Kivu and set up a new model for developing countries. However, what he is worried about is the look in Alex’s eye. He has seen that slightly fanatical gleam before – a cocksure, knowing look that concerns him. He sometimes wonders what makes Alex such a compelling commander, what gives him the mystical charisma that makes men follow him into battle. He’s not sure what it is but it works.
He looks at Alex now and asks cautiously, ‘Are you sure this isn’t so much about establishing the Republic of Kivu as the Republic of Devereux?’
‘You mean, is this just a monumental egotistical folly?’
‘Yes, is this just a toy country to play with, to set up a perfect world, the one we are always talking about?’
Alex looks away for a moment. ‘I know what you mean and we should be wary of that, but on a practical level I think it is actually a lot more doable than it first looks and I think it would benefit the people. Executive Outcomes ended the war in Angola as did the Paras in Sierra Leone; I think we can do the same.’
Yamba nods. Executive Outcomes was a small South-African-led mercenary army that had a huge impact in ending the long-running war in his homeland simply by being very professional and imposing order on anarchy.
Alex continues. ‘The UN has shown it can’t impose order in Kivu and the world community likes to talk about it but doesn’t actually do anything. They let five million people die in the main Congo war and no one really noticed.’
Col looks at the two of them and can see that Yamba is warming to the idea. What he hasn’t told either of them is that last week he was horrified to find himself opening a can of beer at breakfast. After his large payoff he has found himself living the life of luxury he always dreamed of, sinking into sloth sitting on the sofa in front of his huge home cinema screen, drinking Thwaites Original.
When he realised what he was doing he threw the beer can out of the window, ran upstairs, got on his running kit and went for a ten miler out on the moors.
He can see now that Alex has got ‘that look’ in his eyes and is committed to the plan; he doesn’t want to hear whatever objections Col has to it.
Col drops the scornful tone and slumps back on the sofa. ‘Look – I’ll do it, course I will, you know I’ll back you, lad. I just think we need to be careful, that’s all I’m saying.’
Joseph stands to attention and thrusts out his chest.
He is carrying a short-handled digging hoe in one hand and rests it on his shoulder in what he thinks is a military fashion. He is wearing shorts and is covered in mud and ash from burning and clearing a new field that morning.
His platoon is drawn up in three ranks of ten men in the centre of the village; they have just come back in from the fields and look a mess.
His platoon commander, Lieutenant Karuta, has also been working and stands in his wellies and shorts and a tee shirt in front of them. He paces around, looking annoyed, and thinking hard.
The soldiers stand to attention and eye him nervously; when he’s in a bad mood he can be a right bastard.
He turns to them and shouts in his most commanding voice, ‘I have had an urgent message from FDLR High Command.’
He takes hold of the bulky satellite phone on a strap over his shoulder and holds it in the air to emphasise the importance of the message. He’s worried about the order he has to give and is trying to emphasise that it hasn’t come from him.
‘We have been instructed to pack up and fall back to base in the Lubonga valley.’
A groan goes through the ranks of the thirty men. Karuta had told them that they would be staying in Lolo for months and they were looking forward to some easy times. They have spent the last week clearing and burning the bush to make fields and hoeing the land ready to plant extra crops. It’s been backbreaking work and now it seems it was all for nothing.
‘Hey, shut up!’ Lieutenant Karuta snaps and glares at them. They all drop their eyes. ‘I’m not asking your opinion! We have been given an order – a direct order! By High Command! We will obey!’
He was perturbed by the order as well – they had been told to scatter into the bush to avoid the UN forces but now they are being told to concentrate again. He was talking to another platoon commander on the phone who had had the same order.
The soldiers look glum but don’t say anything.
‘You will pack up your kit and be ready to leave in an hour; we will take the women as bearers. Corporal Habiyakare, go and get them ready!’
The corporal goes off with three men to where some women are tied up in a hut.
The lieutenant continues. ‘We have a journey of forty kilometres to get to Utiti.’ He points north. ‘We must wait there and they will send transport to collect us.’
One of the older men in the platoon asks from the back rank, ‘Lieutenant, why are we going?’
Karuta looks awkward. He hasn’t been told anything but doesn’t like showing that he is not in the command loop, so he just shrugs. ‘I don’t know, but there is a rumour from the government in Kinshasa that it will ask the UN to leave the province soon so I think the FDLR High Command want to concentrate our forces.’
He shrugs again and turns away.
The group of five men coming through arrivals at Kigali airport in Rwanda are an unlikely crowd.
There’s a tall, dark-haired man with a stern face, a serious-looking black man, a short balding man with a moustache and grim eyes, and a lanky Chinese businessman with a laptop case. The fifth man is middle aged and heavily built with a crewcut and a chunky gold necklace. He is pale-skinned and Slavic in appearance.
Arkady Voloshin is the other mainstay of Team Devereux. Formerly in the Russian Air Force he moved on to work for Victor Bout’s air transport company in the 1990s, running guns, diamonds, booze, cigarettes, TVs and hookers in and out of Africa. He is an experienced pilot of both fixed wing and rotary aircraft and has good contacts in the world of international arms dealers and aircraft leasing companies.
Since his last mission with the team he has bought himself a red Ferrari and been touring the south of France with some Serbian arms dealer friends. He spent a lot of time and money in Monte Carlo casinos where he took up with a French-Senegalese prostitute called Celeste who looks a bit like Naomi Campbell. She then ‘accidentally’ became pregnant and he now finds himself both married, a French citizen and a father of a baby girl called Anastasia. He’s not quite sure how it all happened but he does know that Celeste wants to remain in their nice apartment in Cannes and that she spends a lot of money.
Although the group in the airport look disparate, they are very at ease with each other and switched on, eyes scanning around the crowded arrivals area as they claim their luggage and move through the doorway into the large entrance hall in the 1970s airport.
It’s early May, a month after Alex’s initial meeting with Fang, and Team Devereux have spent the last two weeks holed up in Akerley brainstorming, planning the operation and writing their logistics wish list. They are here to see Rwandan staff officers to discuss this before heading over the border into Kivu to meet the local politician who will front the whole operation.
Alex spots
