Occupied Seattle (Occupied Seattle Book 2)

by Christopher Kennedy

  “When will this road be open?” asked the soldier when he was within 10 feet.

  “Well,” said Mason, “I guess that depends on you. If you head back to the south, we’ll have everything packed back up and the road open in no time. If you decide you want to pass through, it will take a lot longer, because we’ll have to move the wreckage of your tanks.”

  The trooper near Mason turned so that the soldier could see he was holding a pistol pointed at him. The soldier knew that none of the tank crews could see him, because the trooper was standing behind the car.

  Mason heard the radio in his car squawk. “SWAT’s in place.” Mason smiled at the Chinese soldier. “So,” he asked, “what’s it going to be?”

  The soldier looked back toward the armored column. Was it his imagination, or was the grass moving toward the armored vehicles? The grass was moving; it was crawling with people!

  He turned and began running toward his tank. “We’re under atta…” he managed, before the trooper shot him in the back. He went down.

  Chaos broke out along the length of the column.

  As Mason ran toward the safety of the forest, Molotov cocktails began raining on the armor from both sides of the highway. Davidson had explained that tanks are like sharks. They are more efficient and powerful when they are moving. Everything they had done was to get them stopped and buttoned up. That way, it was harder for them to see his men sneaking up and easier for the Americans to attack.

  At the front of the column, several of the tanks and IFVs were immediately incapacitated as burning fuel ran into their air intakes and their crews struggled to get out. Many others were hit and fires sprang up all over from both the firebombs that hit armor, as well as those that missed. There were several tanks that weren’t hit; the grass moved again and three pairs of men rose and ran forward to jam railroad ties into the sprocket wheels of the tanks, immobilizing the tanks.

  At the back of the column, Trooper Davidson had led his SWAT team and a detachment of National Guard from out of the forest by Anderson Hill Road. The Guardsmen had a .50 caliber machine gun on a tripod to go with his team’s ten machine guns. They spread across Highway 16 about 50 meters behind the last of the vans. “Light ‘em up!” Davidson yelled, and everyone began firing. The afternoon stillness was broken by the sounds of machine guns firing and the metallic twangs of bullets hitting the vans.

  Chinese soldiers began diving out of the vans to return fire at the small detachment of men; they were so focused on the machine guns that they didn’t see the second volley of Molotov cocktails flying in from the forest. The smell of cooking flesh and the sounds of screams filled the air.

  Finally, the Chinese armor made its presence felt as cannon fire began chewing up the forest on both sides of the highway. The Americans were hard to see, camouflaged in the forest, so the Chinese simply began firing. At everything. Every cannon and machine gun began firing at once, shredding the forest and some of the troopers that hadn’t gotten behind cover after throwing their firebombs.

  Seeing that most of the Chinese were firing to the left, where most of the Molotov cocktails had come from, several of the troopers ran forward with firebombs and climbed onto the tanks that had been immobilized with railroad ties. Unfortunately for them, the easiest way to clear infantry from a tank is to have another tank shoot them off, and several of the closest tanks began firing their 7.62mm machine guns. Although the bullets didn’t penetrate the tanks, they tore the Americans apart, throwing them from the tanks.

  The tanks and IFVs continued to destroy the forest around them, and a new sound was heard as the anti-aircraft guns got into the fight. The quad 25mm cannons from the remaining four anti-aircraft guns made a tearing sound as they began chewing up the forest. Recognizing the anti-aircraft guns as the danger they were, one of the troopers stepped out from cover to throw his last firebomb at the closest one. It hit and exploded, quickly consuming the vehicle. The trooper didn’t have long to admire his handiwork, though, as a 100mm round from one of the IFVs exploded next to him, blowing off one of his legs.

  Faced with a volume of fire that was unlike anything any of them had ever experienced, the troopers began retreating up the hill as the Chinese armor started rolling, some of them climbing over the concrete divider in order to get closer to their tormentors. The retreat became a rout as the Chinese soldiers in the IFVs unloaded and assaulted up the hill, firing their weapons and launching grenades at the retreating troopers.

  At the rear of the column, Trooper Davidson saw that the Americans’ time was running out. As more of the Chinese soldiers spilled from the black vans, the volume of incoming fire continued to rise. Two of his soldiers were already down when the .50 caliber gunner was hit. His loader took over the grips of the gun and resumed firing, walking the rounds back and forth across the Chinese soldiers lying prone across the highway and its shoulders. As a third trooper went down, Davidson realized that they were out of time. “Retreat!” he yelled and began running back to his patrol car, which he had left at a roundabout on Bay Street. The rest of the troopers and the remaining National Guardsman followed him, jumped into their cars and headed up Bay Street. They were quickly lost in traffic.

  Ten minutes later, the Chinese column continued its journey north. They left behind ten tanks, two IFVs, two PGZ-95 anti-aircraft guns and over 100 of their soldiers.

  HMCS Victoria, Possession Sound, Two Miles off Everett, WA, 0730 PDT

  “Down scope!” said CDR Robert Jewell. The Victoria had arrived off the coast of Everett, Washington, and CDR Jewell, the commanding officer of the Victoria, was scoping out Naval Station Everett. He was able to look into the piers and see the ships, including the PLAN Kunming tied up there. Just like snipers, submarine crews were silent hunters and were, by their very nature, the epitome of patience. The Kunming did not appear to be going anywhere at the moment, but if it did, the Victoria was ready.

  The Americans, Bangor Naval Base, WA, 0740 PDT

  Colonel Williamson’s men and women were being driven from the field. They were willing, but they were woefully under-armed for this fight. If they had their normal gear, they would have made short work of the force before them; as it was, they had to keep falling back before the might of the tanks and infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs). It wasn’t that there were so many of them. It was their overwhelming firepower and near invulnerability to his troops’ weapons that made them unstoppable. Based on the reports, the Chinese only had about 10 tanks, total, split about half and half between their top-of-the-line Type 99 main battle tank and their nearly-as-impressive Type 98 main battle tank. They had about 20 of the ZBD-08 IFVs, although they had more troops than the 140 that could have been carried inside them. They must have come up in the black vans that were reported with the column. The three remaining PGZ-95 anti-aircraft guns may have been even worse than the tanks for rate of fire and destructive capability, though. Once they got the quad-barreled guns going, they chewed through anything. Especially his troops in the open.

  The one thing that his troops had going for them was numbers. At the start of the battle, they outnumbered the Chinese force in combat troops about 4,000 to 300. Those odds were coming down as the armored vehicles took their toll, but they still out numbered them by quite a lot. This had let the Americans encircle the Chinese, which they hadn’t been ready for, and a group of about 100 troops had attacked the Chinese from behind. Although they hadn’t been able to take out any of the tanks, they had killed two more of the PGZ-95s and had even gotten one of the IFV’s, before they’d been overwhelmed and killed. The slaughter was staggering, but the sacrifice was worthwhile for a couple of reasons. The rate of fire was a lot less without the PGZ-95s, which were, literally, murder on his troops. Not having two of them made the battlefield much more survivable. The other thing the attack had done was to show the Chinese that they were vulnerable from behind. Now, about 1/3 of the Chinese soldiers and vehicles were watching the rear, which meant they weren’t shooting at
the people in front of them, also reducing the level of fire.

  Now, if the Americans only had something worthwhile to shoot at the Chinese.

  He saw that it no longer mattered. The Chinese reached the weapons storage facility, set up a defensive perimeter around it and began collecting the American nuclear warheads.

  The Chinese, Bangor Naval Base, WA, 0740 PDT

  Captain Zhu Jing had dreamed of driving a tank through America for a long time. In fact, he had been dreaming about driving his tank down the streets of Washington, D.C., while he was patrolling the provincial capital of Urumqi, China, when riots broke out there in July, 2009. An enlisted man who had been a tank driver for 10 years at that point, he had taken charge of his company of tanks when both of his officers were killed. In the ensuing three days of fighting, he had led the remaining 19 tanks in the company’s rescue of the local commissar, earning him a battlefield commission to Second Lieutenant. Now, nine years later, he was a company commander in the 1st Armored Division of the Beijing Military Region. Many things had changed for him, but the dream remained the same. Even though he wasn’t driving down the streets of Washington, D.C., he was currently having a lot of fun driving through the state of Washington.

  When he was a little boy, he had seen a pirated copy of one of the Star Wars movies. In that movie, the Imperial forces had invaded a planet and crushed the resistance of a bunch of panda bear-looking beings. He still remembered the scene where the Imperial machines walked through the woods, shooting all the little vermin as the beasts ran screaming from them. That was kind of like now, he decided, as he drove through the woods shooting down all of the little Americans that he saw. They might as well have been using the slingshots that the little bears had, for all the good it did them. As he came to the edge of the woods, he saw his target, the storage facility for the nuclear weapons. Unlike Star Wars, there would be no savior for today’s little bears. He watched a round from the 125mm main gun of his tank explode on top of a group that was firing a machine gun at him. Their machine gun might have scratched his paint…but probably not. Now they were all dead for their efforts.

  He began talking over the radio, setting up a perimeter so that the troops outside could be protected while they got the weapons. It was too bad that he had lost two of the PGZ-95s. They were great for holding off men armed with nothing more than rifles. No matter, he still had plenty of firepower with the tanks, the last PGZ-95 and the IFVs. He formed the vehicles into a circle around one of the weapon depots, with all of the guns facing out. Too easy, he thought, as his men went to make their withdrawals.

  The Americans, Bangor Naval Base, WA, 0810 PDT

  Colonel Williamson’s heart sank as he saw the crate with the nuclear warhead being loaded into the back of the infantry fighting vehicle. They were going to get away with it, and there was nothing he could do about it. His men and women kept trying to sneak forward to get shots at the men loading the weapons. They might get one shot before they were killed by Chinese fire. Sometimes, they didn’t even get that. He had ceased sending them forward, as it was nothing short of murder. Still, his troops knew that their families stood to die in a nuclear fire if the Chinese set off one of the warheads, and many of his men and women continued to try to sneak forward to do their duty anyway. They slid forward on their bellies, which pretty much only exposed them to being shot in the head. There weren’t going to be many wounded after this battle; most of his troops would be dead.

  He knew he had ceased being a commander a while ago. There was nothing he could do besides send his men and women to die, and he couldn’t do that anymore. He just couldn’t. He was out of ideas and was torn with grief at every death that he saw his troops give for their country’s sake. Finally, he couldn’t take it anymore. Grabbing his rifle, he went forward to make his own sacrifice. His men and women were; he could do no less. Reaching the edge of the woods, one of his female troopers grabbed him.

  “Sir, get back!” she said. “They can see you here…” Her voice cut off suddenly as she was shot in the head, the force of the bullet flipping her over backwards. She couldn’t have been more than 18; younger than his daughter. Filled with impotent rage, he stood up and fired his entire magazine into the closest one of the tanks. If he’d have been rational, he’d have known that doing so was pointless. He was no longer rational. He wanted to die, and he wanted to go out shooting. Might as well shoot at the source of his misery. He fired until his rifle clicked; it was empty. He stood there waiting to die, looking down the barrel of the rifle at the tank.

  It blew up.

  Something must have hit it in its ammunition storage, because it blew up with several secondary explosions, the force of the blasts blowing the entire turret off the tank. There was a stunned moment of silence as everyone looked on in astonishment, and then every weapon the Chinese had seemed to fire at once. No one knew what had happened, but it was better to shoot and maybe hit something, then wait and get hit by the next round.

  In the stunned moment of silence, someone tackled him. As every weapon in the world seemed to fire in his direction, all he could hear was a voice in his ear saying something about “Stupid officers not knowing when to duck.”

  There was a lull in the shooting, and another voice said, “Hey, Master Chief, could you get off the colonel now so I can talk to him?”

  The weight on his back was removed, and he saw that there was a group of men nearby that he didn’t remember seeing before. The one that seemed to be their leader, a Corporal Sanders, motioned him deeper into the woods. “Who are you guys?” Colonel Williamson asked.

  “I’m Lieutenant Hobbs,” said the newcomer. Seeing that Williamson was focused on his name tag, the man sighed. “Don’t worry about the uniform, it’s not mine; it’s just the best I could do. I’m the leader of a Special Forces platoon that was sent here to try to stop the Chinese from getting the nuclear weapons. It looks like we are almost too late.”

  Colonel Williamson was still not over his reprieve from death, and Calvin could see his mind wasn’t firing on all cylinders yet. He tried again. “Sir, I brought some anti-tank forces here to help, but I can’t do this alone. I need your help. That’s why I had the corporal blow that tank as a distraction. I didn’t want to give away our presence, but I need your help now! SIR!”

  The final “sir” seemed to do the trick, and he shook his head to clear the cobwebs. When he looked at Calvin again, his eyes seemed clearer and more focused. There was a short pause, just long enough for Calvin to wonder if the colonel was going to rejoin him from la-la land after all, but the colonel was just gathering his thoughts. “OK,” the colonel said finally, “thanks for coming. What kind of support do you have?”

  “I started out yesterday morning with a platoon of special forces soldiers,” Calvin said. “I’ve had some attrition, but just picked up four M67 recoilless rifle teams. Most of the rest of my troops are down to being riflemen due to some supply problems,” he grinned wryly at his own attempt at humor, “but we do have some M203 grenades, and I’ve still got a couple of RPG shots left.” He looked out toward the field. “It looks like they’ve got more armor than I’ve got rockets, though.”

  “It is my intention to try to use the recoilless rifles to take out the tanks first, and then work on the IFVs,” continued Calvin, “but I need your troops to continue to draw some of the fire off the M67 crews. They’re the only thing I’ve got that can really hurt those tanks from this distance, so I don’t want to lose them. I’m going to have them shoot, then move, then shoot again.” He paused. “Unless you have a better plan, that is.”

  “No, lieutenant, I don’t have anything that can hurt the tanks, and that plan’s as good as anything I’ve got.” A funny look came over the colonel’s face. “The M67s have to be from the 506th; they’re the only ones that still have them, right? I was in one of the other 101st Infantry regiments in Afghanistan when they reissued them to the 506th, due to the environment. But a Master Chief and a lieutenan
t…What unit did you say you are from?”

  “We’re Navy SEALs,” said Calvin, not wanting to say that he was an aviator and have to go into the whole story of how he got here commanding army troops. It was enough to let the colonel think he was a SEAL. He didn’t have time for anything else. The colonel just nodded. It made as much sense as anything else had in the last couple of days. He was just glad to have the help.

  Having agreed on the plan, Calvin sent out the troops to spread out around the Chinese. The riflemen and grenadiers weren’t of much use against the tanks, so he told them to hang back and let the regular army folks draw the fire; he knew he’d need all of his men later. Similarly, the RPGs weren’t worth wasting. The distance was about 200 meters, making them long shots to go against the tanks’ frontal armor. Not a good bet and not worth wasting them. Once they started moving, maybe they could get a shot into the side or back of a tank, or even get an IFV, which would also be helpful.

  As the Chinese soldiers continued to remove the nuclear warheads, the Americans developed a routine. One side of the ring would start firing, hoping to draw the Chinese fire, and then a M67 would take a shot from somewhere else. It was a dangerous game, and one that was not even guaranteed to get a kill. The frontal armor on a tank was built to take hits (so the shots often bounced off), and shots hitting the side were glancing blows (so they often bounced off). The IFVs would have been easier to destroy, but they were lower value targets as they had a smaller gun and a lot less armor than the massive tanks. If the soldiers could kill the tanks, they could hopefully pick off the IFVs at their relative leisure.

  The recoilless rifles were hard for the tanks and troops to see until they fired, and they were having some success. Before long, six more of the tanks were burning, along with the last PGZ-95, which had been one of the first vehicles targeted when the recoilless rifle teams saw the amount of fire it sent their way. Unfortunately, they were now down to three M67 teams. A tank round had hit one of Calvin’s crews, killing his men and, even worse, destroying the weapon.