by Steven Linde
Going Home (rev.23), Soldier Up Book 3
Copyright © 2015 by Steven Linde
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Steven Linde
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Printed in the United States of America
Contents
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty–Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Chapter One
Rear Admiral William ‘Willy’ Walcom had retired from the Navy six months prior to the EMP event. He was newly divorced, with kids grown and on their own, and looking for a new beginning. He picked up everything he owned from Virginia Beach and moved across the country to San Francisco. The event caught him unprepared, still unpacking from the move a week before. He was fortunate: his training alerted him to what needed to be done and carried him through the first week.
His neighbors listened to him, and together they set up a neighborhood defense. The Admiral was lucky to have two retired Marines, one a retired Gunnery Sergeant, the other a Master Sergeant, and both were veterans of the Iraq War. Also among the defense was one retired Army Sergeant Major, who had served his entire career with the 82nd Airborne and saw combat in Iraq, Afghanistan, the first Gulf War, and countless other incursions. His experience lent him to act as the Admiral’s go-to man for neighborhood combat operations.
Tough but fair as always, the Marines undertook training and arming the neighborhood. They led the patrols outside the neighborhood to search for food and medicine, seeing their fair share of combat in the surrounding community.
All of their lives changed one morning when they received a report from the OP about a group of tanks, with canons pointed out in every direction, about two-hundred yards off of their position. “It isn’t funny,” the Marine Gunny told them before adding in, “Shape up.” The guards agreed it wasn’t funny, and it wasn’t. Alarms throughout the neighborhood went out for everyone to man their stations. Combat was imminent. The neighborhood was ready, but everyone knew it was no use against the tanks.
Tanks aren’t quiet; they had to have moved in last night, so how come there were no reports then? How come they hadn’t attacked? As the sun rose, the men in the tanks crawled out of the vehicles and began performing maintenance, cleaning the cannons and restocking supplies and ammo. The people in the neighborhood watched all of this with amazement, and were even more amazed when some of the men waved at them and smiled.
It looked like they had no interest in the people in the neighborhood, but then one of the men from the tanks started walking towards them. He wasn’t armed and was wearing a US Army uniform. As he got closer the Gunny stood up, pointing his weapon at him and ordered him to stop and identify himself. The Soldier responded, “Sergeant First Class Morris Townsend, United States Army, 1st Armored Division.”
“Bullshit,” responded the Gunny.
The SFC looked at the Gunny. “Whatever.” He had heard it time and again. “I only came over to ask if there is anything we can do for you. We’re pulling out shortly, but we have a doc with us, and medicines.”
The Gunny responded, “Good, get the hell out of here.”
The Admiral was standing below the Gunny listening to the conversation, “Wait Gunny, not quite yet. Ask him if they have any insulin.”
The Gunny looked back down at the Admiral for a moment, then turned back to the Soldier. “Y’all got any insulin?”
“Yeah, how much do you need?”
“Seriously?” said the Gunny, knowing they hadn’t been able to find any. The Gunny turned to the Admiral and asked how much.
“Ask him to come in,” said the Admiral. This caught the Gunny by surprise, but he was a Marine and that was the order.
The entire time, members of the tank platoon watched what was going on at the barricade. They then saw their platoon Sergeant walk through an opening in the barricade, escorted by at least two people that they could see. The barricade was made up of cars, so they could stand on the tanks and see what was going on.
This wasn’t the first time this had happened. During the liberation of San Francisco, the Army and Marines had encountered many self-protected neighborhoods; though, most of them had been overrun by the large gangs in the area. The ones that generally survived the weeks and months after the event had military veterans running the show who knew what they were doing, not to mention weapon and combat experience.
An older man, perhaps in his fifties, walked up to the SFC and shook hands. The tankers had turned their attention to the commotion at the barricade.
The Admiral reached out to shake the SFC’s hand “I’m William Walcom.”
SFC Townsend suspected that this was the man in charge. “It’s nice to meet you sir.”
“Sergeant, you said you’re from the Army, can I see some ID please?” asked the Admiral.
SFC Townsend slowly reached into his back left pocket and pulled out his wallet and flipped it open, revealing his military ID. He pulled it out and handed it to the Admiral, who studied it then handed it over to the Sergeant Major.
“Where are you out of?” asked the Sergeant Major.
“Fort Irwin,” replied SFC Townsend.
“Who’s the post commander?” The Sergeant Major was clearly quizzing the Soldier, trying to determine if he was real or not.
“Major General Watkins, he’s responsible for all U.S. military forces.”
“No shit!” said the Sergeant Major. “How’s the old goat doing?”
“He’s doing well; He’s currently at Camp Parks with Colonel Clayton.”
The Sergeant Major also recognized the n
ame Clayton. “Colonel Clayton, is that the Special Forces Colonel Clayton, the CO of 19th SF?”
“Yes Sergeant Major, one and the same.”
“Sergeant, would you excuse us for a moment please?” asked the Sergeant Major. SFC Townsend nodded. The Sergeant Major signaled to the Admiral and the Gunny to come with him for a moment. The three men stepped away out of earshot of the Sergeant.
The Sergeant Major spoke first. “As far as I can tell it’s all real. I know the General, and Colonel Clayton is a living legend in the Special Operations community.”
The Admiral nodded. “What do you think they want?”
The Gunny looked at both the Sergeant Major and the Admiral. “Let’s ask.”
As the men returned to SFC Townsend, and the Admiral asked, “What’s going on with the operation?”
“Sir, may I ask who you are?”
The Admiral thought for a moment. “I’m Admiral Walcom, recently retired.”
SFC Townsend snapped to attention and saluted, and the Admiral returned the salute. This convinced him that it was all real: a fraud would not have done that, and possibly not even known to do that. “Sir,” SFC Townsend began, “I’m sure the General will be happy to see you!”
“Why do you say that, Sergeant?”
“Sir, the scuttlebutt is that he’s been looking for a naval commander.” This caught the Admiral by surprise. SFC Townsend continued, “Who are these other gentleman with you, if I may ask?”
The Admiral introduced the Gunny, Master Sergeant and Sergeant Major. SFC Townsend replied, “The Marines will be happy to see them too! And we have the 184th Infantry Regiment (Airborne), who I would think would be real happy to see the Sergeant Major.”
Their heads were swimming with these new revelations. “Sergeant, would you mind clarifying the situation in the AO?” asked the Admiral.
For the next fifteen minutes, SFC Townsend gave a quick down and dirty summary of what had happened at Camp Parks and then Fort Irwin, and overall combat operations. The men had to sit down and take it all in. This was all fantastic news. They knew their military wouldn’t let them down, it was all of matter of time.
“Sir, do you mind if we contact the General?” asked SFC Townsend.
“Not at all, Sergeant.”
“Sir, could we bring the tanks in closer so it would be easier for you to talk to him?”
The Admiral was confused. How was he going to talk to him? All communications had been knocked out. “You can bring the tanks in, Sergeant, but how am I going to talk to the General? Will he be coming out?”
“Over the radio, Sir, and I suspect he would come over, he’s out and about all the time.”
The Master Sergeant chimed in “You have working radios?”
“Yes, many of the older radios we found worked fine. Most had some sort of EMP shielding built into them.”
SFC Townsend turned and signaled for the tanks to be brought in. The platoon had the tanks at the barricade within ten minutes, and five minutes later SFC Townsend was on the radio to the rear. He was able to relay a message back to the General with the names of the Admiral, Sergeant Major, Master Sergeant and Gunnery Sergeant. Ten minutes later the General was on the radio requesting to speak with the Admiral.
The Admiral had to climb into the tank, a first for him. He couldn’t believe five men lived in here. Sergeant Townsend handed the radio mic over to the Admiral and exited the tank. Fifteen minutes later, the Admiral exited the tank and told the Sergeant Major, “Alright gentlemen, we need to get everything ship shape. Our new boss is on his way out!”
Chapter Two
When the EMP event hit San Diego, California, it threw the entire city into chaos. Lucky for San Diego, most cities didn’t carry the heavy military presence it did, with its Navy and Marine Corps bases. Much of the military equipment that the Navy used was immediately useless, having no way to contact ships already deployed out to sea. Any ship that used nuclear propulsion was immediately disabled; there were no meltdowns, as the reactors were built in the event of an EMP or solar flare to shut down gracefully. The ships’ computers were all fried, meaning that all modern ship navigation systems were disabled. Almost every aircraft that the Navy and Marines had was also disabled.
The event happened on a weekend in the middle of the night, and at least half of the officers, NCO’s, and enlisted lived off post. Many didn’t live near the base they served at, instead living in East County San Diego, twenty to thirty miles away. Once the Base Commanders realized it was a national emergency, they locked down the bases and immediately began evaluating the situation.
The bases consisted of Naval Base San Diego (32nd Street), homeport to sixty ships which were more or less boat anchors now; North Island Naval Air Station in Coronado, California, which was now formerly home to aircraft carriers; Amphibious Base in Coronado, California, home of BUDs (SEAL) Training and various SEAL teams. There was also the Navy’s mothball fleet in San Diego Bay, as well as the Marine Pendleton in Oceanside, California, and Marine Corps Air Station in Miramar, California.
Commanders hurried to get head counts. They also wanted to know how much food and water was available. Once that was done, every single military vehicle was started or attempted. Many, if not most, of the Humvees started, which was good news. When they found a vehicle that would crank but wouldn’t start, they jump started that vehicle using one of the running Humvees, and had a fairly high success rate. Of course all of the old 2.5 ton trucks ran with no problem at all. The newer Buffalos were a hit and miss.
The Marines, on the other hand, had a lot more vehicles to check out. Most of the M1A1’s and M1A2’s started with little to no problems. The LAV’s started, as well as the AAV’s. They were looking good. The Marines had infantry, armor, and artillery at Camp Pendleton, but their problem was that they depended on the Navy to give them a lift everywhere they needed to go. Since all of the ships that could carry them were no longer functional, they were tied geographically to Oceanside and areas around San Diego. There was also the issue of fuel for these vehicles. They had a great deal of fuel on post, which would last them for some time. However, no one at this time knew for sure for how long.
They needed to make the most out of what they had, since there was no more fuel coming anytime soon as far as they knew. Any refineries were located in Long Beach and Los Angeles, and no one knew what was going on up there. They were discussing securing the fuel in the service stations and pumping it out, then transporting it back to base for safe keeping. Many of their generators still ran, so they were fortunate that way.
During the first week of the event, the bases went on lockdown inventorying and consolidating. When possible, they retrieved Sailors and Marines, as well as their families who were off post. Commanders also had to now directly deal with the growing number of family members on post. This was a deal breaker for the Sailors and Marines: if commanders wanted them to stay, their families had to be taken care of. They certainly could have ordered them to stay, but in the greater scheme of things they still would have left to take care of their families.
Roving patrols throughout each base were established. Weapons with ammunition were issued and permission was given to use. This was done because on the second week the bases were being breached by civilians looking for food and weapons, or in some cases just weapons. Several Sailors were hurt, and two killed, when it first started happening on the naval bases. When it started to happen on the Marine Corps bases, the civilians who fought back were either beaten or killed. The Marines took a lot tougher stance on the situation from the beginning; for the Navy, there was going to be a learning curve.
On the second week, the bases in Coronado were in contact with the base on 32nd street. The problem was the command structure wasn’t clear cut: each base had its own commander, each ship had its own, and each Navy group had its own, and so on. In some cases, the command structure was back east. At the end of the second week there had been quite a bit of infighting wit
hin the Navy over who was running what. The various commanders, Navy and Marine, got together to decide who was going to be overall in charge. For the Marines, the Senior Commander at Camp Pendleton was Lieutenant General Walter P. Charkin of the I Marine Expeditionary Force, which includes the 1st Marine Division commanded by Major General Alfred “Ally” Larkin.
The Senior Commander for the Navy was Admiral Timothy “Timmy” Meyer, who outranked the Marine Senior Commander by a Star, which was a relief to the Navy. Even if the Marine Corps Commandant had been in town at the time of the event, tradition was that the Navy Senior Commander outranked the Marines, unless of course by order of the President.
On the last day of the second week, the Navy and Marines met to hammer out the new chain of command for the time being, at least until the relevant commanders could be contacted in Washington D.C. There weren’t a lot of fireworks at the meeting, for they needed to know who was ultimately responsible for West Coast Operations of the Navy and Marine Corps. There was no Army or Air Force that they were aware of.
The decision was quick as there were no other four stars more senior than Admiral Meyer. The Marines insisted that regardless of rank, the second in command must be a Marine, even if that required a promotion. The Navy brass actually agreed with them, and went with Lieutenant General Charkin, the Senior Marine on the West Coast. From there it was decided that Admiral Meyer’s staff would be equally represented between Navy and Marines. With that said, the Navy side could create their own chain of command within the Navy framework, and so could the Marines. Everyone was in agreement.