Pablo Escobar's Story 2: Narcos at War by Attwood Shaun

Author:Attwood, Shaun [Attwood, Shaun]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gadfly Press
Published: 2019-06-30T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

Cali’s Foreign Mercenaries

Pablo’s enemies were finding him difficult to capture or kill. The Cali godfathers turned to their head of security for ideas. Over six-feet tall, Jorge Salcedo towered over his peers. The softly spoken ex-army officer had short dark hair, thick eyebrows, a well-trimmed moustache and a firm gaze. He was a family man with degrees in mechanical engineering and industrial economics. Early in his career, he had designed forklifts and other machinery. His father was a retired Colombian army general and a diplomatic figure. Regarding himself as more of an engineer than a soldier, Jorge had become an expert in electronic surveillance, which had drawn him into counterterrorism assignments.

In a previous job for the military, financed by the Medellín Cartel’s Gacha, Jorge had worked with mercenaries based in the UK. Enticed to Colombia on the pretext of fighting Communism, they had found themselves participating in a turf war with guerrillas over cocaine labs. Having been paid so well, their leader, David Tomkins, was enthused about doing more work in Colombia.

With coiffured grey hair, dark brows, narrow features and a tattooed arm, Tomkins was a demolitions expert and soldier of fortune who gravitated towards the hotspots of the world. His career had started in Africa. In Afghanistan, he had fought with the Mujahideen, in Croatia with warlords, and in Uganda he was involved in a plot to assassinate President Idi Amin. In Angola, a mine had exploded on him. After a medical operation, his wounds had deteriorated into near gangrene. Back in the UK, he had been hospitalised. Two days later, when the nurses came to dress his wounds, they found that he had returned to the battlefield.

As detailed in his book, Dirty Combat , Tomkins received a call from Jorge in February 1989. “Are you prepared to come back for another mission?”

“Yes, subject to terms and conditions.”

On February 13, Jorge greeted Tomkins at the Bogotá airport. “Your prospective clients,” Jorge said, “are a group of businessmen whom Pablo Escobar has sworn to kill. The Medellín Cartel has engaged in a bombing campaign against their business interests. They live in Cali, which is Colombia’s third-largest city. More than thirty bombs have exploded in their Drogas La Rebaja chain of 350 stores.”

“Why has Pablo Escobar targeted them?” He pressed Jorge into revealing that the clients were the Cali Cartel. The express purpose of the mission was to kill Escobar. Although the mission had no official government backing, the authorities had blessed it.

Back in England, Tomkins recruited some colleagues. On February 24, they flew to Colombia. In Cali, they were situated in a heavily guarded five-star apartment. They had their own bar, en suite bathrooms and money-counting machines. After they showered, land cruisers took them to a little town outside Cali called Jamundi, which Pacho controlled. The four godfathers arranged to meet them in a private sports facility with a swimming pool, gym, sauna and running track.

After getting into a complex surrounded by sheet-steel fencing and through security checkpoints, Tomkins

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