by Ralph Peters
“Vulture, this is Eagle.”
“This is Vulture.”
“What’s your status?”
“We have the southern bridge. Intermittent fighting in the town on both sides of the river. The organization you requested is on the way.”
“Casualties?”
“Heavy. The British ambushed us the first time we went for the bridge. But we cleared them out.”
“How bad?”
“I’ve got about a hundred left.”
“With your company?”
“Including everybody. Never found the antitank platoon. They must have gone down. We have about twenty prisoners. About the same number of wounded.”
“All right. Just get in the buildings and hang on. Keep the wounded with you. I’ll send a doctor down from the hospital. Get the mortars to shoot in to support Falcon. Establish a layered defense on both sides of the river.”
“I’ll do my best.”
The radioman died. Gordunov could feel the difference in the room. When the radio went silent, it felt to Gordunov as though he were in a haunted place.
“Eagle, this is Falcon.”
“Eagle.”
“We can’t find you. What’s your location?”
“Never mind,” Gordunov said. “I don’t need the help anymore. Just watch for me coming in.”
Gordunov sat in silence for a moment, marshaling his strength. There was no sound close in. Only the ebb and flow of firing up the street. In the bowl of almost-silence, the pain in his ankle seemed to amplify, as though someone were methodically turning up a volume dial wired to his limb.
Gordunov rose onto his knees. With a deep breath, he caught the radio on his shoulders. At the last moment, he remembered to go through the dead boy’s pockets for the communications technical data pads. The papers had sponged up the boy’s blood. He wiped the pads and his hands on an upholstered chair, slopping back and forth over the coarse material in the darkness. Then he climbed to his feet.
He toppled back down. His ankle would not accept the additional weight of the radio. As he fell the corner of a table jammed him in the small of his back.
Breathing deeply, trying to drown the pain in a flood of oxygen, Gordunov forced himself back onto his feet.
One step. Then another.
He stepped down into the street. No sign of Karchenko. Just as well, he thought. Up the road to the north, near what appeared to be a rail crossing, the buildings blazed, featuring the black hull of a ruptured tank in silhouette. There was firing down the first alleyway, as well.
The random bodies of the dead glistened and shone where eyes remained open or teeth caught the fluttering light. Gordunov felt no emotional response. The corpses were abstractions, possessed of no inherent meaning now. He walked upright and slowly. Each step under the weight of the radio jolted currents of pain up his leg. He pictured the pain as a green liquid fire, racing up his nerves. It was impossible to move with any tactical finesse now.
The growing fires lit the street more brightly than a full moon could have done. As Gordunov approached the network of unengaged positions by the bridgehead no one challenged him. Instead, Karchenko and another soldier rushed out to intercept him.
“Are you crazy? Get down,” Karchenko demanded. Belatedly, he added, “Comrade Battalion Commander.”
“Help me, Karchenko. I have a problem with my leg.”
Karchenko reached out, pausing only at the last moment before touching Gordunov. Then he closed in, and Gordunov put his arm around the company commander’s shoulders, easing his weight.
“It’s all right,” Gordunov said. “We have both the bridges.”
“Let me take the radio. Here. Massenikov, take the radio from the commander.”
“It’s all right,” Gordunov repeated. “Now we just hang on. I’ve been through this before.”
Eleven
Chibisov watched the front commander eat, reckoning Malinsky’s mood by his mannerisms. The old man’s table manners were normally very precise. But now he absentmindedly forked up bits of cutlet and beans, simply fueling his body, as though it was just another piece of warmaking machinery. An aura of urgency had accompanied Malinsky back from his visits to the forward army commanders. Chibisov, however, remained unsure about how much of the front commander’s anxiety was genuine worry and how much arose from the need to personally accomplish an overwhelming number of practical tasks, despite the support of his staff. The complexity of the contemporary battlefield was enough to break any commander who paused too long to think about it. Overall, the situation appeared extraordinarily favorable, especially in the north, in Trimenko’s sector. But there were also potentially enormous difficulties, more of them each hour. Some of the difficulties had been adequately forecast, and the system had been designed with substantial tolerances. Other difficulties, such as the speed with which units on both sides essentially ceased to exist, and the tempo of movement, strained the troop control system at all levels to a dangerous point. While these difficulties had been argued theoretically in peacetime, virtually no one had internalized the practical considerations. While Chibisov himself had encountered few intellectual surprises, on a visceral level he found the reports from the formations engaged in combat almost unnerving.
As usual, Malinsky had declined to receive a full staff briefing. Although the Front Commander understood the value of ceremony and personal control, he also recognized the dangers of formalism. At the moment, continuity of effort was crucial. The staff was nearly swamped with requirements and demands, and a break in the pattern of work might have been inordinately costly. Malinsky had simply asked the chief of staff to brief him on key events and items of particular interest while he himself had a meal in his office.
“Trimenko’s doing splendidly,” Chibisov said, tapping the point at the deepening red arrows on the situation map. “The Dutch were too thin, and the Germans are too slow.”
“Trimenko tells me that Dalyev’s division is in a bad way,” Malinsky interjected. “Half of the division’s combat power is either gone or so disorganized it’s unusable.” But the tone of genuine worry wasn’t there yet. Malinsky ate another trimmed-off piece of meat.
“Too much frontage,” Chibisov said. “But we expected that. Dalyev had a thankless task. And the sacrifice appears to have paid off. Dalyev’s attacks focused the Germans’ attention. Overall, the Second Guards Tank Army is ahead of its timetable. Trimenko’s got one forward detachment battering it out in Soltau, and another’s running loose in the Dutch rear. He’s ready to introduce an independent tank regiment to break for the Weser. Malyshev’s division is up, and his lead regiments should be in contact in a few hours. The situation may not be clean enough for a demonstration exercise, but the key units are making it to their appointed places. Oh, and Korbatov has Lueneburg.”
“I know,” Malinsky said, dropping into his quieter personal voice. He shook his head, wearing a frankly baffled look. “Pavel Pavlovitch… I still think that entire affair…” Then he shrugged, switching his mind back to concerns within his area of decision. “Trimenko’s crisis is coming tonight. He knows it. But knowing may not help. The Germans are going to hit him. I’m surprised they haven’t hit him already. If they just wait a little longer, until the Sixteenth Tank Division completes its march and passes into commitment, we’ll be fine. At that point, the Germans could punch all the way up to the Elbe, and they’d only be caught in a trap by follow-on forces. But the Sixteenth Tank Division must break out. Trimenko’s extremely vulnerable as long as we’re muddling through the commitment of a fresh division. It’s a difficult function even in a peacetime exercise.”
“Trimenko has already reported local counterattacks from the south against the flank of the Twenty-first Division.”
“And I’ll be delighted, as will Trimenko, if the Germans and Dutch continue with their local counterattacks. Let them piecemeal their combat power away. As long as they feel they’re achieving little successes, it may blind t
hem to the bigger picture.” Malinsky dropped his knife and fork from the ready position, making a slight clatter as they hit the tray. He stared up at the map as though his eyes were binoculars to be focused in as sharply as possible. “If I were the German corps commander,” he said, “I wouldn’t strike with anything less than a reinforced division — preferably two. Local counterattacks are ultimately meaningless. It will take a powerful blow to stop Trimenko now.” Malinsky scanned the known locations of the enemy forces. “If that blow doesn’t arrive tonight, the Germans are fools. Or amateurs.” Malinsky stared past the map for a moment. “Perhaps, Pavel Pavlovitch, we’ve overestimated the Germans all these years.” Then his facial expression relaxed, a familiar signal to Chibisov to continue with the briefing.
“In the extreme south of the front’s sector, the Twentieth Guards Army is approximately six hours behind schedule,” Chibisov said. “The problem appears to be primarily terrain-associated. The Belgians have made very effective use of mines and obstacles along tactical directions that were already constricted. We’ve had to employ tactical air assaults in a leapfrog fashion to break defensive positions from behind. The situation is essentially under control, but we definitely underestimated the initial difficulties in the south. Perhaps our greatest ultimate advantage in that sector has been the experiences culled from Afghanistan in the employment of helicopter-borne infantry in mountainous terrain.”
“And the Belgian forces themselves?”
“Tenacious. Very determined local resistance. I don’t know what they’re fighting for, really. Their greatest weakness is insufficient firepower. Further, the terrain restricts their relocation of forces to the most threatened sectors and their resupply as badly as or worse than it hampers us. We’re moving forward, while they attempt to move laterally. Also, Dudorov’s intelligence-collection effort indicates the Belgians have logistics problems.”
“Similar to our own?” Malinsky asked.
“Some remarkable similarities, actually. Every one of our formations in contact is screaming for more tank main gun ammunition and more artillery rounds. The level of consumption seems almost impossible. It appears that we’ve even won several engagements by default. Nothing left for the tanks to do beyond ram each other or pull off.”
“Our transport?”
Chibisov’s bearing slumped almost imperceptibly, a reluctant shifting of the spine under an uncomfortable load. “We must find ways to reduce its vulnerability,” he answered. “Our major lines of communication have been hit repeatedly, and to serious effect, by NATO air power. The organization of traffic is extremely difficult, and it’s especially bad at the Elbe River crossing sites.”
Malinsky looked troubled. “How bad?”
“Quantitatively? Acceptable thus far. But over a longer period, our hauling capability could be… painfully weakened.”
“Painfully?” Malinsky repeated, smiling despite himself. “That’s rather a theatrical expression on your lips, Pavel Pavlovitch.”
Chibisov reddened. The experience of warfare on this scale, and at this level of intensity, had surpassed the careful vocabulary of the General Staff Academy in its expressive demands. Raw numbers might have aided his effort at communication, but the battlefield reporting was uneven, and Chibisov instinctively could not bring himself to trust all of it. Trained to report empirical data with unerring precision, he found himself struggling to report impressions, tonalities, and elusive feelings that insisted on their own importance now.
“NATO’s air power,” Chibisov resumed, “has shown more resiliency than anticipated. While we have achieved several impressive initial successes, the forces confronting CENTAG in the south appear to have bogged down, and the outcome of the air battle remains to be decided. If we achieve decisive superiority within forty-eight hours from now, our capability to support the ground offensive will remain at least marginally adequate. Should NATO intensify its deep strikes on our support infrastructure, however, we will experience sustainment problems within three days. It’s very frustrating, really. The chief of the rear is going mad. He has the ammunition. And the fuel. As well as sufficient vehicles to move bulk supplies at this time. But attempting to link them all up and get the trucks and supplies to the right place at the right time is proving extremely difficult. Realistically, Comrade Front Commander, if the first day is like this, while we’re still on the plan…”
“And we’ll continue to adhere to the plan,” Malinsky said firmly. “The tactical units and the formations can fight with what they have. The one thing that we cannot sacrifice, the one thing that is in critically short supply, is time. This is the hour when plans come into their own.” Malinsky sat erectly, but his voice became intimate and direct. “If I could spare you, Pavel Pavlovitch, I’d send you forward to take a look for yourself. It’s an astonishing thing. Despite all of the theory and the calculations, the endless tinkering with the tables and norms, I don’t think any of us was quite ready for this. It’s all… so fast.” Malinsky slowly turned his head, a tank turret sweeping the field. “I couldn’t change the plan now, no matter how badly I might want to. Oh, we can adjust details. But there’s no time for, no possibility of, anything greater.” His eyes shone out of the darkness. “The speed of the thing, Pavel Pavlovitch. The speed and the power. It makes the Hitlerite blitzkrieg look like a peasant horse and cart.” The front commander paused for a sip of tea, but Chibisov knew from the intensity in Malinsky’s face that the old man didn’t really taste it.
“I don’t know,” Malinsky went on. “We looked at it all in such detail… perhaps in too much detail. We examined the questions of mechanization and the impact of new weapons and technologies on the dialectic. We surveyed road networks and studied means of communication. We delved into automated support to decision-making and struggled with the issues raised by radio electronic combat. But somehow, we haven’t done a very good job of putting them all together. What would you and your mathematician comrades say, Pavel Pavlovitch? That we haven’t written the unifying algorithm? But perhaps it was unwritable. At least the enemy doesn’t appear to have done any better than we have. In fact, they appear to have done considerably worse.” Malinsky leaned forward, suddenly, lifting a hand, then a lone finger, as if to admonish Chibisov. But the old man was addressing an absent audience now. “Have pity on the commander without a good plan. If we have done anything correctly, it was to plan and plan and plan. Frankly, excessive planning may not work in the industrial base. But there is no alternative on the battlefield. Perhaps the difference is between problems of sequential efforts and problems of simultaneity. But I have seen the results with my own eyes. Maintain the momentum now, the momentum of the plan. Don’t let up. If the enemy has a plan, don’t allow him time to begin its implementation. Make him react until his efforts grow so eccentric that he loses all unity in his conceptions. Ram your plan down his throat.”
Malinsky settled back into his chair, smiling with sudden gentleness. “But I’m lecturing. And to you, of all people, Pavel Pavlovitch. Tell me about your computers. How are we doing in the new dimension of warfare?” Malinsky asked, boyish mischief in his voice.
“Frankly,” Chibisov said, “there have been many disappointments. The computers in themselves are reliable enough, but the human factor is too slow. And the amount of data that must be transmitted strains even our best communications means. I believe, Comrade Front Commander, that I personally missed an important consideration. Along with allowances in the plan for such traditional measures as refueling, resupplying the units with ammunition, feeding soldiers, reorganizations, and the like, contemporary plans should also include the factor of programming and reprogramming. You recall how many officers, most of whom were simply afraid of the new technology, insisted that all of the comprehensive data accounts would be thrown out or would disappear on the first day of the war. To a limited extent, they were correct. The systems in our possession have proved to have only limited capabilities under the stress of combat, and
some have failed. Yet those who denigrated automation and the volume of information to which we became accustomed were only correct in the most superficial and even tragic respects. While some of the systems and capabilities ‘went away,’ the requirements for the information itself are even greater than expected. We considered the symptoms, not the disease. Modern warfare is increasingly dependent upon massive amounts of highly accurate information, for targeting, for intelligence, for the rear services… even for the making of fundamental decisions. Those who cling to the past have made the mistake of believing that if you destroy the machinery, you destroy the need for the product. Certainly not an error a good Marxist-Leninist should make. On the other hand, too many of us fell in love with the machines themselves, confusing the relationship of means to ends. And no one from either camp fully realized the extent to which modern war would be waged on the basis of massive quantities of data.” Somber at the end of his assessment, Chibisov dropped his eyes away from Malinsky’s piercing gaze. “In the end, I’ve failed you, the army, and the Party. It all seems so clear, so obvious now, looking back.”
“All of your preparation is being rewarded, my friend,” Malinsky said. Chibisov winced at the unexpected choice of words. “All of the work you’ve done is in evidence out there.” Malinsky waved his hand at the map. “I know you’re having trouble with the computers. I’ve heard the same thing from everyone. But you’re honest about it, which is a terribly hard thing for a true believer. Just use the machines within their limits now. I suspect they’ve already done their jobs in the preparatory phases. Perhaps the next war will be theirs. We’re still in a transitional period. And now we’re leaving the realm of strict military science. Now it’s a matter of military art. And of strength of will.”
“Comrade Front Commander,” Chibisov began. There was an uneasy, stilted formality in his voice as he searched for the right tone. He had been caught totally off guard by the piercing word “friend.” “I understand that your last stop was at Starukhin’s forward command post. Shall I nonetheless review our perception of the Third Shock Army’s situation as we see it from here?”