Impasse (The Red Gambit Series)

by Gee, Colin

  One Sherman was smoking badly, a panzerschreck in Russian hands having struck it fatally.

  The report that Starshina Kon and his vehicle had reached Dahlem did nothing to calm Artem’yev’s rising foreboding.

  “Where are my rockets, Comrade Bailianov?”

  “We can’t get through, Comrade Polkovnik.”

  Artem’yev gripped the binoculars tightly, working off a little tension in the doing.

  “There are reports of heavy air activity across our rear, Sir. Maybe...”

  “I don’t need maybes, I need my rockets, and I need them now, before they get closer,” emphasising his point, Artem’yev waved one hand across the battlefield to his front, “The enemy’s bunched. I need them now, Comrade Major!”

  “I’ve sent a vehicle back, Comrade Polkovnik, but I fear...”

  Two shells bracketed the headquarters position, shaking men and equipment, but causing no real damage, except to strained nerves.

  “Boris Ivanovitch... get me my rockets.”

  Turning away, the Soviet commander brought the glasses back up to his eyes and focussed on a small bend in the southern track.

  Behind Artem’yev’s line, the Katyushas had received a beating.

  One unit had been detected by radar and received a thorough going over from 8” artillery, taking it out of the fight for some time to come.

  Another had been discovered by returning ground attack aircraft, most of which still possessed enough munitions to make a complete mess of the ammunition and headquarters vehicles.

  Only one battalion remained fully functional, but it was presently in transit to an alternative position, the commander using the excuse of the artillery and air strikes to move his unit closer to Moscow, or at least that was how the subsequent courts-martial would probably interpret the withdrawal.

  There would be no further rocket support for Artem’yev’s force.

  A squad of US Infantry rushed forward to secure the hedges around the bend that was the subject of ARtem’yev’s attention, and found no resistance, although fire from Soviet forces nearer Dahlem wounded the young 2nd Lieutenant leading the force.

  The second in command waved the supporting tank forward, and organised the eveacuation of his former leader.

  Artem’yev had left the firing of the charge to one of his platoon commanders, and the man chose the perfect moment to order detonation.

  An electrical pulse, sent down a thin wire, initiated a three hundred kilogramme explosive charge that had been dug into one of the small grassy banks and then concealed with snow.

  Some of his soldiers, assigned to help the engineers who laid the charge, had packed gravel and stone around the bomb, despite the engineers’ assurances that it would not be of any advantage, as three hundred kilos of explosives would be enough to clear the area by itself.

  The engineers had left for another assignment, but their legacy was impressive.

  The explosion was tremendous, and those soldiers that had cleared the hedges to the south of the bend were swatted away in an instant.

  The Sherman tank was eight metres from the blast.

  Towers had his binoculars focussed on the spot, and his eyes baulked at the brightness of the light.

  None the less, as he jerked his head away, part of his brain detected the sight of many tons of tank propelled sideways at high-speed.

  From his position, Artem’yev had anticipated the explosion, so was not affected as Towers was.

  He observed, seemingly in slow motion, as the thirty-three ton lump of metal wiped through half a dozen men on the north side of the bend, completing the suffering of the supporting infantry group.

  Fascinated, Artem’yev observed the tank rolling some distance, sending track links and externally stowed equipment flying in all directions, until coming to rest on its naked wheels.

  The crew had died horribly, churned like butter in their steel coffin.

  Towers hammered his fist on the halftrack, knowing he had just lost a lot of men.

  Artem’yev hammered his fist on the sandbags, knowing he had just struck a huge blow.

  The former grabbed the radio, and organised his reserves forward to cover the hole, whilst the latter listened angrily to the report on the fate of the Katyusha support.

  On the northern track, advancing GI’s and tanks paid more respect to the ground over which they advanced, seeking out detonation wires, and looking for signs engineer activity.

  A young soldier from Oklahoma saw something that scared him, and used his bayonet to cut through a wire three seconds before a Soviet Leytenant ordered the second charge’s detonation.

  Anti-tank guns engaged the northern force again but were quickly silenced by a combination of direct tank fire and mortars from the Heavy Weapons, brought to bear by Towers’ direct command.

  “Tombstone-four-six, Healthy-two-six, Route two looks open all the way, suggest plan three, over.”

  Ayres, leaving the engagement of the AT guns to his gunner, had searched the track and ground ahead, seeing nothing but an invitation to move forward at speed.

  Plan Three was a joint surge by the tracks and tanks on one axis, and Towers went with it immediately.

  Artem’yev saw the movement, and understood the danger.

  “Blyad! The other charge is a dud. The Amerikanski are attacking there, on our right, surging with their tanks and halftracks. Tell Kon to engage the right flank, now! Now!”

  Bailianov gave the order, and the radio operator sent Starshina Kon his instructions.

  Starshina Kon, twice Hero of the Soviet Union, was a very experienced soldier. Once a Colonel of Artillery, Stalin’s purges had brought him to the very bottom of his existence, before fate took a hand and he was freed, once more to became a soldier, although he always declined to become an officer when promotions were offered.

  Once bitten, twice shy.

  With a reputation second to none, he was transferred into the Army Tank Prototype Assessment Unit, in order to bring his expertise to bear in ensuring that Red Army’s new vehicles would be the best that they could be.

  The ATPAU had sent one group to the west, to serve within the Red Banner forces.

  Part of the group was at Dahlem.

  One tank, one tank crew, one maintenance section, and a group of civilian engineers and designers, the latter very keen to see their hard work in action on the field of battle.

  Kon had brought the tank in question to the field, and it was Artem’yev’s ace in the hole.

  “Fucking hell! Something’s got Hettie!”

  Hettie, an M4A3E8 Sherman, was already roaring away like a cooker, her crew incinerated in an instant.

  Ayres had no idea where the shot had come from, but he was sure it was something new.

  “Joe, move left to that clump... get us out of sight pronto.”

  The driver shifted down easily and the tank surged towards safety, just in time to get out of the way of a silver streak, as a Soviet shell missed the turret by less than a metre.

  The pungent smell of urine filled the inside of the tank as more than one bladder emptied itself in fright.

  Ayres had spotted the flash and looked at his map.

  He radioed Travers, requesting some artillery.

  Satisfied that his own tank, ‘Hawkeye’, was in cover, he jumped out and moved up through the snowy undergrowth, the tank’s Thompson submachine gun cradled in his arms, just in case.

  The arrival of Travers’ salvo coincided with him spotting the all-white enemy vehicle as it moved away from the artillery strike zone.

  ‘Shit, the bastard bugged out.’

  Kon was too wily a soldier to spend too long in one spot, and he had been well away from the strike that accurately fell on his former position.

  Ayres also knew his trade, and had been pushing vehicle recognition with his unit since day one of the new war. However, this one wasn’t in the book.

  ‘What the fuck is that?’

  It was a question th
at none of the Soviet soldiers would have been able to answer either, so new was the prototype tank that Kon had brought to the day’s combat.

  At just over thirty-nine tons, the T54, known until recently as Obiekt137, was equipped with excellent armour, a 100mm main gun, fender mounted defensive machine guns, and had an increased combat range.

  All in all, it promised much.

  However...

  The list of faults was long, as Kon and his crew found issue after issue with the design. Today, it would have its christening on the hardest test facility known to man; the modern battlefield.

  The strange Russian tank disappeared behind some burning buildings before Ayres’ gunner could get a shot.

  The radio was suddenly alive with warnings about something new and nasty in the Soviet inventory.

  “Well, at least the gun works, Comrades.”

  Starshina Kon joked for the benefit of his crew, as the driver nursed the tank into cover, its engine temperature rising dramatically with a suspected coolant leak.

  ‘Make that yet another fucking coolant leak,’ Kon thought to himself, as his crew were already quite jittery.

  He pulled out a dirty notebook and made some additional entries, announcing his solution to each in turn.

  “Right. Oleg, get that traverse fixed. Check the fuse box first. Maybe it’s the same as last time.”

  “Leonid, coolant... and tighten every hose before you top it up this time.”

  The driver had already been ribbed to death over his previous efforts.

  “David, stand security. I’ll be back soon, Comrades.”

  Kon dismounted and left his crew to overcome the latest difficulties his tank had thrown at them, both of which were serious enough for him to seek a safe refuge to repair. The enemy artillery was dropping close, but seemed disinterested in the area the T54 was presently sat in, having already worked it over heavily.

  As the tank commander moved through the destruction wrought by the American artillery, he saw the products of the high-speed union of metal and flesh scattered in all directions, the infantry company positioned here at the start of the battle having paid a heavy price.

  Twenty could easily have been forty corpses, as pieces lay close to other pieces, but did not necessarily originate from the same son of Russia.

  A Junior Lieutenant lay wrapped in a blanket, ready to be evacuated although, to Kon, he looked like he had already made his final journey.

  An infantry Captain sat smoking, staring at an imagined object a thousand miles away, clearly in shock, and not functioning.

  His men protected him, failing to report his breakdown, so the whole company, or what was left of it, was commanded by a dirty and bloodied Senior Sergeant from the attached mortar unit.

  “Comrade Starshy Serzhant. Looks like you’ve had a shit time, Comrade. How are your soldiers? Can you hold?”

  Had it not been for the two HSU’s on Kon’s chest, the answer might have been very different, but the NCO realised that the tanker was a serious soldier.

  “Comrade Starshina, I’ve sixty-one still standing, thirty-six’ve been evacuated to the aid station,” the Starshy Serzhant gesticulated at a slightly grander house, apart from the main group that formed Dahlem’s western environs, “And fifty-one unaccounted for or dead.”

  ‘Fifty-one? Fuck!’

  As an ex-artillery officer, Kon could appreciate the work done by that arm of service.

  ‘Poor bastards.’

  He paused long enough for the NCO to know that he appreciated their plight before doing what he had come to do.

  “I’ve got problems with my tank, and my crew must have time to fix it... Comrade...?”

  “Ponichenkarova. Dina Ponichenkarova, Comrade Starshina... and yes, we will hold.”

  The woman slipped the magazine from her PPD and checked its contents simply by weighing the metal in her hands.

  Sliding the magazine back in place, Ponichenkarova took a swig from her water bottle and proferred it to Kon, who was extremely surprised to find it contained water.

  “Thank you, tovarich.

  He reciprocated by sharing his cigarettes as the female NCO explained the defensive position to him, pointing out where the surviving mortars were concealed, something that was wholly necessary as, even when told they were there, Kon could still not see them.

  The position contained two 76.2mm Zis-3 guns, three DSHK heavy machine-guns, and three of the increasingly rare Panzerfaust.

  The tank commander could not help but be impressed by the woman’s calm approach and manner.

  However, he was more impressed by three mugs of something hot that arrived in the hands of an extremely attractive young Junior Sergeant.

  Renata Astafieva handed the scalding coffee to both NCO’s, and started on her own after accepting a cigarette from Kon.

  “How is the ammo, Renata?”

  “Twelve per weapon at the moment, Comrade Ponichenkarova, but I have sent Tania and her tribe back to pick up more. That was ten minutes ago.”

  Kon choked as the hot liquid hit is throat, announcing the presence of something more serious than coffee.

  Astafieva smiled disarmingly.

  “Special brew, Comrade Starshina.”

  “Nice, very nice. Thank you, Comrade Mladshy-Serzhant.”

  The landing of a mortar shell interrupted the calm scene, and all three were back to business immediately.

  More shells followed, betraying increased American interest in their position.

  “I’m afraid that may be because of me, Comrades. Tanks do attract such attention.”

  Ponichenkarova knocked back the last of her drink, drawing an incredulous look from the tanker.

  “Well then, Comrade Kon, perhaps you should be back there, spurring your men to higher efforts in their repair work.”

  Kon searched for humour in the statement but found none. Ponichenkarova was just business, and her business was keeping her troops alive, so getting the lame duck moved was a priority for her.

  Ignoring the burning pain, he finished his own drink and handed the cup back to the pretty young soldier.

  “Spassiba, Comrades. Best of luck.”

  When he got back to the T54, the news was encouraging.

  1334 hrs, Friday, 6th December 1945, Dahlem, Germany.

  “Fire!”

  Ponichenkarova punctuated her command by slapping the back of the DSHK gunner.

  The machine-gun hammered out 12.7mm bullets, and strikes were obvious on the front of the approaching half-track.

  The Zis-3 to her immediate left was already dead, its front shield distorted and displaced by an HE shell. The crew had been swept aside by the same burst.

  The Sherman it had fired at was similarly shattered, although its crew had managed to abandon before the wreck was engulfed in fire.

  All along the defensive positions, weapons fired at the attacking Americans, but less than before.

  The attackers were much nearer already and few seemed to be stopped by the defensive fire.

  Screams drew Ponichenkarova’s attention, and her eyes caught something tossed high as an enemy mortar round found something prepared to explode in turn.

  Immediately, the hardened NCO understood that the ammo party had been hit as it returned.

  The 179th’s mortars would be without ammunition for the foreseeable future, a fact that Astafieva breathlessly arrived to confirm.

  “Shit, fuck and abhorrence! Right, get your mortar crew prepared as my reserve, Renata. Grab all the auto weapons you can find and have them set... there.”

  She pointed at a hollow bordered by low bushes.

  “Any breach in the line... any hole... you go at it immediately. Don’t wait for me to tell you to attack... and don’t give the bastards time to settle, ok?”

  Again, an enemy shell punctuated the exchange, wiping out the other DSHK machine-gun with a direct strike.

  “Once you’ve pushed the Amerikanski out, reform your unit. Now mov
e, Renata, move!”

  The lithe blonde sprang away from the position, returning to the mortars and organising the crews as Ponichenkarova’s fire brigade.

  “Roger, Healthy, wilco.”

  The Shermans had poured fire into the enemy position and the dividends were apparent for Ayres to see, so he had informed Towers.

  “Tombstone-four-six to all Tombstone-four call signs, push now, push now, straight down the track and into ‘em!”

  His senses, as well as Ayres’ report, told him that the enemy was ready to come apart.

  The last enemy anti-tank gun had been destroyed and now decorated the battlefield like some macabre flower, its barrel representing the stem, the trails forming the open bud. The body hanging from the breech played no part, except to add a small patch of scarlet to the scene.

  The men of the 90th closed in as the enemy fire fell in volume.

  Here and there, a GI dropped to the snow, screaming or silent, alive or dead.

  Towers watched as the leading soldiers washed over the Soviet line, taking surrenders in the main but, occasionally, finding resistance.

  A group of infantrymen, supported by two Shermans, rushed forward, heading towards an earthwork fringed with sandbags and crates; obviously a defensive position of importance.

  Opposite and to the left, Towers watched a group of Russians rise up and smash into the doughboys, shooting down a number as they moved forward.

  Colt met Tokarev.

  Garand met Mosin.

  Bayonet met bayonet.

  The American infantry were driven off, and the small group of Soviet soldiers went to ground in and around the bunker.

  A smoke trail reached out from a burning house, narrowly missing the intended target; Ayres’ M4A3E8.

  Head out the turret, Ayres spotted the source, and lashed the spot with.50cal from the turret-mounted weapon.

  “God, but that was fucking close, Preacher.”

  “Amen to that, my Capitano. He watches over us... and don’t blaspheme in my presence, y’hear me now.”