Originally posted on November 10, 2012.

In a remote corner of West Africa, the River Gambia remains one of the last major undammed rivers on the continent. Flowing from a small rivulet in the Guinean highlands, known as the Fouta Djallon, the river runs northwest and west for 733 miles to its mouth at the Atlantic Ocean—a six-mile-wide estuary of mangroves, sand bars, and braided streams.

In what may be the first source-to-sea descent of the river, Jason Florio, a New York-based photographer, and his wife, Helen Jones-Florio, have set out to witness and document the river in its entirety. With folding canoes and Pelican cases full of hardware, the two will spend the next three months on the river.

“I’m not an explorer or adventurer,” says Florio. “I’m really a photographer at heart. So this is kind of new territory for me.”

Rife with hippos, poachers, crocodiles, and a thousand unseen hazards, descending the River Gambia will be no walk in the park. Florio, who is far more comfortable shooting a camera than a rifle, does not seek out the dangerous side of life. Nor does he intentionally visit hostile environments—though he’s been shot at by a sniper in Somalia and trekked through warzones in Afghanistan. He knows this expedition will be long and difficult in many ways, but the hope is that this will be a trip without violent confrontation, armed rebel groups, or warring militias. To the Florios, it’s a river trip through a wild slice of Africa.

The first challenge will be finding the source of the river. To do that, they’re mostly relying on a book by Frenchman Gaspard Mollien, one of the earliest Europeans to explore West Africa in the nineteenth century. In 1820, Mollien published a book called Journey into the African Interior in which he documents finding the source of the River Gambia. That book, and a handful of maps from the Royal Geographical Society, where Florio is a fellow, is all he and his wife have to go on.

At the river’s source in the Fouta Djallon, the river is too narrow and shallow to float. The Florios will trek 150 to 200 kilometers downstream to their stashed canoes in Senegal where the river widens and deepens. From there, they’ll descend through scattered gold mining developments and fishing villages to Niokolo-Koba National Park, where the poachers are reputably as dangerous as the hippos.

“There’s a lot of poaching in the park,” he says, “but as long we don’t bother the poachers, we think they’ll leave us alone. That’s what we’re hoping, anyway.”

About half the river is considered navigable. With the folding boats, which the two tested between pubs on canals in rural England, they hope to be on the water a lot more than half the time. The two will rely heavily on prearranged guides, mostly local fisherman, to coordinate border crossings, necessary permits, and resupply points along the way.

The Florios have timed their expedition to coincide with the end of the rainy season when the flows will be high enough to paddle most of the river but the regular, monsoonal drenchings will have ended. As the river dries out, it becomes less friendly to paddlers.

“If the water gets too low,” Florio says, “the rocks will be bad and the hippos will congregate.”

As the saying goes, behind the mosquito, the hippopotamus is the most dangerous animal in Africa.  In fact, hippos are responsible for killing more people than any other animal on the continent. Some people have told Florio that the hippos won’t be a problem—that people deal with them everyday without incident. Others have warned him that the animals can be aggressively territorial and to give any they encounter a wide berth.

“They reckon there are four to six thousand hippos on the river,” he says. “If the hippo situation becomes problematic, then we get out and portage. We might have to get out of the river at night.”

While descending the river at the end of the wet season seems like a good idea, the logistics of an expedition this size are sure to be fluid. The first change of plans was a three-week delay of the ship carrying their gear to Gambia. Their tentative launch date is now November 11.

The Florios are intent on travelling light. They’ll be eating a lot of local food, like fish from the river and millet bought at villages along the way. They’ve also packed Clif Bars, energy snacks, and several bundles of Ramen noodles (at $0.18 per pack, a super-cheap form of nourishment).

They’re paddling folding canoes made by Norway-based Ally Canoes. They’ll provide live tracking through a Yellowbrick tracking device. They’ll boil water for their Ramen noodles with stoves from Kelly Kettles. They’ll also be carrying an array of DPx Gear knives for both their own use and as gifts for the locals.

The hardware, though the heaviest part of their load, is arguably the most important. The cameras, solar chargers and laptop computers will allow the two to document the river and the people who rely on it for their livelihood. As they hunt for the river’s source, trek downstream, paddle their folding boats, and negotiate hundreds of miles of riverine wilderness, the Florios will maintain a blog of their journey, while also posting updates on their Facebook page.

But in the end, the expedition is about creating a document of the people and the river. Although it’s one of the last major undammed rivers in Africa, that could, and most likely will, change.

The Gambia, the country nicely bisected by the lower third of the river, is the smallest country in mainland Africa, with a population of 1.7 million. The river is the lifeline of the country and the livelihood of nearly all that live on its banks. But development is scarce. Bumpy negotiations between Gambia and Senegal have stood in the way most major projects.

Talk of damming the River Gambia has gone on for the last decade. In many ways, a dam is inevitable. And when the waterway is changed, the effects on the people who depend on it will be irrevocable.

Florio first traveled to the River Gambia in 1996 to document an ecotourism project. He returned in 2009 to produce “A Short Walk in the Gambian Bush—930 km African Odyssey,” which won first place at The International Photography Awards of 2010. During the 2009 expedition, Florio and his wife circumnavigated Gambia, the country, travelling up one bank and down the other.

“That trip felt like a warm-up for something bigger,” Florio says. “Now we want to meet the people, see if they know about the damming, see how it will affect them.”

The Florios expect to reach the river’s mouth sometime early next year. But the expedition could take longer than that—either due to logistical complications or interesting places to spend time. They don’t intend to hurry through this cultural and environmental cross section of West Africa. But they have little idea of what lies in store for them.

“This is one of the biggest things we’ve tackled in terms of logistics,” Florio says. “There are a lot of question marks. But at the end of the day, I think you just have to get there and let the pieces fall into place.”

As the Florios make their way to river’s headwaters and begin their downstream journey, we’ll be keeping tabs on their progress. Check back here for the latest dispatches.

All images copyright Jason Florio.

The post Down The Gambia Part One appeared first on Dangerous Magazine.

Photographs courtesy Tim Freccia

Delivering anything to South Sudan is not easy. Especially not five truckloads of military equipment that has to cover the breadth of equatorial Africa to get there. Even if the end user is the United Nations.

But that’s exactly what a Nairobi-based expatriate from New Hampshire and his crew of five drivers are doing: running a convoy containing 14 pieces of over-sized heavy equipment 5,500 kilometers from Johannesburg, South Africa to Juba, South Sudan for the UN. They’re calling it the Joburg to Juba Juggernaut, and the payload is 90 tons of equipment, delivered at the end of January to the tune of about $135,000.

The list of deliverables is two Samil 20 personnel carriers with field-office bodies; one Nissan CW45 10-ton water tanker; one International Eagle tractor with lowbed trailer; one Caterpillar D7H armored bulldozer; two 2,500-liter off-road diesel fuel trailers; three 1,000-liter off-road diesel fuel trailers; and four 1,000-liter off-road water trailers.

Cox

Spearheading the project is Ian Cox, who now runs a “specialty vehicles and procurement” company called Lorry Boys. Cox sells a lot of Toyota Land Cruisers and heavy equipment throughout Central and East Africa to clients such as Doctors Without Borders, the landmine-mitigation company Mine Tech International, and, of course, the UN. To him, the Joburg to Juba Juggernaut is just another job, albeit a challenging one.

“Paperwork in Africa in general is a nightmare, regardless of the type of equipment,” he says. “But anything with armor adds another level of scrutiny and paperwork, such as End User Certificates.”

The delivery will cost about $15,000 in fuel, probably as much in repairs, and take the crew along the shores of Lake Victoria, through lawless areas of several countries, and over enough dirt road to . And anything involving the South Sudan, the world’s youngest nation, is assuredly a nightmare.

“Hit some livestock in South Sudan, pay $5,000 [USD]. Hit a human, maybe pay with your life,” he says. “The first 180-kilometer paved road was just installed, and they don’t know how to judge car speed yet. People are getting whacked all the time.”

Thankfully, a photojournalist will be along for the ride with Cox and his drivers to document the mayhem, tribulations, and inevitable breakdowns along the way. Tim Freccia, whose work has appeared in The New York Times, the BBC, and Al Jazeera, has worked all over the world covering conflict and disaster. Like the others on board, he’s well-suited to working in Africa—he wants to open a bar in Mogadishu in the near future.

“Ian’s in it for the job. I’m in it for the TV,” Freccia says. “I got tip my hat to him though, he’s kept it rolling right through the holidays.”

The convoy has yet to make it out of South Africa, and the trucks only started rolling last week, but the few short video clips on the Joburg to Juba Facebook page hint at a wildly entertaining sketch. That’s partly due to the two American drivers, one of whom currently lives in Africa and the other who once lived there but is now very much a product of the American Southeast.

Sines

Raymond Allen Sines looks like a Southern trucker. Greasy ball cap, sleeveless flannel shirt, stained canvas pants with an oily rag flagging out the back pocket. Sines was flown in from the Sunny South to drive the cab-over International Eagle tractor, currently with “major brake issues.”

The crew refers to the Eagle as the Biohazard Buffalo because of the grimy condition of the cab. The mattress in the sleeper is the color of dishwater. But Sines is unfazed.

“I drink the water straight out of the rivers of Appalachia,” he says in a video on the Joburg to Juba Facebook page. “I ain’t got sick from that. I won’t get sick from this mattress, I bet.”

Jared Andrew, who now lives in Kenya, is the other American driver. He’s a fitting

Cat D7 Dozer

counterpart to Sines and Cox. (The other three drivers are Africans.)

“I went to visit [Jared] and his family in Tanzania once,” Cox says. “We made some primitive guns in the morning and went shooting crows in the afternoon.”

The convoy will travel from South Africa, through Zimbabwe, Zambia, Tanzania, and Uganda to South Sudan. Cox will be riding a Kawasaki KLR650-C motorcycle and expects to deliver the equipment to the UN sometime about the end of January, barring major setbacks.

The holiday season notwithstanding, paperwork and personnel complications have already caused delays. That’s to be expected, since it’s Africa we’re talking about. Which also means the trucks are shoddy, the roads are rough, and the natives are apt to be restless.

But Cox is in the business of making such deliveries. At the front of each trailer is a stack of spare tires. The cabs of the trucks are packed with tools. And Cox’s network of contacts will likely be as handy as both the tools and the spares. If there’s a man for the job, it’s Cox.

“It’s basically a group of redneck intellectuals,” says Freccia. “Most of what I do isn’t all that fun, but this will be fun.”

All images courtesy Tim Freccia, © Tim Freccia 2012

The post The Joburg to Juba Juggernaut appeared first on Dangerous Magazine.

I ask Doug, the Father of the White Monkey, why he calls his operation “Free Burma Rangers.” Like many of Doug’s decisions, it is intuitive and simple. “I made up the name when I climbed Mt. McKinley, and I had to write down a name. Kind of like the Texas Rangers or the Army Rangers.”  He started in 1997 with one local media team and now trains five-man teams from volunteers. They are trained in security, communications, media, medical skills and morale.  But Doug makes the point that this is being done by the Karen, not him. Koala Bear, a small, hard-as-rock 37-year-old Karen commander, is in charge of training.

Doug has the unnerving habit of interrupting our interview with a prayer. “Robert, what kind of Christian are you?  I need some prayer.” I don’t know what to say after seeing the godless wastelands of insurgency and terror in 36 wars. Without an answer, he prays for my success and the Karen. Then just as quickly pops back into interview mode. The Free Burma Rangers now have 15 different teams, and do two-month missions to document and help Karen that are attacked by the Burmese army. Volunteers spend four years inside FBR and then move on to military, support or political arms of the KNU. Currently he has 11 different ethnic groups at the camp, and even one Muslim. Doug estimates FBR burns through about $1 million a year, mostly donated from church groups. “We have 55 teams out there, but we are treading water. Help, hope and love is how they survive. We do our best to send out information, to help the people, stay with the people.” Looking to define it better, he then adds, “I cannot run away.”

Although Doug is a devout Christian, who grew up in Thailand and whose parents are Baptist missionaries,  he insists that no one is trying to change anyone’s religion here—though there is a distinct sense of religious zeal and devotion in the camps by both instructors and students. “We have been here seven years, have four other training sites and eight teams operating from the Indian side. Since I was five years old, I wanted to be a soldier and then missionary.” His dad was a missionary when Thailand was still rural and undeveloped. Dave was sent to a boarding school at age seven. “That’s when I gave my life to Jesus.  I got dengue. I was crying under my pillow. I was alone and sick I asked Jesus to help. And I felt this warm love come over me.” Growing up in Thailand shaped him. He used to hunt, fish, hike and ride horses while his missionary father dug wells and built schools.  This beautiful mountain landscape with raw rivers and pristine hills is also his home. He owns 150 acres and wants it to be a national park. He bought it for $1,500 after the owner’s elephant trampled the rice crop when he was a way.

Doug’s history is both religious and military. He joined the Army, then wanted more of a challenge so he went to Ranger school. Because of his Thai language skills, he then became Special Forces. “In 1992 at my ten-year point I could have gone CAG (Delta Force) or Defense Attaché but got married. I met a lady and she left me. We were both immature, selfish people.”  Doug’s life seems to be a constant battle between success and failure.

We talk about the conflict of religion and military life. He tells me a story. “Robert, when I was 27 years old and I was a Ranger, we were preparing to overthrow the dictator in Surinam. My job was to take out a group of Cubans at Paramaribo Airport. Bad dudes. To get to them we were going to have to run a mile and a half with full gear and then call in coordinates for an air strike. I was supposed to give them a minute to surrender before calling it in.  But good old Ranger Lieutenant Eubanks was going to run in and just let them have it. The operation never happened but later my commander, General Mayer heard this and said, “You were going to give them one minute weren’t you.” Doug was surprised that Eubanks had no problem killing dozens of people without hesitation. He said, “You may be in the army but you serve a higher force. I thanked Mayer. That’s when I learned that I serve something higher.”

The higher force, despite the military structure, has kept FBR funded by humanitarians, church groups and individuals.  One day, instead of the normal PT that keeps them lean, they are practicing singing songs, throwing Frisbees and making each other laugh—a task to cheer up demoralized and abused villagers. Their weapons are whatever the students can beg, borrow, buy or scrounge. I saw less than a dozen very old M1s and AR 15s in the camp.
The other odd part of Doug’s life is that his wife, his two young daughters and son live with him. “We want to be together as a family. The locals asked us to bring our family. It shows them that here it is safe. There are no locks on the door here. The Karen break a candy bar and break it into five pieces. We have two days warning if the Burmese are on the move.”  He is proud that his son Peter did a 30-mile movement at age four. I ask him about the new attack helicopters. He says he doesn’t think it will be a problem and then says, “Yeah, we should probably think about digging bunkers.”

He said he was first mobilized to do something when he met the leader of the democratic party. “I met Aung Sang Syu Khi in the States in 1996. Even though she is a Buddhist, I gave her a bible and asked if I could pray for her. She said we need the prayers of people. I said I would be obedient until death. Just like the Lord says. Be obedient till death… So I am obedient until death.”

Doug has to balance life between being a mercenary, missionary and humanitarian. He makes it clear that no one here is making money, removing the mercenary stigma. He admits that there are plenty of foreigners behind enemy lines and the main sponsors do their best to coordinate. But he defends the need for military people in this war.  “When the fighting starts, the missionaries all leave, the NGOs are next…but where are the Livingstone’s? We stay with the people under attack and will not leave them. We have no program of arming teams. We also prohibit offensive action. There is always room for people’s interpretation. It’s not a clear black and white.”  Then he finishes by saying, “I love this God who speaks through the voice of God.”

“I don’t know what we are going to do next,” he says. “All I know is that I have 13 years of doing this. I have been in five close firefights… I like to fight, but God has never told us to do that.  We have lost eight guys, half by sickness and half by combat.” The best perspective is the most banal, “Really the biggest danger is blisters, whacking your head or malaria.”

Doug and the FBR teams are the best single source of intelligence coming out of Burma.  Thanks to his teams, the tactics of the Burmese Army are well documented and distributed via his website. “The SPDC mortars the village, chase them away, shoot and loot, then burn it and leave. The idea is to drive them into camps in Thailand or surrender. They kill the rest.”  He has books of photos of murdered, raped and abused villagers. Once singular event that haunts him is a seven-year-old girl, raped, shot at point blank range
and left on the trail for the Rangers to find her.

I ask Doug where God was on that day.  He immediately asks. “Can I pray, Robert?” His eyes clench, he lowers his head and he prays out loud for the “strength and guidance to carry on”. He looks up at me “When you experience something like that, you want to kill them all, eat their bodies and then eat their shit and piss so there is no trace of them…. But the four of us [the FBR leaders] voted on it and said, no… we will be with the people and defend them.”

Doug wants me to understand we’re in an active war zone. “Burma is divided into 10% free fire or black zones, 20% brown or army controlled and 60% peaceful. We are in a black zone.  We can recon the army within two hours. But you saw from those trails, that they don’t come here. The Burmese army doesn’t want to burn villages and murder villagers, but they are forced to.  We intercept radio communications where a the major said if you want to be promoted you will burn the village if you don’t you will stay on the river.”

Part of fighting back is not only documenting the methodical human rights violations but also staying alive to do it. He views his position as a mouse between two elephants. “In 1997, the two governments of Myanmar and Thailand had meetings. The Burmese said these Special Forces guys were causing problems. Within an hour of the Burmese leader landing, the Thaïs arrested us. Thankfully, we were released. This Thai General said I fought for your release but God got you out.  I believe in God. I don’t go for a hike and throw away my compass but God guides me.   So we have a working relationship. They say don’t mention your name and never show your face in a publication and cover up all the white people who enter.” For some reason they don’t care about Christian publications. One group in the government supports his work because he keeps the Karen refugees inside Burma, the other group wants to shut him down and a third group doesn’t care either way.  Today FBR is 250 people. I push him on what he really wants. He says “300 rifles?”  He smiles. Doug realizes he must walk that line again. “We have zero secrets. No secret spook stuff, but if the CIA wanted to help us we would take it.

Later that day, one of the American military trainers is concerned that the story is about the “ethnics” and not “the white faces.”  He was trained as a Marine Sniper and his wife is a midwife. “She was trained to bring people into this world and I was trained to take them out.” But I ask him why he is here. “There are only so many conflicts that are this right. We are only here to support them.”

At dinner, we talk again.  Doug is still trying to get to the core of his motivation and his
constant internal battle. “Injustice is someone who holds you down who is stronger. I am only 150 pounds, but how many times have I been unjust?”

Dave constantly asks me to focus on the Karen and not on the gullawa. But it is clear that the outside support is one of the reasons why the Karen have held out so long. Villagers, dirty, tired and smelling of smoke and urine, sit patiently for the FBR medics to take care of them. It is up the western doctors to operate on a small boy, draining the pus out of his knee. The two doctors set up a makeshift operating area across from my mat and cut in without anesthetic.

Doug’s opinion of the foreigners is that unless they stay, fight and actually are there throughout the combat operations with the Karen they trained, they are just here on vacation. He also thinks that the Rambo-like mentality of many of volunteers, like the Americans who were detonating large explosive charges right on the border simply makes it more difficult.
“The history of outside involvement probably began with Captain Hang, who was a veteran of the French-Indochina war.  He was a legionnaire, Vietnamese and rose in France. He not only trained but he went and did the operations. Very tight. When I see some of Bo Jo’s men operating on the river, I can see Hang trained them.

“A couple of more Legionnaires came in the French marines. They did well. By the fall of Mannerplaw in 1995, the easy access was gone. There were very few foreigners in here after that. Lots of fighting, travel was dangerous, nobody knew who to talk to. Before July of 2003 they were just across the river at Mai Salit under the cliffs, but the Thais told them to move or they would have to arrest them. You could come in a wheelchair. Wouldn’t even get your feet wet.” He points to the sheer green walls around us. “Now you have to walk.”

After a couple of weeks come and go, the pain from the walk has vanished. I am losing weight, eager to run up hills. I bathe every day in a jungle stream, eat rice and deer meat, go to bed at 8 p.m. and get into the rhythms of the jungle. The young men and women of the FBR have become friends and invite me to take part in their activities. It is clear that for someone looking for a cause, this place is like Mecca.

Before we leave the students surprise Rob and I. They hoist us above their heads, cover us in ash and dirt and then throw us in the river. Then they carefully wash us off, smiling and laughing at this simple ritual of acceptance. I suppose it’s a baptism of sorts. There are long speeches from both sides, crudely printed diplomas and earnest thank-yous, and then it is off to the green vertical hell for two days of walking back to civilization. But this time, it’s enjoyable and I’m a little wistful.

Nerdah Mya is probably the most famous Karen commander. Before I interviewed General Bo Jo and the other generals, they had not been interviewed by Western reporters for five years.  Nerdah, by contrast, posted a YouTube interview a few weeks before our arrival. He can be seen and read about in dozens of publications or documentaries. I am intrigued and want to meet the most famous Karen rebel commander—the magnet for much of the controversy. Rob says back at his restaurant,  “If Nerdah has any foreigners there, he will trot them out like it was the Westminster Dog show.”  After a few phone calls we are directed to drive south and meet with “Gary.”

Gary meets us at 4:45 a.m. outside of his hotel. He is short, heavy eye browed, bullet headed and speaks in a broad Australian twang. We quickly learn he has an obsessive love of providing painfully accurate directions even to the gas station. I figure Gary for a security contractor on leave from Iraq.

We meet a film crew that is also going in. A disheveled Frenchman appears out of a van and keeps asking us who we are. A former French marine turned fixer and photojournalist, he is there to make sure the BBC get in and out without a hitch.  In our conversations with Nerdah’s people we had arranged to go in, and we’d been told there might be an ABC or BBC crew along as well. “Nerdah thinks everyone is the BBC,” quips Rob. It turns out it actually is the BBC crew here to cover a historic event.

Unlike our death march to visit the FBR, Nerdah’s soldiers simply drive down a rutted road between huge limestone spires, and suddenly we are in Burma. At the checkpoint a thin fair-haired, middle-aged westerner in military garb stares intently at us.  We are in a hurry not because there is fighting but because there is a peace ceremony between the DKBA and KNU.  We arrive just as two lines of armed Karen fighters shake and hug.

The
rest of the sweltering day is filled with droning speeches, except for a speech by an elderly monk, Rambo. The constant waves of laughter help him work the crowd like a Karen Rodney Dangerfield. Rambo is famous for showing a few Karen rebels how to hitch a ride: They stood beside a road trying unsuccessfully to flag down a driver when Rambo borrowed their gun fired a few shots at passing cars until one stopped. He then handed the gun back, and said, “That’s how you stop a car.”

Nerdah makes a speech first in Karen and then in English for the benefit of the BBC. On the tail end of election coverage he has brokered the Buddhist Karen troops switching sides from the Myanmar government to join with the Christian Karen. They shake hands again for the benefit of the BBC crew and the few unshaven stringers.  “Today is the reunification of the country,” he says. “The Burmese will respect our freedom.”

Troops from both sides wear garlands of flowers and on command hug and shake hands. A Buddhist monk blesses then and a priest officiates. Children sing as speeches are made. Colonel Nerdah greets us and welcomes us. A new DKBA flag flies next to the tattered KNLA flag above Krep Po Ta village.

As Nerdah poses for pictures, he greets me in very slightly accented American English. “We must psyop them. After the election we must take the initiative.   The Burmese army is waging psychological warfare against us so we need to show that we are together.  Aung Sung Syu Kyi cannot do it by herself. We need to forgive and forget. We show love and forgiveness.”

That night back at the camp we have dinner. What made this candle light conversation unnerving was not the thump, thump, thump of distant mortars or even the mix of legless veterans and childlike soldiers that huddled around us, it was the constant smile and politeness of our host.   This is ground zero for much of the interest by foreigners fighting inside Burma.

Nerdah was the mentor to Thomas Bleming and many other Western volunteers turned mercenaries.  The reason becomes abundantly clear. Nerdah despite his high rank is one of us. A favored son of the Karen’s most famous commander who spent years in the US.

Nerdah went to school in the Napa valley area of California and even has a pilot’s license. He too has dreams of an air force, more volunteers, basically anything to push back the relentless murder and pressure of the Burmese Generals. But his ideas are likely to remain dreams. He shows me his village—once burned and now rebuilt by Populi—and urges me to come back anytime. The BBC is done and is on the phone looking for “abused refugees” from the recent fighting to complete their story. They finally have to film them backlit. Its time for Rob and I to leave the war zone and return to “civilization” a short drive back.

When we are done with Nerdah he appears in civilian clothes and is eager to get home to his three daughters and wife. Military commander has become urban commuter.

We are back at Rob’s restaurant in the small bucolic town.  As the customers move inside from the rain, Rob and I have gin and tonics over a spectacular pad Thai. Rob is careful on how he lays out the way things work and the people that flow through here.

The towns along the border are full of NGO workers with ponytails and earrings. Very few go “inside.” Fewer take up arms.  One man who did is Oregonian, Robert Erhausen. It’s opening night at his new pizza place on the river. He has a couple of tables. He stops making pies long enough to sit and talk. When I point out the sparse attendance he says, “It’s Ok. This place will make money. It’s a soft opening.”
Erhausen is the grandfather of the foreign clique. And runs the Displaced Persons Action Committee, supports the Safe Haven Orphanage, and now trains and supports seven de-mining teams who work with wands to clear mines. He doesn’t look 63 years old, but he joined the US Marine Corps at age17 and fought in Vietnam, working with the Nung tribesmen in the Central Highlands.

“I first came here off and on 14 years ago,” he says. Like many of the foreign volunteers, he came through Nerdah and eventually decided to stay. Rob was once connected to Baptist groups and ended up commanding a division of Karin soldiers. “I took over Ben Shipley’s old regiment. Ben was never in the military. He was doing drugs and went nuts. Started firing an AK and was shipped when the 7^th brigade was overrun.”

Erhausen clashes with Doug because he now works with the government-backed Buddhist DKBW as well as the Christian KNLA.  Erhausen’s take is that Doug is good on tactics but he’s not good on strategy. He applies that criticism to the KNLA. “It’s a business for the Generals. On both sides. They even give back weapons when they take ground from the government,” he says. He eventually ended up training General Bo Jo’s Special Forces but he senses that this war will not end well.“ I went to a meeting with the Generals and said, ‘It looks like you are losing a lot of real estate. What happens when you lose?’ They said, ‘we will pray.’” He shakes his head.  “They are like the North American Indians at the end of the West. They’ll just take up the Ghost Dance . The Karen Generals are waiting for the second coming.”

He is getting less idealistic and more pragmatic. Even the pizza parlor is a better way to fund his activities. “If it weren’t for us they would have no medicine or food inside. I have fed up to 10,000 people.” Erhausen is interrupted by the waitress—there are more pizzas up.

I ask him about the foreigners. “A lot of people go home after a couple of years because they get disgusted.” He thinks back, trying to help yet another reporter with a story on mercenaries. “There were the Germans who paid to shoot people.” He offers but then thinks, “But it’s not something worth talking about.”

A briefing document shows that the end may be sooner than the second coming. The
Burmese Generals have been eager students of how Sri Lanka successfully ended its 26-year-old war. They simply kept the media out and crushed the Tamils with overwhelming force. The Burmese now have built three-dozen new military bases, ploughed new roads and purchased 62 assault helicopters in preparation for what may be the final battle. The election was simply one item on a checklist to show that the “free and democratic” nation of Myanmar was simply eliminating a troubling insurgency. A campaign of infiltration, assassination, assault and assimilation is expected to begin this year. At that point, the war will be over. The foreigners have lit up the war in Burma, but one by one they flicker and then go out.

Waking back from Erhuasen’s, Rob seems to have forgiven Tookie, his girlfriend.  When we returned from the jungle he was furious that a giant karaoke machine had appeared in his restaurant and that none of his hired help could find cigarettes.

It is the festival of loy krathong, and it occurs on the night of the full moon. Thais launch their krathongs to carry their dreams and to float away their sorrows. Others release khom fai, paper kites, lifted into the sky by a burning wick.   The luminescent balloons float ill fortune away.  Rob and Tookie light a flickering balloon and wait for it to rise. It gently sways and then lifts. It climbs until it is just a speck, then catches fire, and flares brightly. Then it is gone.

The post Inside Burma’s Dirty War, Part II appeared first on Dangerous Magazine.

Death Valley is the largest National Park in the United States.  It’s also the hottest (average temperature: 77 degrees Fahrenheit), the driest (average precipitation: about two inches), and the lowest (282 feet below sea level). It’s an austere desert landscape not suitable for most plants or animals, humans included.

To some, the harshness of the environment presents a challenge. For a lot of those people, the only way to tackle the valley is on two feet, one step at a time. As far as that goes, Chase Norton plans to do what’s never been done: run the entire length of the valley alone and unsupported.

On February 14, the Hawaii-based Norton will begin his run at the north end of Death Valley National Park. Over ten days he’ll camp at a variety of primitive sites, cabins, and established campsites. He’ll run through sand dunes, over salt flats, and across alpine snow fields at 11,000 feet. He’ll carry everything he needs and he plans on running nearly the entire 228 miles.

Though no one has ever run from one end of the park to the other, there have been and are similar undertakings. Most notably, there’s the annual 135-mile Badwater Ultramarathon that runs from Death Valley to Mount Whitney. The race calls itself “the most demanding and extreme running race offered anywhere on the planet.”

The fastest racers finish the Badwater Ultra in about 24 hours, and there’s a 48-hour time limit on all racers. Norton’s run will take ten days and cover 228 miles. The biggest difference between what Norton is doing and the Badwater: Norton will be carrying on his back everything he needs for those ten days.

“I like to push myself solo,” he says. “High mileage over difficult terrain. When it comes to misery, I welcome it.”

His pack will be heaviest on the first day, loaded with ten days’ worth of food, two days’ of water and weighing about 32 pounds. Of the nine nights spent on the trail, two will be without water. And it’s no secret that finding water in Death Valley is no easy task.

“Too bad the early settlers didn’t have Google Earth,” Norton says. “The nice thing about Death Valley is that there are all these hidden places where you can find water.”

Norton is no stranger to grueling runs. He’s run marathons, and last April made a grueling 8-day, solo ridge-line trek in the coastal mountains of Hawaii. But one thing that makes him particularly suited to running through the firebox of the Mojave Desert is his experimentation with water usage.

“I hate Camelbaks,” he says. “You can’t tell how much water you’ve drank and you can’t tell how much you have left.”

©Olivier Renck

Norton has devoted a lot of attention to water usage. Basically, that means he’s pushed himself to the brink of dehydration to assess his personal water requirement. Which has turned out to be three liters per day. When the body’s performing at a high level, that’s not much water. In Death Valley, gambling with water usage is dangerous territory.

But to Norton, not much of his run is a gamble. He’s never been to the area, much less run with a pack for more that a week there, but he’s planned as much of the project as possible. Really, the only unknown is the ascent to the summit of Ubehebe Crater on Day 3. A thorough investigation of the topographic maps, however, leads Norton to believe his way is the best. He’ll know for sure about the time he gets there.

The hardest day of the run will be likely be the climb from the bottom of the valley at 282 feet below sea level to the summit of Telescope Peak at 11,049 feet. That night will also be the coldest, though he’ll be sleeping in an old cabin (that he hopes is still there) used by high-country travelers for decades.

The overriding focus of Norton’s gear selection is minimizing weight wherever possible. He’s cut the labels and all unnecessary straps and pockets of his Berghaus backpack. His spork is made of ultralight titanium. His stove, the Trail Designs Gram Cracker is basically a small cube of solid fuel in a foil wrapper. It weighs less than his spork. His shelter by Zpacks is a fly made of the ultralight material Cuben Fiber and weighs less than five ounces.

For food, Norton will be eating a lot of spam, which is unusually popular in Hawaii.

“I wouldn’t touch the stuff when I first got here,” he says. “But now I could almost be sponsored by Hormel. I stick with Spam Classic. It’s high in calories, high in fat, and low weight.”

Norton has scheduled a 50-mile day to end the run on the tenth day. He’s never run 50 miles in a day, but as the last leg of an epic run, he’ll likely have it in his tank to finish out strong.

“If you can see a light at the end of the tunnel, you can will yourself to do incredible things,” he says.

Norton also has a Kickstarter project, called Death Valley: Chase’s Way, to create a film of the run. To do this, he teamed up photographer Olivier Renck.

Above image copyright Olivier Renck

The post Running Death Valley appeared first on Dangerous Magazine.

Kawthoolie – The distant sound of steady mortar fire didn’t seem to bother Lt Col Nerdah. Nerdah is the 41-year-old commander of the 6^th Brigade and the son of the late Karen supreme commander Bo Mya. The commander had changed out of his dress uniform and was now relaxing by candlelight wearing a black t-shirt and beret. Nerdah had just concluded a busy day of peace celebrations between the DKBA (the Myanmar government-backed Buddhist faction of the Karen) and the rebel Christian faction. But the day wasn’t over yet.  “There are about 100 government soldiers making their way toward us. I will send my men to attack them and mine the way. It will not happen quickly.” Turning our attention to the dinner of rice and tinned sardines it seemed just like yet another day in the 60-year-old war between the Burmese government and the Karen rebels.

The Karen have been fighting their war of independence ever since the British gave national sovereignty to the Burmese after World War II.  Like many other ethnic groups pitted against a brutal regime, the Karen view the Burmese as historic interlopers and brutal oppressors.  The outside world sees the conflict as an endless internal war generating countless deaths and hundreds of thousands of displaced people. And while there are signs of progress — President re-elct Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are slated to visit the country this month, which will be the first visit by an American President in more than 50 years — a recent report by the International Crisis Group reaffirms that Burma has long been on the brink of internal collapse and that, in reality, little has changed.

Today, the Burmese government and the generals control the central delta area while the ethnic groups surround them. The country is divided into black zones where free fire is allowed, brown zones where rebels are under control, and white areas where there is no fighting. My trip is to the black zone just east of the capital city, Yangon. The steep, remote area is made dangerously beautiful by limestone cliffs, lush valleys, dense jungle and unspoiled rivers, like the Salween.

It is here in the unrecognized nation of Kawthoolie (no one can quite agree on the source of the name) that the Karen rebels appear to be making their last stand against the ethnic cleansing, slow strangulation and constant attrition imposed by the Burmese generals and their 300,000-man conscript army.

I came to Burma during the elections. The first ones held in two decades.   The rebels and minorities assumed the Generals would win and would use that win to launch a decisive offensive against the Karen. The United Nations and much of the Western world considered the elections rife with fraud. Not surprisingly, the State Peace and Development Council won handily. As a symbol of the party’s confidence, it released former democratic leader Aung Sun Syu Shi from house arrest. Although the event was noted around the world as a positive sign, it did nothing to help the millions of ethnic groups still fighting the government. If anything, her arrest rekindled the flame of resistance — releasing an elderly woman to a defunct party seemed to show that her cause was extinct. Some ethnic military groups, like Nerdah’s, moved against Burmese government forces after the election. The current result was the fighting that was coming our way.

To the outside world, it may have seemed that the war between the ethnic groups and the Burmese had grown stagnant — it was, after all, the longest running civil war in the world. Even the Lonely Planet guidebook and agreed that it was safe to visit Myanmar. Sylvester Stallone filmed the fourth installment of his Rambo franchise along the Salween River and raised some awareness of the area. But with higher-profile wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, it seemed the rebels were doomed to obscurity.

I first became interested in Burma when I heard that a friend of mine, who I encouraged to go to Burma in the first place, was hanging out with the rebels. But even more interesting to me was the long-standing relationship between mercenaries and the Karen rebels. In he 1980s I had heard about the frontlines of Burma at Soldier of Fortune conventions in Las Vegas. Eager doctors, loud braggarts and quiet vets talked about war there, and the wink-wink part was that if you wanted to wield a gun, camera or scalpel, adventure awaited you in Burma. Many viewed the fight as a holy war where the Buddhist-but-rather-odd gaggle of Generals were intent on wiping out Christian hill tribes.

The Generals seized power in 1962, creating the country’s longest running military dictatorship.  In reality, though, the war between the Karen and Burmese had gone on for centuries. The Karen have long since been an agrarian hill people who have viewed the Burmese as aggressive interlopers.  Though this interloping may date to the 9^th century, it continues to this day as the Burmese slowly, methodically and brutally eliminate, integrate and intimidate the Karen and other ethnic groups into submission.

The most likely explanation for why the generals haven’t totally wiped out the Karen is the people’s inherent skills as classic jungle guerrilla fighters with a history that goes back to supporting the British against the Japanese, which led to the inability of the Burmese rulers to provide ethnic representation inside what is now Myanmar.   It is clear from watching the non-government controlled areas shrink over time that the Karen are losing.

There is another reason war continues. War is a business in Burma. War keeps the Generals in power and the rebels fighting. The Generals of the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), formerly known as the SLORC (State Law and Order Restoration Council), generate one 100 percent of the their foreign direct investment for natural resources (minerals, oil, teak). The international monetary fund estimates that the Generals have $5 billion in foreign currency reserves , and that they’re ‘working’ the disparity between the official exchange rate for natural gas at 6 kyat for every U.S dollar externally, but internally providing 1,000 kyat for every dollar — keeping the 994 kyat and dropping only kyat in the national bank. That neat trick earns Myanmar the label as the third most corrupt nation, according to Transparency International (only Afghanistan and Somalia are considered worse).  There is also plenty of money for Russian fighter jets (20) and helicopters (50), Chinese light attack helos (50) and troops (300,000), and an embryonic nuclear program. The grim statistics firmly place Myanmar at the bottom end of the world’s list of countries.

The Karen National Union (KNU) and its military arm, The Karen National Liberation Army, have been fighting this war for 60 years, since the first post-colonial battle on January 31, 1949. The Karen, however, have not been not without the suspicion that the Karen leadership have also turned the war into a business that supports an aging Karen infrastructure. More war, more funds; no war, no funds. KNU leaders collect the donations and supplies and do not pass them down to the troops (who fight for free) or the villagers. The Generals keep a tight lid on coverage of circumstances in Burma, and the rebels, by virtue of their isolation, get little to no coverage of their fight.

It’s hard, perhaps intentionally impossible, to estimate the size of the Karen army.  A rough guess is 8,000 soldiers and 2,000 militia groups with varying qualities of weapons and supplies. The free fire area in the south, where I’m headed, is divided into seven Brigades, each commanded by a different personality. The goal of the Karen is to force a federal system, but their motto of  “no surrender” reflects a lifetime of distrust of an enemy who continues a scorched-earth policy, combined with a “four cuts” policy that continues to shrink territory, gain control, and integrate Karen through division. There was clearly only one way to find out

Rob Swain

Rob, 39, is a friend from California and former toiler in the LED-lit trenches of the Hollywood special effects factories. He is animated, multidimensional, attention-deficit-disordered and, for once, at peace with his new life as a volunteer and local restaurant owner. We sit above the river overlooking a postcard scene of tropical beauty — a place used by Hollywood to film movies like Air America for its similarity to Vietnam in the 60’s. As he shows off his girlfriend’s ta tim deep fried fish specialty, he looks for a way to sum up his life and reasons for being here.

“I put digital pants on dead VC in Apocalypse Now Redux.” His air quotes create a humorous epitaph. He continues,  “I was Charlese Theron’s driver… Her mom was hot… I was a cocaine dealer, a bouncer at a lesbian bar, former skate punk, worked a halibut boat out of Cook inlet, an editor on the Gotti show. I even edited Intervention. He pauses in that ADD style. “We cut out the parts where the guy was smoking crack out of a broken light bulb while another guy was blowing him.

“I was sitting in a cubicle working stupid hours… making $100,000 and spending $100,000. Getting fat, frustrated and heading toward 40.”  He flips out another Marlboro Light from a pack adorned with a gruesome photo of a cancerous liver.

“I was poor, not white-trash poor but Southern California poor. Spent my life in shitty apartment complexes.  My Dad was a rocket scientist. My mother was a hippie who divorced my father when I was five.” The waitress pours another LEO beer and drops ice in our glasses. “During my teens, I was a fatty, a stoner and kind of a lush. My mother took me to visit Uncle Carol, a former marine sniper. He would beat me when I visited him at his ranch. He would say, ‘You’re kind of a pussy kid.’ He was a cut-off-the-ears type of guy. He would bring me down to the bar, order a Miller Lite and tell me Vietnam sniper stories like: ‘The CIA paid me to shoot this VC colonel. I had to shoot through this hooker.’”

Rob shakes his head.  “When he bought his ranch that was my Auschwitz. I had to kill gophers, dig holes… crazy stuff. He was just one of a series of fucked-up mentors.” Rob takes another drag and stubs out the cigarette. “But, hey… I love the crazy people and the crazy people love me.”

He’s well prepared for the trip into Burma. He’s done it 17 times now and has a cupboard full of gear. Hydrating salts, foot care, HEST knife, Becker patrol pack, short machete, local bug juice (“You’re done having kids right?”), and one wet outift, one dry, a pair of US-made jungle boots… and the look.

“Yeah I’m a little vain out there,” he says. “I’m rocking a Khmer headband, aviator glasses and a fedora on top. Straight out of a Michael Jackson video.  Burma is a funny place. Kids have names like Hitler cause they dig the imagery.”

Rob has been here a year and slowly been accepted into the expat community of NGO’s and freelance foreign military advisers. The difference is that the military folks who come over for two weeks or so don’t fit in. They go directly from the airport into safe houses. Every square inch of white skin has to be covered up. It bothers Rob that a lot of them seem to be on holiday, drinking loudly and showing gory pictures at local bar. “The Thais are cool with the humanitarian stuff as long as it’s on the down low. But some of these military guys are just genetically programmed.  I guess they way they carry themselves, haircuts, clothing.” This nameless town is just one of the gateways for mercenaries, missionaries and do-gooders who come to help the rebels.

But it is another foreigner in particular, an American, who most drew me here to Burma. He is perhaps the most influential and effective Westerner working behind enemy lines to help the rebels. He has acquired an almost legendary reputation. In these parts he is know simply as The Father of the White Monkey.

Getting inside is simple. Look at any map of South East Asia and you can cross almost anywhere along Burma’s hundreds of miles of unguarded border.  I chose to sneak in with Rob, who has spent some time with the major players. To get there requires hours of driving mountainous mud roads to get to a major river, where you’re then hidden under a dirty tarp and ferried to any number of Karen refugee camps along the border. In an odd love-hate relationship between Thailand and Burma, both sides agree to pretend that if each sees nothing, there is nothing to report or even to crack down on. But if you mess up and get flagged, you could be responsible for shutting down the life supply for thousands of desperate refugees.

The refugee camps aren’t the grim, tent-like affairs that smell of human waste and suffering. Karen IDP camps are clean, orderly with self-appointed management, security, logistics, bamboo houses and spotless latrines. People smile and wave and food, blankets and mosquito nets appear without prompting. This is one of the Karin’s main problems. They are stubbornly cheerful and resourceful, even in the worst of times. It may be this collective power of optimism, selfless charity, and lure of lost causes that binds outsiders to them.

We’re inside. We sleep in a classroom used to teach young Karen medics. We have been trying for days to contact Thai Boon, the head of “Ranger 49,” on the sat phone. Thai Boon is the man that can send us inside to meet the Generals and the foreign fighters. That night when we go to Nanji’s store for our nightly can of warm Chang beer, we find him cross-legged on the split bamboo floor. My first thought is that he looks and talks exactly like Jackie Chan.

He invites us to sit down. He hasn’t bothered to turn on his sat phone in who knows how long. “Where did I go to school? Harvard!” He laughs. “No, I have a grade 4.” He laughs louder.  Thai Boon,47, is the son of a KNU bigwig. He runs Ranger 49, named after the year the war started, though he doesn’t really have soldiers nor is he a Ranger. But he runs the foreigners in and coordinates training.

“He’s like the Hollywood agent of Kayin State.  He schmoozes all the foreigners,” Rob explains. “He used to run a $30,000-a-year officers training school. It shut down last year when it ran out of money.”

Thai Boon has been called here to meet with the Generals. Heads of the 5^th, 3^rd, and 6^th brigades are here. Although Karen state is separated into 7 “brigades,” the 4^th fell in the rebels’ June 2009 offensive, and the 7^th fell soon after.

Boon hears my pitch of wanting to go inside and says, “You will go to 3^rd brigade!” While the villagers watch Mr. Bean and a Dennis Rodman movie, Boon lays out a map on the polished bamboo floor of the store and holds it down with Burmese cheroots. “Here is 3^rd brigade. Here is Dawa.” He slides cheroots to mark the spots. He chuckles with glee “Ooooh, it’s another planet! The rest of the world goes forward in time, we go back 250 years. You will see!”

In the dim light he gets serious and looks up at us. “You can go. But don’t give up… Never give up. If you give up, a lot of problems. It’s an 18-kilometer hike at night. Very bad.” He jabs his palm upward to make is point. “Very steep!” He makes clawing motions.  “First night you walk by night. Rest of time you walk by day.  Then four more days during the daytime. You just carry water. Porters will carry your packs! OK?”

Rob and I are not gaunt tri-athletes. I am 6-4 and 240 pounds, and the last time I took a serious walk in the jungle was at gunpoint after being kidnapped in Colombia in 2002. Rob and I look at each other.  How could we say no?

“Dawa” is the home of the legendary Free Burma Rangers, or FBR as they are called. To some, the FBR is an “up the river” paramilitary force run by a deeply Christian, former Special Forces Major who goes by the name The Father of the White Monkey. Others will tell you that the FBR’s secretive leader is the most effective foreigner working with the rebels deep inside Burma against the Generals.  Thai Boon waves his hands. “Crazy Amish Christian relief people. It’s hard to tell where they begin and where FBR begin.”  Boon and Rob are reticent about the “gullawa,” or white people, who are currently inside Burma.  ”The normal tour is a two-week vacation or leave. I don’t really get into to what they do. Some of it is above my pay grade. I have heard stories,” says Boon.

The next morning we have visitors. Two thin Italians from Lake Garda who rebuild villages inside Burma for an NGOcalled Populi, and a young American who is clearly ex-military. They have walked three days from the interior to reach here.  The American says he is “security.” It’s hard to imagine what one unarmed person could provide in the way of securit

y, but he says he is along to determine enemy troop positions and navigate the humanitarians safely in and out.  The Italians were going to travel further until they found out that a three-day hike takes five days. They turned around seven hours short of Dawa. Rob and I remember to factor this in. The Karen estimate travel time for themselves—not for heavy, lumbering gullawas.  We decide that if we make it to Dawa, it will be an accomplishment.

Although the American is at first standoffish around his Italian clients, when they leave he becomes chatty. David Gray, 27, is a former Marine Force Recon soldier with who tells me that most of his military records were redacted when he started doing spooky stuff in Colombia starting in 1998. “I read an article in Soldier of Fortune about fighting in Burma. I kept that article on what to take inside, and had it posted on the inside of my locker for years.”

Gray first connected to Burma through Karen expat, Robert Zan.  Zan was a former commander in the Karen army who now lives in Minnesota and raises money for Karen in the US. Gray’s next step was to get in touch with Thomas Bleming, a Vietnam vet in his 60s who wrote a book about his brief time in Burma and what appears to be his conversion from self-described PTSD effected Vietnam Vet to journalist to mercenary.

“In my Google searches,” Gray says, “I would come across Thomas Bleming mouthing off. So I made contact with him.  He spent the next three months trying to sell me his book. His book is basically a road map on how to get in. He invited me to meet him here.

“Tom had made a couple of previous trips. He also went to Honduras to see if he could get involved in that.  Now he is trying to get something going along the border in Mexico. He tells people he has been in 25 conflict zones and hasn’t yet figured out how to make money.  Tom even appointed himself as consul general.” Gray sums it up: “The Karen are easy on people who are a little bit crazy.”

Gray also sees himself transitioning from marine to trainer to mercenary. “I was in the military from 1995 to September 19, 2001. I have been shot twice, stabbed seven times with an ice pick and had 8 inches of my intestine removed.  Toward the end of my time, I spent nine months in the brig.  I went from private to sergeant to private.” He provides a quick but convincing recap of his time working with counter-drug, CIA and other groups in Latin America and Africa. “I worked as a shooting instructor at Front Sight near Pahrump, Nevada.”

He first came to the region in 2007 on an “O” English teaching visa. Now he has an anti-piracy business. “My new piracy thing is only a couple of months old, but I know where to get everything.”  He says his company STORM or Strategic Tactical Reconnaissance Maritime, was inspired by a TV show called Shadow Warriors. “I used to have a website but I couldn’t afford to keep it up.” But he did find that a lot of people were interested and has had over 3000 business inquiries. “Out of those, 11 were potential candidates. Out of those, four actually came, and three have made multiple tours. I did have a couple of 16-year-olds pretend to be 18 years old.”

Gray also thinks there will be business from the US government. “DEA wants info, the US wants info, but they won’t leave the embassy. Even when they want to meet, they don’t want to go more than one subway stop from the embassy.” Although Gray is enthusiastic, it seems the US invests accordingly. “The DEA is eager to fund with Toughbooks, sat phones and BGANS. They have to check with higher ups. They might give me 2000 baht a month [about $65 USD].”

“They are worried about drugs, nukes, China and North Korea. There are a lot of Burmese who would sell that info. Manifests, large equipment on RoRo’s.” His stillborn maritime attempt seems to have attracted some interest.  “I have a bunch of people coming from Afghanistan. Couple of British guys, mostly contractors who have money. All I have is contacts and experience. I don’t have any money.”

Gray sees a bigger geopolitical importance to the region. “China is setting up in Burma big time. Rich people in America want to disrupt shipping along the coast for the Chinese. We could set it up for $500,000.”
The ideas keep flowing as we chat inside the bamboo clinic. “I am thinking of doing anti-piracy along the coast. Charge fees for the ships that come in that steal the fish. The Burmese have no presence along the coast. I know I need two fast boats.” He finds humor in the idea. “We could charge them a fee for fishing in Karen waters.”

Gray’s newest idea seems the most far-fetched and most lethal.  “I want to use an ultra light. Fly it out of a small strip… Ultra lights can carry 250 pounds…You can arm them. I put an M16 on an ultra light with a scope and night vision. You shoot from 6000 feet… the bullet goes straight down… We tested in out in the desert near Fresno. We laid out a bunch of soccer balls, something the size of a human head… Start at 16,000 feet and glide in. It takes about three shots during the day.  At night it takes longer, six to seven shots with night vision.

“You can buy them for 16,000 bucks. It seats two side-by-side, or pilot and load.” David is full of ideas. “I can get Glocks for 45,000 baht ($1,500 USD). I can get M1s for 25,000 baht ($830)  all day long. I can get all the ammo I want. But I am broke. I am about as broke as they come.”  His clients call. Time to cross the river.

Late at night, Rob and I are sitting on a rough-hewn bamboo bench listening to the sounds of the jungle at night. The creek burbles, people inside their huts are singing and the usual group is watching a Mr. Bean DVD on the battery powered TV for the umpteenth time and laughing at the exact same spots every time its played.   The stars burn through, and we stare up. Rob talks about death.  “I had thyroid cancer. They took it out. Had a Cambodian kid in Seattle die in my arms after he was shot in a drive-by.  Found a dead homeless guy that was stabbed.  Those things seem to gravitate to me.” A satellite tracks across the sky as we sit in the cool of the dark. “My girlfriend shot herself. When I was 22. We broke up. She went out and bought a Remington 303. She called my friend, ‘Is Rob there?’ And then shot herself. I had to go pack and clean up her place. I found pieces of skull and brain in my clothes. I kept going in a downward spiral. Like a tuna before you gaffe it.” He doesn’t have a funny ending. He pauses. “Eighteen months I was working in a cubicle. Now I am here.” A shooting star interrupts him.

“Look at those people.” He nods to the Karen watching TV. “There is a soldier, sitting next to a baby. Look at the women. They are smiling”.  He pauses again but there is no shooting star that burns and disappears.  “I am happy here.“

The next morning we are on. Thai Boon has set up a meeting with the generals. We travel to the “commando training camp” before dawn, and the first thing we hear is the raucous sound of two distinctly Americans voices bellowing, “Fucking… fucker… Fucking …dipshit. Fucking… goddamn… fucking… asshole…”

As we hike up from the river there are two geriatric silver-haired men drinking their morning coffee discussing old times and acquaintances with a liberal dose of profanity.  They are here to train General Bo Jo’s Special Forces.  They are both Vietnam-era Special Forces vets, one with time in Germany and Cambodia and now training contractors in the US.

A few yards away a fire is cooking two pots and what looks like a very large vine. On closer inspection, it’s a freshly killed python. The Karen eagerly drag the 8-foot snake across the coals to cook their morning delicacy.   While the two Americans continue their good spirited but foul-mouthed conversation, I talk to 48-year-old General Bo Jo, the commander of the 5^th Brigade—the most active and largest of the KNLA army.  The 5^th Brigade has about 1,300 men under arms, and is up against about 3,000 Burmese troops.

General Bo Jo’s grandfather worked with the legendary “Grandfather Long Legs” and spent time in prison with him. He began as a Sergeant in 1982 and has been a General since 1997. Like many senior Karen, he has a link to America. His wife is in Indiana working on her PhD. He is not optimistic for the future. He sees the struggle lasting another five to 15 years. He personally visits each village that is burned, and he asks me if I have any idea for a better freedom for his people.

As the interview wraps up the General says to me, “Don’t forget about us.”
After the interview Bo Jo puts on his uniform for photos. He wants to just sit and talk with us. Behind us the python is being served up, two small dogs fight and the cook puts on a large pot of boiling water. Mama noodles, bamboo shoots, fried potatoes, sardines and rice. All washed down with Birdie premixed coffee. By now the two silver-haired Americans begin teaching their classes. Down by the river they have built a small model of a Burmese Army Base. With the aid of an interpreter one of them is teaching the Karen how to attack: “The snipers need to take out the towers, while the rest of the forces fires mortars” The other hobbles off into the jungle with the aid of a cane to start the class on self-defense. A British instructor is working on training the Karen in the use of a shortwave radio.

A lot of gear is donated to the Karen effort, and it gear ranges from erasable markers to motorcycle batteries to soldering and wiring kits.  Communications equipment is their most important need. A quick inspection of the Karen Special Forces soldiers is not encouraging. Their weapons are battered Vietnam-era Colt AR-15s, some still stamped “Property of the U.S. Government.” Some carry bolt-action rifles and Garands that date back to Korea and World War II. They have rubberized jungle packs and most wear sandals or flip-flops. A few have jungle boots. Some commanders wear tactical leave-behinds by foreign advisors, like Casio watches, binoculars and the most popular gift: telescopic rifle scopes. Before we leave, General Bo Jo asks to have his picture taken with me and to get an autograph. “You are our advisor now”.

After almost a week of waiting, it’s time for our march into the heart of the conflict. We take a boat upriver for an hour. Hidden under a stifling black tarp is a doctor, a former electrician and now pastor of a church in Southern California, the wife of a former SF soldier, the wife of a volunteer, , another doctor, a former missionary pilot and head of partners, and a silent American who turns out to be a property tax accountant on vacation with the pastor. We are dumped off on the riverbank as the last light of day disappears. Inside the jungle, it is even darker. We switch on our headlamps for the long walk ahead.

It’s easy to both embellish and understate the amount of pain and effort it takes to hump a heavy pack up and down guerilla mountain jungle trails. The best way to describe is to say that one very physically fit and young man would attempt this walk and fail. The doctor along with us has also tried and failed this hike. The distance is only about 20 miles, but the terrain is chosen specifically to deter Burmese army troops.  On painkillers and only ten feet at a time, we accomplished the hike. Large holes in the bush were reminders of where sure-footed pack mules slipped off the muddy trails and crashed down the side of the mountain.

On the tail end of the second day we hiked down from a mountain, sun baked, thirsty and in pain and ended up in Dawa.  There to meet us was the Father of the White Monkey.  We’ll call him Doug. Doug was a former Ranger, Special Forces Major and always a devout Christian. He immediately greeted our small group by praying and then loading up our packs for the hike deep in the forest. After a bamboo-raft river crossing, a steep hike up and down, we arrived in a narrow valley. Camp Taw Wah, one of a number of training camps used by the Free Burma Rangers to mentor and graduate five-man teams that spread out across Burma.

This camp is in a deep, green valley with a spectacular, boulder-strewn river at the bottom. There are a dozen huts—woven grass roofs, pole supports and made from peeled bamboo. During the day, purple and black butterflies flit in and out, cicadas chorus. The ground is river silt with the tops of giant boulders poking out and bamboo sprays. It’s the start of the dry season. At night the frogs call to each other like ducks, the stars explode and the cold air rushes down.  Nights are chilly as the moon slides over the narrow valley with only the sound of people talking softly.

At 5:30 in the dark morning, the sounds of PT enliven the camp. Doug leads the exercises in singsong Karen. Before breakfast the recruits chant an English statement for freedom before digging in to massive bowls of rice.

The camp is small and the small bamboo huts holds about 100 young men and women. There are three Americans, two of them ex-military, one a computer expert.  There is also Doug’s family of three young children and his wife. The two Americans, volunteer military trainers, are joined by their wives who were along for the hike. The gullawas eat at a headmaster’s table elevated above the recruits’ area. Anyone who has been to a military or boarding school would recognize the concept immediately.

Doug is up before dawn reading his bible or books and has run up the mountain and back before six o’clock. The Father of The White Monkey is a dynamo of energy and optimism: tapping out emails on his ToughBook, talking on his solar-powered sat phone system, meeting with recruits, writing update emails or making lists on the many white boards. He is a hyperactive perpetual-motion machine. But he often stops mid thought or sentence to ask people to help him pray. It’s hard at first to understand why a well-trained military commander would stop and seek guidance and support. The concept took me back to my days with al Qaeda and other jihadi groups. Like the Chechen rebels, also trained in the military, who simply said, “Our faith in God is simple. There is no one else to help us”

Doug has no one to help him other than the few medical and military volunteers who risk the steep trails and hard living, the young Karen, who put in 4 months of training, and his religion. Deep behind enemy lines—his only supply chain by foot or mule—he has managed to carve out a well-oiled training camp, high tech communications center and beacon of hope for the Karen. Doug is thin, small shouldered and wiry but his accomplishments are immense. The students beam under pressure and constantly say; “Rangers never give up.”

Part II next week…

The post Inside Burma’s Dirty War, Part I appeared first on Dangerous Magazine.

I met up with the West Coast Survival School in November last year outside Wrightwood, California. The nearby ski area was open, and a light snow had fallen the day and night before I arrived. The three-day school was being held on the east slope of the San Gabriel Mountains, in a dry valley of oaks, firs and pines.

Reza and Reuben

The two instructors, Reuben Bolieu and Reza Allah-Bakhshi, had just opened their West Coast school as a branch of the Alabama-based Randall’s Adventure and Training (RAT).  Both are young, energetic instructors who willingly share what they’ve learned over the years from bushcraft experts.

In a lot of ways, Reuben and Reza are a refreshing pair. Their open-minded approach to wilderness problem solving encourages out-of-the-box thinking and innovative ways to apply survival skills. They teach you the skills you need to know, and they let you decide how to best apply them in a given situation.

“We show you what to do, and then make you do it,” Reuben says. “That way, the first time you do it isn’t when you actually need it.”

Reuben, 36, who writes regularly for SWAT and Tactical Knives magazines, first became acquainted with Randall’s Adventure and Training in 2007 on a survival course in Peru led by owner Jeff Randall. Since then Reuben’s been on half a dozen jungle trips with RAT, traveled around the world learning local bushcraft techniques, and instructed classes here in the US. He first met Reza in 2011, and “we knew he was the right guy to start up the West Coast class with me,” Reuben says.

Reza, 28, is an avid student of survival. Much of his training is within the same school as Reuben’s, and because they’ve been subject to the same teaching, they work well together. And what makes their schools so valuable, are the expert teachers they’ve had—people like Jeff Randall and Mike Perrin.

In the class I attended, four of us had braved the snows to spend two nights camped with minimal gear in a cold valley. A low ceiling of clouds hung a gloomy mist in the forest, and fog drifted in and out all weekend.

By far the highlight of the trip was the squirrel dinner. When Reuben and Reza arrived at the campsite the day prior, they found a hawk eating a squirrel. They flushed the hawk off its dinner and retrieved the squirrel. All but the squirrel’s front left leg was uneaten; the carcass was generally intact.

Everybody was interested in how were going to cook the squirrel. After gutting the small varmint, Reza skinned the squirrel by holding the body with one hand and firmly gripping the skin in the other hand. He ripped the skin from the body—just like peeling a banana.

We boiled the meat for about 15 minutes before roasting it on sticks over the fire. With a little salt, the meat tasted just like chicken. Everybody was pleasantly surprised how delectable the squirrel was, and how good the dinner tasted in the cold night.

Like most bushcraft schools, a lot of time is spent on knife work. Using a variety of blade shapes and sizes, Reuben and Reza go through the basics of how to use a knife—the four different ways to hold a knife, how to make fuzz sticks, how to baton a knife, split kindling, and lop off a branch.

“It takes a lot of feel,” Reza says. “Not a lot of strength.”

After the class demonstrates an understanding of how to use the knife and proficiency with it, pairs of two people build a shelter of pine boughs and branches. Mistakes are made, the shelters look lousy, and some can’t even be entered. But after adjustments and advice, the lean-tos start to look better. Pretty soon, all are worthy of a night’s sleep.

Reuben and Reza demonstrate how to make a figure-4 trap, how to tie half a dozen basic knots, and how to find north using the sun’s traveling shadow. Every body goes through the motions. Everybody builds a fire using a ferrous rod, and everybody has to find dry tinder in a forest that was under an inch of snow last night.

Of the five people in the class, all had come from the smog of urban centers to spend a few days in the woods breathing clean air, getting their hands dirty, and learning how to survive if they get lost, injured, or otherwise in a bad situation. Which wouldn’t be that hard to imagine, given the generally low level of wilderness experience the students had. And that’s exactly the reason they’re out there with Reuben and Reza: to learn.

Since I attended the West Coast Survival School, Reuben and Reza have held similar schools in the same area and continue to grow their branch of wilderness instruction. Next year, they’re planning on a Southeast Asia survival class in May held in the Philippines. They’re also hosting a women’s-only class in June. Check the website for dates, availability and pricing.

The post Survival School in Snowy California appeared first on Dangerous Magazine.

In March 2008, National Geographic published his photo of an Afghan National Army solider crouched in front of a wall in the snow. For having no formal training as a photojournalist, that was a homerun for Ridgeway. But he wasn’t an Army photographer; he was a scout with the 3-71 Cavalry of the 10^th Mountain Division.

“When we showed up in country, the rule was: no cameras outside the wire,” he says. “And then we lost four soldiers in a helicopter crash, and I took a photo of the memorial service. That photo went viral. Then nobody cared where my camera went and everybody wanted copies of the pictures.”

Ridgeway carried his digital Canon Rebel on his vest in a pouch designed for night-vision goggles. Which, for the most part, kept it safe, dust-free, and handy. Anytime an image presented itself, his camera, like his rifle, was at the ready.

Soldiering in Afghanistan was a target-rich environment for a photographer. Finding compelling images was easy. Managing and downloading those images was not easy.

Less than a gigabyte of memory on his camera’s SD card meant triage-type judgment of which images to save and which to delete, and storing the keepers in less-than-desirable, low-resolution format. A dearth of generators confined him to hooking up his laptop to power converters connected to Humvees once every two weeks. It was a pain in the ass, he says, but it worked.

The Canon Rebel is not a combat-spec camera. Although it “was a real tank,” warzone duty at a mountaintop observation post proved too much for it. More than a few trips to the mortar pit, the hurricane winds of dozens of helicopter landings, and that was the end of the Canon.

“Four months before our deployment ended, my Canon crapped out,” he says. “I borrowed two more from other people, and broke them, too.”

Like most US troops in Afghanistan, Ridgeway’s unit was ambushed countless times. But near the end of his tour, the 3-71 Cavalry was caught in a three-way ambush in Nuristan Province that nearly cost the lives of many in the unit.

“I saw two women in light blue burkas fleeing across the road with children running behind them,” he says. “I knew something was up, and, sure as day, the front of my truck exploded.”

Ridgeway’s unit pushed through the explosions and the shooting. They suffered causalities, but no one was killed. And while images of the wounded are grim, the soldiers and their families will forever have tangible evidence of the sacrifices made for their country.

Ridgeway’s images have gleaned emotion even from those not in combat with him. National Geographic, in addition to publishing his photos in the magazine and on the website, produced a three-minute documentary of his story that was nominated for an Emmy award.

Today, Ridgeway is working toward a degree in business administration from the University of California, Santa Cruz. His photos have appeared in California newspapers, and a career in photojournalism is in his sights. But compared to what he saw in the mountains of Afghanistan, life in California can be a shade domestic.

“I’m tired of taking pictures of restaurant food and of squirrels on water skis,” he says. “I need another subject. Something worth shooting.”

To see more of his photos, visit his website, jeremiahridgeway.com.

The post The Photography of a Soldier at War appeared first on Dangerous Magazine.

A swarm of nano quadrotors has a menacing presence. The video embedded below is from the University of Pennsylvania’s General Robotics, Automation, Sensing and Perception Laboratory.

The flying robots are the work of professor Vijay Kumar and two graduate students. Kumar gave a lecture at this year’s Technology, Entertainment, and Design Conference in Long Beach, California, about how the robots work.

“This gets a little challenging,” he says in the lecture, “because the dynamics of the robot are quite complicated. In fact, they live in a 12-dimensional space.”

The quadrotors in the video have preprogrammed flight paths. Motion sensors in the lab’s ceiling guide the robots, which calculate flight commands 600 times per second. To a degree, they’re autonomous: There is no pilot. The robots determine themselves how best to get from point A to point B while coordinating their motion with their neighbors’ motion.

Kumar and his students have shown that the robots can fly through hula-hoops, build small structures, and even play music. Their payload may be light, but they’re potential uses are many. For starters, the menacing-looking swarm could probably find good work off the coast of Somalia or in the Persian Gulf.

But for such missions, the UAVs will need to be weaned from their controlled, indoor environment. Though these quadrotors rely on the overhead sensors for guidance, there are some that do not.

The Aeryon Scout unmanned aerial vehicle may have the most impressive resume of any quadrotor out there. It weighs 2.5 pounds, is 80 centimeters across, and has a payload of 400 grams. It has maximum flight time of 25 minutes, a maximum altitude of 500 meters, and is controlled by a PC tablet.

“For anyone who’s ever used Google Maps,” says Ian McDonald, vice president of product and marketing for Aeryon, “using the Scout is very intuitive. You really don’t even fly it—it flies itself. You just tell it where to go. It’s point-and-click flight.”

The Scout’s payload is most often a high-resolution camera, a 10x optical zoom video camera, and a thermal FLIR infrared camera. The Scout can stream live video to nearly any device and is capable of over-the-hill surveillance up to 3 kilometers away. Its ability to endure 80 kilometer-per-hour wind gusts is unrivaled.

Aeryon released the Scout in 2007, and in 2008 the first buyers were military customers. Almost immediately, the tactical value of the qauadrotor became clear.

In 2009, reconnaissance by a Scout helped local law enforcement in Central America arrest a drug lord. From about 850 meters outside the compound that held the drug lord, security forces launched the quadrotor to survey the area. After all, if nobody’s home, there’s no sense in raiding the place.

“They were looking for confirmation that [the drug lord] was there,” McDonald says. “They were looking at what vehicles were there, how the compound was secured, how high the walls were, and where there was barbed wire.”

The Scout flew for 12 minutes at an altitude of 39 meters. It shot 14 photos and six minutes of video. After it returned to its point of take off, authorities moved on the compound and arrested the target suspect.

This past summer, when Libyan rebels needed to know Gadhafi’s troop positions, they ordered a Scout. Zariba Security Corporation, in cooperation with the Libyan Transitional National Council, delivered a Scout to frontline troops making the push on Tripoli. Within minutes, the rebels had their Scout airborne and an overhead view of the battlefield.

At last year’s Defense and Security Equipment International exhibition in London, Aeryon flew the Scout during a mock anti-pirate operation and streamed live video from the quadrotor to a big-screen television inside the conference. Just weeks ago, a Scout surveyed sea-ice thickness to help a Russian fuel tanker trying to reach the port of Nome, Alaska. As you read this, a Scout is probably shooting video of sea lion colonies on the Aleutian Islands so biologists can better estimate the secluded, wary populations.

On March 4, 2012, a single-rotor UAV crashed into a SWAT vehicle during a police test and demonstration near Houston. No one was hurt, and the armored vehicle only suffered minor “blade strikes.” But the incident underscores one of the main concerns with drones: If they get away from their controller, where will they go next?

The Government Accountability Office is at the top of the list of those worried about a rogue drone with no guiding hand. And there’s no doubt that when the malfunctioning drone came out of the sky near Houston, it would have been no picnic to have the copter crash in your lap.

Most drones, including quadrotors, are programmed to return to their point of take off if they lose communication with their controlling tablet, run low on batteries, or otherwise malfunction. Precautions like these are aimed at satisfying the Federal Aviation Administration.

According to McDonald of Aeryon, the FAA enforces tighter regulations than does Transport Canada, the governing body of aviation in Canada. To him, that means there are more quadrotors used in Canada than in the US.

At some point, the question becomes, what advantage does using a quadrotor have over using a fixed-wing or single-rotor drone? Besides the ability to hover (consistent point-of-view reconnaissance) and take off and land vertically (every ship deck or flat piece of ground is a launch pad), quadrotors are significantly easier to fly than the aforementioned drones.

If Libyan rebels can successfully fly a Scout after only minutes of training, a stateside cop should be able to figure it out.

“Compared to helicopters, hands down these things have taken over the market,” says John Ohnemus, president of operations for Airfoil Aerial Systems. “People come back and tell us all the time that they picked up how to work this thing ten times faster than anything else they’ve used to get done what they want to do.”

Airfoil, based in Lorraine, Illinois, has had its flying drones in the public-service sector for months. Ohnemus and his staff surveyed the tornado damage in Joplin, Missouri, immediately after the storm.

The company uses H3 Hummers as launchpads for their drones. They drive up, snap the robot together, set it on the hood, and minutes later have high-resolution overhead images of the surrounding area. And lately, the most valuable images have been spherical photos.

Experts insist that spherical photos aren’t really panoramas. Instead, they say, spherical photos are 360-degree photo collages where the camera stays in one place and “you’re actually in the photo.” Over the flattened Joplin, Ohnemus’s drone took 12 photos in 4 seconds. Ohnemus then sent his images to the storm prediction branch of the National Weather Service.

Local and state Illinois law enforcement agencies have used Airfoil’s drones for a variety of missions. With the thermal-imaging capability, the drones have an obvious role in search and rescue scenarios. Overhead photos have also proven useful for reconstructing automobile accidents, evaluating structure fires, and even busting a methamphetamine lab. Airfoil’s biggest customers lately have been power companies wanting to survey transmission lines.

The Q700-Pro has a starting retail price of $3,900 ready to use out of the box. The drone is operated by a standard RC controller, and you can equip it with your own DSLR camera.

As far as sending a swarm of quadrotors to the Middle East, Rob Jenks and Dick Ahlborn of Intelesis Technologies are working hard to make it a possibility.

“Our ultimate goal, if given the opportunity by Uncle [Sam],” Jenks says, “is to come up with a mini mobile air wing, performing the same functions you would have of with an air wing off an aircraft carrier, just all miniature. If you did that, every deck becomes an aviation-capable deck.”

Jenks and Ahlborn have met several times with the company Advanced Tactics, which just secured a contract with the US Air Force for a large quadrotor that would serve as a battlefield MEDEVAC, to develop small UAVs with a variety of capabilities. Specifically, they want a quadrotor not only able to visually relay a picture of the battlefield, but one that could also be weaponised.

“We want to shape the battlefield by identifying who’s who, and prioritizing targets in sufficient time so that you know what’s going on,” Jenks says. Their quadrotors will be highly autonomous, he says, “electing their own leaders for formation, and arriving on location knowing exactly what to do.”

As far as weapons, Jenks and Ahlborn are pursuing a miniature kamikaze quadrotor that will most likely be tube launched and will use a cellular phone network to determine distance between aircraft and position. And they want to be able to send a fleet of them into a given scenario.

“Possibly thousands of them,” Jenks says. “The technology exists to fly a gazillion of the things.”

The drones could also carry a disco-ball laser designator to help identify and track targets. Whatever the final product, a flight of quadrotor drones could be used in the not-too-distant future to dissuade Somali pirates or sink Iranian skiffs.

“The military is intrigued by the idea of having numbers,” Jenks says. “And were exploring a bunch of different UAV combinations. Essentially, like in the Persian Gulf, every ship deck could be a lilly pad for refueling or whatever.”

The post Quadrotor Tactics appeared first on Dangerous Magazine.

By Robert Young Pelton

The first major lesson in surviving crime is to expect it. Not just in bad neighborhoods or late at night but anytime, anywhere. In the pinball-like confluence of criminals and victims the chances are good that you won’t run into criminals today, but with enough time and travel you will. In general, you can safely assume that there is crime in bad neighborhoods when the bars close on Friday nights, and there is also crime at nine in the morning in nice neighborhoods, specifically because that is when people don’t expect it to happen.

On the heels of expecting crime to happen follows the next advice. Don’t act like a victim. Criminals cue in on folks who carry themselves like they’re frightened of the world. Body language is everything. Darting eyes, head cast low, a meek posture and stride—all these suggest to some guy lurking in the shadows that you’re an easy mark. Instead, walk confidently and purposefully.

Be Vewy, Vewy Cawfool

Elmer had it right. Many crimes require a willing victim. Someone who stops to help someone, give directions, or tell the time is someone who entered into an evil appointment with all the best intentions. When they see a cheap pistol pointing at them, they can’t believe the nice man is, in fact, a thug. When it comes to attacks on women, almost 90 percent begin with some type of ruse to gain the victim’s trust.

Your Home

Despite spending thousands of dollars on security devices to make homes burglarproof, many people still open their doors when the bell rings. Go figure. A simple intercom is ideal in most cases, but it also provides access to impersonators who then rob your home. A coded access is ideal, since only people who have your code can dial in. Most homes are cased before they are robbed, so be suspicious of people who cruise by looking too intensely or too many times. And don’t leave your garage door open: You’re providing an inventory of goods for a lazy thief.

Put a block on windows and doors so they can’t slide open to allow access. Plant plenty of nasty bushes around your house. You can use lots of lighting, but if nobody’s watching it won’t help, so install motion detectors at the sides and back of your home.

When you sell something in a classified ad, arrange to meet the person at your office or next door. What better way to have something stolen than inviting a “buyer” into your home to show him how it works?

Your Car

Make sure you lock your car doors, keep everything inside hidden from sight, and have enough insurance. If a thief wants your car, he’ll get it. You can install an alarm, have a safety trip, use a steering wheel lock, and even in- stall a tracking device, but chances are he’ll know more about those devices than you do and how to disable them quickly, or he’ll resort to carjacking. (If you really want a surefire anti-theft system, install a homemade direct dis- connect system to the battery.)

Carjacking is popular due to the success of anti-theft devices. When I was driving through Johannesburg (the carjacking capital of the world) with the Flying Squad, they explained that there’s no reason for a thief to smash up a nice car, jimmy the ignition, and then scream down the street with the alarm wailing when he can invite you to hand him your car and convince you to throw in your wallet for some spending money too.

Carjacking is a very organized and predictable crime. Syndicates put in orders for certain cars, either for parts or resale. Typically, the most popular cars are not the flashy ones but models that have been top sellers for the last three to five years. They are in high demand for parts and repairs.

Once a carjacker has an order for a specific model, he will typically wait where traffic slows down to make a turn or at a stoplight. When the traffic light changes to green, he can make his getaway.

The most popular method is to bump the car to feign a minor traffic accident. Carjackers want you to get out and leave the keys in the ignition. They’ll also watch to see if you pocket them. After you rudely inquire where they learned how to drive, they will knock you down, grab the keys, and make off with your nice car. They will often carry a gun to intimidate you, and will use it if you take too long explaining that the car belongs to you and not them. If there is a baby in the backseat, don’t worry; they’ll toss it out when they’re clear of any chase cars.

How do you survive car crime? Take the bus. (Sorry, couldn’t help myself.)

Probably the most dangerous and cleverest crime combination is car- jacking plus home invasion. Thieves look for commuters with fancy gold watches and flashy cars heading for nice neighborhoods. They follow you right into your garage, rob you and your house, and drive off with their loot in your car.

Preventing a carjacking may appear to be paranoid behavior, but it can be rather effective. Drive with your windows up and your doors locked. Leave enough space in front of you to avoid being boxed in. As you roll to a stop at a traffic light, adjust the rearview mirror so that it covers your blind spots. Keep your eyes on blind spots on both sides of the vehicle. Stay in the lane closest to the center of the road.

If you think you’re being followed, make two to four right turns in succession. If the guy is still behind you, head for a police or fire station. If you are rear-ended or the person in front of you brakes suddenly, causing you to run into that vehicle, remain in the driver’s seat. If possible, signal with your hands to go to a nearby full-service gas station, or some busy store or parking lot, to exchange license and insurance information. If you need to speak with the other party, crack the window and explain where you want to go to file a report or exchange information. Choose a location with as many people as possible. Keep the engine running. Carjackers normally work in pairs or teams, but don’t assume that if the other car has a single occupant the situation is safe. Install a car phone; many can be programmed to dial 911 with a single button.

Other Danger Zones

ATMs: Thieves don’t like crowds and they don’t like crowded places. A good rule of thumb is to do your business in daylight hours, take out more money at once rather than less money more often—and do it when other people are around. Lots of people. That usually means Friday evenings or lunchtime during business days. The worst time is late at night, stumbling out of a bar to get more beer money. Often the crime occurs after you leave and get in your car. When you leave the ATM, check to see if you are being followed and lock your doors. If you lose your card, report it immediately and be skeptical of callers posing as bank managers or cops who want to verify your PIN. Never reveal your PIN to anyone.

Phone booths: Telephone booths are an ideal place to rob people. Bad guys love ’em, because you can’t run, there’s only a single entrance, and no one can hear you scream. Often, you’ve pulled out your wallet or purse to get your change, revealing precisely where you keep it. The deterrent is to use open, wall-attached public phone booths or busy phone banks in well-lit places. Popping in to a telephone booth to make a call is also an ideal way to have your car ripped off. Many people jump out of their cars to make a quick call, and leave their engine running.

Elevators: Elevators make an even better venue than telephone booths to get jacked up in if the thief is looking for uncompromised discretion and privacy. There’s no way out and, again, there’s no one to hear you shout for help. Most elevator thefts happen on the lower floors, where the thief has readier access to escape routes. A good way to avoid being pickpocketed in an elevator is simply to face others in the elevator with you, away from the door. Sociologically curious, perhaps, but effective.

City streets: The MO for many pickpockets is to distract and grab. Someone spills something on you and tries to brush it off. In some cases they of- fer to hold your purse while you wipe it off. Duh. Hey, do you have change for a twenty? If you do, I’ll figure out where your money is kept. Did you drop a fiver? Maybe you’ll pull out your wallet to check. Purse snatching is not even worth going into. You carry your valuables in a purse, you deserve to lose them. Same goes for gold Rolexes and nice jewelry.

Often beggars put on a half-assed entertainment show and then send kids to shove their grubby little hands into your pockets. While they are en- treating you to donate to the cause of the impoverished, the smart ones are lifting your possessions. Don’t bother chasing the laughing one, because he’s already passed it off to the cherubic but snot-nosed little girl. Oh, and if they hand you a baby, you’re probably being jacked up. As the kid runs off with your weekly pay packet, you’re wondering if babies bounce when they’re dropped. You quickly pat your money belt to make sure your cash is still there. That’s okay, chump, they expected that and Pops is waiting to lift it at knifepoint around the corner.

The post Come Back Alive: Crime appeared first on Dangerous Magazine.

Dave Barr holds two Guinness World Records, has two prosthetic legs, and has ridden a Harley-Davidson motorcycle across every continent on Earth, save Antarctica. His story is one of commitment, perseverance, and freedom.

In the face of grave odds, he has accomplished what few men would even try. His first feat was riding his motorcycle around the world, a journey of 83,000 miles that took three and a half years. He made the trip alone, without a support crew. His second was reaching the four extreme points of Australia on his motorcycle.

“It’s a story about commitment—total and absolute commitment,” he says. “And no one’s been stupid enough to try to best either of those records.”

Barr now works and travels as a motivational speaker, earning what he can by sharing his story with others. As an inspiration to the disabled and the able-bodied alike, Barr continues he exploits. For after so many years spent on the road and at the mercy of no one but himself, he knows no other life.

But before the far-flung motorcycle trips and transcontinental exploits, Barr was a soldier in the truest sense of the word: He dedicated his life to the freedom of others.

Barr was born in Los Angeles in 1952. He enlisted in the Marine Corps and served as door gunner and crew chief on a gunship during the Vietnam War. He was awarded 57 air medals for his service, including a single-mission decoration for valor. When Vietnam ended he returned home to a country that was unappreciative of his service.

“I watched the cowards that were running the country take victory and replace with a resounding defeat,” he says. “And like a lot of veterans, I was bitter as hell. I had to get out.”

He bought a one-way ticket to Europe and landed with $300 in his pocket. After traveling and working his way from country to country, he ended up in Israel with $20 to his name. Not being Jewish, he was an illegal immigrant. He took some serious risks, he says, and became a member of the Israeli Parachute Brigade.

Once again, he returned to the US and tried to make a stable life for himself. But he fell back into the rut that plagued so many veterans—unemployed and drinking too much booze. So he left, and took a job on a pumping rig in the Gulf of Sinai. From the rig derricks, he watched the sun rise over the Sinai Desert and set over Egypt.

But along came the Camp David Accords, and Barr felt it “was time to get the hell out of Dodge,” as he puts it. He went to South Africa and Rhodesia in September 1979 and became a militiaman in the Rhodesian Light Infantry. Barr eventually joined the 44 Parachute Brigade, Pathfinder Company of the South African Defense Force. Barr’s Pathfinder unit was under the command of the famous Scottish soldier Peter McAleese, whom Barr to this day maintains a very high respect for.

The Pathfinder unit was making counter-insurgency excursions into Angola, blowing up culverts and bridges and the like, and generally keeping the insurgents off balance and outside of South Africa. On one of the excursions, Barr’s life would change forever.

On August 29, 1981 at 3:30 in the afternoon, Barr was standing in the back of vehicle that rolled over a Russian TM-57 anti-tank mine. Six jerry cans of fuel were in the back of the truck with him, and he was blown into the air.

“I was totally conscious through the whole thing,” he says. “My colonel pulled me out the fire. I was burning…The indestructible colonel, his face was lacerated by a machine gun butt during the explosion.”

Eleven and a half hours after the incident, Barr was finally operated on. He was moved from hospital to hospital and eventually ended up at a hospital in Pretoria, South Africa where he spent the next nine and a half months. After 20 operations, four of which were amputations, Barr was released from the hospital and left to his own devices.

Barr continued to serve in South Africa for a short while longer before returning to his home in West Covina, California. That’s when he got his old motorcycle out of storage and took it for a ride.

“The first time I rode my motorcycle, I had vision of exactly where my life would go,” he says. “It became very clear to me why God had put that landmine where it was. He had another job for me: It was for me to ride my motorcycle around the world–it was just up to me to make it happen.”

In 1983, he took the motorcycle to South Africa and began to ride around the world. He started from the southernmost tip of South Africa, where the Indian and Pacific oceans meet, and rode north to the Arctic Circle. He then shipped the motorcycle back to the US and from Baltimore, Maryland, rode north Prudhoe Bay, Alaska.

From Prudhoe Bay, he turned his bike south and rode to the southernmost point in South America. His bike was then shipped to Hong Kong, and he rode into Mainland China.

“I was the first [person] to go in unescorted,” he says, “thanks to some very good contacts.”

He spent seven months in China and ended up making a documentary with the Chinese to benefit disabled children and to raise money for schools. The documentary aired twice to half a billion people.

He then left China and entered Mongolia where he crossed the Gobi Desert during the Month of Wind and Sand. From Mongolia he rode to Moscow and then north to Murmansk, where spent a night in the nuclear submarine base in Murmansk.

“That’s a highly restricted area,” he says. “It was very illegal for me to be there.”

A common theme throughout Barr’s travels is the goodwill of people he encountered along the way. Without a doubt, that’s a lot of what made his trips possible.

After reaching the Arctic Circle in Murmansk, Barr shipped the motorcycle home. He returned to the US and wrote his first book, called Riding the Edge. Subsequent media attention and speaking engagements, particularly one in Germany, lead Barr to set his sights on establishing a Guinness World Record.

From the European Atlantic coast he rode east across the continent to Vladivostok on the Pacific Coast. And due to the lack of roads and vast marsh and swampland, he made the traverse in winter.

“Well, I don’t get cold get feet,” he says, “and I camped out in a tent.”

Along the way he promoted his journey through the media, sending a message to the Russian people encouraging them to follow their dreams. From the Pacific Coast he turned the bike west and returned to Murmansk, thus establishing his first Guinness World Record and the first such record on a Harley-Davidson.

The award did not recognize his disability—having two prosthetic legs—in any way, it recognized the fact that he had crossed Europe and Asia in the winter. He says that such a feat may have been harder for someone without his disability.

In 2002, he set another Guinness World Record for his “Southern Cross Journey” where he attained the four extreme points of Australia on his motorcycle. The reason no had established such a record, or even attempted it, was very plain to him: the journey was extremely difficult.

“Only one of [the extreme points] is even remotely accessible by motor vehicle,” he says.

During the arduous Australian journey, he was in three accidents and suffered broken ribs, two crushed vertebrae, and two “crushed shoulders.” And while those injuries are noteworthy, Barr’s perseverance could hardly be dimmed by such trivial discomfort.

In 2000, Barr was inducted into the American Motorcyclist Association Motorcycle Hall of Fame. He continues to share his story and help others overcome setbacks and discouragements. He’s about to embark on 6,000-mile journey for the Patriot Express to help military families who have individuals suffering long-term medical treatments.

“By the grace of God, I made it,” he says, “and I did all this all on Harley Davidson motorcycles.”

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