Red Ice

“What do you want from me?” I said, fully knowing what was to come.

“Let me go with you. My heart burns to watch roshiajin die. They deserve to die the way they made my brothers die.”

The Japanese concept of giri had a strong hold on some. Giri was an all-consuming obligation of honor entered into on behalf of one’s comrades. Revenge in its name carried no stigma. Rather, such actions reflected one’s commendable personal integrity and strength of character. Giri did not stem from some contrived fit of pique, but from a sincere sense of obligation.

I sized him up. He was physically up to it. Fishing was grueling work. Yet he had no military experience.

“We are not going on a vendetta. You will take orders from me, an Amerikajin, a foreigner. If you cannot take orders, you will not live to return with us, if we return at all.”

He nodded.

“We are going to attack a corrective labor camp. Don’t let the others know just yet. Before we’re through, you’ll see plenty of Russians die, all right. And then again, you may end up right back where you started—in one of those camps again, along with the rest of us.”

His eyes flared. “I will die first.”

“You may. Very well, we need your help, no doubt of that. You may come along provided you meet the standards everyone else has had to meet. Tonight we’re going to make a covert raid on Kunashiri. You’ll stay with the fishing boat on this side of the straits. We’ll straighten this all out when I get back. Now let’s get under way.”

After I cut away the handcuffs, he rummaged belowdecks for a few minutes, and then the ancient engine rumbled to life. I took a quick look at the radar. It was an inexpensive bottom-of-the-line model.

By now, everyone was aboard, and the inflatable half-deflated below the gunwales of the boat. The men of the landing party were oiling down their shotguns and wrapping them in plastic bags. They put their camouflage uniforms in watertight canoe bags. The two boat guards, Wickersham and Lutjens, stood lookout with their short-ranged weapons.

“We should have brought some rocks aboard,” Wickersham muttered, “Could throw rocks farther than I can shoot this fowling piece.”

Using our chart, I showed Matsuma where we intended to launch the F470 and where we wished to be picked up.

At about 2230, we loaded the inflatable and headed for the rocky shores of Kunashiri. Wickersham and Matsuma stayed with the fishing boat. The rest of us—Dravit, Chamonix, Puckins, Gurung, Lutjens, and I—all clad in dry suits, wedged into the small inflatable boat. Our muffled outboard engine pushed us along at about five knots. Seaweed kept jamming the prop, so we stopped periodically, cursed silently, and prayed intently the engine would restart. The seaweed of the Kurils was notorious. I figured a good sprinter could race from island to island in the chain, just resting quick footfalls on the seaweed.

We didn’t see land until we nearly ran into it. Visibility in the fog was about one hundred yards. We heard breakers and then a great black cliff loomed ahead of us. I had Lutjens cut the engine and drop anchor.

Without hesitation, Gurung and Chamonix, acting as scouts, slipped over the side. It seemed like hours before they blinked the all-clear signal by light to us from shore. Then the rest of us slid over the slick black thwart tubes with our bags and shotguns. Lutjens stayed aboard as a boat guard. I made a mental note of two distinctive rocks as a navigational range. They’d point the way to the F470 when we returned.

There’s nothing like a night dip in dark, frigid waters to make you doubt your sanity. The shock of the cold water against the dry suit makes you inhale sharply and wonder if you’ll ever master regular in-and-out breathing again. A night swim has that deceptive peacefulness that foreshadows doom.

Swimming in pairs, we let the waves wash us in to shore and smash us against the rock-strewn beach. A barnacle-encrusted rock scraped at my knee and I felt a cold trickle of seawater flow down my shin. Dravit nearly lost his equipment bag to a heavy breaker and Puckins’s shotgun clattered against a rock. Quickly, Gurung and Chamonix led us to concealment below an overhanging cliff.

Like so many volcanic islands, Kunashiri rose from the sea in a series of rocky sloped surges. This was the most desolate portion of the island. The wisps of fog, the heavy waves on the seaweed-covered beach—it would have made a picturesque setting for some less grim activity. But we didn’t have time for reveries, the port and main village were still several miles away. We changed hurriedly into camouflage uniforms, turtlenecks, and watch caps.

Gurung clicked his tongue against the side of his mouth to catch my attention. He pointed up and about ten yards farther down the ledge. A small red spot glowed above the edge of the cliff. As I started, I gradually made out the silhouette of a man with an AKM rifle, a fur hat, and the long gray belted coat of Soviet winter field dress.