The next chapter of the Dhofar Redemption is up and ready for your reading pleasure! Need to get caught up? Check out earlier chapters, starting with Chapter One here. Also, check out the store to support this written endeavor through some good, old-fashioned American commercialism! And don’t forget about the many ways to win merch between now and 04 July 2024, details in last week’s update post! I hope to see you at the book tour, and subscribe to the blog to get updates on future writing projects and merch drops!
General Ghattas’ body was interred the next morning, buried by the officers who followed him against the coup. The officers from Nizwa and Captain al-Ibrahim’s unit discussed the question of what to do with the Omani Officers that remained loyal to the former sultan while they dug General Ghattas’ grave. Nowak spoke passionately on behalf of execution, much to the frustration of Captain al-Ibrahim and Colonel Drake. Fortunately for the dissenting officers, a telegraph arrived from the palace in Salalah informing them that if they took an oath of loyalty to Sultan Qaboos, they would be allowed to keep their commission. All of them agreed quickly, and the oath was administered before the officers were reassigned and loaded onto a plane headed South to Salalah.
After the airfield was secured, Captain al-Ibrahim sent an ambulance to pick up the detachment that had stayed behind to secure the wounded man in the Wadi. When the unit was whole again, Captain al-Ibrahim gave the unit a day to rest while he received the next set of orders. The pressure was on, and Sultan Qaboos was not about to let up after an easy victory.
The night after the coup, Harrigan found himself in a briefing room in the airfield headquarters building with Captain al-Ibrahim, Colonel Drake, Ramsey, Nowak, and Kelly planning the next move.
“The Sultan’s directive,” Colonel Drake, “is to contact the villages in the jebel that have experienced problems with the communists.”
There was a huge map on the table, and the Colonel pointed to a spot labelled “Midway/Thumrait.” The men all leaned in to hear him continue.
“Regular Army will focus on moving into the jebel by more conventional means,” the Colonel continued, “Our new Sultan has determined that the forces up here near Nizwa and Muscat will move in from the North, and the forces near Salalah will establish defenses near the Yemen border and move in from the South.”
“We,” Captain al-Ibrahim took over the briefing, “are going to be jumping into the jebel ahead of the regular army, where some of the harder-hit villages are.”
The men in the room shared a quick look, the last jump had not gone as well as one had hoped. Kelly broke in before Captain al-Ibrahim could continue, “Sir, if that’s the case, we are going to need new and better parachutes.”
“It’s already been taken care of,” the captain responded, “new, and I mean new and not surplus, parachutes arrived this afternoon, along with new rifles and ammunition for the regular army, and Sergeant Wessels.”
“I thought he was going home?” Ramsey said, his one eyebrow raised above his eyepatch.
“He was,” Captain al-Ibrahim nodded, “but when I told him about the results of our first operational jump, he agreed to stick around for a bit longer.”
“Fine by me,” Nowak growled, “I could use some actual experience in my platoon.”
Captain al-Ibrahim hushed the Polish lieutenant with a glare and then continued, “the objective is to contact the villages, tell them to join forces with us and forming a pro-Sultan militia, a firqat, to fight against the adoo. We also want to use them to help us capture communist supplies to help fight the war. They have a lot of equipment we could use.”
“What happens if they don’t join?” Harrigan asked.
“They will,” Colonel Drake said, “the sparse reports we have been getting out of the jebel is that the locals are furious. The adoo have been throwing village elders off cliffs and executing dissenters. The former Sultan was so focused on Muscat and Salalah that the outlying areas weren’t being protected.”
“We will be there to show them that the new Sultan wants to create a new Oman,” Captain al-Ibrahim stated firmly, “a new Oman that includes all Omanis.”
The men stood around until late into the evening, planning the operation. By the time Kelly and Harrigan made it back to their temporary berthing in the clap-board barracks at the edge of the airfield, they were exhausted. Harrigan peeled his sweat-soaked uniform off his body and slugged down a canteen of water before climbing into bed.
Harrigan found himself in an observation post overlooking the target village just over forty-eight hours later. The unit’s second parachute insertion had gone much more smoothly than the last one, with no more than a few twisted ankles among the men. They had quickly gathered their equipment and conducted a brutal march through the desert to the first village they were to contact.
“Ready,” Kelly whispered, his eye glued to his rifle scope. Kelly, Harrigan, Ahmed, and Malik were high above the little unnamed village of tents and huts and had been there for the greater part of twenty-four hours. They were feeding information back to Captain al-Ibrahim, who had maneuvered the rest of the unit to surround the village and clear it. This little village was to be their first contact in the jebel, and Harrigan had counted barely twenty people in the village, mostly older men, women, and children, and at least a dozen adoo in rag-tag uniforms carrying Chinese-supplied Kalashnikov rifle variants, bolt action rifles, and ancient jebeli muskets. The well-trained unit would make short work of the disheveled militia Harrigan was observing through his binoculars.
There had been some debate on whether the armed men in the village were communist rebels, adoo, or if they were merely members of the village who had taken up arms to defend themselves. As Harrigan’s team watched the men in the village, that doubt had been completely removed as one young woman found herself at the mercy of three scrawny armed men in the village. As they dragged the woman toward a shack at the edge of the village, Harrigan had the handset to his radio pressed against his ear with one hand and binoculars in the other.
“We are ready,” Captain al-Ibrahim whispered through his radio, “on your shot.”
“Fire when ready,” Harrigan had barely whispered the full sentence before Kelly’s suppressed Winchester Model 70 spat. One of the men holding the young woman dropped her foot, and tried to stare at his chest before crumpling. Before the first adoo hit the ground, Malik’s Lee-Enfield boomed, shattering the quiet of the early morning air and a second man’s head snapped backward.
Malik’s unsuppressed sniper shot caused a commotion below, and the remaining adoo in the village started barking orders, but only a few of them had the sense to take cover. Both Malik and Kelly worked the bolts on their rifles and readied for a second volley as the rest of the unit below broke from cover and assaulted the village. Most of the adoo were focused on the hill where the sniper shots had come from, and Leftenant Nowak’s rifle platoon took them totally by surprise.
There was a flurry of gunfire in the village below, as Nowak’s platoon hammered controlled pairs from their FAL’s. Many of the adoo fell right away, but a handful of them retreated to the edge of the village to take cover. Nowak and his men moved methodically through the village, rooting out the adoo as they went.
As the men neared the edge of the village, several adoo popped their rifles over cover and around corners, firing blind. Malik and Kelly killed several more as Nowak’s men took cover where they could. The firing died down just as suddenly as it had started, and Nowak’s men stood at the edge of the village.
“They’re clear,” Captain al-Ibrahim spoke into the radio, “come join us in the village when you can.”
“Coming down,” Harrigan responded before turning to the other three men in their hide, “They’re clear, time to move.”
Harrigan, Kelly, and their protégés walked down out of their hide and met the rest of the unit in the village below. Captain al-Ibrahim was already meeting with the village elder, a gnarled, stooped old man draped in sand-colored robes with cataract clouded eyes and a mouth missing most of its upper teeth that showed when his thin, cracked lips pulled back into a smile. The Captain and the elder sat on cushions with their feet underneath them, talking in Arabic.
As Captain al-Ibrahim spoke with the elder, a woman covered head to toe with flowing black robes and an uncomfortable looking metal mask over her face came out of the Elder’s home. She was carrying an ornate silver platter, which hosted an equally ornate, colorful teapot. Harrigan and Kelly paused to watch the exchange for a moment, they could see the steam rising from the teacups into the desert air. After watching long enough to be sure the Captain wasn’t in any danger from the village elder, they left to catch up to Leftenant Ramey and Leftenant Nowak.
“That looked like it went well,” Kelly said amicably when they found the two officers sitting against the shaded side of a hut at the center of the village.
“Thanks,” Nowak said, scowling a bit, “two of them got away down the hills. We saw them running when we got to the end.”
“Captain al-Ibrahim wouldn’t let him pursue,” Ramsey said, his eyes closed and head laid back against the hut, “that makes Jakub upset.”
“Yes! It makes me upset!” Nowak retorted, “We aren’t here to let communists escape off into the desert to tell their friends about us!”
“And you would have pursued them into their own territory,” Ramsey said gesticulating with his good hand and without opening his eyes, “where they could have lured you and your men into a trap. Possibly slaughtering you all if they got reinforcements.”
Nowak cursed at Ramsey in Polish, then stomped off into the village, “I am going to check my men. Make sure the idiots have set up proper security.”
“He’s a nasty piece of work, isn’t he?” Kelly asked, cradling his suppressed M76 Submachinegun in the crook of his arm as Nowak stormed off to the perimeter of the village.
“Some people are just here for the violence, I guess,” Harrigan said, taking a seat in the shade next to Ramsey, “I suspect we all know some folks like that.”
Ramsey and Kelly grunted in agreement, and Kelly swung his sniper rifle off his shoulder, set it against the hut, sitting down in the shade. In the distance they could hear Nowak chastising some poor trooper who had managed to irk the already irritated Leftenant.
The men sat in silence against the hut, enjoying the shade while they waited for Captain al-Ibrahim to finish conversing with the village elder. They didn’t have long to wait, as al-Ibrahim walked over carrying his FAL in his left hand by the carrying handle and his right hand resting on the butt of his Colt revolver. Captain al-Ibrahim kicked the bottom of Leftenant Ramsey’s boot to make sure the British officer opened his eyes.
“I spoke with the village elder,” al-Ibrahim announced as he crouched down, “the men we killed this morning were members of a unit of adoo that have been harassing the villages in the jebel. There are sure to be more of them come nightfall.”
“Leftenant Nowak did say a couple managed to get away,” Ramsey said with a shrug, “so I figured they would come back.”
“Yes,” al-Ibrahim continued, “well the elder has agreed to align his village and the rest of the villages near here with the Sultan and form our first firqat.”
“Awful nice of him,” Kelly responded with a sardonic grin, “and what did he want in return?”
“A new well drilled,” Captain al-Ibrahim responded with his own grin, “and a new pen built for their camels and goats.”
“Is that it?” Harrigan asked, “That’s all they wanted?”
“Yes, Leftenant Harrigan,” Captain al-Ibrahim nodded, “They are a simple people, these jebelis. All they want is to tend to their livestock and be left alone. The adoo’s manifesto does not align with Islam, and they have been terrorizing the villages for years.”
“Seems easy enough to help them out,” Ramsey replied, “probably shouldn’t leave them quite yet though. What with the adoo likely to come back and all.”
“Agreed,” Captain al-Ibrahim said, “I already told the elder that we would be staying here for the night to protect the village before we move on to the next. We have to wait for the engineering team to get here anyway.”
Captain al-Ibrahim stood up and turned to walk away, “Leftenant Ramsey, are your men done burying the dead adoo?”
“Yes, sir,” Leftenant Ramsey said, standing up as well, “Matter o’ fact, I was just heading that way to check up on them.”
“Good,” al-Ibrahim turned to walk away, but stopped, “where is Leftenant Nowak?”
“We saw him a bit earlier,” Harrigan responded, “He went off to check his men on the perimeter.”
Captain al-Ibrahim nodded and continued his way toward the perimeter in search of the Polish officer.
“We probably better go find our charges then,” Kelly said while standing up, “seeing as everyone else is getting busy.”
Harrigan murmured his agreement and accepted the hand Kelly thrust in his direction. The two men walked to the center of the village, where they found Ahmed and Malik dozing in the shade between four rucksacks. Kelly nudged Malik’s foot with his boot, and Harrigan did the same to Ahmed.
“Wakey wakey, boys,” Kelly said with a grin as the two younger soldiers awoke with a start.
“Ah, Mister Kelly, Leftenant Harrigan!” Ahmed said with a hasty grin, “We were just guarding the packs, like you asked.”
“We can see that,” Kelly said sarcastically, “and we really appreciate it boys.”
Ahmed and Malik shuffled to their feet, picking up their rifles and looking a bit sheepish at being caught sleeping.
“Alright you two,” Harrigan said, “We have business to attend to.”
“Malik, you come with me,” Kelly pointed at Malik and then to his ancient, scoped Lee-Enfield, “bring your rifle. We’re setting up an observation post on another hill.”
“Ahmed,” Kelly continued, “its time we got some practice in with real aircraft.”
The hot summer sun beat down on Harrigan and Ahmed as they called the hulking form of the Westland Wessex helicopter into the makeshift landing pad in a flat spot of desert below the village. The rotor wash sprayed sand and bits of gravel all over, stinging any exposed bits of skin as the crew helped the troopers on the ground offload the precious cargo. The helicopter bore one hundred gallons of fresh water for the villagers, an ammunition resupply for Captain al-Ibrahim’s men, and a Royal Army engineer to survey the village.
Once the cargo had been offloaded with some help from the troopers from Ramsey’s platoon, the helicopter’s engines roared and the bird rose from the ground and headed back toward its home airfield near Muscat to the North. The men left behind on the ground carried their cargo back up the hill to the village, and the engineer set about surveying the village for their new well and livestock pen.
As the day grew late, the village was on high alert, ready for a follow up attack from the adoo that they were sure was to come before nightfall. Leftenant Nowak’s men had gotten very little rest since arriving in the village. Even from his position well inside the village in the makeshift command post that Captain al-Ibrahim had set up, Harrigan could tell the men were scared. They had routed the small detachment of adoo pretty easily, but the villagers had spoke of almost a hundred men that belonged to the communist guerrillas in the area.
Dusk was just setting in when Kelly radioed in from his observation post in the hill above the village. “Visual on a force of adoo moving toward the village.”
“Where?” Captain al-Ibrahim radioed back.
“They are four-hundred meters south of the village perimeter.”
“Rifle Platoon, do you see them?”
“Negative,” Leftenant Nowak’s voice came through the radio quietly.
“Sniper team,” Captain al-Ibrahim spoke authoritatively into the radio handset, “When they get within two hundred meters, take a shot.”
“Roger that,” Kelly’s voice was scratchy on the radio. Harrigan felt the sweat starting to build in anticipation. They waited quietly in the command post for what felt like hours, the only sound in the whole village was the occasional bleating of a goat.
“Adoo are within two hundred, taking a shot.”
There was a split second pause, then the loud report of Malik’s sniper rifle reverberated around the hills. Another split pause and the valley below the village to the South erupted in wild gunfire.
“The adoo are shooting every which way, they don’t know where the shot came from.”
With a jolt, the firing all stopped at once, and Harrigan figured that the whole attacking force must have all expended their magazines at once. Another loud report from Malik’s rifle cracked.
“We see them now.” Leftenant Nowak called on the radio.
“Open fire,” Captain al-Ibrahim announced. The Southern perimeter came alive as Leftenant Nowak’s platoon opened up, firing single shots at the enemy working their way to the village.
“Do you want us to get Mortars on them?” Harrigan asked al-Ibrahim.
“Maybe, let me hear what Nowak says.”
“They’re turning tail.” It was Kelly on the radio, “they are running and leaving their dead behind.”
“Hmm,” Captain al-Ibrahim murmured, “I guess they weren’t expecting a trained enemy.”
The firing died down in spurts and quiet returned to the hills. Leftenant Ramsey’s platoon replaced Leftenant Nowak’s platoon on the perimeter, and they dug in for what they all hoped would be an uneventful night.