Chapter 8. The Miskito Coast (pt.1)

The dusty, alternately muddy and rutted, back roads were the main arteries through the bush. Diego had a newer model Jeep Cherokee in which we were forced to pull over and off the road several times by passing military convoys on narrow tracks through mountains. I tried to make small talk with Diego and this Old Dog hulk who merely nodded now and then.

Diego dropped us off at a forest track where we were met by armed guerillas and led a few hundred yards to a field where a Piper Cub awaited. Everyone seemed to know who I was and where I was going. Everyone except for me, of course.

When my escorts spoke, it was in Miskito Creole that was almost English I’d already begun to pick up on. But no one in these parts seemed to be into casual chit-chat.

“You will be taken to the Northern camp,” the pilot said, as he took me by the arm to help me into the plane.

“Northern Camp? Not Commander Zero? Edén Pastora… the Contra?”

The pilot laughed. It was the first sign of levity since arriving in Tegucigalpa, “Dee school teacha can answer any questions y'have.” He smiled, “And, Periodista, you’d best learn to frame your questions bettah.”

I didn’t know what he meant and wondered if he was in league with the old Bird Dog.

The pilot was of a Cuban/Miskito mix named Reynaldo who wore a 2506 Bay of Pigs patch adorned with a pre-Castro Cuban flag over a white cross on a shield. He spoke nonstop to anyone that would listen and I was the only passenger... a captive audience.

“You’re a periodista from California? Write dees down. You tink dees a war of Communists verses Falangists, or dat dee Contras are reactionaries and Fascistas against democracy. Dees ees a war of deceptions and foggy mirrors of ideas, una guerra ideológica. But eet ees really a war of the city fockers who want to fock over the campesinos. Eet ees true everywhere here in Central America from Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras… everywhere!”

He let go of the rudder and didn’t mind at all that the plane pitched, swerved and dove before he recovered it. I was grateful for the seatbelt as Reynaldo continued, “The Spanish speaking assholes in the cities would rather see us go away. We are a bother to theem. We are in the way of their plans whether they are Mafiosi dictators or Sandinistas. Half these Contras helped overthrow Somosa and the rest are Somosa family’s officers and ex-National Guardsmen. Dey needed a job." 

"So, why did you join them?"

"The Sandinistas were organized and sat their asses down in Managua, smoking Cuban cigars, but we all went back to our villages thinking we won."

"Then you joined the Contras? Aren't they what you fought against?" 

"Contras? We aren’t Contras. We are Miskitos that could care less what happens een Managua. There's oil in Bluefields. Ha, they’d like to get rid of us for dat. And shit, mon, the Contras… they are led by old generals who want to put the Somosas back in. You see it happen in the U S A… you heard it first here. Agra-businessmen wit armies of lawyers in El Ay and New York wit pink hands make dee laws dat fock-over campesinos in fly-over country. Your precious democracy will get sucked up wit it. You’ll see…. Here we are. Look down.”

It was the first time I’d heard the term, Fly-Over Country.

The Piper Cub bounced through turbulence worse than Diego’s Jeep on the ground. By the time we landed near Waspam on the Rio Coco, I was ready to kiss the ground. The cub swooped, turned barely above the trees and slapped itself down perfectly within a narrow swath cut out of the jungle. From the landing-strip I was hustled away and out through the mountains surrounding the ruins of the once vital Miskito village. 

After a couple hours on a jungle track, we came upon a clearing with tents pitched strategically under the canopy of the surrounding forest. Taken to one with sides hurled up and a couple of cots, I was finally able to rest after setting down my pack and ten-ton typewriter case on a table in the middle of the space.

A young man holding an AK-47 woke me with a nudge from the barrel of his rifle saying, “Time to move aside. The others will be here soon.”

“Commander Zero?”

He laughed, “No, only the Captain.”

Kuka approached the table wearing camos and a holstered pistol hanging from a strap over her shoulder. As one of two other soldiers set my gear on the ground, she ignored my presence altogether. They spread out maps and talked in military jargon in Spanish and Miskito that I barely understood. One of the soldiers nodded in my direction before she said anything about me, “He’s okay,” then she addressed me, “Max, the Dog will take you from here.”

From my treatment since arriving, I expected Kuka to be important to these people, but not a leader in a guerrilla army. I heard the cracking of automatic weapons firing in synch and went in that direction. My instincts told me we weren’t under attack but that some kind of drill was taking place.

The Old Dog was instructing a group of young men in a file with new, out-of-the-crate, M-16’s. They held their rifles like fearful toys. The Dog barked orders and strolled down the ranks adjusting the posture and grip of the fresh recruits, “Short bursts. Remember what I said!”

Down range, a row of sand-bags with a red circle painted on the front, were set against a berm above a perimeter trench. They served as targets only fifty yards from the line of young men and women in camo-fatigues.  Not one bullet hole could be seen within the red paint circle. In fact, most of the sacks appeared to be untouched. I thought the Contras were mercenaries but, if these were mercenaries, no one would be getting their money’s worth for a while. There were a few professionals from other countries. Pastora’s volunteers were eclectic and not necessarily anti-communist nor entirely Miskito. Eden Pastora considered himself a true Sandinista and wore the Sandinista patch on his uniform the day of the bombing.

“Go ahead, take your pick from the crate, McGee. Fill your clip and join our little party. You do know how to load a clip?”

“Sir, Yes Sir!” I loaded, snapped the clip into place, and joined the ranks to shoot.

I wanted to show this old prick a thing or two so I flipped off the safety, left it on full automatic, and put a neat pattern of three into the red circle of one bag.

“Well now, I am surprised.”

Then with control put four into another, five into the next and six into the last.

“I’m impressed, periodista. You didn’t learn that from the Navy.”

“Mounted fifty caliber drills from the fantail was all I got there.”

“And the M-16, periodista? Where did you learn that?”

“Sir. Basic shit. Sir. One gun’s pretty much the same mechanics, sir.” I put-on the military posture of respect mockingly. The truth was that I’d fired an M-16 and an AK-47 before.

“Cut the drill sergeant crap. What else wasn’t in your profile, goddammit Mr. McGee?”

“Just because I know how to point a gun doesn’t make me a warrior,” I assured him. 

I wasn’t being modest, it was true. A friend from way back had an M-16 and an AK-47. We’d spent more than a couple of clips plinking beer cans several years before in the bayous of Northwest Florida. However, I knew I wasn’t trained for combat and had no experience except for deer hunting and playing cowboys and Indians as a kid. I had, however, dodged a few bullets once, dealing pot and acid in Southern Fla back in the early 70’s, but never came close to actual combat.

“I’m from Northern Idaho. Our graduation gift from diapers is a rabbit rifle,” I lied about being from Northern Idaho, but I did have a membership in the Junior NRA from the time I was fourteen.

Old Dog had other business to attend from there and he knew I wasn’t telling the truth about my experience but I thought he must’ve liked that about me. It meant I could keep some of my shit to myself instead of bragging about crap that didn’t matter. He assigned me the task of training these fishermen, lumberjacks, miners, and farmers, to shoot. Most of whom had used nothing newer than old Springfields hunting rifles left in Bluefields by the Marines back in the twenties.

I spent a week in camp learning commands in Spanish, breaking down and reassembling my piece with the recruits. I didn’t know what I was doing. I had no field experience, but, if I was to survive what I was beginning to believe was an ill-conceived adventure, it would behoove me to be as much a student as I ever could be a teacher.

 I was told to leave my typewriter and gear other than a day pack. It would all be packed to where we were going. I wasn't told that tidbit of information and didn't think it prudent to ask. 

I did have the advantage of being in fairly good shape from riding a bicycle twenty-miles to and from our home in Winters to work at CMF in Vacaville. Even though I’d been idle almost a year after cracking my skull, my strength came back to my legs while hiking through jungle and mountain trails.

We didn’t see any action at first but we did see the aftermath of Sandinista/Cuban reprisals and removals of entire Miskito villages in the hills. We were protected by popular support most of the way to Greytown. None that lived in the area around the San Juan estuary at the border of Costa Rica cared much for the Sandanistas. This protection got stronger the closer we got to the coast, as we worked our way in separate small groups through the cover of the thick jungle and the cypress swamps. 

I’d almost forgotten about Kuka and stopped wondering where she was. I hadn’t thought much about Myra, Celeste, or Ariel either. My attention was on more immediate concerns. Though I’d begun to question what I was doing in the jungle in the first place, my immediate concerns were simple things like watching that my feet didn’t disturb a Yellow Beard coiled up under leaves and waiting invisible for one careless step in the bush; or, shaking scorpions out of my boots upon rising. 

My note pads were filled with descriptions mused over and embellished with sketches of parrots and frogs pared to fit in dispatches once over the Rio San Juan into Costa Rica where my typewriter and gear had been sent ahead. Only two of my journal entries, under a pseudonym, were published and I received $250 for them. But I was published and I felt like I was no longer acting the part of a journalist but was, un verdadero corresponsal de guerra; a real war correspondent.

Diego had joined the patrol wearing fatigues and the strapped holstered pistol over one shoulder that signified rank after we landed in Waspam. He was the squad leader who filled me in on the Bird Dog and why an American spook would be trusted after the assassination attempt on Pastora in La Penca that happened while I waited in the safe house in Tegucigalpa.

“The Bird Dog isn’t CIA. He’s a contractor and he’s the sort of businessman that’s connected on damned near every level.”

“And you trust him?”

Diego then warned, “No one’s trusted. You might be mistrusted as much as anyone else, Max. Other Contra groups, or the CIA, are just as deadly to us as are the Cubans and Sandinistas.”

“So, why’s he trusted?”

Diego looked at me as though I’d asked the dumbest question he'd ever heard. “He isn’t… a little more than you are though.”

“Me? What about me? I’m new here and have no idea what’s goin’ on.”

“It’s because you are new. Be careful Max.”

“And the Bird Dog?”

“The Bird Dog has as many contacts in Managua as he does in Washington.”

“You mean, with Sandinistas?” I asked incredulously.

“The Sandinistas... Som too.” He then tipped his hat, “and your Kuka has friends. Yes, she was with them in the beginning, with Pastora.”

“She told me as much as that back in Santa Monica.”

“Did she tell you she was fucking Daniel Ortega back then too?”

“What!” I was more than a little jealous.

“Don’t worry, Max. It’s just a rumor… the stuff of legends. Nothing is as it seems down here and the truth disguises itself in wild stories.”

I decided that nothing I would write would have anything to do with the rumors and propaganda of the day. And, besides, because I carried an M-16, no one cared what I wrote.

I challenged Diego’s implication I might be a spy, “I’m not comfortable with the idea I could be dispatched under a false suspicion.”

Diego was unmoved and shrugged, “You should have known that before you came to our little party. Amigos de la Revolución are always the first to go. Did you imagine we would be any different from the Sandinistas?”

The second most significant event that happened was on a foray into the swamps of the coastal Lagunas west of Bluefields. Ours was a patrol on a recon mission to observe the removal of a Miskito enclave by the Sandinistas. We weren’t supposed to make contact with the enemy. The patrol came upon a village. To me, it wasn’t exactly a village in a normal sense of the word. It was more a collection of houses on stilts scattered throughout the high ground beyond the swamp. The Sandinista had already removed the residents into relocation camps. It was a ghost town.

The squad had taken a break under one of the houses when a scout warned Diego of an approaching patrol. A silent choreography of his trained and able squad took perfect positions for an ambush. The point approached close enough for me to see his face. He couldn’t have been older than fifteen… maybe even younger. I surmised he might be the kid in the group and that was why he had to take the point. I was relieved when our squad leader signaled for me to hold fire. The boy walked ahead. It was a revelation because most of these Sandinistas that followed also looked like they couldn’t have had pubic hair yet. 

The signal was given to commence firing. I couldn’t… my trigger finger didn’t respond… confusion set in… a horrifying confusion. A barrage of gunfire opened-up from cover behind me and the kids dropped like rag dolls. They just dropped... sometimes in shock… sometimes still moving forward. I’d seen their faces. Diego swaggered through the mess of corpses dispatching a pistol shot into their heads just in case they were still alive.

He commanded, “Leave them here so that Daniel Ortega will personally be told about it.”