Ruth's Diary - No.9 (2.9)

[Beatriz]

I'm so sorry for the delay.

*****Spoilers for 2.09*****

[21st May 2004]

This week we’ve been investigating the Chala Cartel. The Colombian biggest drug traffickers are thought to be bringing air missiles into the country.
Last night Tom was in a Customs and Excise surveillance van awaiting the Chala Cartel shipment in the coastline of Kent. It was a quiet night so far, Tom left the van to report his status and when he came back, he found out his collegues fate, they were all slaughtered.

Early this morning we discussed all the implications in the meeting room. The Spanish liaison officer from the CESID had warned Zoe about the Chala Cartel. Three months ago they set a bomb in Madrid which killed 30 youngsters in a disco.

We have to be very careful, these people do whatever they think it’s necessary to get their goal. If they have fire power in Spain they’ll have it here, as London has the biggest community of Colombians outside Madrid.

We have intelligence that Rafael Morientes, one of the leaders of the Chala Cartel, is in London and moreover, he is dealing with Ross Vaughan, leader of Petcal (one of the main oil industries in the UK), through Rafa’s girlfriend Mariella.

Chala is a lawless region where a great amount of drug dealers, left-wing guerrillas, right-wing paramilitaries, etc. coexist. A nightmare of a place. That must have thought Vaughan in the 1980s, when his company had oil interests in that place. He must have bought protection from the Chala Cartel and now he’s returning Rafa the favour; a classic qui pro quo relationship.


[24th May 2004]

The Chala Cartel are having their meetings in Petcal headquarters, where Danny managed to bug the cleaning room where those take place.

This morning, I listened to these recordings (as well as refreshing my Spanish), I was beginning to think they would say nothing important when I realised they had the intention of swapping a shipment of drugs for Surface to Air missiles. I told Harry as soon as I learnt all the details.
I get too excited the moment I discovered something vital in an operation, that I completely forget to knock before entering Harry's office. Hope he understands my motives.

Later in the meeting room, given that the Chala Cartel and other Carteles carried out attacks in planes during the 1990s, I expressed my concern about bothering people of their kind. No sooner had I finished my first sentence, than Tom began to yell at me, he even said I might as well go back to GCHQ! It was an awkward moment, everybody fell silent. He apologised afterwards. I don’t blame him, I know he’s upset, high-strung he’s going through a hard time in his life. First Ellie, then the EERIE exercise, and now he nearly got killed in an op. He’s being too emotional at the moment (I can understand his feelings though).


In the afternoon, I went to Harry’s office to brief him about the documents Mariella was carrying in her briefcase aimed to Vaughan, thanks to Zoe and Tom being undercover.
Vaughan is using the huge PETCAL apparatus to help bring the drugs in and then make the money vanish. If all this information were filtered... Harry said it had to be smothered... It’s astonishing the things we discover in this job, heads of leading industries making deals with mafia and drug dealers, laundering money... and what we have to do is to turn a blind eye.


[27th May 2004]

The whole Chala Cartel operation ended. Rafa was killed and it was all over. Apparently somebody high up in the goverment was protecting Vaughan. It will appear in the news that all this was a Colombian matter, no British people implicated. So wrong, so unfair. That is how it works, I reckon, I don’t feel comfortable at all, though. I don’t have a clear concious and less when an inocent was killed, Mariella, stabbed by her boyfriend.

In the middle of this operation, Sam was fooled by Tessa Philips, a former MI5 officer with no morality and no qualms. Without knowing what she was doing, actually, Sam filtered some important information about the Chala Cartel, and Tessa used it to tip off Vaughan in order take her personal revenge on Harry and that was Mariela’s end, in Tom’s arms.

In this job you walk over the line most of the times, and sometimes, you cross it, does the aim justify the means? Today is one of those days you question your work... Another sleepless night awaits for me...

[Tea Lady]

Bless, poor Ruth. She is starting to realise what it means to work in Section D as opposed to her sheltered life when she was at GCHQ. She is starting to drop Harry's name in her diary more and more I noticed.

Good stuff.

[lwhite53]

Liked that Ruth's conscience is going full throttle at the end of the entry. Great work, B!