Allies: The Rivers

By Wolf Riedel

Allies: Anaconda – A Novella

Allies: The Inquiry

Allies: The Trial

Allies: The Rivers

Allies: The Bay

Allies: The Gulf (Coming 2015)

Dawn Flight (Coming 2016)

— § —

Allies: The Rivers is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is coincidental.

Smashwords Edition

Text, cover, maps Copyright © 2014 by Wolf Riedel – All rights reserved.

Cover photo Copyright © 2010 by, and used under licence from, the Government of Canada – All rights reserved

Excerpt from Allies: The Bay Copyright © 2014 by Wolf Riedel – All rights reserved.

Excerpt from Dawn Flight Copyright © 2014 by Wolf Riedel – All rights reserved.

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— § —

For Andrew and Karyn

Contents

Also By Wolf Riedel

Map - Southern Afghanistan

Glossary

Prologue

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Epilogue

Authors Notes

Acknowledgements

About The Author

Extract Allies: The Bay

Extract Dawn Flight

Map – Southern Afghanistan

GLOSSARY

ACM – anti-coalition militia e.g. Taliban

ANA – Afghan National Army

AO – Area of Operations

APC – Armored Personnel Carrier

AQ – al-Qaeda – Islamist terrorist organization

CG – Commanding General

CJSOTF-A – Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force – Afghanistan

CO – Commanding Officer

Delta – 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment Delta

ETT – Embedded Training Team

FOB – Forward Operating Base

GMV – Ground Mobility Vehicle (SOF version of HMMWV)

HLZ – Helicopter Landing Zone

IED – Improvised Explosive Device

Intel – aka int - intelligence

ISAF – International Security Assistance Force

JAG – Judge Advocate General

JTF 2 – Joint Task Force 2

JSOC – Joint Special Operations Command

KAF – Kandahar Air Field

Kalay – Afghan term for village

Kandak – Afghan term for battalion

Klick – one kilometer

LAV or LAV III – Light Armored Vehicle (aka Stryker)

Masjid – mosque

NDHQ – National Defence Headquarters

ODA – Operational Detachment Alpha – 12 man Special Forces Team

ODB – Operational Detachment Bravo – Special Forces Company Headquarters

ODC – Operational Detachment Charlie – Special Forces Battalion Headquarters

PB – Patrol Base

PPCLI – Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry

RPG – Rocket Propelled Grenade

Ranger – member or element of U.S. Army 75th Ranger Regiment

SF – Special Forces – members and elements belonging to a SFG(A) – not to be confused with the term SOF – special operations forces which refers to the wider community to which the SF belongs and which includes elements such as Delta, SEALs, JTF 2 etc.

SFG(A) – Special Forces Group (Airborne) (aka Green Berets)

SOJ2 – Special Operations Joint Staff-2 (Intelligence)

TAC – Tactical command post

TOC – Tactical Operations Center

Taliban – armed Islamist militants (aka Tims, Timmies)

TF – Task Force - a military element or unit specifically configured for a given task

TIC – troops in contact

UAV – Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

USASOC – US Army Special Operations Command

USSOCOM – US Special Operations Command (aka SOCOM)

VCDS – Vice Chief of Defence Staff

WMIK – Weapons Mounted Installation Kit equipped Land Rover

— § —

THE RIVERS

AN ALLIES NOVEL

— § —

PROLOGUE

— § —

PB DAGGER, Sangin, Afghanistan

Monday 3 Apr 06 0322 hrs AFT

Black.

Nights in Afghanistan were always dark but right here and right now it was as black as Tom Price had ever seen it. The moon wasn’t scheduled to rise until a few hours after dawn and while the stars arced across the sky above him, they cast no discernible light on the land.

Disembodied sounds drifted randomly across the field: over there a squawk from a radio set’s speaker; over here a vehicle’s hydraulics cycling; and there the low voices of the medics working frantically on a casualty.

The site was relatively secure now; as secure as it could be in the circumstances. The Canadians had the perimeter locked down and the massive hulls of their four LAV IIIs provided a significant comfort factor. Occasionally there was a whine as a LAVs’ turret mechanisms traversed its 25mm chaingun to scan up and down the riverbeds and ridgelines with its thermal imagery gunsight.

Several kilometers behind them a pair of Canadian M777 howitzers was trained on defensive fire tasks to cut down any Talibs that might try to take advantage of the situation.

Price stood close to the center of the position. His attention was not dwelling on the perimeter which was the Canadians’ platoon commander’s responsibility.

Price’s focus was on the dead and wounded and arranging a landing zone for the incoming MEDEVACs.

The platoon was in an open field half a klick north of Price’s patrol base which lay just on the opposite bank of the Helmand River from where they were now. Another platoon, this one an Afghan National Army one, which Price’s half of ODA 053 was supporting, had remained behind at the PB to secure it. He’d left Walt Schroeder and Fred Young with them. Both were weapons specialists with the team: Master Sergeant Schroeder was also the team’s operations sergeant.

Taking a knee to his right was Ed Moore, a new member to the ODA and Price’s communication sergeant.

MUSTANG 53 ECHO, Roger, Out, Ed’s voice was slightly muffled, his head down as he spoke into his radio’s mic. His head then came up looking towards Price’s shadowy figure. Five minutes out, Tom,

Roger, acknowledged Price. The choppers are five minutes out! he called out to the men around him. Sound discipline was a minor matter now that they were within the perimeter of the steel LAVs.

Dave! he called over in the direction of the HLZ. You guys ready?

Yeah. The pad’s swept and the glow sticks are all laid out. Dave was Sergeant Dave Creasy, the team’s engineer sergeant who, together with a Canadian engineer had laid out the HLZ and checked it over for any mines or IEDs.

Price flipped down his night vision goggles and could now see the green glow of the IR glowsticks that had been thrown around the perimeter of the HLZ.

Let the choppers know the HLZ is marked and swept, Ed, said Price. I’m going over to see how Raul’s doing.

Roger, boss.

With his NVGs still flipped down, Price easily made his way over the twenty meters to where Raul Rodriguez, the team’s medical sergeant together with the Canadian Platoon’s medic and two of their Tactical Combat Casualty Care trained soldiers were managing the wounded. The platoon’s warrant officer and three other troopers were there as well to lend a hand with the casualty evacuation. Also there were a British paratrooper and an American National Guard captain standing beside a land rover and an up-armored HMMWV, all of whom Price ignored as he made his way to the medics.

Rodriguez had his hands full, literally. On the ground in front of him lay another Brit para stripped to the waist with a large abdominal gash spilling intestines. Another Brit kneeled next to his comrade holding an IV fluid bag attached to the casualty’s right arm, the left arm being immobilized and its upper portion wrapped tightly with two Israeli bandages.

Hold it right here, Chuck Rodriguez directed the Canadian medic. If I can get this last bit back in I can get enough stitches in to hold the thing together and seal it. The Canadian already had his left hand busy ventilating the para through an oral airway and reached over with his right.

Chopper in five, Raul. How are you doing?

Just about got this one stable, Boss, he replied without looking up. Those three are ready to go. Two ambulatory and light; the third a litter and stable. The three VSAs are bagged up and ready as well.

Warrant! Chuck, the Canadian medic called over to where the other casualties were grouped.

One figure turned and took a step over. Price recognized him as the Canadians’ platoon warrant officer. What’s up? he asked.

The choppers are five minutes out. Can you get the other wounded and VSAs over to it and loaded when they’re down. Tell the crew chief we’ll be right there. We’re still stabilizing the line 3 BRAVO?

No sweat, the platoon warrant said and returned to the small group huddling nearby.

Price turned back to the Brit and the American captain standing by their trucks. The platoon warrant could use a couple of extra hands loading the casualties. Once you’re done with that I’ll be over at the platoon commander’s LAV.

In the distance he could hear the air being beaten by the blades of the MEDEVAC and its Apache attack helicopter escort.

Time to organize the trip home.

— § —

Home at this point was the patrol base.

Their PB was a smallish municipal compound, about fifty meters square sandwiched hard up against the eastern bank of the Helmand River at the very edge of the bazaar of the town of Sangin. The town was a hardscrabble cluster of fourteen thousand farmers and merchants settled in a line maybe two kilometers deep and seven kilometers long on the eastern side of the river.

Helmand’s rivers were few and far between and meant life in this part of the world. As they meandered through the province they laid down narrow green ribbons—the green zones—on what was otherwise a bare, gravel wasteland of ridges, plateaus and mountain ranges. To the far south it was pure desert.

Along the rivers, even the ones that just ran seasonally, towns, villages and individual farms sprang up. Their waters were the life blood for the green zones’ abundant crops. Of all the crops here, the annual opium harvest in the springtime was the most lucrative. Later in the season would come corn, wheat and watermelon. However, right now the poppies were up and therein lay the problem.

Price had been in Sangin for only two days and he’d already come to hate the town and everything it represented. Irrigation canals and drainage ditches filled with raw sewage meandered everywhere. The roads were dirt; easily mined. Electricity ran only intermittently and at night not a glimmer could be seen of the family compounds behind their two to five meter high walls often a meter or more thick; everyone of them a potential fortress. Everything here was built of the mud and stone that lay everywhere in abundance and which gave the entire area and its buildings a uniform ochre tinge.

Operational Detachment Alpha 053 had come to the PB early yesterday morning. The ODA, ordinarily belonging to 10th Special Forces Group out of Fort Carson on the south side of Colorado Springs had been mobilized three months ago to augment the Special Operations Task Force based on the 3rd Battalion, 7th Special Forces Group in Kandahar. A Special Forces battalion headquarters better known as an Operational Detachment Charlie, was designated a Forward Operating Base when deployed on operations. Its designator was formed using the number of the group the battalion was from and its battalion number within the group, hence FOB 73. A name that was a frequent point of confusion for non-Special Forces troops for whom FOB was used to describe a place on the ground rather than an entity. Hence FOB 73 was frequently also called TF 73.

FOB 73 had an area of operations that extended throughout southern Afghanistan, from around Kandahar all the way over to Herat in the west. A second SOTF covered the east and north of the country.

Towards the end of February a major operation had started spinning up. The 3rd Kandak of the 1st Brigade of the 207th Corps of the Afghan National Army together with their American Embedded Training Teams and ODA 2062 had been sent down from Herat to develop a Forward Operating Base—FOB WOLF—at the southern edge of Sangin.

FOB WOLF had become a cluster of camps; one each for the ANA, the ETT, the ODA and a small platoon of Afghan security guards. Since the day they started the heavy duty construction work they had become the subject of daily and ever more complex attacks by the Taliban. Somebody wasn’t happy with the improvements FOB WOLF was contributing to their neighborhood.

The action had risen to a crescendo on the 28th of March when another incoming ANA convoy with its own ETTs had come under attack while driving up to the FOB. The result was the death of eight ANA soldiers. A Canadian platoon-strength Quick Reaction Force was dispatched by helicopter from Kandahar to reinforce the FOB and that night, when the base was hit again, an American ETT and a Canadian were killed and three Canadians and an American wounded.

Since then, further forces had been arriving in the area: yet another ANA Kandak with an ETT from Kandahar, a Canadian mechanized infantry company combat team from the 1st Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, and last, but not least, a further ANA infantry company supported by Price’s ODA 053.

Not to be left out of the action, a British battle group from their 16th Air Assault Brigade was arriving in Kandahar and bit by bit moving on to assemble at a new camp designated Camp BASTION, some sixty kilometers to the west-southwest of FOB WOLF. The British Brigade’s main combat element would be the 3rd Battalion of the Parachute Regiment which was only just starting to arrive. Earlier in the week Price had seen their reconnaissance element, the Pathfinder Platoon, leaving the Kandahar Airfield in a small convoy of WMIK Land Rovers and Pinzgauer light trucks.

The Brits were to take over responsibility for all of the province of Helmand in much the same way that the Canadians were on the ground and already responsible for all of the province of Kandahar. The Dutch, in conjunction with the Australians, were also in the process of starting their deployment to take over the adjoining province of Urozgan in the north. One last element, the fledgling brigades of the ANA, was being fleshed out just as quickly as the national training centers in Afghanistan were able to turn out qualified and equipped soldiers. All in all it was a period of change. The bulk of the American forces still in the country were currently redeploying to the northeastern part of the country.

On the down side, the changeover was creating issues. The current operation for Helmand had been spun up well before the Canadians had assumed command. The planning for it had been controlled more by political directives from Kabul rather than military planning in Kandahar. As a result the troops converging on Helmand from numerous directions were reacting more to the situation there than carrying out anything resembling a deliberate coordinated effort.

A case in point was the deployment of the 2nd Coy of the 1st Kandak of the 205th Hero Corps’ 1st Brigade from Camp SHIR ZAI just outside KAF.

With only twelve hours notice, the company had been ordered to deploy to augment FOB WOLF.

ODA 053 had been given even less notice since whoever had decided to send the 2nd of the 1st Kandak had overlooked advising FOB 73 that the company that usually worked together with the ODA was deploying. The ODA’s commander, Captain Derek Goddard, Warrant Officer Price and Master Sergeant Walt Schroeder had been dragged out of a deep sleep, hustled into FOB 73’s TOC and given frag orders which basically said get your trucks, get your gear, don’t forget to take lots of ammo and water, meet up with your ANA and get on the road to Sangin RFN. The implication was that ODA 2062 would provide them with better orders on arrival. This was not an optimal deployment and the battle rhythm was screwed up from the get go.

By the time they had reached Sangin late in the evening of the 1st of April someone had in fact drawn up a plan whereby Price with half of ODA 053 and a platoon of the ANA would deploy to PB DAGGER the next day while Goddard, with the rest of the ODA and the bulk of the ANA’s company, deployed to another PB. This one was located a further six kilometers north on Highway 611 the main road running up alongside the south side of the river.

By that evening Price and his ANA partners had their position defensible and ready for the construction crews to come up the next day.

That night the Taliban had decided to welcome them to the neighborhood with a lively fireworks display of mortars, rocket propelled grenades and PK machine guns.

After that things had started to go downhill.

— § —

PART 1

CHAPTER 1

Gulf Blvd, Redington Beach, Florida

Wednesday 28 June 06 2040 hrs EDT

The harmony had greatly improved over the last hour. The three voices drifted up to him from the fire pit on the beach:

"… when this old world starts getting me down

And people are just too much for me to face ..."

His son Brian was singing Up On The Roof’s lead solos with a strong tenor voice that Phil hadn’t known that the boy possessed. There was a passion there that paralleled that of the Drifters’ lead singer. Who was that? thought Phil. Ben E. King had left before this song came out so it had to be Rudy Lewis.

The two girls, his daughter Tracy and Marie, the Canadian legal officer who was quickly becoming a part of the family, joined in on the choruses with sweet voices which, while higher than in the original version complemented Brian’s voice perfectly.

Earlier in the evening they had started off with some Phil Spector’s productions, the Crystals’ He’s a Rebel and Da Doo Ron Ron and the Ronettes’ Be My Baby and Baby, I Love You. Tackling the Wall of Sound had been a bit ambitious in a cappella even though their voices had melded quite well. With the Drifters the trio had reached a definite high-point.

"… at night the stars put on a show for free.

And darling you can share it all with me . . ."

That line had always brought a touch of moisture to Phil’s eyes but tonight he had to physically stifle a sob. Luckily it was darker where he was sitting with his laptop and he was able to discretely wipe away the tears which had started to run down his cheeks. Phil loved listening to music; especially the golden oldies. He just couldn’t produce any; his best efforts were off key baritone grunts at best, hence he had begged off joining them in order to do some work on his laptop while sitting near them on the lanai.

The day had been a hot one with temperatures in the low nineties. A shower had briefly rolled in from the Gulf but the rain had been warm and brief. Most of the day had been lounging around the pool or on the beach.

The kids had come down for the summer holidays from Kentucky, where they lived with their maternal grandparents while they continued their schooling there. The arrangement had been in place since their mother, Diana, had died in a motor vehicle crash in Tampa in 2002. At the time she had been opening up Phil’s beach house in preparation for their transfer to US Special Operations Command. Phil had been serving with the 10th Mountain Division in Afghanistan. Her death, caused by a drunken doctor driving home after happy hour, had devastated the family. Phil’s tour had been cut short and, with the new job and the children's’ young age, he had gratefully accepted the Jorgensens’ offer to help raise the children.

Time had passed. Brian had just turned seventeen and Tracy was fifteen. It was time to rethink the future. Tracy still had two more years of high school while Brian’s graduation from grade twelve had come just few weeks before his birthday. The boy had been actively pursuing his options chief among which was following in his father’s footsteps with an application to West Point. His chances had always been good. His academics had placed him at the top of his class; he had scored very high in his SAT; his physical fitness was excellent and he had been an adept leader in several of his high school’s clubs and programs. Out of an abundance of caution there had been several applications to safety schools which would now not be needed as his acceptance to West Point had come through. In a few days he would be leaving for New York to start his Cadet Basic Training.

Dad?

Phil looked up at his daughter. In his reverie he hadn’t noticed the song ending.

Mmm?

"Marie and I are heading inside. There’s a Desperate Housewives rerun that neither of us have seen before. Can we get you anything?"

No thanks sweetie. I’m good, he said holding up his half-full tumbler of scotch-on-the-rocks.

Marie blew him a kiss as she followed Tracy into the open air family room.

— § —

His relationship with Marie, whom he had known for a year now, had blossomed in the last four months following their attendance at the trial of Sergeant Lane in Perth, Australia.

Sergeant Lane, a member of the Australian Special Air Service Regiment had helped to save Phil’s battalion’s bacon when they had become pinned down on Operation ANACONDA in 2002. More recently he had worked for Phil in a joint US/Australian/Canadian Special Operations Task Force assigned to free a number of international archaeologists who had been captured by the Taliban in Herat, Afghanistan. Lane’s patrol had the job of rescuing four of those hostages, all female. Three had been freed but one had been killed in the effort. Lane had subsequently been charged by the Australian army, not with anything to do with the death of the female hostage, but with manslaughter arising out of the death of several civilians who had been working with the Taliban and who had died in a fire fight in the hostage takers’ compound.

Phil and his friend Colonel Kurt Richter, a veteran of Canada’s elite special forces unit, Joint Task Force 2, had gone to Perth to give testimony on Lane’s behalf. Lieutenant Commander Marie Lamoureux had been assigned as Kurt’s legal advisor and had accompanied them there.

The friendship that had already been developing even before that trip grew by leaps and bounds thereafter as Phil saw her competence and common sense at work; traits which far exceeded those of his own legal advisor a Lieutenant Colonel out of USSOCOM.

They met frequently after that trip: at Phil’s beach house in Florida, in Ottawa where she worked, and at Kurt’s house at Horse Thief Bay on the shores of the Saint Lawrence River. The friendship and respect had grown into something stronger. Phil had never expected or sought to find love again after Diane’s death, but he was sure that this relationship was definitely heading in that direction. They felt close and comfortable with each other and the petite, blonde-haired, blue-eyed Québécoise had been accepted by the kids without reservation.

Phil swirled his glass. The last of the ice was just about fully melted and what he had now was a fairly weak twelve year-old, single-malt Glenlivet and water. He finished the contents with one healthy swig.

The last four months had also seen a significant change in his work routine.

The year ending with the trip to Perth had seen him employed as Commander USSOCOM’s roving troubleshooter. Whenever General Peters, a four-star, needed a quick investigation, liaison or task commander, Phil was tapped for the job at the expense his principle billet, working intelligence for the SOJ2 directorate.

After Perth, he was effectively grounded in Tampa while an investigation was conducted into the circumstances surrounding the al-Qaeda bomb plot which had been defeated in a flurry of gunfire from Kurt’s JTF 2 and Phil’s Delta close protection teams on the steps of Perth’s Commonwealth Courts building.

Clint Peter’s loss was SOJ2’s gain. Phil was immediately given the lead of a fusion team coordinating intelligence support efforts in aid of Joint Special Operations Task Force 88 in its war against al-Qaeda in Iraq and particularly in hunting down and eliminating its leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. JSOTF 88, formerly JSOTF 145, reported to Joint Special Operations Command at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, one of USSOCOM’s subordinate commands. JSOC already had the resources in play to develop and exploit their own intelligence for what were mostly black, door-kicker operations going after high value targets. Phil’s team was definitely a side show emplaced to ensure that JSOTF 88 had everything it needed and expediting the upward and downward flow of intelligence for tie in to other theaters.

They’d had a major breakthrough this month. JSOTF 88 had been on al-Zarqawi’s tail for some time and nearly had him on a number of occasions. Starting in May, several pieces of information started coming together and on June 7th, the terrorist was seen entering an AQ safe house a few kilometers north of Baqubah. Two laser-guided, five hundred-pound bombs—the ultimate in door-kicking weaponry—dropped by an F-16C ended the hunt. The next day al-Zarqawi’s body was positively identified.

The euphoria following the strike, while justified, was short lived. Everyone knew he’d be replaced and by mid June it had become clear that Abu Ayyub al-Masri had been anointed as al-Zarqawi’s successor. In the interval terrorist attacks in Iraq continued almost unabated averaging about twenty a day and everyone was anticipating a major revenge strike.

The really good news was that JSOTF 88 now had a system and a battle-rhythm that was working; Find, Fix, Finish, Follow-up and Analyze. It was the Follow-up and Analyze components that were leading the way. They consisted of rapid analysis of captured terrorists and their equipment and documents followed by immediate exploitation thus leading back into the Find element of the cycle. Every successful strike led to one or more other strikes. It was all a matter of resources; sufficient intelligence and direct action resources. The resources were there. Deltas, DEVGRU SEALs, British SAS and SBS, a battalion of the 75th Ranger Regiment, helicopters from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment and a heavy element from the Intelligence Support Activity intermixed with CIA and other components.

Being returned to intelligence full-time had also focused Phil’s attention on his career. He was now in his fourth year at USSOCOM. While there was great benefit in having General Peters as a mentor, there was also a down-side. Peters had come to USSOCOM after Phil and by all indications would remain there another year. By this time Phil should have moved on to commanding a Brigade Combat Team or a Special Forces Group. This would give him the balance of staff and command experience which would make him a likely candidate for a general’s star. The extra time he had been spending at USSOCOM as the commander’s personal trouble shooter wasn’t helping and was slowly dragging him out of the running. By now he should have received notification of his next duty assignment or received some hint about how he had stood on the Army’s Brigadier General Selection Board. No word on either was forthcoming.

Phil sensed a presence near him. The light from the laptop screen had impaired Phil’s night vision so he had missed seeing Brian approach from the fire pit. The surf was gently rushing up against the beach masking any sounds the boy’s bare feet might have made on the lanai’s tiles. It wasn’t until Brian spoke that Phil actually knew that the boy was there.

Dad? Can we talk?

CHAPTER 2

Schloss Richter, Richterich, Germany

Thursday 29 Jun 06 1200 hrs CEST

Pünktlichkeit, thought Kurt. Punctuality, more particularly, German punctuality had struck again to dictate that the day’s meetings had to come to a full pause while lunch was served.

Kurt Richter had three jobs.

The first, which was his full-time one, was as a colonel in the Canadian Army currently attached to the intelligence staff at the National Defence Headquarters in Ottawa. As the Director of Transnational Intelligence he reported directly to the Chief of Defence Intelligence. It was a good thing that Kurt had a capable deputy working for him who could easily manage the office in his absence because Kurt was frequently called away on his unofficial second job.

Because of his experience as a highly skilled veteran of Joint Task Force 2—not to mention his practical common sense and ability to resolve things quickly and efficiently—Kurt had become the Chief of Defence Staff’s primary investigator of incidents involving Canada’s special operations forces or those of other countries that impacted on Canadian interests. This second job had arisen out of the need to bypass the military’s cumbersome and slow boards of inquiry processes. The CDS needed a reliable gut feel for immediate decision making; not reports that didn’t hit his desk until months or years down the road.

This week, however, Kurt was on leave attending to his third job; the running of the family’s substantial commercial interests in operating a chain of breweries.

Kurt had been born into a family owning a regional brewery in Richterich, a small town next to the Dutch border just north of Aachen in west-central Germany. Under the stewardship of his father and uncle the brewery had expanded satisfactorily to a national brand within Germany. The two brothers had concluded that further expansion necessitated moving the brand offshore to North America, a market which at the time was dominated by a few big producers and where, in their opinion, one beer tasted pretty much the same as any other. An extensive market study of both Canada and the US led them to the city of Kingston in eastern Ontario as their initial home base. A toss of a coin in 1977 had led Kurt’s father to move his family to Canada.

While settling in Canada, the US was always part of the expansion plan and as such the family ensured the development of ties with that country. One of those moves was enrolling Kurt at the nearby New York Military Academy at Cornwell on Hudson for his high school education. It was subsequently, when Kurt was studying business administration at the University of Toronto that the family’s business and succession plan went off the rails. Kurt, by then a rifleman in an army reserve unit, the Queen’s Own Rifles of Canada, decided that he would prefer to follow a future with the military.

His involvement with the brewing business remained however. He continued as a member of the company’s board of directors and eventually became the CEO for North American operations; operations which had by now expanded further in Canada and into the Northeastern US. In this job as well he was fortunate at having a competent deputy to look after the day-to-day operations.

It was this third job which had brought him back to the ancestral home, Schloss Richter. Twice a year the family held coordinating meetings. Each midwinter, just before the end of the fiscal year, Kurt and his cousin Wilhelm, who had succeeded his own father as the head of European operations, would meet with the company’s key officers to discuss progress, issues and plans to set the company’s direction for the next year in detail and the next three years in outline. Each summer Kurt and Wilhelm would meet more informally by themselves to look over the operation from a family point of view.

This year they were focused on a growing issue. Was the company getting too big to stay under tight family control and should they think of taking it public? If they did, how would they continue to affect control and what would they set up as a fair mechanism of executive—i.e. family—compensation?

Kurt’s interest diverged somewhat from Wilhelm’s principally because he had already ceded much control and a share of his compensation to his deputy while Wilhelm had remained much more in day-to-day command of the European operations. They had even begun to broach the issue of separating the operation into two distinct companies when Wilhelm’s wife Gabriella came to give them a five minute warning for lunch on what Kurt sarcastically referred to as the back deck.

— § —

Kurt and Wilhelm had made their way downstairs and through the Schloss's Great Room, flanked by a thoroughly modern kitchen on one side and the library on the other. Large glass doors and windows faced out the rear overlooking the back deck; in reality a slate patio developed into an ornate courtyard that extended all the way to the rear portion of the house and its moat.

Schloss Richter was a chateau originally built as a stately home for the nobility and sat on a sprawling wooded lot of some 300 by 150 meters. Its red brick walls, grey slate roof, and grey fieldstone trim at the corners and around the windows and doors were reminiscent of British Georgian style architecture from the 1700's. In fact it had been built in the mid 1700s.

The main building was some 60 feet across and, with its two U shaped wings at the back, extended some 100 feet in depth. While only two stories high, each story had a ceiling height of 16 feet. A substantial moat—almost a lake in fact—fully extended on both sides and