First Into Action (26 page)

They had no idea they were being listened to eighty miles away, and they no doubt intended to dust me anyhow. They felt in control. As they talked, I kept my radio on ‘send’ and their voices were picked up by the highly sensitive microphone and transmitted to the operations room.

‘Michael’s the name.’

Michael, the one who was clenching his jaw, did not appear to be the leader of the two, but he looked the most eager to have a go. The other quietly stared at me, more intelligent and calculating than Michael. The comms room didn’t quite catch the name and I repeated it, at the same time stepping slightly forward so the men’s voices could be picked up better. I found myself repeating much of what they said.

‘You shy?’ I asked the other man who did not appreciate being talked to like that.

‘Cassidy. Jimmy Cassidy,’ he said confidently.

In the ops room our intelligence officer, still in his pyjamas, jotted down the name and hurried off to check it.

‘Where’s your mates?’ Cassidy asked.

‘They’ll be along,’ I said.

‘Will they, now?’ asked Michael.

Our pick-up car was still some twenty miles away and the driver was going like the clappers to get to me, fully aware of what was going on as he listened to the transmissions. I was feeling edgy. Whoever started the shooting would have the advantage. I was daring myself, looking for an excuse to start. My adrenaline was rising. Things were starting to seem like they were taking for ever. I decided to move first and destroy the bastards, but something was holding me back. A doubt, perhaps, that I was all wrong about what was going on. I rehearsed the move in my mind. I would hit Michael first. All I needed was a tiny excuse to start. Then the intelligence officer’s voice came through my ear-piece and brought me back.

‘I’ve got two possible Jimmy Cassidys of South Armagh. How old is he?’ Then, quickly realising I couldn’t talk directly to him, he said, ‘Is your man in his twenties would you say?’

I kept silent.

‘In his forties?’

I clicked the radio twice.

‘That’s a yes,’ said the bleep.

Michael and Jimmy could not hear the transmissions, obviously. They said something to me, but I just stared at them, concentrating on what the intelligence officer was telling me.

‘One of the Jimmy Cassidys I have is forty-seven. His hair is thinning – a high forehead.’

I clicked twice.

‘He’s five-ten, stocky, round-faced, about eleven stone.’

I clicked twice. Cassidy said something to me during the transmission. I heard myself say ‘What?’ and continued to listen to the intelligence officer and Cassidy at the same time.

‘If it’s our Cassidy he runs his own ASU.’

‘I said what are you doing out here?’ asked Cassidy, repeating his question.

‘The other man is more than likely one of his team. Try Michael Doherty.’

‘Are you deaf?’ Cassidy asked.

‘I told you. Waiting for some friends.’

Michael moved away from Jimmy, stretching the gap between them to a few yards. They were dividing up – getting closer to making their move. I decided if one of them made an attempt to climb over the fence I’d take advantage of his hands being occupied and engage the other first.

‘Doherty is thirty-five. Dark curly hair. His eyebrows meet.’

I clicked twice and decided to take a different tack.

‘You’re Michael Doherty, aren’t you?’ I said.

Michael’s reaction confirmed it.

‘Yeah, it is Doherty, isn’t it?’ I was speaking to the intelligence officer in reality.

Michael was staring at me, wondering how I knew him. I’d stalled him.

The intelligence officer started to rattle off information from his file.

‘What are you doing here yourself, Jimmy? Bit early for you, isn’t it? Don’t you live in Armagh? Hall Street, I believe . . . number seventy-seven.’

Jimmy’s eyes narrowed.

‘Two-twenty-four Saggart Road. That’s where you live Michael, when you’re this side of the border that is. Isn’t that right? With your sister and her husband.’

Michael flashed a look at Jimmy. I talked to the two men as if I were recalling their details from memory, repeating what was said to me over the net.

‘How’s your brother doing, Jimmy? Another five years and he’s out . . . perhaps.’

Both men were off balance.

‘And how’s the bomb-making school doing?’ I continued to Jimmy. ‘I understand you’re specialising in mortars these days.’

‘Who the fuck are you?’ Michael asked.

I had nowhere else to go with this. They were no doubt stunned that I knew so much about them. Then I heard a familiar voice break over the radio.

‘I’m twenty yards behind you, Duncan, on your left.’

It was Max. He had heard everything over his own radio and had run then crawled as close as he could without being detected. He would have his M16 pointed at them.

‘If they show armour I’ll unzip the fucker on the left,’ he said.

I now felt in control. My confidence in Max was total. Their lives were in my hands. A desire to goad them into a fight flickered across my mind. Max would take out Michael. I would take out Jimmy. But that’s not the way I am. I’m not a murderer, which is what it would have been had I gone for it. We could have got away with it, too. I could have said they had drawn first. We could have upped our score. I could have killed them for Jack and several other friends who had been killed by the IRA over the years. But body counts don’t win wars. They are won by convincing the other side they cannot succeed.

‘There’s a rifle pointed directly at you,’ I said. ‘Either one of you takes a hand from his pocket and you’ll both lose your heads.’

They took this information well and I could see by the subtle change in their faces that they had no doubt I was telling the truth. Perhaps they read the booming confidence in my threat.

‘I’m gonna do you a favour today. Now fuck off the way you came.’

They communicated to each other with silent looks. Jimmy nodded to me then they stepped back and walked away.

On certain levels relationships between 14 Int and the SAS were deteriorating with each passing year. This was mainly due to the SAS’s heavy-handedness and the cock-ups they were continuing to make. Apart from its contributions to 14 Int, the SBS had by now virtually pulled out of Northern Ireland (they sent the occasional small team over with the SAS). The SAS hung on to its role, which 14 Int battled to redefine and absorb into its own. Initially designed purely for intelligence-gathering in Northern Ireland, 14 Int was technically a wing of the SAS, though none of the members were badged. It was decided in the early days of 14 Int that, as the operatives were essentially intelligence-gathers, regardless of their intense weapon training, they were not qualified (trusted, to be precise) to handle ambushes or any kind of direct action. Therefore, whenever an operation developed to the stage where a lethal conflict was inevitable, 14 Int operatives literally swapped places with SAS troopers. There was a lot of justification for this, especially in the early days, but by now many 14 Int operatives felt that their training and level of experience in the Intelligence Detachments was higher. Although many operatives were more suited to surveillance alone, each Det had a sufficient number of able operatives to do many of the direct action jobs (every Det had at least one SBS rate if not more, several Royal Marines and Paras, as well as members of other capable army units such as the Green Jackets). Many operatives felt they could handle all aspects of the job, including deadly ambushes. I was never wholly convinced of that, simply because when forming a hasty ambush or assault there is not always time to assess each member’s skills and background. I would have confidence in the man behind me, even if I didn’t know him, if he was SBS or SAS. But I could not say the same about a 14 Int operative I didn’t know. To be sure, there were several I did know who I would not want running into a room behind me with a cocked weapon in their hands.

Operatives were understandably pissed off when, after spending sometimes years on an operation, they had to hand it over to the SAS for what was arguably the best bit. The climax of an operation is usually the most sensitive part and key to wrapping up the case. If it got screwed up, many thousands of man hours could be washed down the drain. It was a bit like building a house of cards, and with one card left, a crowd of SAS troopers walking in, shoving us out of the way, surrounding the delicate structure with heavy breath and ham-fistedly proceeding to lay the last card on top. This happened to me personally on two operations and both times I sat with Max, out of the area, and listened to all our work go up in smoke.

The first time was in Lurgan after we had housed a cache of weapons in an old terraced house in the centre of town. We knew the weapons were to be picked up by a notoriously aggressive ASU any day. The SAS liaison officer monitoring our operation reported to the headquarters group in Lisburn that we had reached the contact phase. The SAS storm-troopers moved in.

They were briefed on the situation and given as much detail as possible, but it was impossible for them to assimilate it all and get the feel of the town in the short space of time they had. They left the briefing clutching maps and photographs of places and players, lists of cars and characters and their descriptions, and reams of notes on the operation, but with hardly any time to go over it thoroughly. We never carried any of that stuff. It was mostly all stacked into our memories. Except for updated lists of new cars and number-plates there was nothing we didn’t know about the operation. But as long as the SAS kept it to a clean ambush and things did not develop into anything more complicated, they would get the job done. But Murphy’s Law clearly states things rarely go as planned, and to counter-react soundly to unexpected and sudden developments, it takes knowledge and experience of the situation which the SAS troopers, arriving at such short notice, could never have had.

This particular ambush in Lurgan required someone to trigger the bad guys moving into the house and their departure. One of the Det operatives who knew all the players was wisely chosen for this task and he remained in our hide across the road. Due to the geography, the narrow streets, and the awareness of the ASU, the boyos were to be allowed to place the weapons in their car and drive out on to the main street unmolested. A two-man SAS team in a car would then move in behind and, remaining a sensible distance back, follow them to a crossroads where an RUC road-block would halt the ASU and arrest them. If the ASU surrendered that would be that, but we knew it was doubtful with this particular crowd. If the ASU reacted with gunfire they would be caught from the flanks of the crossroads and cut off from behind. Other SAS teams were stationed in various side-streets as cut-offs in case any of the ASU made it out of the corral.

The only part that went to plan was the initial 14 Int trigger.

As the four members of the ASU left the house in their vehicle with the weapons, the 14 Int operative reported it over the net. The rest of us sat back in our operations room miles away, listening to the radio exchanges. The ASU drove to the end of the narrow side-street and paused at the T-junction with the main road. They turned left and headed along the virtually empty road towards a junction with traffic lights several hundred yards away, where the RUC lay in wait. The SAS car, acting as rear cut-off, immediately pulled away from its holding position on the main road and closed on the ASU car. The move was sloppy, they were too eager and got too close too soon. The ASU, who were naturally in their most paranoid state, were on the lookout for any suspicious signs. Seeing two thugs in a car pull out from where they were parked and close in behind them was enough to send them on to the offensive.

Before the PIRA car reached the crossroads it suddenly halted. One of the men in the back climbed out holding an M16 and without hesitation opened up on the SAS car. It might as well have had a winged dagger painted on its bonnet. The windscreen was shattered and the lights shot out but somehow the two SAS troopers were unharmed. The boyo climbed back into the car and it took off towards the crossroads. The two SAS troopers pulled themselves together and immediately gave chase. The RUC were thrown into confusion by the shooting, which they could not see and did not expect so soon, and so they didn’t react immediately when the first car tore through the crossroads. By the time the SAS car came through at speed, the RUC had recovered and, mistaking the shot-up SAS car for the ASU, presumably assuming it was the SAS who had done the damage, opened up on them. The car was peppered with bullets and, again miraculously, neither of the troopers was hit. To avoid further fire, the SAS troopers sped down a side-street at random, no longer in pursuit of the ASU and just trying to stay alive. The street they turned into was occupied by one of their own SAS cut-offs. This was not good news because the SAS cut-off did not recognise the car at first and made the same mistake as the RUC. Fortunately they only released a few shots before recognising their colleagues. Once again, neither of the SAS in the car was hit. Meanwhile, the ASU had dumped their car after several blocks and had charged into a house. The SAS reacted by quickly gathering to mount an assault. This took precious minutes and would allow the ASU time to regroup and prepare. When the SAS eventually assaulted, with teams charging into the house from the street and then through room after room, the only occupants found were a petrified family. The ASU had not paused on bursting in through the front door. They had gone straight out the back and into the city. They were not caught.

After listening to our thousands of man hours go up in smoke we adjourned to the bar to have several beers and dull our senses.

The second cock-up on my watch was in the area of Cookstown. We had uncovered weapons in excellent condition in a short-term hide in an overgrown patch of ground surrounded by fields. We watched the weapons knowing they were due to be moved any day soon, and Max and I set up an ambush for the ASU we suspected would soon return to uncover them. The following morning we were relieved by another Det team who were going to watch the site for that daytime only – it was highly unlikely the weapons would be picked up in daylight. We felt the ASU would turn up that night or the next and Max and I would be there as one of the cut-off teams, waiting for them. But the operatives had some bad news for us during the exchange. The SAS had arrived in Cookstown and were taking over the op that night.