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rock where I could scan the plateau through the binoculars. Nothing. Ra’ashid and the trucks must have had a good hour’s start: on this flat going they could be twenty miles away by now – easily. I and took stock of our situation.  Perhaps Ra'ashid thought we too had got the chop in the pass and had pressed on. Who could tell?
    I did some sums. By now we were down to one full tank of dieso in the Rover; about 10 gallons. In addition, we had our own four spare jerricans, each with four and a half gallons - say a total of 16 gallons, allowing for wastage - plus the three jerricans taken from the deuce and a half - another 12 gallons. With one tank and 28 extra gallons, I worked out that with a reserve we had fuel enough for about 280 miles at  l0 miles per gallon, and a lot less if we found bad going or had to detour. Nusret filled the empty tank as I worked and Yusif checked the water.
    The decision was hanging over me, when a low rumble made us look at each other in alarm. Instinctively we pressed into the shade. A second later a pair of jets roared over, heading north west, one on either side of the pass and dropping to low level as they cleared the hills. Then they barrelled away into the distance, banking hard to their left. From the stubby fuselage and little wings I recognised them as bombed-up ex-Russian Sukhoi 25s. Ground attack variant. Probably from Tabriz air base a hundred miles to the south east. . . .
    " Narooh !" muttered Yusif, "Let's go." He clutched the chagal, or  water bag, carefully. Hardly had he spoken when another pair of jets thundered north. Nusret and I needed no urging.
    Ra’ashid 's group had abandoned us. We were on our own, and the Iranian air force was hunting for the Kurdish terrorists who had attacked Hasak.  Time to get the hell out before the Iranians found us and took their revenge.
    Keeping as close to the bottom of the foothills to the right as we could , we inched along to the right, along the eastern side of the plateau. We drove slowly to keep the dust down and tried  to keep heading north.  All the time we gazed anxiously to across the open plain out to our left, looking for any sign of the jets. At one point a distant rumble, like far-off thunder, could be heard above the motor.  I stopped, but we heard nothing more, so I restarted the engine and drove quietly into a rock shadow against the rock wall that rimmed  the plateau.
    Not a moment too soon, either.   Far off to the left two black dots appeared above the horizon and grew into climbing jets coming straight towards us, while behind them a distant smudge of dust and smoke rose indistinctly above the skyline.  Engines roaring, the silvery swept wing shapes passed high overhead, banking steeply to their right before disappearing above the mountains to the south. The rumble of their engines faded but all three of us continued to stare at the eastern rim of the plateau. A handspan to the left of the initial smudge of smoke a cloud of greyish yellow dust drifted gently up. The thunder-like rumblings echoed again, remote yet ominous.
    Sa'aeed !" hissed Ali, and pointed. Two more specks flitted low above the plain, miles away and wavering in the heat haze. Then they, too, disappeared behind us over  the mountains to the south. It would take them an hour to refuel and rearm, I reckoned, with maybe half an hour's flying time. The fighter bombers could make two more trips before dusk. I looked at my two bodyguards and Yusif shook his head.  Nusret gestured ahead to the north, where the track hugged the side of the plateau before escaping into the mountains on the Turkish border and freedom.
    "North" he called. "North." "Yes," I intoned, flatly. "North".
    *               *               *
    To our eternal shame, no thought of rescue crossed our minds. Survival was the only concern. I let in the clutch and drove carefully north, hiding in the eastern rim of the plateau, as the stains on the