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by Patricia Camburn Behnke (Author)
For an autographed copy, Please call Barbara or Brent at (352)493-2257 Brent Swan slowed his truck and found himself looking down the barrel of an AK-47 assault rifle. A movement at the passenger window caused him to shift his gaze to the right and into the face of a grenade launcher. "I thought it was a cannon," Brent said in 2005, fifteen years after his capture in Angola by Cabindian rebels. Just minutes earlier, he had been cruising south, down a road that paralleled the Atlantic Ocean, having left the Chevron oil compound, Malongo, at six o'clock on Friday morning, October 19, 1990. The fog and mist lay heavy around his new company pickup truck. He smelled the ever-present odor of burning petroleum from the flares burning off the excess natural gas at Malongo. On this morning, he needed to be at the Cabinda Airport early enough to do an inspection of the oxygen masks on the King Air before the plane took off for Luanda, the capital of Angola. Brent worked for Petroleum Helicopters Inc. as an aircraft mechanic. PHI was contracted by Chevron to provide helicopters and the King Air for their personnel. Cabinda is one of eighteen provinces in Angola, but its position is unique. It does not border any part of Angola and is separated from its governing body by the Democratic Republic of Congo, known as Zaire at the time of Brent's kidnapping. Cabinda shares a northern border with the Congo, and many Cabindians believe they should be an independent entity. Brent Swan began his sixty-one days as a hostage the moment he slowed his truck for members of the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda in Angola in 1990. Even though Brent provided the FBI with complete descriptions of his kidnappers and their camps, it took until 2003 for just one of those kidnappers to be brought to trial, with outstanding warrants still on file with the U.S. Justice Department for three others. The second kidnapper was arrested in The Hague in June of 2005, but the Netherlands released him until a later date, but Bembe left the country and never returned to The Hague. The court dismissed the extradition request because Bembe was presumably no longer under Dutch jurisdiction. The U.S. government contacts the Swans and gives them information when they might need Brent as a witness, and each time they receive a call, they are thrown back to 1990 and forced to relieve the nightmare once again. There are days when they aren't sure who the real terrorists are. Two Moons in Africa: Barbara and Brent Swan's Story of Terrorism brings Brent out of the jungle with Barbara at his side. It is the story of Brent's literal journey into a dark and dank jungle at the hands of rebels. It is the story of Barbara's journey as well as she awaited first his release and then his recovery. It is the story of the love between two people who suffered and survived. But it is also the story of a country crammed with deadly land mines and embroiled in decades-long civil wars. It tells of a people destroyed by hopeless poverty while oil fields and diamond mines sit within view but beyond reach. It shows the true meaning of Africa as the Dark Continent. It is the story of rebels so intent upon their cause that the troubles of one American family have no bearing upon their fight. In fact, these fighters for Cabinda's liberation felt they were so right in their cause, they made Brent Swan an honorary citizen of a country that does not exist except in their minds. It is also the story of how victims of terrorism are treated in the aftermath of the terrorist act as justice is sought but not always achieved. Two Moons in Africa represents their desire to tell the story. It is Barbara's and Brent's attempt to take control of a situation that has been out of their hands since 1990. But it has never been out of their minds or hearts or souls. Today, they still wonder about justice, but with the publication of Two Moons in Africa, they have found a way to express
