by Andy Farman
Major Venables ears were still ringing but his eyesight was back when the Bn CP sent their query via Ptarmigan. Both armoured ambulances were now burning, and he typed a quick sitrep, estimating the enemy numbers at 12 to 16.
“Colonel Sir!” Pat Reed turned from reading Venables reply,
“Yes Sarn’t Major?”
“All stations have acknowledged with the exception of our 9 Platoon, their CP is closest to the penetration point.”
With 9 Platoon l CP out of the loop there was but two ways to get messages to the remainder of that platoon, either by radio or by runner, and he was not going to risk anyone’s life to friendly fire by sending a man with a message.
“Break radio silence, tell all stations we believe that the intruders are in the area of 9 Platoon CP, I want a shermouli put up from 7 Platoons lines, then its watch and shoot at anything not in a trench, ok?” He next turned to the battalion MFC.
“Lance Sarn’t Cornish, your tubes have all individual positions registered, yes?” The MFC nodded.
“Yes sir…do you want 9 Platoon’s CP stonked?”
“Perhaps, but not until I say so, I would like visual confirmation that it has been overrun by the enemy first.”
Team Five’s commander did not have to crawl past any of the platoons trenches in order to get close enough to identify where the landline ran to, it was positioned slightly further to the rear than the position they had come from, and over to the left. Once the small arms fire had petered out she’d ordered the rest of the teams to pair up and stalk the NATO fighting positions. There had been twenty Spetznaz troopers on this mission, and they were down to eleven already. She was now lying in a shell crater with two of her own team, with just one defence platoon trench between her and their goal when the handheld para-illum went up. All three hunched in the mud when they heard the ‘whoosh’ made by the small rocket, and each closed their shooting eye to preserve their night vision. The commander squirmed onto her back, laying down her British SA-80 on her stomach and extracting a steel mirror from a breast pocket, and another two grenades’ from an ammunition pouch. She had done this drill for real once before in Chechnya and before that many times with first dummy, and then live grenades.
Poking the small mirror above ground with her left hand, she gripped the first grenade tightly in her right whilst one of her men pulled its pin out. The small parachute flare was now lighting up this area of the battlefield, and her other troops, but she ignored all else but the identifying of the trench. She had to open both eyes to find the trench and judge the distance, then after a moment's pause she lobbed the grenade backwards over her head and immediately grasped the second grenade. Her trooper pulled the pin on that also and she lobbed it after the first, before rolling over and fixing her bayonet to the NATO rifle and pulling another grenade from the pouch. Both grenades landed in the British trench, but the first was scooped up by a young Guardsman and thrown to the rear, he hadn’t seen where it came from, and unfortunately he didn’t see the second one arrive either.
With her eyes squeezed tight to try and restore some of her lost night vision, the team commander waited for the shermouli to fizzle out, and then she was up and running, with her troopers in firing positions to give cover if needed. The old Wehrmacht bunker had been built with observation slits, but these had been left covered with earth after its re-discovery. The sappers had cleared away the earth from the steps leading down to its entrance but removed the rusted steel door, lest it trap its new occupants inside.
With the detonation of the two grenades nearby, RSM Stone picked up his SLR, fixed bayonets and moved quickly over to the entrance, ducking under the inner blackout, a trailers tarpaulin, and then moved aside the blanket hanging down beyond it. There was just enough light getting around the corners of the tarpaulin for him to see a figure rushing down the concrete steps. He was holding his rifle by the pistol grip with his right hand; the butt was tucked under his armpit, muzzle and bayonet pointing down. He paused, taken aback on seeing the pretty face of the girl on the stairs, dressed in British uniform.
Still hampered by the lack of full night vision, the team commander did not see the big British soldier until she was almost on top of him. Bringing up the SA-80 she aimed from the hip one handed and pulled the trigger, but nothing happened.
Barry Stone did not comprehend the danger until she made that threatening move, but then she was thrusting the weapon forwards, stabbing him in the upper body and trying to push him back through the curtain, to make a gap she could throw the grenade through. The RSM was off balance, and she had the advantage of height, but as he went backwards he brought up the SLRs muzzle. It had become so heavy, so suddenly, thought the RSM. There was a fire in his chest and he couldn’t get his breathe, but he gritted his teeth and thrust forward as hard as he could, spearing his attacker in the stomach. She screamed in agony, dropping the jammed rifle and grenade to grasp the blade with both hands, trying to force it out of her body. The grenades spring-arm flew free; allowing the spring-loaded striker to fly down inside the fuse assembly onto the percussion cap and the five-second fuse began to burn.
RSM Stones strength was failing fast, pierced through the heart he no longer had the strength to hold the rifle and his right leg gave way, staggering backwards into the blanket and tarpaulin, which tore away from their securing nails.
Jim Popham spun around when he heard the woman scream, in time to see RSM Stone pull away the blackouts and fall to one knee. The next thing his consciousness registered was a hand grenade bounce down the stairs and into the bunker’s interior. He heard himself shout the warning.
“Grenade!” and launched himself across the room towards it, but the RSM first steadied himself with a hand on the bunkers wall, and then pushed himself forwards, landing on top of the grenade, smothering it with his body.
At 0600, with no coded ‘Success’ message being received by waiting signal's intelligence across the river, the tempo of the artillery barrage increased dramatically. Rocket artillery that had stood down lest its less accurate fire hamper the Special Forces mission now re-joined the effort. Six batteries of tube artillery which had so far played no part in softening up the targets in this sector, opened up on the Guards, 82nd Airborne, Light Infantry and the Argyll’s with specialised munitions carrying Nerve Agents, Blister Agents and hallucinogenic LSD compounds, began to burst on the western bank.
Geilenkirchen AFB, Germany: 0610hrs, same day.
Less well known than the larger USAF airbase in Germany, Geilenkirchen AFB, thirteen miles north of Aachen was the home of NAEWF, NATO airborne early warning force in Europe. 93rd Air Control Wing had six of its converted Boeing 707, JSTARS airframes there, flown in from Robins AFB in Georgia when war looked imminent. They and the multi-national E-3 AWAC force, including aircraft and crews from 552nd Air Control Wing out of Tinker AFB, Oklahoma, were running around the clock missions, controlling strike and air superiority missions. Eavesdropping on enemy radio traffic, snooping on enemy movements in the air and on the ground, plus electronic warfare were their tasks.
Three E-3 Sentry’s were up, two up and one back in reserve, should anything happen to either of the two other valuable AWAC aircraft. An equal number of JSTARS E-8s were aloft, and that meant the ground crews had their work cut out keeping the on-board systems and the aircraft themselves, serviceable.
The technicians working on the aircraft systems at the individual dispersal’s heard a single shot, coming from over on the perimeter. The shot was answered by another, and another. There had been a number of phantom fire fights on the perimeter since the war had started; nervous sentries killing shadows, usually preceded by noises in the undergrowth as the wildlife went about its nocturnal business. The first time it had happened the technicians had rushed to their stand-to positions, swapping circuit testers and spanners for M-16s, but now they merely glanced toward the sound of gunfire and then got back to their tasks. The firing ended, as usual, and silence returned to the pre
-dawn setting.
Ten minutes later the outline of the woods from where the firing had been were illuminated from behind by a bright light, a second or two later the sound of the explosion reached the nearest group of ground crew. They stopped what they were doing and stared off toward the woods, wondering what was going on, the base alarms had not sounded so they conjectured that a stray round may have hit something, their breath fogging in the frosty air as they whispered, and hey, wasn’t there a Patriot site over that way?
The reverberations died away and the sound was replaced by that of engines coming from the flight line and further along the perimeter, the first vehicles to race past were armoured Humvees, disappearing into the wood. The second vehicles could be heard but not seen, a pair of Bradley fighting vehicles outside the perimeter, following the fence toward the wood.
Senior NCOs put an end to the idle gossip, hustling the men and women back to work on the airframes, engines and systems. There was more work to be done than there were warm bodies to do it, and another two aircraft had reported problems which had to be fixed before they saw any sack time.
The NCOs did not get their wish, both Bradleys exploded as they ran over bar mines laid only a half hour before, and shoulder launched anti-tank weapons took care of the Humvees. The ground crews hesitated, they did not need audible alarms to tell them something was now seriously amiss, but they weren’t trained infantry either, they were standing in the open and clearly visible in the night sight of the gun group which had just set up on the woods edge, a moment later the gun opened fire.
Wizard Zero Four had been on-station for seven hours, flying a monotonous racetrack pattern over the Upper Harz mountains. They had little to do in regard to interceptions, few aircraft were up apart from their opposite numbers, A-50s and the older Mainstays, brought back into service to make up for the losses in the A-50 fleet. The JSTARS and AWAC had a close co-operation, feeding one another information, but it had been mainly one way, AWAC vectoring in strike aircraft against positions on the ground identified by JSTARS as viable targets. At 0547hrs however, that all changed.
“Wizard Zero Four, this is Bloodhound One Eight.”
Zero Four’s senior controller answered the JSTARS SC. “This is Wiz, go ahead Bloodhound…got some business for us?”
“’Hound, giving you a heads up on something developing down there. Lots of attacks on unit command elements, they scored big against us in the Haldensleben area and at Bernburg on the Saale River; took out a couple of brigade and battalion CPs.”
“Wiz, roger that…you want to qualify ‘a couple’ ‘Hound?”
“’Hound, one brigade CP for sure, maybe two, and three battalion command posts for certain, could be five but they are still trying to re-establish communications and get a handle on things. Lots a’places got hit by throw-away units but most got beat off…standby Wiz…Wiz we got ground traffic heading in from rear areas toward them two places and three more besides. I’m guessing the other three are diversionary attacks.”
Wizard Zero Four’s senior controller’s attention was called to tracks appearing on the eastern edge of his monitor.
“Wiz, check your air defence screen ‘Hound, we got lots of fast movers comin’ west. Wiz out.”
There were indeed ‘lot’s’ coming their way, four Regiments of interceptors had formed up at 30,000 feet, topped off their tanks and climbed to 40,000 feet before going to burner and heading towards Wizard Zero Four, Bloodhound One Eight and their escorts. An equal number were racing toward the other flight of JSTARS and AWAC aircraft.
The airborne control platforms turned west, calling for help whilst their escorts swung east and started looking for targets.
NATO scrambled fighters but the Red Air Force was not hanging around, they overwhelmed the escorts and carried on west, Wizard Zero Four’s operators could see that they were in serious trouble. Both of the big Boeings had been heading west in company, they now split and began emergency descents, looking for ground clutter to hide in until the cavalry arrived.
Wizards operators were gulping furiously, trying to make their ears pop with the radical pressure changes when the automated systems began discharging chaff and flares, they didn’t do that unless the aircraft were already locked up. With 10,000 feet to go before they got into a valley, an Archer missile scored on them, flying into the starboard inner and blowing the whole wing off, and Wizard Zero Four fell onto the town of Holzminden.
Il-76 transports followed in the wake of the next force to go west, this force was tasked with the deadly task of SAM suppression, and without the E-3 Sentry’s to tell them what was coming, or to guide their missiles, the NATO batteries had to fire up their own radars, and the attrition began.
Colonel General Alontov struggled with the weight of his parachutes and equipment as he hooked himself up and checked the parachute of the man in front of him. Behind him another paratrooper did the same for him, as they readied themselves for their second combat jump of the war. His Division’s task was not entirely dissimilar to their last mission, two brigades would cut the NATO supply lines at different points, whilst the third would secure the western bank of the Elbe. After Leipzig he had reorganised the Division for this mission, the green replacements all went into the third brigade, where he left a hardcore of experienced men. The survivors of Leipzig formed the first and second brigades, they had the hardest tasks, seizing Helmstedt and Braunschwieg, the toughest, where four autobahns came together. He of course would be jumping into Braunschweig, along with his Spetznaz company 21 miles from Helmstedt and 37.7 miles as the crow flies, from the bridgehead at Haldersleben.
When he had been told of this plan to cross the Elbe and Saale, he had been offered his choice of the two available divisional tasks that the soviet airborne forces had been given, and as he did not want to sacrifice a third of his men, he had chosen this one. The airborne division of 2nd Guards Shock Army would be dropping to their south, at Bernburg, Eisleben and way west into Belgium, beaters to flush SACUER into the sights of the gun line.
The brigade going to Belgium could be written off, there would be no attempt made to resupply it.
Looking out through the nearest port he saw the first flakes of snow whipping past in the turbulence.
Snow when it should be Spring! The Russian shivered inwardly, what have we brought upon ourselves?
Lt Col Reed accepted the news of his RSMs death without comment, he nodded to the signaller who had brought the sad tidings and went about the business of running the unit.
The resumption of the enemy incoming had been mainly airbursts, no doubt designed to kill any NATO troops above ground engaged in hunting down the Spetznaz troops who had infiltrated the lines. It didn’t bode well for the enemy soldiers; any that had not been in shelter bays would be unlikely to survive. Major Popham had reported that they were doing what they could for an injured enemy soldier, her wound was severe and they had given her morphine for the pain and dressed the wound with dressings from her own pockets, she wouldn’t survive long without surgery, but Pat Reed didn’t really give a damn. His soldiers were taking a battering from the artillery; he didn’t know how many were still fit to fight and wouldn’t do until the bombardment ended. At least with counter-battery fire they were giving some back, and preventing the enemy from using everything he had, all at once.
Five miles from the small town Belgian town of Petergensfeld, SACEUR received the reports of chemical weapons with a mere nod, it was to be expected that if the soviets had any stocks remaining they would use them now. His view of the situation had been severely hampered by the loss of his JSTARS and AWAC cover, and now less capable land based battlefield radars and unmanned reconnaissance vehicles were his only eyes.
He had called in the AWAC and JSTARS aircraft from Norway, Spain and the USA to replace the losses, in the air and no doubt those on the ground too.
Nearby the base a road convoy enroute to the front were diverted. The British Army part-timers of the 1
st and 2nd Battalions of the Wessex Regiment, TAVR , were still moving into position and organising before attempting to retake the overrun Geilenkirchen AFB. Word of the attack had been sent by the occupants of a farm who’d telephoned the police, reporting automatic fire and large explosions.
General Allain rather suspected the attack had come from within, as much as from outside, the attackers had apparently neutralised the airbase communications totally.
Updrafts buffeted the big Il-76 transports carrying the Helmstedt force, and the snow that had begun as flurries now fell heavily, whipping across the wings and obscuring the pilot’s vision.
Nikoli Bordenko tried to ignore the pain in his arms, legs and back from standing in a half crouch to bear the weight of his equipment. He held onto the cable that ran his side of the hold with his right hand, the knuckles were white with the effort. His nose wrinkled as the man in front vomited onto the cargo deck, he knew what would happen next, the stink of bile would start a chain reaction, and indeed he was right, it became puke city shortly afterwards. One hundred and twenty five men were facing forward, toward the two side doors, hooked up to one of two cables that ran the length of the hold, and now over half were unloading the sausage and pickled cabbage stew they had eaten a couple of hours before.
Their aircraft had let down to 1000 feet five minutes before, after crossing the Elbe. So far they had received little in the way of ground fire, although the odd line of tracer flashed past coming from below, Nikoli had seen that out of the corner of his eye, through one of the few window ports in the cargo bay.
He tried to change his stance slightly to ease the ache in his limbs, but found one corner of his bulky map case, safely tucked inside his smock, dug into his armpit. The additional maps went with his new rank and position, Captain and 2i/c of the company, a job he was not entirely comfortable with because he missed his platoon and being the boss, the one who made the decisions.