The man on the parabolic mike winced and lifted his headset away from his ears. “They’re calling on the criminal Kediri to surrender himself to the Will of Allah and
justice of the Indonesian people.”
Christine sighed. “Once, just once, I’d like to hear one of these outfits just come out and say, ‘Yo, dude, you’re out of here!’ But no, they’ve always got to do the deathless prose for the ages.”
Goodyard lowered his binoculars for a moment. “Excuse me, Commander, but this is my first military coup. Are they always this … polite?”
“It depends, sir. And I don’t hear any fat ladies singing yet.”
The amplified voice repeated its demand three times, then fell silent, a silence that protracted painfully. Then the main palace gates began to draw open.
“Show’s over,” someone announced, prematurely as it turned out.
Suddenly, from half a dozen firing slits on the palace walls, automatic weapons opened up, raking the coup column. Infantrymen crumpled under the fire storm and vehicle commanders died in their turrets.
“Get down!” Christine shoved the ambassador to one side and below the balustrade as bullets snapped and whickered overhead. Back on her knees, she got her binoculars out just in time to see a big Mercedes limousine roar out of the Palace gate to plow into the two Land Rovers blocking the exit.
Given the way the two military vehicles spun out of the way, the Mercedes must have been a heavily armored security vehicle. The point was proven as teargas sprayed from concealed vents under its frame and submachine gun muzzles flamed from gun ports under the windows.
Two more limousines tore out through the gap created by the first, likewise streaming gunfire and tear gas. In an instant, the entire square became a war zone. The vehicles in the rebel column returned fire, turrets and ring mounts traversing after the fleeing cars. The gun positions in the palace continued to engage, and now some of the other police outposts around the perimeter of the square were opening up, tracer streams intertwining across the open spaces and ricocheting off the statuary.
The low-velocity 90mm cannon of one of the Scorpion tanks chuffed angrily and one of the limousines was lifted off of its wheels, thrown into a flaming death roll. The other two cars continued their headlong race across the square. Swerving wildly to evade gunfire and ignoring curbs and roadways, it was apparent they were heading for the US Embassy.
Where the hell else did they have to go? Christine thought wildly.
She hunkered beside Ambassador Goodyard, who still lay sprawled on the gangway. “Mr. Ambassador!” she yelled over the gunfire. “We need a command decision right now. What’s left of the Kediri government is headed right for the Embassy. I suspect they’re going to ask for sanctuary. What are your orders, sir?”
It was the moment Randolph Goodyard would be remembered for. “Open the gates!” he bellowed, drawing himself up. “Open the damn gates!”
The heavy steel bar grillwork of the embassy entrance retracted into the blast walls and the anti-vehicle barriers sank flush with the ground. Barely slowing down, the two bullet scarred sedans tore into the refuge of the Embassy compound, the gates and barriers closing behind them.
A line of enraged armored fighting vehicles were now advancing across Freedom Square toward the Embassy, and the slugs that dug chips from the compound walls were no longer accidental. One of the light tanks coughed out another shell, its detonation cratering but not piercing the thick concrete.
“Return fire!” the FAST platoon leader yelled. A Predator anti-tank rocket streaked away from an embrasure and the Scorpion dissolved into a black and orange fireball.
The siege of the Jakarta Embassy had begun.
West of the Pulau Seribu Island Group
2000 Hours. Zone Time, October 29, 2008
There was no conferencing among the freighter captains. No group decision developed. It was just time to cut and run. Civil sideband and satcom channels crackled with radio messages to owners and brokers.
Local situation untenable! Damn the contracts! We’re pulling out!
Coasters, schooners and small craft streamed out of Jakarta port. Burdened with refugees fleeing from the convulsing capital, they fled past the anchorage, seeking the refuge of the outlying islands and the open waters of the Java Sea.
All hands turn to! Stand by to heave round! Engine room, stand by to answer bells!
A pair of Indonesian Air Force jets screamed low over the sea. Reversing, they circled the anchorage, the rocket pods under their wings glinting in the fading sunlight. They orbited twice, as if thoughtfully eyeing the nervous merchant vessels, then banked off toward the mainland.
Anchor lights flicked off. Running lights came on. The fleeing freighters moved in silhouette against a flaming twilight sky.
“Where away, captain?”
“The fastest course out of this hell hole! Engines ahead full!”
The merchantmen scattered, heading northwest for the Karimata Strait, southwest for the Selat Sunda, northeast for Makassar Passage. A handful of refugee boats too small or ill-equipped to make the run to safety trailed in their broadening wakes, desperate passengers waving handfuls of rupiahs, begging for a passage out to anywhere.
The urge for flight was becoming infectious, instinctive, like wildlife fleeing before a coming hurricane. A nation was in its death throws.
Only one lone ship raced up the Javanese coast, inbound to Jakarta.
The United States Embassy,
Jakarta, Indonesia
2210 Hours; Zone Time, October 29, 2008
Goodyard had donned his conservatively cut blue pinstripe – not the new tropical weight he’d purchased before being assigned to Jakarta but the old reliable that had served him well back in Lincoln, Nebraska, a crisply unworn Brooks Brothers white shirt and, for luck, the indigo tie that had been a birthday gift from Caroline.
The role he was about to play was more daunting than any he had ever imagined for himself. For the next few minutes, he must be the living embodiment of the United States of America. He must speak for the most powerful nation on Earth and possibly set its policy in this developing crisis. It was the legacy of Ambassadorship that extended back to Benjamin Franklin and all of the cutting-edge telecommunications in the world couldn’t ease the burden or the responsibility. Goodyard really hadn’t considered that factor when he’d accepted his appointment, but he was more than aware of it now.
He was seated at his desk, a silver pen in his hand, when the knock came at his
office door. “Come in.”
He didn’t look up from his writing as Commander Rendino and the Embassy Marine Detachment leader entered, ushering in a third figure, an Indonesian Army Officer. The two American military personnel were in camouflage. The Indonesian was in semi-dress uniform, decoration ribbons bright on his chest and an empty pistol holster at his belt. His posture was nervously belligerent.
Goodyard continued to write, keeping the man waiting for a good minute. Then he deliberately set his pen aside and looked up.
“This embassy has been fired upon and has been surrounded by hostile troops,” he said coldly and without preamble. “This situation is totally unacceptable and I demand to know who is responsible for this outrage.”
