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Armed with bazookas and a recoilless rifle, a 13-man defense squad was already set up in front of us, ready to cut the road if the enemy emerged from Amgala. That would give the main party time to set up a full-fledged ambush several miles away. At that point, however, the guerrillas stopped for a celebration—building fires, cooking camel meat, boiling tea, praying and congratulating one another for hitting Amgala with at least eleven of the 19 rounds. After half an hour it became apparent that the Moroccans would not be coming out to fight that day. The fires were covered, and we started leisurely back to base camp, eight hours away—the first leg in a two-day ride across the immense desert to the safety of Algeria.