"You see, you are lighter, faster, and better if you use their strength against them and your own ability and weapons to your advantage. Rizzo was a perfect example of how much work is needed to get you into fighting shape. And so begins your real training."
Six months later.
The camp at Naples had expanded tenfold since they arrived, and it was just one of many such troop concentrations which had developed since the new war began. Taylor was walking back to the mess halls from morning exercises when a fresh armoured regiment rolled in. He stood and watched for a few minutes as dozens of armoured vehicles rolled on past. Many were brand new. Others were heavily modified and older. Eventually, he recognised one of the tank commanders on top of one of the vehicles passing him.
"Becker!"
Captain Lukas Becker, and in much better shape than when we last met.
The German Captain looked down and instantly knew Taylor. He spoke into his radio ordering his driver to pull over and out of the column.
"Colonel now?" he asked.
He jumped down from his tank and embraced Taylor with a hug. He could still never get used to such European mannerisms but accepted it as the sign of friendship it was.
"And you, still a Captain. I thought you'd be in charge of the regiment by now."
"I could have perhaps come close to it, but that is not the life for me. Let me worry about my own crew, and that'll do just fine."
"You must be one of the old men of the regiment now."
"Yes, a veteran of more battles than I care to remember, but not as many as you."
"Any news on when all this kicks off?"
"No, but it can't be long now. Every unit I have contact with has been moving to the southern coastline. You may be able to go by air, but much of our armour will have to go by sea."
"So will a lot of our infantry, I'm guessing. With this large a force, we simply won't have enough aircraft for everyone. I'm glad to see you made it through all this and are still fighting on. Last time I saw you, I thought you looked ready to pack it all in.”
"Yes, I was, but the enemy had other ideas."
"Well, I'm glad to have you with us."
"Likewise," he said, climbing back onto his tank.
"I'll see you around, Colonel."
He gave a casual salute as the tank rolled on to join the seemingly endless column. Jones appeared at Taylor's side and had just caught sight of Becker as he left.
"Sending German armour to North Africa? Didn't work so well last time."
Taylor had to laugh.
"I wouldn't remind him of that."
"We must be close now."
"Yep, I guess another day or two, and we'll be ready to move."
Just as he said it, a voice came over the loudspeakers mounted around the base.
"All senior officers report to the briefing room, immediately."
"I guess this could be it."
Taylor's hunger from a busy morning completely subsided at the realisation they might finally have news. They rushed to the large briefing room that had been established at the centre of the base. Over fifty officers had assembled, and Commander Phillips stood on the stage with several other higher-ranking officials. Chief among them was General Schulz. Taylor hadn't seen him since the first war had ended, but they seemed to have settled their differences back then. Schulz stood up to address them.
"At 2100 hours tomorrow Operation Freedom will begin. That is the operation to take the fight to the enemy!”
Cheers rang out. Few wanted to have to fight, but all wanted to see and know that an end was in sight. He lifted up his hand to call for silence.
“At 2100 hours the infantry forces stationed here, as well as along many other bases throughout the Mediterranean, will set off for designated landing sites in North Africa. Their deployment will be timed to land just hours before a massive beach landing of armour and additional forces. Be under no illusions, this will be the greatest military operation in the history of the World.”
The room fell silent as they took in his words.
“Operational details will be handled at Company and Battalion level and is being organised and dispersed presently. Tomorrow it all begins, and it does not stop until we have seized absolute victory. These bastards have occupied our lands long enough. Let’s take them back. I want all of you to rest easy tonight and be ready for the road that lies ahead. That’ll be all.”
They all exited the room in a stunned state. All thought of the day to come and knew they wouldn’t sleep that night.
“You really think this is it?” asked Jones.
“Yes. We’ve given those boys all the training we can. We have amassed all the forces we can. It’s time to move.”
“You think it’ll be enough.”
“Sure, why not? We fought the first war on their terms in their time. This time we do it on ours.”
The night passed slowly with little sleep for any of them. Everyone knew the time was nigh. Some hoped for a delay, but most wanted it to begin now. The fact they had to go to the enemy was certain. It was time to get it over and done with. When the sun rose, the camp was eerily quiet. There was no time left for training. They were the best prepared they could be.
At 2000 hours the megaphone sounded. The Battalion had been sitting in the warmth of the evening outside their billets, coffee and tea their only comfort.
"All personnel to begin boarding and prepare for take off."
Taylor looked down at his watch.
"The ships must already be at the coast by now."
"Then let's hope that armour gets ashore."
They had poured over intelligence gathered from the enemy positions for weeks and months, and now it was time to finally act.
I only hope we’re right about it all.
"Let's move!"
The order was carried on down the line, as the base was becoming a sudden hive of activity. He strode for Eddie’s copter, knowing the pilot was always waiting to be his personal pilot. It brought him a sense of security to have Eddie at the controls. They had been shot down and gone through hell together more than a few times, but they always survived.
As he climbed aboard, he looked down at his Mappad to study the area one last time. The allied landings would be taking place along the coast of Tunisia from Gabes to Tripoli, but their job was to go beyond in the largest airborne operation in history.
Chapter 11
Gabes,another city I’ve never heard of, despite spending weeks preparing anoperation there, Taylor thought.
He'd poured over photos and maps to the extent he felt he was intimately familiar with the land.
"Two minutes!" said Rains.
Anti-aircraft pulses burst in the sky before them and were increasing at a rapid rate. The massive aerial offensive was hopefully enough to hold back their air power. For the Battalion and all the others in the sky, they could only wait and hope. He couldn't see anything from his seat, but neither did he want to. Their time finally came.
"Thirty seconds!"
"Line up!" ordered Taylor.
They were all glad to be getting out of the copter. They'd rather face the enemy themselves than wait to be blown out of the sky. Their job was to secure the land north of Gabes, a narrow patch corridor between the salt lake Chott el Jerid and the sea. It was the opposite end of the offensive to where the ruins of the K'til lay, but he knew it was vitally important until they had secured a beachhead.
There’ll be plenty of time yet to find Demiran.
He counted down on his watch as they all stood and approached the door.
"Good luck to you all," he said through comms.
Several nodded in agreement. Jones was first at the door. Taylor was halfway down the line with Jafar at his back. The green light at the door lit up, and Jones leapt without hesitation. The rest of the platoon followed him. As Taylor reached the door, he realised how dark the area was. There was no lighting on the ground. The moon provided minimal amounts. Only the
enemy pulses and explosions provided streaks and bursts around them.
He stopped at the door for only a second and jumped. The copters had been flying at just over two hundred metres from the dusty surface, so it was a quick descent. His boosters lit up the space beneath him as they dropped. It quickly become apparent they were landing right on top of a complex system of enemy trenches which had not shown up in any of their intelligence reports and satellite imagery. He could only assume they covered it by day, but there was no time to worry about that now.
Pulses raced up at them from the enemy positions below, and far more fire was sent down from the airborne as they descended. Inter-Allied, and Italian forces from 3rd and 4th Mechanized Infantry formed their 5th Brigade. It was the first time the Italians had seen combat, but Taylor was confident they would hold their own.
He was approaching a Mech at high speed, despite his boosters slowing him rapidly. The creature was firing up at several of his comrades. He opened fire with his rifle and got off three shots before landing on top of the alien. His weight smashed it off its feet. He quickly got up and could see his shots had killed it before he’d even landed.
A quick assessment of his surroundings found he stood inside thick concrete-like trenches. They were three metres wide by two deep, tall enough so that he could not see out over the top. He jumped up onto the body of the Mech to get some view all around. As he did so, he caught a glimpse of an enemy Mech advancing around a bend in the trench, but before he could respond, gunfire ripped into the soldier. He looked up. Jafar was above the trench and firing in.
Gunfire sounded all around; more of theirs than the enemy. Jafar jumped down in the trench to his side.
"Why the hell didn't we know about these positions?" Taylor asked.
Jafar seemed as baffled as him. Several of Jones' platoon joined him.
"All right, let's sweep and clear."
He lifted up his rifle and continued on down the line. The first thing they encountered were three Mechs firing over the trench line at the incoming friendlies. They fired several bursts, moving in on the aliens, killing them before they could respond.
"At least it looks like we did actually catch them by surprise. Thanks to you, no doubt," he said to Jafar. He’d been instrumental in their counter-intelligence operations leading up to the invasion.
They continued north along the line of defences and found little resistance until they reached the farthest point of the trenches looking out north. Taylor reached for a flare from his webbing and fired it up into the sky. They saw open barren land for as far as the light extended.
The gunfire in their location was already calming down, but they could hear the battle raging a few kilometres away at the coastline. Jones finally found the Colonel and had a look of utter shock about him.
"Surely it can't be this easy?"
"No, it can't, and it won't be. We could have attacked anywhere, so they would have had to spread thin to defend the borders and coastline. Now they know we're here, they'll come for us with everything they've got."
"How long do you think we have?" asked Jones.
"Not long at all. This is where they'll hit us. Get our anti-tank guns deployed along this line, and find out how the beach operations are going."
Jafar stood silently, looking out into the pitch-black wasteland to the north.
"Maybe we did hit them with overwhelming numbers. They must be weakened from the fight in the east. "
"Yes, they are, but not finished, Charlie."
"No, never underestimate a wounded animal."
They waited in the trenches for an hour before Jones received solid information.
"Most of the beaches have been taken, supply lines are being established, and the armour should be with us within a few hours."
"Then let's hope that's soon enough."
As he said it, they heard the sound they feared the most, heavy tracks from an armoured column advancing from the north.
"They better be quick!" yelled Taylor, lifting his binoculars and switching to night vision. Across the open flat plain, he could just make out the vehicles which were over ten kilometres out and merely silhouettes at present."
"How long do we have?" asked Taylor.
"Maybe twenty minutes."
"Get those guns ready!"
There was nothing more to do but wait for the enemy and await reinforcement. They carried magnetic mines for taking on the tanks if the trenches were over run, but all prayed they would not have to use them. The time seemed to pass quickly. Taylor sat beside one of the portable anti-tank weapons they had brought with them. It was as large as a man and needed two to carry it. They had just a dozen of the weapons within the Brigade.
"Concentrate fire on the two targets given. I want them to think we're punching above our weight," he said into his comm.
"Six guns on two vehicles?" asked Jones.
"I'd rather be sure to nail two than risk spreading our fire. They need to think we've got a lot more here than we have."
"You don't think we can hold against them?"
"Not without armour, no. I can see dozens of tanks heading our way, and I bet there are many more en route."
"How about the airborne armour?"
"It's nowhere to be seen, is it?"
"Bugger."
They had entered into range. Taylor looked down the trench, and the troops were almost shoulder-to-shoulder.
"Fire!" he yelled.
The six guns fired almost in perfect synchronisation. He looked through his binoculars to see one smashed by the fire with two holes having direct hits on the centre of its hull. The other vehicle seemed to brush off the fire and kept moving.
"Shit," he whispered to himself. "Reload!"
The crews were already well ahead of him.
"All fire to be directed on previous target."
The first enemy tanks opened fire and pulses smashed into the ground before and after Taylor's trench.
"Fire!"
The salvo struck the enemy tank, five out of the six shots landed, crippling the vehicle immediately. Smoke belched from its cracked hull.
"Reload and fire in your own time."
Two more of the enemy vehicles fell soon after, but they were now within a kilometre of the trenches and showed no signs of stopping. The intensity of the bombardment was increasing, and dozens of casualties were being reported in the nearby positions alone.
"God save us if they reach here," said Jones.
Taylor pulled out one of the magnetic charges, but it seemed a near hopeless situation if it came to the point of using it. He hunkered down to the trench edge and held the mine ready to deploy. The ground began to shake as they approached.
"Five hundred metres!" warned Jones.
Then their hearts almost stopped as lights flashed to the east, and the cannon fire rang out. Taylor could see a tank regiment approaching and firing with everything they had. He turned back to the battlefield. Half a dozen enemy vehicles were smashed beyond recognition in the initial salvo. Cheers rang out across the trench lines as the enemy advance ground to a halt.
The battle raged on for two hours amongst the armour. They could do little but appreciate the cover they had inherited and hunker down to wait for it all to be over. By midnight, all had gone quiet, and both sides began to settle in till morning. It was just half an hour into the peacefulness when Jones got out his stove and began to brew up. Taylor smiled as he propped himself up against a trench wall nearby. The excitement of the initial attack was over. For once they had gotten it easy.
"Jafar thinks they'll be falling back through the night," he said.
"I would if I were them. They must have spread themselves thin over thousands of kilometres of shoreline. We're closing in on them now. They must know the end is in sight."
"And yet they still came. They came to Earth with too little, too late," replied Taylor.
"They didn't come for a stand up fight at all, remember. They're trying to survive us, n
ot the other way around."
It was true, and for the first time Taylor was starting to realise how scared they must be, just as they had been in the first war.
"I want Demiran before this is over."
"You and the rest of the world, Mitch."
"No, he's rightfully ours. I want to see that son of a bitch bleed, and I want to see him die at the hands of one of ours."
"We usually get pushed to the front, so there's a good chance of it."
"Chance? That’s not good enough."
"There is a way of finding him."
The two of them were shocked to hear Jafar's voice. It came from up over the trench into the darkness that divided them from the enemy. He jumped down from the edge into the trench. They were both glad his abilities were put to good use with them, as he was a league apart from the regular Mech infantry.
"Go on," said Taylor.
"I know the way he thinks, and I know the way he plans. If I could get a view of their positions, in maybe just an hour or two, I'd know."
"But they must surely be moving constantly."
"If you could get me overhead of the K'til and the positions they have setup there, I could identify Demiran's location by morning."
"But how long would he be wherever you find him?" asked Jones.
"A day, maybe two."
"It could be enough."
"We can't move anywhere without orders."
"Armoured divisions will be heading north at first light. Our job here is done. We'll be heading southeast to take on the main force," replied Taylor.
"Well, probably, but not like we know for sure."
"Sure enough," he said, turning to Jafar.
"So with a little time of aerial surveillance, you reckon you can find him?"
Jafar nodded.
"I can't get you much. Rains is probably crazy enough for it, and one of the only pilots who would do so without asking questions."
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