodded at that.
" all right, options?" except for the whir of the equipment in the room, there was silence.
"Ricardo Elisar is, or rather was a drug lord we bagged earlier this year. This was after the Colombians asked our help in dealing with this guy." After a heavy sigh he told them the rest. "Basically what our investigations showed this guy to behave like the next Simon Bolivar. we didn't find any kind of reference that he had some kind of armed wing though." The general looked at Shawn disapprovingly, then reactivated the speaker phone.
" Okay Jeff, it seems you're dealing with an armed fraction of Ricardo elisar's friends. From the looks of it, these gentlemen want him out of our jail. Since everybody knows we let these guys rot now, you're clear to engage to your discretion.
" Understood sir, they'll get a show tonight."
7:The island
Hunter headed back to the command post of the Royal Netherlands Marines, which made up the perimeter force. Thomas Warnier met him at the entrance. "I've been cleared to go in. my platoon leaders should be on their way in here."
Within a couple of minutes all five men had arrived.
8:Command centre
The six men were studying the blueprints. This wasn't going to be easy. " Okay, I guess we can forget the roof. Though the guy on the roof 'll be toast once you give the go ahead sir." This came from Tom Daley, the commander of Charlie troop, the snipers. Don Schulz, commander of Dog troop had an intense look on his face. "Tom, can your guys also deal with the second floor? I am not too happy with the lay of this building and if we're fired upon from above, things 'll get ugly."
At that Charlie Sizemore had to laugh. " Don't worry Don, I've got a couple of M203s with me that'll take care of that if needed." Echo platoon was the support platoon. They had most of the heavy weapons, including grenade launchers and machineguns. Richard Waterman of Alpha troop was quiet for a moment. "My guys first up?" he asked Hunter directly.
Hunter nodded. " Yup, straight through the front, deploy on the first floor, search, clear and secure. The Dogs get second floor, same procedure." Hunter looked at the faces of his commanders. He looked at his watch. "Go hour is 2315. All elements should be in place by no later then 2300. I'll be with Alpha when they go in. Good luck gentlemen."
Time is sometimes a friend and time is also sometimes an enemy. That's why Hunter always felt a bit anxious just before an assault. He checked his watch again. Two minutes. He spoke into the voice activated microphone.
" Slugger One to all units. Two minutes. Charlie one are your sights on?"
" Charlie one, all sights on. Ready when you say go." As soon as Charlie one went of the air the rest of the platoon leaders checked in as well.
Hunter went through some quick breathing excercises to calm himself down. Then he checked the dials on his watch. 2300 hours.
" All elements, Blackbeard, I say again, Blackbeard."
Without acknowledging, the snipers from Charlie Platoon opened fire. In that same microsecond, explosives installed during a night raid destroyed the barricaded fence, allowing the alpha platoon to enter the small compound.
While they were entering, there were a couple of explosions slightly above them. Hunter allowed himself an internal chuckle, the plan was working perfectly so far.
" Fire in the hole!" The cry was loud enough to be heard, even without the vox mike.
With a brief thump the front door disappeared allowing alpha platoon to enter the building.
9: inside
Miguel Sanchez paced the second floor when all hell had broken loose. First, Jesus Rincon on the roof had been shot and apparently killed. Then, Fernando who had been the guard in the hallway on his floor, had been shot, with a very big gun. The series of explosions that followed had also gotten Tomas, the man that had rushed in from guarding the hostages to try to help Fernando.
An explosion below told him that someone had entered the building.
After more explosions and gunshots, coupled with some very bright lights, Salazar came running up the stairs. He was clenching his gun hand against his shoulder, even though it was dark, Miguel could see blood seeping through.
" Find a place to cover the stairs, hurry!!"
Although Salazar was a bit of a mystery to the ten of them, he had made it clear to all of them that it was their duty to help Ricardo Elisar after he had helped them of the streets. He had seen the look of some of the women they had taken hostage. Could it be that this was not the way to do it?
Miguel took his position. Instead of covering the entrance to the stairwell, he hid himself in the darkness as best as he could and covered the hallway instead.
The moment the fighting stopped below him, he knew there was trouble coming his way.
He had barely started to ready himself when he felt himself being pulled down from his position after which darkness followed swiftly.
10: assault
Don Schulz had occasions where he wanted to be point man. This however, wasn't one of them. Up ahead his point man and his support had taken care off the one guy that had been left to guard the stairwell.
Through intelligence gathered through directional microphones, the Delta operators had learned that were at least ten hostage takers altogether. They had however been unable to locate the exact room they were in. Examination through sniper scopes and binoculars had given only a slight indication.
It was on this indicated room that Dog platoon was moving.
There was a brief crackle in Schultz headphone " Dog one, Slugger one. Sitrep?" Schulz looked around the floor. " Proceeding to objective treasure trove. One contact, no casualties." After a brief pause there came a reply " Dog one proceed with caution, possible hostiles still in the area." Before the sentence was finished a door was opened and shots were fired from an automatic weapon. The point man fell to the floor, but the support man took out the shooter.
While a medic attended to the point man, Schulz and three other men reached the door where the shooter had disappeared through. The soldier carrying the M4 Masterkey combo nodded his head and got on his knees in front of the door.
The shotgun blast echoed through the corridor, immediately followed by another one. The second blast blew the hostage taker away.
As another door opened, and a face peered out, Schulz reacted out of instinct and fired. The face disappeared. Red blood stains were clearly visible on the door. Somewhat further up, another door opened.
11: two way terror
Samantha Reading was terrified, and with good reason. The man all hostages now knew as Salazar held a Micro Uzi to her head. In the distance she thought she saw movement.
The moment Don Schulz identified one hostage taker coming out, but holding a gun to the head of a hostage, he asked Jeff hunter to come up.
At his order, Dog platoon faded into the darkness.
Salazar was surprised that the soldiers he had seen on the bottom floor had also made it up here. Now it seemed as if they had all disappeared.
Hunter was now on the second floor was well. He observed the man holding the hostage through his night vision. Interesting challenge was the first thing he thought up.
But when challenges come up, so do opportunities. When the hostage taker aimed his gun at the stairwell, looking to clear it, Hunter body checked him through a passageway. He roled through his move and came out in a fighting position.
The hostage taker was a bit drowsy but was already getting up as well. He shook his head briefly, and took out a small fighting knife. He charged for Hunter.
Hunter was ready for him.
As he grabbed the target's knife hand with his right hand, Hunters' left hand found a grip near the belt loops on the other guy's pants. He turned instantly and swung.
The other man disappeared from view. There was the sound of glass breaking.
Not much later, Hunter heard a crackle in his helmet. " Geez , I hope that wasn't a hostage."
"Trust me on this one, Charlie one, it wasn't!!!"
" Whatever you say boss."
12: mop up
The mop up was quick. The Dutch marines acted as trailers while the troopers checked the rest of the building and made sure there were no other suspects amongst the hostages.
Fortunately, that was not the case. And within 12 hours Hunter's troop was on their way back to the USA.
13: vacation, three months later,
Samantha Reading was still on the island of Aruba. Despite the incident, now three months ago, she was enjoying her stay and her work. Now she had a day off and had decided to spend it on the beach.
Finding a good spot on a public beach wasn't all that hard. After putting on some sunscreen, she started on the new Steven King novel.
It was 15 minutes later and she was well into the novel when there was some movement on her right side.
It was a man, in his early to mid thirties, rather muscular and no fat, wearing Hawai like surfshorts.
" Is this spot taken?" she had to laugh. Since the guy was kind of cute she wouldn't mind talking to this guy. She wouldn't mind at all.
" Sure, but would you mind telling me your name first?"
" Jeff Hunter, pleased to meet you."
THE END
1: the red phone
Fort Bragg, North Carolina, USA
The red phone rang. Trouble came a calling to the main command centre of the JSOC. The duty officer picked up the receiver and listened. After a few moments he acknowledged the message and turned to a nearby sergeant. "Call the ranch." The sergeant picked up another phone and made a call.
2: the ranch
The Ranch had it all. From workout equipment and an Olympic sized pool, to ranges for everything up to an M82. Captain Jeff Hunter was on the pistol range, trying out his handy work with the good old M 1911a1, when his pager started to beep. A quick look showed the number on screen to be that of the briefing centre. "Oh shit." Hunter looked out to his left to see his troop sergeant, Silevski, hosing a target with an M9, his weapon of choosing. When the sergeant ceased fire, Hunter waved him over.
"Get them together Si, we got us a job." Silevski nodded and secured his weapon before heading for the range exit.
The ranch, briefing room
"All right boys, your eyes and ears are mine for a moment. We got us a situation. At 0900 local time, a number of unknown persons took over the United States Consulate on the island of Aruba. At this time they have made no demands. Since this is an American installation, the Dutch government has already declared that if the United States wants to handle this, they'll be perfectly happy to see it happen. Now to the current situation."
A screen displayed a road map. "The consulate is located here." Hunter illuminated the building with a laser pointer. "I'm not too worried about any collateral damage or about locals getting in the way. Once we're ready to go, the Dutch Marines present on the island will form a perimeter. After that, the hostage takers will all ours." There was a brief pause.
"Any questions so far?" There were none. "All right, grab 'em and at 'em."
3: the island
Three hours later, Island of Aruba, Kingdom of the Netherlands
Despite wearing Nomex coveralls, Hunter found himself sweating. He drank some water from his canteen before returning his attention to the building. It was odd that no demands had still been made by the hostage takers. But then again, who ever said hostage crises were the same all over.
It was a classic two story colonial building, white painted and large windows which had now been closed. The only thing that made this stand out, where a couple of satellite dishes on the roof, and the minor movement of a shadow. It was on that shadow Hunter had planted his binoculars.
There was a brief crack in his headset. "Charlie five has eyes on." This was the third sniper pair. Armed with M21s, they had been positioned straight across from the building. "Slugger one to all Charlies, hold your fire." Not much later, Sil showed up to tell his boss that he was wanted at the command post.
4:Crisis command post
Captain Thomas Warnier of the Royal Netherlands Marine Corps looked up to see the American commander enter the room. "Over here please." Hunter went over to the Marine captain who was positioned near a tape recorder. "They've made their demands." Warnier pushed the play button on the recorder "This is the United Liberation front. Unless Ricardo Elisar is not set free within 24 hours, we will begin executing hostages on every hour." with that, the phone connection was terminated.
Hunter remained silent for a moment. Then he turned to Warnier. "ET phone home, Thomas. I'll be right back."
5:Near the consulate
Everywhere they went, Delta force had satellite communication equipment with them. Hunter's troop was no exception. In the corner of their own command post, Silevski had a sat phone connection set up. He had a near instant connection.
6:JSOC operations centre, USA
by now the commanding general had arrived, along with some other officials. Naturally the general had briefed the officials and vice versa. It was then that Hunter's call arrived. The general switched on the phone and answered
" Go ahead Jeff, we're all ears here."
" Yes sir. They've just made their demands. They call themselves the United Liberation Front and they want a Ricardo Elisar to be released by midnight." from the corner of his eye, the general caught one of the officials flinching. "Captain, hold on a minute."
The general gave the official named Shawn his full attention "Okay Shawn, who's Ricardo Elisar?" Shawn sighed for a moment before taking out a folder and handing that to the general. "Ricardo Elisar. South America's most a typical drug lord. This gentleman sees him self as the next Simon Bolivar and all his profit of the drug trade has gone into this. Most of the data concerning that so called United Liberation front tells me that this is the armed resistance wing of his operation." The general nodded at that.
" all right, options?" except for the whir of the equipment in the room, there was silence.
"Ricardo Elisar is, or rather was a drug lord we bagged earlier this year. This was after the Colombians asked our help in dealing with this guy." After a heavy sigh he told them the rest. "Basically what our investigations showed this guy to behave like the next Simon Bolivar. we didn't find any kind of reference that he had some kind of armed wing though." The general looked at Shawn disapprovingly, then reactivated the speaker phone.
" Okay Jeff, it seems you're dealing with an armed fraction of Ricardo elisar's friends. From the looks of it, these gentlemen want him out of our jail. Since everybody knows we let these guys rot now, you're clear to engage to your discretion.
" Understood sir, they'll get a show tonight."
7:The island
Hunter headed back to the command post of the Royal Netherlands Marines, which made up the perimeter force. Thomas Warnier met him at the entrance. "I've been cleared to go in. my platoon leaders should be on their way in here."
Within a couple of minutes all five men had arrived.
8:Command centre
The six men were studying the blueprints. This wasn't going to be easy. " Okay, I guess we can forget the roof. Though the guy on the roof 'll be toast once you give the go ahead sir." This came from Tom Daley, the commander of Charlie troop, the snipers. Don Schulz, commander of Dog troop had an intense look on his face. "Tom, can your guys also deal with the second floor? I am not too happy with the lay of this building and if we're fired upon from above, things 'll get ugly."
At that Charlie Sizemore had to laugh. " Don't worry Don, I've got a couple of M203s with me that'll take care of that if needed." Echo platoon was the support platoon. They had most of the heavy weapons, including grenade launchers and machineguns. Richard Waterman of Alpha troop was quiet for a moment. "My guys first up?" he asked Hunter directly.
Hunter nodded. " Yup, straight through the front, deploy on the first floor, search, clear and secure. The Dogs get second floor, same procedure." Hunter looked at the faces of his commanders. He looked at his watch. "Go hour is 2315. All elements should be in place by no later then 2300. I'll be with Alpha when they go in. Good luck gentlemen."
Time is sometimes a friend and time is also sometimes an enemy. That's why Hunter always felt a bit anxious just before an assault. He checked his watch again. Two minutes. He spoke into the voice activated microphone.
" Slugger One to all units. Two minutes. Charlie one are your sights on?"
" Charlie one, all sights on. Ready when you say go." As soon as Charlie one went of the air the rest of the platoon leaders checked in as well.
Hunter went through some quick breathing excercises to calm himself down. Then he checked the dials on his watch. 2300 hours.
" All elements, Blackbeard, I say again, Blackbeard."
Without acknowledging, the snipers from Charlie Platoon opened fire. In that same microsecond, explosives installed during a night raid destroyed the barricaded fence, allowing the alpha platoon to enter the small compound.
While they were entering, there were a couple of explosions slightly above them. Hunter allowed himself an internal chuckle, the plan was working perfectly so far.
" Fire in the hole!" The cry was loud enough to be heard, even without the vox mike.
With a brief thump the front door disappeared allowing alpha platoon to enter the building.
9: inside
Miguel Sanchez paced the second floor when all hell had broken loose. First, Jesus Rincon on the roof had been shot and apparently killed. Then, Fernando who had been the guard in the hallway on his floor, had been shot, with a very big gun. The series of explosions that followed had also gotten Tomas, the man that had rushed in from guarding the hostages to try to help Fernando.
An explosion below told him that someone had entered the building.
After more explosions and gunshots, coupled with some very bright lights, Salazar came running up the stairs. He was clenching his gun hand against his shoulder, even though it was dark, Miguel could see blood seeping through.
" Find a place to cover the stairs, hurry!!"
Although Salazar was a bit of a mystery to the ten of them, he had made it clear to all of them that it was their duty to help Ricardo Elisar after he had helped them of the streets. He had seen the look of some of the women they had taken hostage. Could it be that this was not the way to do it?
Miguel took his position. Instead of covering the entrance to the stairwell, he hid himself in the darkness as best as he could and covered the hallway instead.
The moment the fighting stopped below him, he knew there was trouble coming his way.
He had barely started to ready himself when he felt himself being pulled down from his position after which darkness followed swiftly.
10: assault
Don Schulz had occasions where he wanted to be point man. This however, wasn't one of them. Up ahead his point man and his support had taken care off the one guy that had been left to guard the stairwell.
Through intelligence gathered through directional microphones, the Delta operators had learned that were at least ten hostage takers altogether. They had however been unable to locate the exact room they were in. Examination through sniper scopes and binoculars had given only a slight indication.
It was on this indicated room that Dog platoon was moving.
There was a brief crackle in Schultz headphone " Dog one, Slugger one. Sitrep?" Schulz looked around the floor. " Proceeding to objective treasure trove. One contact, no casualties." After a brief pause there came a reply " Dog one proceed with caution, possible hostiles still in the area." Before the sentence was finished a door was opened and shots were fired from an automatic weapon. The point man fell to the floor, but the support man took out the shooter.
While a medic attended to the point man, Schulz and three other men reached the door where the shooter had disappeared through. The soldier carrying the M4 Masterkey combo nodded his head and got on his knees in front of the door.
The shotgun blast echoed through the corridor, immediately followed by another one. The second blast blew the hostage taker away.
As another door opened, and a face peered out, Schulz reacted out of instinct and fired. The face disappeared. Red blood stains were clearly visible on the door. Somewhat further up, another door opened.
11: two way terror
Samantha Reading was terrified, and with good reason. The man all hostages now knew as Salazar held a Micro Uzi to her head. In the distance she thought she saw movement.
The moment Don Schulz identified one hostage taker coming out, but holding a gun to the head of a hostage, he asked Jeff hunter to come up.
At his order, Dog platoon faded into the darkness.
Salazar was surprised that the soldiers he had seen on the bottom floor had also made it up here. Now it seemed as if they had all disappeared.
Hunter was now on the second floor was well. He observed the man holding the hostage through his night vision. Interesting challenge was the first thing he thought up.
But when challenges come up, so do opportunities. When the hostage taker aimed his gun at the stairwell, looking to clear it, Hunter body checked him through a passageway. He roled through his move and came out in a fighting position.
The hostage taker was a bit drowsy but was already getting up as well. He shook his head briefly, and took out a small fighting knife. He charged for Hunter.
Hunter was ready for him.
As he grabbed the target's knife hand with his right hand, Hunters' left hand found a grip near the belt loops on the other guy's pants. He turned instantly and swung.
The other man disappeared from view. There was the sound of glass breaking.
Not much later, Hunter heard a crackle in his helmet. " Geez , I hope that wasn't a hostage."
"Trust me on this one, Charlie one, it wasn't!!!"
" Whatever you say boss."
12: mop up
The mop up was quick. The Dutch marines acted as trailers while the troopers checked the rest of the building and made sure there were no other suspects amongst the hostages.
Fortunately, that was not the case. And within 12 hours Hunter's troop was on their way back to the USA.
13: vacation, three months later,
Samantha Reading was still on the island of Aruba. Despite the incident, now three months ago, she was enjoying her stay and her work. Now she had a day off and had decided to spend it on the beach.
Finding a good spot on a public beach wasn't all that hard. After putting on some sunscreen, she started on the new Steven King novel.
It was 15 minutes later and she was well into the novel when there was some movement on her right side.
It was a man, in his early to mid thirties, rather muscular and no fat, wearing Hawai like surfshorts.
" Is this spot taken?" she had to laugh. Since the guy was kind of cute she wouldn't mind talking to this guy. She wouldn't mind at all.
" Sure, but would you mind telling me your name first?"
" Jeff Hunter, pleased to meet you."
THE END