Life as a New Hire Ch. 42

Then the Army of Myanmar launched a campaign to push the Kachin resistance off its last legs and into the grave. The Kachin had fled over the border to China in the past ... and the Chinese had always sent them home to be subjected to the blood-stained hands of the Burmese. When August 14th rolled around, the Burmese offensive was in full swing and once more the Kachin were fleeing north into China ... only this time, they walked right into the path of a Khanate mobile patrol heading south.

'Why are you here in our territory?' the Khanate leader asked thru his local translator. He was the commander of a Zuuns ~ 100 men (now slightly reduced) but the Khanate military prided itself on initiative among its non-commissioned and junior officers.

'We are being slaughtered in our homeland,' the people wailed.

'Well, we don't have the resources to take care of you here.'

'Please don't send us back. We will be raped, tortured and even murdered.'

And since that commander had been told to ally with the local ethnic minorities in this part of Yunnan (who also happened to be kinsmen of these Kachin), he showed his initiative. "I'll go down the road and talk to these Myanmar troops so they will stop attacking you until our Tumens commander can work something out ~ say mediate a cession of hostilities", he told them. And off he went.

A roving Myanmar helicopter saw a light armored column rolling south in the middle of a stream of Kachin heading north. The pilot assumed they had crossed the border, so he attacked. The helicopter had the misfortune to kill one of the 86 remaining Khanate troopers. As he wheeled around for a second pass, a Khanate soldier wielding a 9K333 Verba SAM blasted him out of the sky.

Even as it died, the helicopter was being told that a Khanate column was coming down the valley to exchange bona fides with the Myanmar commander. Since both sides were conversing in Cantonese, there were definitely confusing communication issues going on:

Myanmar commander: 'Be careful, we have a helicopter in the area.'

Khanate commander: 'We are aware of that. It killed one of my men.'

Myanmar commander: 'Where is our helicopter now?'

Khanate commander: 'There seems to be a misunderstanding. You killed one of my men.' In modern English slang ~ 'It is so on!'

Before rolling down into the valley, destroying one mobile column of Myanmar light infantry and then annihilating the closest town garrison, the Khanate commander called up some air support. Amidst the ground carnage, the six Khanate Mig-35's escorting twelve SU-25MS's jumped four Myanmar Mig-29's, shooting down three of them.

By midnight, the tiny Khanate force had retreated back over the border, leaving the Burmese wondering when the Khanate would come stampeding south in even greater numbers.

The next morning the Khanate Commander of a Thousand explained to his Myanmar counterpart that this matter was settled, unless he wanted to take it another step. For both sides, the announcement of an upcoming truce between the Khanate and the PRC hung heavy in the air. Myanmar opted to forget the issue and the outside world was unaware how close the two came to war.

No one gave the Kachin the memo. They immediately came, hat in hand, to the Khanate's Yunnan provincial commander, who was looking for a way to not get squeezed between a hostile PRC and Burma ... and he had plenty of former People's Liberation Army equipment he'd just taken from disarmed Chinese troops lying around. So he gave the Kachin a few thousand assault rifles, grenade launchers, SAM's and mortars ... plus some men to train them in how to use said weapons and in 'proper' insurgency tactics ... some of which was 'on the job' training.

Now why would that mean anything to anyone at JIKIT? Recall the other two K's? They both bordered Thailand and on August 26th, massive 'Red Shirt' [not the name I would have chosen for a pro-democracy movement] protests broke out in some of the country's largest cities and towns. There were strikes and work stoppages. The country was on the verge of grinding to a halt.

Late on the 29th, the regime's military began violently crushing the opposition. Hundreds died in the streets. What few understood was that the majority of the military leadership came from the populous Eastern District ... which bred some resentment in the other's commands. Early on August 30th [Thailand was a day ahead NYC], someone killed the commander of the Royal Thai Third Army. His Chief of Staff took over and immediately declared his support for the 'Red Shirts'.

Why did this matter?

Several thousand Karen and Karenni fighters joined with the 3rd Army theater leadership in hopes that a democratic regime would take a hard line stance against Myanmar's (almost a dictatorship) junta and support their ideas for independent states. These highly trained veteran fighters were desperately needed by the Thai rebels. Still, why would most of us care?

To add to the confusion, the battle in Thailand wasn't even about democracy. The various General-Princes were jockeying for power and the Red Shirts were giving the players with less power a way to express greater influence. The current 'dictator/President-for-Life/Prime Minister by Popular Acclaim', Prayut Chan-o-cha, had taken over a few weeks earlier ... using his hand-picked legislature who were part of the new Constitution he had created.

He had left his rivals out in the cold with little to show for their past loyalty when, as Commander-in-Chief of the Royal Thai Army, he had launched his surprise coup in May. In June, he had created a new Constitution which gave him virtual control of every aspect of the country's life. On the 24th of August, he was unanimously appointed Prime Minister. He was now leader of the Army, the only allowed political party and the country's governmental apparatus. Three for three.

The new Prime Minister had been rounding up dissenters and officers who opposed the coup. His surviving enemies hadn't waited for their time to come. They took to the streets in large, if disorganized mobs. Still, until the Third Army switched sides, these down-trodden citizens had no real chance to create change. The military had been a tightly organized, unified body and the army's size was up to the task of controlling the populous. Now an actual civil war was in the offing.

Most people couldn't tell you what the ten nations of Southeast Asia were, much less where they were. The odds of knowing how democratic or how corrupt they were was even more unlikely. Suffice it to say, the countries at the bottom of the heap were Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, though Myanmar was in the same pack. So the fun geopolitical part was ... the Black Lotus wanted the autocratic Khanate to ask their ally Vietnam to put pressure on their neighbors (Laos and Cambodia) to support the pro-democracy side -- i.e., the most repressive regimes supporting the cause of freedom (in someone else's country).

To add to the bizarre, the world's leading democracy, the United States, was pressing for calm -- which would doom the pro-democracy side. The US was supported by the PRC (People's Republic of China), Russia, Malaysia and Myanmar. The World's largest democracy, India, WAS supporting the Red Shirts. The other regional entities (big Indonesia and tiny Brunei and Singapore) were sitting on the sidelines.

The rest of the world? The European Union wanted the UN to put forth a cease-fire and have the differing sides to sit down together. The government of Thailand wasn't going for any intervention impinging their sovereignty ... because they couldn't see the world of hurt that would be coming down the pipeline. Prayut Chan-o-cha was thinking he was still in pre-Khanate Asia. At worst, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos would send terse letters and withdraw their ambassadors for consultations at home.

Vietnam and the Khanate (by way of JIKIT) were thinking INVASION with a blitzkrieg before the rest of the world could slap down some sanctions hard enough to hurt. All they had to do was lure the Royal Thai First and Second Armies into a climactic encounter, crush them, then set up free, UN-sanctioned elections. Would this foster true democracy? I hoped so, yet I had the impression no one else (except for Rikki maybe) was thinking along the same lines.

Addison and Lady Yum-Yum told me upfront that they didn't give a fuck. All they cared about was that the new Thailand would be a regional ally for the Khanate ... and thus Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. It was harsh, global reality setting in. Laos and Cambodia had anemic economies and weak militaries, while Thailand had a strong manufacturing economy and a powerful army. Vietnam's military was bigger, but didn't share a border with Thailand. When the war with China broke out again, the Khanate would need its southeastern flank and Vietnam to be safe.

To do this meant regime change. Neither Vietnam, India, nor the Khanate were ready to intervene in Thailand, yet they had to act while the iron was hot. That meant going with what they had handy passing over the less than stellar road and river networks through Laos and Cambodia. They would be fighting a war along a very fragile logistical train -- so they needed to win decisively and fast. An answer to this problem was the sea -- the Gulf of Thailand to be precise.

The Thai Navy was more powerful than the Vietnamese Navy to the point where Vietnam's option to arrive by or be supplied by sea was virtually non-existent ... so the Indian Navy was finally going to have to get their hands dirty ... except [I love/hate that word] the Royal Thai naval commanders might not want their biggest bargaining chip ~ the size of their navy ~ committed to a risky battle at sea.

The Third Army wasn't alone in its stand either. Given the opportunity to stay neutral, the Fourth Army and Royal Thai Air Force were both pledging to stay on the sidelines. That still left the Third Army in an uneven struggle. The First and Second Army were both individually larger ... except they sat over a restive, repressed civilian populace who now had a trickle of military hardware coming their way.

The world would react to the invasion, there was no doubt. The problem was: there wasn't much to respond with actually in the military theater. Pro-PRC Myanmar had a house full of internal problems, plus they had border issues with India (~ 'just because' ~) and with Bangladesh, who was supporting the Muslim minority in the west of the country that the Myanmar government was also oppressing. Myanmar had more problems than any other country I'd ever heard of ... oh, and they thought their military junta ruled by popular consent. With their predilection to shoot dissidents, I could see how they won that opinion poll.

Malaysia could attempt to intervene, but they would be mobilizing against the neutral Fourth Army ... unless they wanted to risk the sea approaches as well and their navy was in no way up to challenging the Indians either. The US didn't appear to have the will. The PRC wouldn't want to anger the Khanate this soon into the cease-fire. This wasn't Russia's fight, so all she would do was send words. Besides, she despised the US, UN and EU for all the sanctions she was suffering through because of the 'problems' in the Ukraine.

Yet again, this was on the far side of the globe so why would we care? How could we make any of the key players give a damn?

It was all about the Benjamin's. See, there were plans on the drawing board for a canal traversing Thailand's Kra Isthmus, connecting India's Andaman Sea to the Gulf of Thailand, which would greatly shorten the distance for sea trade from India to the rest of Southeast Asia. If a Thai-Indian consortium controlled that canal, it would be worth untold billions for both those nations. Such trade routes would put Vietnam much closer to the global market place, further boosting their economy (as well as Cambodia's). It took my Alal-mind just over three hours to figure all that out.

Much to my continuous chagrin, young men and women would be dying to make a handful of rich entities richer. It was sometimes difficult for me to understand that most noble fights happened amid the dim perceptions of polite societies. In practical terms, brothers fought for brothers, their families and clans ~ be they tribes, battalions, or unnamed fraternities. Compared to the elected technocrats that ruled ... I was finding myself drawn to the starkly brutal organizations most like my Amazons.

Many of the women who had voted me into a lifetime of slavery were chomping at the bit to join their sisters in this urgent struggle I had brought about. I still knew I should hate them. I also prayed for their success because it was what we all so desperately needed. My children's lives were on the line. All our children's lives were on the line and in that, we were united in bonds closer than blood.

After gifting JIKIT with my insights, Lady Yum-Yum's first response was to call some 'friends' in some of the larger news outlets in Great Britain to make sure they could splash the pro-democracy crackdown as the lead story/front page news because ... the Khanate was going to assure Thai independence the same way they had made sure democracy reigned in Tibet ~ just like Tibet was the theme. That was for the Thai populous as well as for foreign consumption. The Khanate would come -- then go.

Khanate armed forces? Four whole Tumens and a 120 combat aircraft were sitting in Yunnan. They could be riding trains through Vietnam's rather dysfunctional railways on their way to the Cambodian/Laotian/Thai border.

'Was this for real?' the newsies wondered.

Was Lady Fathom Worthington-Burke a member of the shadowy JIKIT, which may/may not have been something more than a mere research body?

Should those news outlets put their people on the streets of Bangkok?

Should they hire some stringers?

Yes and yes ... and she could also imbed them with the Khanate troops closest to the future conflict ... maybe with the military mission to Vietnam itself. No one had been on point with the Khanate military machine before; and being in the front lines with the rawest footage was what the 24/7 was all about.

I must have looked pretty stunned at her audacity, because she patted me on the head like a prized Irish Setter. The moment she finished her fifth phone call, Addison confronted me with a similar list of news agencies that would need a favor for a favor. She knew less people, which at least meant fewer requests I had to make of Iskender.

All the women around me were happy, my co-workers insisted I was doing a fantastic job and people in powerful places thought I was doing the world a great service. The only way I could have been happier was if I really understood what I was doing ... or we had a bathing suit attire dress code ... that would have been pretty cool too.

(... and she brought a spear)

I left work early. I had this sneaking suspicion that yet more people around the globe were going to die and I had advance notice of this calamity and could do nothing to stop it. I could tell myself that people had been, were, and would be trying to kill one another with no help from me. That didn't assuage my guilt much, so I decided that I could extinguish some of my self-pity by going to the Full-Blooded gym and convincing someone to kick my ass.

I imagined I would have plenty of takers. Despite the opinions of Pamela, Katrina and Rachel, I was still largely a pariah -- and unwelcomed intruder foisted upon them by forces they could not question -- their Ancestors. The fact that I was dragging that jumped-up Runner, Juanita Ishara, along with me only added insult to their injury.

It definitely didn't help that Juanita didn't take guff from anyone. Sure, the House Amazons were warriors trained from a tender age to be lethal killing machines, but Juanita was the baddest of the bad -- the hardest, fastest and most determined of the roughly 20,000 Runners that existed alongside the Host. She didn't resent the House Amazons because that would have been counterproductive to her survival. Also, before I came along, she knew she had virtually no chance of joining their exclusive club.

Now that she was a 'House Amazon', she absolutely insisted that she be treated like one and woe to the fool who chose to deny her that hard won right. To add to the unpleasantness, she had the 'Buffy-ist' ideal that no one could disrespect me in the slightest. I tried to take my chiding in good humor. Juanita was having none of that. Ten minutes into my stress-relieving workout, Juanita called out some dingbat to the mat.

I could have let her go alone and be gang-jumped. That would have been unfair to her and something Buffy would take me to task over, once it was all said and done. So in I went .. and when two Amazons joined the first opponent, I blindsided them. It was the Amazon thing to do. I didn't get to enjoy my victory because my intervention was the cue for the grand pummeling to begin.

Letting us both be beaten black and blue made no sense. I grabbed Juanita by the waist and hurdled her into two others, spilling all three off the mat (and out of play).

"Stay!" I commanded, pointing my finger at Juanita. I wasn't going to have her sense of outrage spoil my selfless gesture.

Into this eye of the storm a calm settled. It dawned on my twelve assailants that what they were doing looked bad even by Amazon battle-ethics. Twelve Amazons to beat up one male? That was hardly the conservation of resources they practiced. They were trying to juggle down their numbers when someone decided to help them along in the decision-making process.

They had numbers. She brought a spear, plus she was one of the five scariest combatants I had ever encountered. I would have been happy if it was Pamela ... or Saku (maybe) ... I would have been highly suspicious if it was St. Marie, the Golden Mare and de facto leader of the Host. If it had been Alal, I would have been horrified (that Havenstone security had been so fatally compromised).

No, I got number five, which left me both somewhat elated (I liked watching her fight) and somewhat confused (she was normally kicking my ass). It was Elsa, and none of the others could stand against her. Soon we had cleared the mats, partially out of skill and mostly out of fear (of Elsa).

"Good to see you again," I tested the waters.

"I wish to be alone with Ish -- Wakko Ishara," Elsa announced. Only Juanita hung around. Since I doubted they had actually met before ...

"Elsa ... I've never asked you what your house was," I struggled through the introductions. "This is Juanita Ishara, of the Isharan House Guard. Juanita, this is Elsa, commander of the SD (Security Detail) in Havenstone."

"It is Elsa Zorja," she clarified. "It is normal protocol to not inquire into the house of a member of the SD, as we stand outside the House political structure."

Zorja was the Slavic amalgam of the Two Guardians ~ the Morning and Evening stars. I hoped it didn't mean the whole group was bi-polar aka Super-Bitchy and Super-Bitchy Possessive. That would be unfortunate for Yours Truly.

"I know who she is. She is on our 'Must Watch' List," Juanita stated.

"We have a 'Must Watch' List? How come this is the first I've heard of it?" I questioned.

"Buffy has made a roster ~ a rather long roster ~ of people we can't trust to be alone with you," she explained.

"You mean it is an anti-girlfriend list," I protested. "This is not happening -- no way, no how."

"And, if you wish to defy the list you have to take it up with Buffy ... in person. Phone calls and e-mails won't do," Juanita finished.

"What about Facebook? Twitter?" That didn't warrant a response.