"If we bowed to your demand today, we would be asked tomorrow to ban the army from using teargas and sound bombs,"
-One Israeli Supreme Court Judge, in a decision ruling the use of flechette shells legal.


"We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office."
Aesop

"From a historical basis, Middle East conflicts do not last a long time."

Vice President Dan Quayle, 10/2/90 (Moronic, right?)

InshAllah; God Willing

Illhamdillah; Praise be to God

The core principle behind showing the Ma'dan how to retrieve their own commodities was based on the understanding that Mujahedeen prowled to interdict logistics routes.

UpLink's risk assessment analyst, Vince Scull, had a think tank and roster of test pilots exploring the best ways to make safe drops of everything needed, so in time, the Marsh Arabs will be free to consume goods from the outside more safely, but for the next few months, supply refreshments would be tenuous.

No worries, the Sword Operatives seemed fit to merge the desert into the global market, InshAllah, and life will be better with men like Molina and Nimec, Ilhamdillah.

Today, these operatives wheeled a select group of the boys away in their Forties- their APCs- for a fishing excursion by the coast. It was an all-daylong task, but in truth, these youths had nothing better to do. Best if they bring back a nice catch.

The Sheik sat restfully with a fragrant Turkish cigar gnashed under his molars.

InshAllah, one great mother of a catch will come back, Illhamdillah.


The Gulf

Robin Molina, Paul Evens, Nigel Braun, and Tom Ricci, park a half-dozen Ma'dan youths in a leviathan Forty beside the sea. They take the trip south aboard a British or European controlled amphibious assault vehicle, under the recommendation of Scully, before disembarking on a shoreline well recovered from the oily mess of thirteen years ago.

"We are actually within the borders of Kuwait," Ricci announces, "as added insurance against being interrupted."

He wades from the APC first, toward a beige-and-black tent pitched a couple hundred feet ahead.

Plain-clothed contractors mill about bench tables and jigsaws. Wielder plumes arc luminescent smithereens over the tent roofs.

"Boys, this is just one of the fabrication plants we have running to provide affordable tools beside the job site. Come take a look."

He waves them along to one secluded table.


"A redneck exhaust pipe," liberated from a mutilated monster truck, or so it seemed, lay at the table center.

Nigel Braun, the South African veteran of many wars involving privatized military firms, cradled the object in his arms.

"You see all those seagulls on the rocky shore?"

They followed his eyes, seeing theme flock out of reach of the tide.

"Now you see a feast!"

He triggered a tempest of near-hypersonic flechettes and ball bearings, over-killing by incalculable factors.

The pictorial beach tinted red, foul, murderous.

"Whoa oh! All alright, kiddies, bag all those fowl, and stow them in the forty! Yeah! Next, your safari guide will show you how to fish with a frag grenade!"


Joel Soler, as coincidence would have it, is a real-life French filmmaker that actually has footage of Saddam Hussein's passion for grenade fishing, in the documentary, Oncle (Uncle) Saddam. In the film, Saddam himself actually slings grenades in a pond, and orders a frogman in to retrieve his kills. And they say redneck games aren't universal.

They say, well, actually, Israeli Military Historian Martin Van Creveld says, that the longer two opponents face one another in combat, the more alike they'll become, because they'll acquire survival traits from one another.

Under this reasoning, it should be no surprise to anyone that the American GI adopted the "Fritz" helmet, that Yankees built up an ironclad force, and that a United States Privatized Military Unit shared a fishing technique with a sworn enemy of fourteen years.

"Some of those poor buggers are going live crawling at the bottom, too maimed to breed, miserable, with wrecked bladders and cuts open to infection, so don't use this method too frivolously, you hear?"

They didn't, but Nigel Braun chose to go on with his illusions, roaming the beach, taking a swig from a bottle no devout Moslem would touch, as a searing flame encroached on the cigarette butt nestled between two fingers.

"Bag those Pisces tight, and don't forget to vacuum those sacks with the fancy pumps, we'll need all the space."

Thomas Ricci, Sword operative, retired SEAL, dismissed cop, professional fisherman in his own right, walked alongside the South African post-apartheid professional soldier, identically dressed in khaki shorts.

"I thought the aquatic population would be thinner than this," commented Ricci, "so Nimec and I decided we'd fry the fish guts, and feed them to the kids, so they'd get fat."

Braun chuckled.

"That's the way to go. Back when I was a kid, we thought that was candy. We'd saturate it in oil, and bake it until it was all crusty. We didn't know about cholesterol, and you can bet the farm I'd prefer the blissful ignorance of these kids," pointing at the Iraqis, who are spearing shish kabobs in the sea, "and taste the joys of old fashioned cooking, rather than live old and crotchety."

"But science and Eve not leaving things alone ruined all that," observed the SEAL.

"Amen, buddy, don't burden them with nutrition yet. Code level black, and all that."


Iraq

It was as useful a stakeout as any, sunken off road, slowly turning the tracks through a ragged course selected for 'terrain masking,' and it made a nice entry-level op for the Marsh Arab militia fighters.

Fraser Singe, one of Her Majesty's Gurkha riflemen, and Intel Chief, Peter Nimec, supervised eight friendly Arabs in hot sands- January hot sands- of an empty pasture a few hundred meters from a newly strung power line.

Fraser stirred a new packet of dehydrated punch flavoring into a pitcher of water every quarter hour. He'd just finished stirring in the last batch of fruity granules when Pete traded shifts on the Maw-Deuce.

"I just finished talking with one of our friends. He says he'll want all the paper cups when we're finished with them."

Nimec perplexed Singe.

"What for?"

"He wants to see what applications Papier-mâché products could have in Iraq between now and whenever the country is plugged into the international market."

"Hold on, he didn't say if, but when?"

Hmm

"Yeah, but he thinks he'll have plenty of time to compete locally on a few items made of Papier-mâché and clay. He has my blessing."

The two stared thoughtfully at the Forty's broadside graffiti art:

Si vis Pacem, Para bellu: if you want Peace, prepare for War.

Nimec hedged a question.

"So Fraser, why'd you come to Iraq?"

The Gurkha rubbed his chin.

"Because Angelina Jolie refused to adopt me. No, I'm a top-dollar professional soldier, doing the Queen's work while collecting a wage unknown to Nepal. I also liked Mr. Gordian's mission statement. I probably wouldn't be here if I wasn't aligned with Sword."

The bass sound of a Honda truck dislodged their discussion.

"Here they come," Pete announced, "let's prepare to engage."

Nimec rounded up the team, offered reminders and pointers.

"This is kind of like capture the flag. You four," he pointed out the individuals he wanted, "follow me around the left flank here," he demonstrated with his hands, "and you guys are the flag defenders. One, stay at the wheel, you there, stay at the maw deuce, and you sir, keep a lookout at the door. That leaves you. Assist Mr. Fraser with the mortar if he asks."

"Let's go!" In a minute, it became evident the truck riders were indeed the electric wire bandits, as Nimec, lying prone behind a pebble dune, used his lapel radio to relay what his eyes told.

Arab men in gray coveralls roped up creosote poles. Some other men looked on. An RPK gunner regularly rotated 360 degrees, while perched atop the white truck.

With GPS, calling the coordinates came easy.

"I've got the truck. HE round, fire!"

The round fell in the cabin, causing the shockwave to push the metal frame outward. The RPK man somersaulted clear, much like Paul Hamm's Olympic performance.

The landing didn't match up.

"Just a notch to your left, fire for effect."
Singe did, hitting the twisted pickup bed's flank, causing a break-dance spin.

"We have them outgunned. Drive up the dune, and show them the .50, why don't you?"
Within seconds, the burglars faced the forty head-on.

"To arms, my brothers, let's hump it across this road, and what awaits us."
They arrived in time to grant quarter to the few surviving thieves.