The Red White & Blue

by Harry Kellogg III

  He had heard about the water caravans in the earlier part of the war and how they now had immunity from both sides. Maybe this was another peace overture between fighting men. He had known of a case where an officer who had ordered his men to fire on a water caravan. The squad had fired their rifles into the air. The officer drew his weapon to shoot them for disobeying direct orders. The men took his gun from him. Then, they propped him up for execution by the snipers across the battlefield, who obliged with no questions asked.

  There were no more attempts to interfere with a water caravan on the entire Pyrenees Line, including the small German forces arrayed there. After all, did it really help to win the war if you shot a few dozen of the stupidest soldiers by sniping? Then, all you had left were the smartest and toughest ones when it came time to really attack. He was not a warrior or violent man, but he just couldn’t see the glorification of the sniper. A sniper was a good target shooter who could kill the stupidest men on the other side. Men, who had no intention of posing a serious threat. Men, who probably took more than their share of rations and had never their weapons effectively. Men, like him.

  In looking at this own squad and hearing the stories of other units, he estimated that only 10% were truly effective soldiers. The other 90% were there just to be killed by that 10%, a truly depressing thought. He vowed that he would not become one of the 10%. He would miss, unless his life depended upon it.

  His life had been spared by another member of the 90%. He intended to pay that debt back many fold. The dictators Franco and Stalin were the true killers, they were directly responsible for the 10% who did the actual killing. There was no high-principled discussion of political theory involve. Just one dictator trying to dictate to the other, and the remainder of us have to die over their quest for power. Being spared by the enemy sniper, he had decided to not play any further part in their horrific scheme.

  Shades of Faith, Hope, and Charity

  Jeesus…uhhhh…shit!

  “Red one, this is Red two. I missed as well.”

  “Damn it! Let’s go again.”

  “That would be the third try, Skip. Are you sure?”

  “I’m going to get that bastard, Mitch. Now, shut up. We need to get our timing right, for god’s sake. It is ridiculous that we can’t get this bastard.”

  “Roger.”

  The pair of America’s newest model F-80 Shooting Stars zoomed to 5000 feet while keeping their prey in sight. This prey was a lone Yak 3 flown by one hell of a pilot. The two jets had bounced the much slower Soviet propeller driven fighter 15 minutes ago. The fight should have been over in seconds. But, the Soviet pilot knew exactly how and when to take evasive maneuvers that prevented the two American jets from hitting him with their 50 cal. machine guns.

  The Yak pilot had actually put a few holes in the wing man of the leader of Red Flight which was why he was so pissed off.

  This guy was damn good, thought Captain Mark Bellows. Bellows situation reminded him, briefly, of the famous Malta dogfights where modern fighters could not overcome the skill of experienced pilots flying obsolete planes. In fact, the fighter pilot was so good that the Captain figured the guy had to be very exceptional, and probably a multiple ace. His goal was to knock this guy out of the war before he got himself a Soviet jet and became really dangerous for some other American pilots.

  This guy was so uncanny at knowing just when to turn or sideslip or even barrel roll. He not only fought in the horizontal but in the vertical. The vertical acrobatics really pissed Bellows off. The guy could loop on a dime and still have enough energy to maneuver while in the loop. Usually, when you got to the top of a loop you were pretty much out of energy and a sitting duck, but not this guy.

  In fact, that’s when he had put the holes into Mitch, right in the middle of a 3g loop the guy still was able to kick his rudder and get his nose on Mitch. The American had heard of a one-eyed Japanese ace named Saburō Sakai who regularly dueled up to 6 Hellcats near the end of the war with no apparent damage to his plane. Sakai often downed one or more of his opponents. This Soviet was of that caliber and it would sure be nice to keep him from killing any more Americans.

  They split and started to dive on the Yak.

  “Skip, he’s doing it again…”

  “Ok. Number two. This time you stay high and I’ll take a run at him. Remember Mitch, under no circumstances, are you to try and turn even for a second with this guy. He’ll nail you like a 10 pound sledge hammer…you copy?”

  “I copy Skip.”

  “Going in now.”

  Holly shit! He dumped his flaps!

  “Now, Mitch, now!”

  The Yak had dropped his full array of flaps and was barely hanging in the air. That maneuver made Red One miss by a mile, but he was now helpless for Red Two to pounce.

  “Now, we got you son of a bitch.” yelled Bellows to no one in particular.

  The P80 named Shooting Arrow was closing fast …too fast. Contrary to all his training, Mitch McGuire pulled his dive brakes to slow down to get a better and longer shot at what should have been a helpless opponent. Unfortunately for Mitch, the Yak driver was far from helpless. He stalled on purpose and put his plane into a flat spin. When he came around on spin number two, his nose was in the perfect position for a very hard deflection shot.

  The 20 mm cannon just spit out 6 rounds and three of them hit Mitch’s fuselage just under his seat. The rounds tore a huge chunk of his control surfaces as well as some steering cables. Mitch recovered, as did the Yak 3 after a few more spins and a vertical drop of 1500 feet. The Soviet pilot gained control at an altitude of what should have been 6 feet under the ground in a smoking crater. He, then, continued on his way as if nothing had happened at tree top level with apparent disregard for the jet fighters above him.

  “Skip…”

  “I know Mitch, let’s head for home. You okay?”

  “I’m hit, but I stopped the bleeding.”

  “Okay buddy. We’re pretty close to home so you hang in there with me. You copy?”

  “Copy Skip”

  “Stay awake, Mitch, just stay awake.”

  The two jets slowly climbed and let the Yak go on his way.

  The twenty-minute dogfight was similar to the situation over Malta in World War Two with three old British bi-wing fighters named Faith, Hope and Charity. The trio had managed to frustrate the Germans and Italians for weeks during the Battle for Malta. These Gloster Sea Gladiators were planes of a by-gone era and had kept the Italians at bay for 10 days until more modern planes could be brought to the fight.

  Chapter Seven:

  Grand Scheme of Things

  Shorter is Better

  The Soviet supply line was shorter and their economy was still at wartime levels where as the US was gradually climbing. Currently, the US economy was stuck at around 55% of full wartime capacity due to the reluctance of American corporations to invest further without the prospect of reimbursement. The national debt was now an historical high of 280 billion, or 147% of GDP. The stock market was on the verge of collapse and inflation was 15% and climbing. President Truman was considering wage and price controls.

  Everything was in short supply except war materials. Overseas rubber plantations, oil facilities, mines etc., had still not recovered from the disruptions caused by World War Two. There were numerous rebellions in South and Central America inspired by Soviet agents that also added to the reluctance to fight in Europe.

  American big businesses was having their bottom line hurt. They wanted the US Marines to go into these Banana Republics and straighten things out such as we had before the war. Companies like the United Fruit Company, Standard Oil and a number the largest American banks were among the companies that were demanding that troops save their profits in countries not under Soviet occupation. Some of these countries were defaulting on loans, organizing labor, and worst of all, protesting unsafe working conditions.

  Sans the oil industry, the Soviets were bringing online mor
e and more of their newly conquered assets in Europe, despite some attempts at sabotage that were dealt with harshly by the ruthless NKVD. Without a credible threat of invasion in Western Europe, the resistance fighters were keeping quiet, knowing they could not survive years of living on the knife’s edge.

  The NKVD was gradually enrolling local traitors and communists in a massive counter insurgency effort. These informants and collaborators reported on their neighbors, friends and family for food. Food was the medium of exchange as one of the hardest winters in a century started to settle on Eurasia.

  The date was 12 December 1946.

  Silently, We Go Along

  Their paddles were muffled using a technique that had been taught them by an Indian instructor from the Menomonie tribe in Wisconsin. It involved keeping the paddle in the water on the forward stroke by turning it sideways. Then, slicing forward through the water until you were normally extended. Next, you turned the paddle 90 degrees and pulled back in a regular stroke. This pattern was almost as efficient as taking your paddle out of the water on the forward stroke and placing it back in during the power stroke. The critical difference was that it was silent, and that was key in this situation.

  The inflatable rafts were the usual black rubber ones designed by the British Commandos and were ubiquitous in the modern secretive military arts. Stealth was essential to getting as close as you could to the shore without being observed. That’s what they were here for, just a quick look to get a feel of the activity level and defenses of the harbor. No sabotage or anything that would indicate they were ever here.

  Two of the divers in re-breathing gear slipped into the water and started towards shore. They were about 1000 feet out. The two men remaining in the raft, let some air out of it to decrease its visibility. Suddenly both men felt something sliding beneath them. Something that was big, and close to the surface. Neither panicked. One of the divers opened some shark repellent just in case. He spread it around. No one really knew if the repellent worked or not, but it calmed your nerves and maybe that was good enough.

  Whatever was under the water had taken a chunk out of the flippers of the leader, so it either had teeth or was moving very fast. Then, they saw it surfacing a hundred feet behind them and heading out from shore. It was one of those midget submarines. Hank was wondering what the hell the submariners were thinking as they felt their propeller hit his flipper. He knew exactly what had happened, but hopefully they didn’t.

  The periscope was starting to rotate in their direction, so the two divers silently slid beneath the surface and stayed there as long as possible. Neither had been prepared to use their scuba gear and had just brought it along for emergencies. All they could do was hope the midget sub missed or misidentified their partially deflated rubber raft for floating debris. The midget submarine crew could do nothing about the divers’ presence. It wasn’t like they had a deck gun. Hank supposed they could pop out of the little conning tower with a pistol. He doubted they had a rifle or machine gun in that tiny space.

  Each diver could hold his breath for a good three minutes. When they resurfaced, they came up slowly. The sub had moved on further out to sea. What were the odds, Hank thought?

  30 minutes later, Hank saw the partially hidden red light of a small flashlight, as the other divers returned from scouting the harbor area. In March, this was going to be a very busy place from what he understood. The harbor would be almost as busy as Normandy. Twenty-five divisions were to go ashore in 2 days. It was going to be a tight squeeze, and that is why this port was chosen. It was such an unlikely spot. That’s what made it perfect.

  A little bit of CO2 from a canister, and they were back up to having a fully inflated raft to climb into. They started to paddle back to the rendezvous point. Williams indicated they had collected good information about the harbor in Trieste, Yugoslavia. The city had once again been taken away from Italy and given to Tito. If NATO had its way, Trieste was going to revert back to Italy and cause the beginning of the end for the Soviet forces in Western Europe.

  December in Iraq

  December brought more gains to the Soviet forces invading Turkey and Iraq. On 15 December, the Soviets were temporarily halted near Bara, Iraq by RAF planes. Tempests and Mosquitoes mounted a fierce bomb and rocket attack on the Reds’ ground forces. The Soviets had outrun their air cover and the British were at the end of their range. With the cessation of attacks on Britain by the VVS, the RAF decided to try and defend its vital oil fields in Kuwait and Iraq. Most of the Brits’ troops were tied up in holding the Pyrenees Line. The massed fighter bomber operation was the next best thing for slowing up a mechanized enemy formation.

  No NATO ground forces had shown up to impede the progress of the Red Army, but there was constant harassment from the air. The raids conducted by the 15th Air Force were devastating to a Soviet ground force without their accustomed air cover. The Reds’ anti-air guns fought with great élan, but were too few to stem much of the attacks.

  The opportunities to hide a tank around Bara were slim to none. Most vehicles went from being feared weapons of war to targets in minutes. The few Stalin’s Fire SAMs sent with the lead forces were quickly destroyed by the fighter bombers before they could setup. The SAMs were basically static units that could be moved. However, they were not capable of quick deployment and were of no use against fighters and fighter bombers.

  There were harassing forces like the merry band led by Captain Marsh. The Captain had finally decided to learn all the men’s names in his unit, but was unable to pronounce the Turkish ones. His group took what they wanted, from whomever they wanted, in their zeal to kill Red Army soldiers. And, they were very good at pillaging and killing.

  Sargent Bill stayed sober and was able to set many a tank trap and mine. Sargent Clem had taught three of the Turks to kill a T34 with a grenade, and they were happily doing just that to the tune of two or three a week. Corporal Frank turned out to be quite a leader and took the four other Turks under his wing. The Captain regularly let the Corporal’s section work independently of the main group. His section ran flanking maneuvers that very often saved their bacon in fire fights.

  Corporal Mike was cut in half by a stray 23 mm cannon round shot by a passing Sturmovik. The Beast took a second run at their group after they had shot down his wingman. Actually, when they examined the wreckage it was a wingwoman. A female body was found inside the uniform, when they had examined it. Captain Marsh supposed that was why her wingman was so pissed off.

  Captain Marsh wondered if the Red Army was running out of male pilots or was it just such an equal society that they regularly let women fight? He only knew that he had stopped his Turks from desecrating the still warm body. He wondered how the pilot would have fared if she were caught alive. The Captain had seen a case where a rather effeminate male prisoner was being gang raped in a POW camp by Turkish guards, but he didn’t think that was the usual. Most men are just pigs and controlled by their dicks if not by their women, he concluded. It was one or the other in most cases.

  His group had done surprisingly well. The Turk, Said, was a very capable young fellow who seemed to know his men and their limitation. The Turk reminded him of himself 10 years ago. Ten years, and another war, ago. This war was just as brutal. One issue, he couldn’t get out of his mind, was all the propaganda efforts that the US Army manufactured during World War Two. The Office of War Information beat into their brains stories of how valiant the Soviet Army and people were in their struggle against the evil Nazis.

  Now, of course, their efforts to demonize the Soviets seemed laughable when contrasted with their earlier attempts to humanize them. Hell, he remembered as late as December of 46 when Life magazine came out with a Christmas edition featuring Soviets celebrating the holidays. He found it very strange how enemies become allies and allies become enemies. Often our leaders can’t figure out who the enemy is and mistakenly send young men and now, women out to kill one another.

  The Captain had heard
that there were former Nazi SS units fighting with us in the Pyrenees and Japanese units in China. How in the hell are you supposed to keep your enemies straight, he thought. The bottom line was that whoever tried to kill you or your squad mates was your enemy, including those children he had killed in Germany. Both of those little kids had found a way to point and shoot at him and his men, killing a number of his friends. He knew he had to stop thinking about those kids, otherwise he would go off the deep end like before.

  In front of him was a clear challenge, a whole squad of armored cars. They were the true scourge of this desert kind of fighting. Too fast to out run, yet they were tough enough to withstand most small arms fire. One of the most annoying things about the armored cars was the fact that a normal anti-tank round, whether fired by a bazooka or anti-tank gun just went all the way through them in half of the cases and didn’t even explode inside them. The armored cars, in turn, just started to hose down your position while the rest of the squad flanked you.

  Engaging the cars was a situation to be avoided at all costs and that was why his command very rarely attacked them. But, now the Captain had a good weapon and gunner to use it. Before Corporal Mike had bought the farm, he had found the perfect weapon and trained one of the Turks in using it…Said…yes, that was it, Said. The Turk had been given a Soviet anti-tank rifle. It was a PTRD-41 and shot a huge 114 mm bullet. The rifle was just powerful enough at long range to punch through an engine block or take out the driver, and then gunner of an armored car. Sometimes, Said was so good with the gun that he could take out the driver and the gunner with one shot, if the angle was right. With Said, they now actively sought to engage Soviet armored cars. In three weeks they had taken out 24, but who was counting.