The Fall of Night

by Christopher Nuttall

  Trautman could barely grasp it. Minutes ago, he had been trying to scrape up another infantry unit for EUROFOR; now, he had been plunged into the middle of a shooting war. It was his shame that the closest he had come to a real war had been a peacekeeping mission in the Middle East, before Europe had washed its hands of the whole matter; now, he would be trying to somehow coordinate a response without any means of escape.

  His hand fell to the radio he always carried at his belt. It was jammed. “There’s jamming everywhere,” Montagne reported, as they jogged round a corner into more drab grey soviet-era corridors. Trautman had never liked them; military bases weren’t designed by freethinkers, but the Russians had taken the entire concept to extremes and stamped out any trace of personality. “I think that this is happening everywhere as well.”

  Trautman remembered the spread-out deployment of EUROFOR’s forces and shuddered. He had talked the Poles, several times, out of mobilising their army. If every EUROFOR base was under attack, and he couldn’t see this attack as being anything other than the first moves in a war, the Russians were all-too-likely to get quite far into Poland before they bumped into something that could stop them. How far could they go?

  He shuddered again; Germany still remembered the Russian hordes looting, raping and burning their way across Germany, in the last war. If some of those tales were exaggerated, and Trautman knew enough to know that folk memory often was nothing of the sort, there had still been enough horror for everyone. Was that what life was going to be like again?

  The elevator ahead beckoned him. “Not bloody likely,” Montagne snapped. Trautman remembered, embarrassed, that the power was out. They headed down the stairs and came to a halt as a burst of fire shattered concrete and sent chunks of debris everywhere. Montagne didn’t hesitate; he pulled a grenade off his belt and tossed it down the stairs, the paratroopers crashing down in the wake of the explosion, firing ruthlessly into the smoke. “Move!”

  Trautman had seen carnage before, but the sight of the Russian bodies was something new; they were torn and broken by the force of the grenade. A single Russian was still alive and Montagne shot him, quickly, through the head; Trautman opened his mouth to protest and decided that it wasn't worth the effort. His very survival, and the only chance of organising a counterattack, depended upon his escape from the horror that the camp had become.

  He took a breath; more drab grey corridors, more blank walls, more sense of danger, of imminent threat. Part of him was wondering if it was an endless nightmare, or if he would wake up; the sheer level of detail reminded him constantly that it was no dream. His hand felt sweaty around his pistol; he had to keep reminding himself that it was dangerous and that he couldn’t put it away or drop it. A voice ahead shouted out a challenge in thick French; Montagne shouted back in the same language. Trautman had prided himself on his command of French, but he didn’t recognise the words at all, just the language.

  “Come on,” Montagne hissed. There was another explosion; this time, plaster and dust drifted down from the ceiling. The vehicle bay was empty; his jeep, he remembered now, had been outside with the other official vehicles, and was either useless or in enemy hands. He wondered if they should surrender, if a surrender would be accepted, but how could they offer it in the midst of bloody chaos? It wasn’t possible and he knew it; commando raids tended to have very high casualties because of the chaos.

  He looked up at Montagne. “What’s the plan?”

  Montagne looked around; there were nine paratroopers left. “We’re in the middle of the camp,” he hissed. Trautman hadn’t needed the reminder. “We’re going to have to head to the north side, where the exercise and training facilities are; they have to be at the bottom of the Russian list of priorities. We can’t get to the barracks by now; unless the Russians have forgotten all they knew, they will be targeting the barracks and the armoury and ammunition dump first, along with the vehicles. Once we’re there, we’ll cut our way through the fence and escape into the countryside.”

  He nodded briefly at his men. “Jean, check the side,” he ordered. “Come on, sir.”

  Trautman followed him into the chaos. The camp seemed to be half on fire, half destroyed; the entire place seemed to be in total chaos. A collection of dead bodies, hit and killed by a mortar round or a grenade, lay in front of him as they moved carefully through the smoke, staying low. The sound of firing was drifting over from the eastern side of the camp, the barracks, but the soldiers there would have little in the way of supplies. The European Defence Commission had drawn up the guidelines and Trautman – he cursed himself for a fool – had implemented them; soldiers would not have their weapons unless they were issued from the armoury. The guards were armed, but how long could they hold out alone?

  “Some of the lads will have kept their weapons anyway,” Montagne said, when Trautman broached the subject. He had had a vague idea that they could retake the armoury and issue weapons. “The modern soldier knows that he could be plunged into war instantly and therefore keeps his weapons ready for action, even if it means a week of fatigues if he gets caught at it.”

  Trautman realised that the Sergeants and Military Police must have known…and had said nothing about it. As long as the soldiers weren’t causing problems, and European soldiers were very well disciplined, they would have allowed the forbidden practice to continue; their failure to act might have saved some lives. The firing was starting to weaken, however; Trautman knew what that meant. The defenders were running out of ammunition…and, once it was gone, they would be hacked apart by outraged Russians. The sneak attack meant only one thing; the Russians intended to be merciless.

  A shout, in Russian, brought them back to reality. Montagne fired once, dropping the Russian, and shouted at them to run. Other Russians fired back as Trautman fell to the ground, firing twice towards the shapes in the smoke and haze; he saw flashes of light as the Russians returned fire. The Russians, at least, seemed as surprised as they were to meet them, but they had the advantage in firepower and determination. Laroche was shot four times by a Russian as he struggled to pick some of them off; Trautman shouted in rage as the Frenchman was blown apart, dead in the prime of his life.

  “Sir, get out of here,” Montagne shouted. The tough paratrooper had been hit, badly; blood was trickling from a wound in his arm. Trautman caught up his assault rifle and fired a long burst towards the Russians, knowing that it was his last stand. He didn’t dare be taken alive, not after what the Russians had done to any number of Chechen leaders. They had been forced to broadcast radio messages ordering their people to surrender…and EUROFOR wasn't composed of rogue fanatics. If ordered to surrender, they might just surrender, particularly if he sounded normal. “Sir…”

  A bullet shattered Montagne’s head. Trautman kept firing, seeing Russians everywhere…and then a burning pain flared through his head. There was an instant of pain, and then he hit the ground, dead. Half an hour later, every European in the camp was dead, a prisoner, or fled somewhere into the Polish countryside.

  No warning had been transmitted.

  Chapter Nineteen: A Day That Will Live In Infamy, Take Two

  The art of concentrating strength at one point, forcing a breakthrough, rolling up and securing the flanks on either side, and then penetrating like lightning deep into his rear, before the enemy has time to react.

  Erwin Rommel

  Polish-Belarus Border, Poland

  General Aleksandr Borisovich Shalenko crossed over to Polish territory with a theatrical flourish worthy of George Patton or Douglas Macarthur. The president had understood that his old friend yearned to command the largest military operation in the history of the world, and if he was denied a direct combat command, he would have the pleasure and duty of coordinating the offensive. Around him, thousands of tanks drove onwards into Polish territory, while above him, the streaks of MLRS-launched missiles and jet aircraft lit up the sky.

  A group of Polish prisoners sat in one corner, guarded by a b
ored-looking soldier. Their faces were masks of horror and grief; they had been caught, almost literally, asleep at the switch. A handful of Spetsnaz, wearing Polish uniforms, had entered the customs post and subdued the border guards, almost without firing a shot. The prisoners now stared at the advancing Russian force, their hands firmly secured behind their backs, broken by what they were seeing in front of them. Shalenko ignored them magnificently; their fate had already been decided.

  A massive line of infantry-carrying lorries rumbled past him, carrying Russian soldiers who still seemed a little bemused at going to war. They had been drilled relentlessly for months, but they had never been told why, not until the hurried last-minute briefings that had explained what they were going to do. Some of them had deserted under the sudden news; Shalenko had heard that Russian border guards had shot two men trying to make a break for Poland. If another had managed to make it into Poland, he hadn’t been able to alert the Poles in time to make a difference; there had only been four Polish aircraft in the air when the missiles started to land. They had been swiftly bounced and destroyed by MIG-41 aircraft.

  “General,” Captain Anna Ossipavo said. She was his aide, lover and bodyguard, all rolled into one. No one would take her seriously – sexism was still alive and well in most levels of the Russian hierarchy – until it was too late; even the Black Widow herself hadn’t convinced Russians that sexism was a dangerous weakness. Shalenko suspected that most of her detractors thought she was a lesbian. “I have the first reports from the observation and assault teams.”

  Shalenko turned and smiled. They stood together in the middle of organised chaos. He knew what it all meant; none of the Poles, or even most of his own people, would have a real inking of the truth. Four massive Russian forces were invading Poland, crashing into the Polish borders and their unprepared defences; behind the lines, Russian commandos were ripping apart the Polish command and control centres, hacking the proud Polish Army into a screaming mob of tiny units. Some would break under the pressure, some would fight to the death…it hardly mattered. Isolated, they couldn’t pose a threat, or a problem.

  “Good,” he said. The Battlespace Management System would warn him if anything went seriously wrong, but he still needed the details. “What’s the bad news?”

  “We scored around a seventy percent success rate,” Anna said, seriously. “In several places, the Polish guards were alert and killed most of the assault terms before they could detonate their bombs or launch the attack; those teams either retreated or were wiped out to the last man. A handful of Polish aircraft were launched into the air before the missiles destroyed their airbases; they may pose a threat to our advance. The attack on Warsaw airport more or less succeeded, but an airliner was destroyed on the runway and is now blocking activities.”

  Shalenko shrugged. He hadn’t expected that part of the plan to work. “Remind the team leader…”

  “His deputy, sir,” Anna said. “The team leader was killed in the assault.”

  “Remind the new team leader that if the Poles do manage to mount a counterattack, he is to destroy as much as he can and run,” Shalenko said. There was little point in trying to hold the airport; the Poles had always had an infantry force nearby, and the missiles might not have destroyed or scattered it. If there was a counterattack, the Russians would lose. “And the rest of the news?”

  “We have destroyed or crippled around seventy percent of the deployed Polish armed forces, as well as hitting all of their barracks and bases with missiles,” Anna said. “The strike team that attacked the EUROFOR camp near Warsaw reported complete success, but they had to mortar the barracks; a mixed force of soldiers was holding out and imperilling the success of the operation. Other strike forces have more or less completed their missions; bridges, dams and command centres are in our hands and the Poles are crippled.”

  Shalenko nodded. Tanks were far more powerful than they had been in the days of Stalin, but the price tag was high…and not just in money. The Poles would have ample opportunity to slow his forces if they managed to scrape together the coordination to mount counterattacks; a single destroyed bridge could stalemate the invasion for hours. The lighter tanks, using armour developed by the Americans and stolen from them by the FSB, might find it easier to advance, but they were more vulnerable to heavy weapons. The Americans had thought about the problem of engaging insurgents, not another armoured force.

  He smiled. “And further in?”

  “The assault units that hit Germany and France have reported success as well, although some of them have been lost or at the very least haven’t reported back yet,” Anna said. “The jamming stations have been emplaced and are being used; that’s actually impeding our own operations in some locations, although we still have direct laser links to orbiting communications satellites. The monitors back at Moscow are claiming that ninety percent of the missiles launched at European targets have found their targets, but they’re requesting that we prioritise the surviving targets for attention as soon as possible.”

  “The devil is always in the details,” Shalenko said, as a hail of gunfire echoed out over the horizon. There were countless Polish civilians in the area and he felt a little sympathy for the hell that they were about to go through. They were caught in the path of an invading army and that was hell for civilians, particularly young female civilians. He had made it clear to his men that atrocities would not be tolerated – and the penal units had an endless thirst for men – but the FSB units were only marginally under his command. “What about the radio signal?”

  “It was transmitted on the general bands, all civilian,” Anna said. The message had been pre-recorded by a traitor, the greatest success story that the FSB had had in Poland since the end of the Cold War, a success story so unbelievable that Shalenko had wondered if it was a sting operation. It was amazing what people would do under the threat of having their night time activities revealed to the world. “The message is repeated every ten minutes, in between the jamming; we took out the official radio and other media centres in the opening moments of the offensive. Even if the President has survived our attempt to kill him, he won’t be able to get his message out…and really, what can he say that disagrees with our message?”

  “True,” Shalenko said.

  They watched in silence as assault helicopters flashed overhead, heading for targets within Poland, harrying the remains of the Polish Army and EUROFOR to the point where they would disintegrate. Other armoured thrusts were moving to relieve commandos who had seized targets; a handful of FSB units had already been given the task of securing prisoners before they could be sent back into the wastelands of Siberia. Shalenko didn’t like that solution, but there was little choice; it was that, or else kill them all. The FSB had argued in favour of just that solution, but Shalenko had put his foot down; besides, they might need something to bargain with.

  A young officer came running up to them. “General Shalenko, sir,” he gasped. Captain Vladimir Ivanov was in the best of health; he had had to have run all the way from the helicopter landing pad away from the guard battalion protecting the makeshift base. “We have all of Unit One in position.”

  “Excellent,” Shalenko said. Ivanov was young for his role and seriously under-ranked, not something unusual in Russia, but Ivanov’s role had been critically important. Unit One was not charged with fighting a war, but preventing one…or at least preventing the war that Russia had started from getting out of control. The entire episode had to be handled very carefully. “Come on, Anna; we’re going for a helicopter flight.”

  Anna had protested, of course, but Shalenko have overruled her. It was true that renegade Polish units might be scattered around, and they might have the SAM missiles needed to take down a helicopter, but there was little need to actually panic. Russia controlled the air over Poland, the Russian Air Force was reaching out towards Denmark, Germany and even Norway…what possible threat could there be to one helicopter with two attack helicopters escorting
it?

  Poland was burning. They flew low, but he could still see the fires, the remains of Polish forces that had been caught by surprise by the Russians, or European forces that had been lulled into a false sense of security. Jet aircraft criss-crossed the sky, hunting for the armoured units that the Europeans had dispatched in a desperate attempt to look as if they were Doing Something; when they found a tank, or even a military vehicle, they would take it out with extreme prejudice. The pilot took them even lower as they approached their target, the forces attached to Unit One spaced out around the area, ready and waiting.

  “There are no signs that Polish forces have attempted to seek refuge here,” Ivanov said softly. The sight of the American base was awe-inspiring, even to Shalenko himself, who knew what it all meant. The base was studded with antennas, radar domes, aerials and all manner of systems, some of them capable of tracking aircraft far into Russia. “The only Polish force nearby has been soundly attacked and dispersed into the countryside.”

  Shalenko nodded as the helicopter came to the ground; he scrambled out and pulled his cap on as Anna followed him, one hand on the rifle she had on her back. He kept his head low as he accepted some salutes, before walking up the road towards the American base. Speed was of the essence…despite himself, he was going to enjoy himself. This was payback time.