One hand on the tube to aim it, the other on the trigger, Diaz intended to put a round into the helo. Jay glanced back for a moment, and he could see the co-pilot had obviously realized the same thing. But Diaz was at the forward quarter of the helo, and he was effectively masked from any of its weapons. The pilots began to rotate the helo just as ropes fell out the back, probably trying to get their side-door cannon to bear.
The cannon started firing, explosions beginning to walk their way to Diaz as the helo came about. As the bird rotated, Jay saw a Chinese soldier on one of the ropes, but holding on as the bird moved.
Come on, shoot! Jay silently implored as Diaz just knelt there, slightly adjusting the angle of the tube.
A cannon round exploded about 10 meters from him. Then, with what looked to be a nod, LCpl Diaz squeezed the trigger.
There was the familiar soft, hollow-sounding chuff as the round took off, and Jay was sure he could actually see the round as it flew past the control tower and impacted into the side of the helo, penetrating it before detonating. An explosion literally tore out the side of the bird, parts flying, some of those parts even impacting on the side of the control tower.
Almost in slow motion, the bird turned over and fell, slamming into the ground on its side. The props tried to turn a few more times, but they flew into pieces as the ground broke them up. The helo bounced once, then broke apart into two huge chunks, the front section on fire.
The soldier who had been on the rope had somehow escaped intact. He jumped off the ground and began to run, but right at the mortar section instead of away from it. Jay didn’t even have to fire as the soldier was quickly cut down. A few more soldiers stumbled out the back of the helo, collapsing on the ground. One soldier crawled, or tried, to, that is. He fell still, whether from being shot or from the crash, Jay wasn’t sure.
Another incoming round from the ship bounced off the roof of the control tower, somehow not detonating. He didn’t know if the pilots had comm with their ship and had requested the fire, or if it was just their turn on the firing list.
“Mark, Maus, get the hell off of here!”
LCpl Maus had just put his feet on the ladder when another round came in, hitting the base of the tower. The explosion threw shrapnel up, one piece hitting Jay in the cheek. He reached up to see how badly he had been hit when the tower began to lean.
“Oh, shit,” he heard LCpl Maus say as the tower began its long fall to the ground.
Jay watched the ground rush up before all went dark.
Chapter 33
Pagasa Island
When the first round exploded in the trees about 50 meters off to the left, most of the Filipinos hit the deck. The trees were dense enough so that no shrapnel made it that far, but it was still disconcerting.
Pete didn’t think they were being targeted by the Chinese. There was no reason to do so as they had a much bigger threat with Kilo Company. The island was pretty flat, and with naval gunfire, errors in range would be the norm. Still, rounds that were overshot or on target had the same effect if they fell among you.
When under indirect fire, the rule of thumb was to disperse, but Pete feared losing control if they did that in the dense jungle. The matter was taken out of his hands, though, when a voice in back of him shouted out something in Tagalog, and people started scrambling up and pushing into the trees on either side of the path. Pete was losing control whether he wanted to or not.
He started to call everyone back when another round hit off to the left, closer this time. People started crashing forward, eager to get to the north and to the rendezvous point, a large rock on the shore that had enough deep water on the sea side of it that boats could come alongside.
Instead of trying to round everyone back to the path, he motioned to his Marines to spread out and try and cover what was now essentially a mass of people on line and moving forward. He stayed on the path himself, along with Analiza and two other Filipinos, trying to maintain contact with the people on either side of him. He didn’t like the arrangement and felt somewhat helpless, but they knew where they were going. This was virgin territory to him.
Analiza touched his shoulder, catching his attention, and said, “Don’t worry. We’ve all been to Bird Rock. We know the way. Everyone’ll get there.”
“I don’t know. What if we run into the Chinese? I can’t protect everyone when they’re spread out like this.”
“If they come, they come. But I don’t think they’ll be anxious to go digging around in the bush. Do you?”
“I guess that’s a good point,” he conceded.
He continued to move north with his three charges. He could see a few people on either side of him and could hear more crashing through the vegetation and occasionally calling out.
The path, such as it was, got even smaller and less distinct. If the townspeople knew how to get to Bird Rock, they certainly did not make the trip often, if the path was any indication. Branches tore at him, one raising a stinging welt on his face. He brought his visor down. None of the electronics worked, so he couldn’t see his display, and while with it down he was hotter, at least his face was protected from the braches and vines.
As he trudged forward, he heard the whup-whup of a helo. For a moment, he thought the Makin Island was finally within range and had sent its helos to evacuate the civilians, but when he caught a quick glimpse of the helo through the low trees, he knew it wasn’t American. Olive grey, the yellow-outlined red star and bar at the base of the tail assembly gave it away. It was Chinese.
Pete should have figured that the Chinese were not going to simply rely on a frontal assault, attacking on the Marines’ terms. Like anyone else, they would want to adjust the battlefield to give them an advantage. What they probably didn’t realize was just how thick the jungle was. As the helo was flying north, the more distance it put between wherever troops would be inserted and Kilo Company, the longer it would take for them to be an influence in the battle.
Of course, as the helo was north of his position, if the Chinese were going to move south to join the battle, they would have to go through his Marines and the Filipinos. He wished he could inform Kilo of what was happening. Sgt McNamara, though, was in the control tower, and surely he could see the Chinese helo. He would get the word to Tony.
The sound of the helo was not receding, and Pete realized that it must be hovering up ahead, possibly debarking troops, either by rappelling or fast-rope, if the Chinese even had that capability. Pete wished he had studied the Chinese PLA in more detail. Knowing what they could and couldn’t do would be a help.
If Chinese troops were being inserted 100 or 150 meter ahead, then he wanted the Filipinos out of the way. He ran off to the left first, then back across the path and to the right, telling those on either side of him to move further away from the path, then to hunker down and stay out-of-sight. He now wished he had kept everyone better under his control, but it was too late for that. He asked those nearest the path to pass the word to those further out, and to pass the word that he wanted Gunny Sloan.
He could hear the word going further out. The good thing was that in this vegetation, someone could pass within five feet of someone else and not see him or her. That was great for the Filipinos, but he had seven Marines with him, and he wasn’t sure whether simply protecting the Filipinos as he was ordered trumped doing something about the Chinese soldiers who were probably ahead of him.
He had to see what was happening. He probably should wait for the gunny, but waiting could take the initiative out of his hand.
Turning to Analiza, he told her, “Stay here. When my gunny gets here, tell him to wait. I’ll be back in a moment.”
She looked like she wanted to argue, but she seemed to accept it and nodded, kneeling down under a gnarled tree of some sort.
Pete slowly pushed forward along the path, senses on high alert. It sounded like if there even were Chinese soldiers on that helo, they had been inserted only a short distance away. If they were t
here, he didn’t know what their mission was, which way they were going, or how many there were. On the plus side, they probably wouldn’t be expecting anyone to be out here in the middle of the jungle, a good 500 meters from the northern shoreline.
He looked back along the path. He was probably only 30 meters from where he had left Analiza and the others, but it felt like he was completely alone. He knew he should get back, or at least wait for the rest of his team, but he wanted to get just a bit further in order to see if in fact there was anyone in their path.
Stepping carefully, he moved forward another 10 meters to where a dense stand of some sort of tall, bamboo-like grass formed a barrier just off the path. Although it was only about a dozen feet high or so, it was a good four feet wide and so tightly packed as to act as sort of a pseudo-tree trunk. He had no idea what would cause it to grow that way, but it would give him some cover from which he could try and see if there was anyone in front of them.
In back of him, he could hear nothing. His charges were either silent or the jungle too dense for sound to travel far. In front of him was also silent. Even the sounds of explosions off in the distance seemed muted in the humid, oppressive heat.
He really should not be alone, and he knew he needed to get back. But first, he wanted to look down the path to see if there was any sign of the Chinese. He pulled out his K-Bar, then very slowly, he moved to the edge of the stand of tropical grass and carefully cut a few loose leaves that came off the main stalks and were blocking the view forward. The leaves fell silently to the ground, and he carefully peered around the big stalks.
The kick caught him right across the face. His helmet shield was designed as a both a screen on which his tactical information could be displayed as well as to protect him from fire and offer some degree of protection from shrapnel. It was not designed to absorb the full impact of a kick.
The face shield was driven back into his face, smashing his nose, but the force of the kick was spread out over a larger area than had the PLA soldier’s kick directly contacted him across his face. Pete was knocked to the ground, and his weapon went flying back into the bushes.
Surprised, his nose aflame, but not really stunned, he grabbed the K-Bar, which had fallen beside him, and jumped up. The PLA soldier was in mid-jump doing some sort of flying back kick.
Pete had received not only the normal Marine MCMAP hand-to-hand combat training but also advanced training as a member of Recon. However, in the split second when he saw that booted foot coming his way, none of that training came into play, and instinct simply took over. He ducked while raising his hand, the one with the knife in it.
Instead of impacting on Pete’s head, the soldier’s leg impacted on the knife at the lower calf, just above his boot. While the kick was jarring, most of the force of the kick drove the knife deeper into the soldier’s flesh where it essentially rode up his fibula, slicing his calf as clean as if a butcher might have done. The K-Bar rode up to the soldier’s knee where his momentum knocked the knife out of Pete’s hand.
The soldier fell to the ground, grasping at his leg which was spouting a bright crimson fountain. It was then that Pete saw the rifle slung across the soldier’s back. Why the soldier had decided to go Kung Fu on him or why he was out on the path alone were questions that flashed through Pete’s mind as he reached down to draw his Colt. His right hand was numb from the kick, so he had to transfer the .45 to his left hand. But at this range, which hand he used didn’t matter. The soldier was in bad shape and had only a moment to try and reach around to his rifle when Pete fired two rounds into his chest. Without body armor, the rounds made a messy work of him.
With the two rounds breaking the silence, shouts sounded in front of him, foreign shouts. A burst of rounds came flying from down the path. Pete would swear later that the rounds sounded like bees going past his ear as he dove back behind the stand of grass, scrambling to get his rifle. His right hand was still numb, but he needed that M4.
He could hear the several sets of footsteps running as his left hand closed on his rifle and he struggled to swing around and face his enemies. He knew he wasn’t going to make it, but he had to try.
Another burst of fire in back of him opened up, and he turned to see one PLA soldier fall on the path, the upper part of his body flopping past the stand of grass to lie just two feet from him. Pete looked back to see Gunny Sloan and LCpl Viejes charging down the path, rifles a blazing.
“Come on, sir!” his gunny shouted, pulling him up.
Pete didn’t need any encouragement. Together, the three Marines sprinted back down the path.
When they saw Cpl Schmidt at the side of the path, weapon at the ready, they dived off the path and into the jungle.
“Are you an idiot, Lieutenant? That was a pretty fucking stupid thing to do!” Gunny Sloan shouted, his anger evident.
1stLt Peter Van Slyke didn’t have a comeback to his platoon sergeant. The gunny was absolutely right.
Chapter 34
Pagasa Island
Sgt Steptoe felt the pressure of the explosion, his breath knocked out of him. The Chinese rocket had been their most deadly weapon, killing and wounding wherever it was on target. This one, thankfully, had detonated in back of their lines, so he didn’t think anyone had been taken out by it.
The fight, so far, was not like anything that he would have imagined. Both of his prior experiences in combat had been more fast-paced, more frantic action at times. Here, faced with a professional army, things had bogged down. He still wasn’t sure how many Chinese soldiers were on the back side of the runway, a mere 175 meters away from him, but the LCACs and a few smaller boats had made several trips from the offshore ship.
About 20 minutes after the first Chinese landed, they had attempted an assault, spearheaded by their lone light tank. The blue tank was almost immediately taken out by a Predator SRAW fired from somewhere to his right, and with a heavy pounding of machine gun fire and mortars, the assault quickly fizzled out, sending the soldiers, in their odd blue-toned camouflaged uniforms, fleeing back to their side of the battlefield, leaving the burning hulk and four bodies on the runway.
Since then, the ship continued to fire its lone gun, but its effect was minimal. The rounds either hit on the runway, some actually skipping back up into the air, or hit long. The Chinese had some sort of grenade launcher, and they fired the occasional harassing fire, but these two caused only minor injuries to legs or arms, nothing life-threatening so far.
One sniper had tried to stick his head up above the edge of the seawall, but a quick burst from an IAR sent him flying back in a haze of blood.
The rockets, though, were a different story. The Chinese soldiers weren’t even aiming the shoulder-launched weapon. A soldier would pop up and fire, the rocket blasting across the runway to explode in the air above the Marines. The rocket housed a fuel-air warhead, and the blast, while not huge, was deadly. It blew down the short trees that gave them cover and killed and maimed the Marines in its blast radius. Already, four rounds had been on target, killing 9 Marines and seriously wounding another seven. What surprised Steptoe was that one rocket had exploded at the far left of the Marine’s line where it married up with the Filipino soldiers. The Filipinos, without body armor, fared better than the Marines. Two Marines, Pvt Dexter and LCpl Alaman, had been killed while the Filipinos next to them had only been injured.
Luckily, the Chinese didn’t seem to have too many of them. Or at least, they had not fired too many. Steptoe hoped that was because of supply, not because they were saving them for an all-out assault.
Meanwhile, the mortar section continued to rain down rounds on the Chinese positions. They were quite low on ammo, so the tempo had slowed, but hopefully, the firing was enough to keep the Chinese occupied.
Steptoe was still amazed that someone had managed to take down a Chinese helo with a mortar round. That was one for the books.
There was still one helo in operation. It had tried to make a gun run on their position,
but a Predator SRAW fired at it made it pull off, even if the shot had missed. They could barely make out the helo on the flight deck of the Chinese ship.
The Filipino soldiers had made one mini-assault. Positioned at the far left of the Marine line at the boat basin, they had maneuvered forward in the rocks and in knee deep water to the very edge of the southeast corner of the runway, popping out to fire down the line of Chinese before pulling back. The Filipino lieutenant reported killing at least 15 Chinese, but Capt Niimoto thought that was probably more hopeful than fact. The assault, though, forced the Chinese to spend manpower to refuse that flank.
The skipper and the XO had discussed the possibility of assaulting the Chinese and throwing them off the island, but the same runway that kept the Chinese from successfully assaulting would prove devastating to them as well. Steptoe could see the skipper was frustrated. He didn’t want to sit there as targets for the shoulder-launched rockets, but to attack would be foolhardy. Their best bets were either to egg the Chinese into a frontal assault that they could beat back or just hang on until the Makin Island was within range. Just one Cobra II run down the Chinese line would be devastating. Of course, a strike from the carrier group would be appreciated as well.
The best the skipper could figure was that they could expect something in another three hours or so—that is, if things were quiet on Taiping and they received all available support.
Sgt Steptoe took a deep breath. That last blast had been a little close for comfort. Whatever the Chinese were using as a fuze was less than 100% accurate, something for which he was eternally grateful. If it had detonated another 25 or 30 meters closer, that might have been all she wrote for Mrs. Steptoe’s favorite son.
Over his ringing ears, he heard the land line, which was still somehow functioning, buzz. He picked up the handset.
The Return of the Marines Trilogy Page 57