by Chuck DeVore
“This is not our fight, Colonel Flint,” the President’s voice came back on the line. “This is all a terrible misunderstanding. We will protest the sinking of the Belleau Wood, of course. But don’t engage in any hostilities.”
“It’s too late for that, Mr. President. We’ve already engaged elements of three different divisions of the enemy.”
“What can a few hundred Marines do against so many?” came the response, dripping with sympathy. Phony sympathy, Flint decided.
“I think you’d better try and end hostilities, Colonel,” the President continued, “After all, we don’t want to find ourselves in World War Three.”
“You mean surrender, sir?” Flint’s voice was icy.
“Now hold on, Colonel. That’s your word, not mine. But. . . yes, find some way to sit down with the local Chinese commander and work out your problems.”
“I’m afraid that’s impossible, sir.”
“Now listen here, Colonel!” the President shouted. “I am your commander-in-chief. I order you to surr . . . er . . cease firing.”
“Sir, a cease fire would be difficult. We are being attacked by aircraft at the moment here at the airport. At two other locations my Marines have successfully broken contact with enemy air mobile troops. Surrender is not a viable option right now. . .”
“Why not?” A different voice was on the line. Flint knew he was on a speaker box now.
“Because, to surrender, you have to have someone to arrange a surrender with. Right now, the only officers who may have been able to accept a surrender are either dead or are our prisoners. Lieutenant Colonel Chen, the senior surviving officer of the PLA’s 97th Infantry Division, and Major Wu of the PLA’s 3rd Airborne Division, have both surrendered to me. Several other cargo ships and ferry boats carrying follow-on troops have been sunk or severely damaged as well.”
There was dead silence on the line. Colonel Flint shrugged at Major Ramirez and continued with his briefing. “We have inflicted something on the order of 7,500 casualties on the enemy, probably double, maybe triple that if you count the shipboard losses. We have taken approximately 750 prisoners. The MEU—that’s Marine Expeditionary Unit, sir—has sustained approximately 350 casualties, half from close-in fighting with the paratroopers and air bombardment and the other half at sea when we were hit by Chinese anti-ship missiles. The Navy has sustained many more casualties, but there’s no way for us to know exactly how many. We managed to get 600 or so sailors ashore,” Colonel Flint smiled, “and are trying to make them into Marines.”
There was still silence. Flint drove on, “We have established contact with the ROC forces, who have been hit hard by some kind of combined biological and chemical weapons attack. Their reserves are being mobilized and they may have enough combat power to defeat the last Chinese assault that just pushed us off the beach.”
Colonel Flint concluded, “We will continue to hold the airport Mr. President, unless, that is. . .” Flint gave a wicked grin to Major Ramirez, “you order us to join the ROC assault on the commie forces at the beaches.”
Flint heard a gasp on the other end of the phone. Two more sonic booms sounded overhead.
“The U.S. Marines are holding Kaohsiung International Airport, sir!” Colonel Flint didn’t even try to keep the pride out is his voice. “There will be no throughput from the PLA forces here sir! I doubt if they’ll try another motorized hang glider attack. We handed the enemy his head today sir!”
Flint heard some shuffling at the other end of the line.
“Uh, right, Colonel Flint.” It was a female voice. The phone clicked at the other end. The phone was obviously off the speaker box. “The President is indisposed. Motorized hang gliders you say?” The voice was soft and quiet. She sounded loathe to disturb the President and those around him.
“Yes, hang gliders. Who is this?” Flint demanded.
“That’s not important—remember, this is an unsecure line.” The voice sounded uncomfortable and reluctant.
Flint knew he was dealing with a non-political type—probably an NSC, State, DoD, or CIA staffer, “Why the lack of interest in my situation over here?”
“Umm. . .”, the woman’s voice got very soft, “Suffice it to say that the President is very concerned about the situation.”
Flint heard the phone system click over to the speaker box. “Colonel Flint, this is National Security Council Advisor Lindley. It’s six in the morning out here. The President has been up all night following your situation. Needless to say he is exhausted. Continue to hold the airport. . .” the phone spit static and faded out.
“Hello, can you hear me?” Flint pulled the phone away from his ear and looked at it. The low battery light shone on the phone. Damn!
Half a world away, Lindley was finishing up his instructions to the Marine colonel, his tired mind half looking at CNN and half trying to direct the conversation. “. . .Continue to hold the airport if you can. Minimize your contact with the enemy, if possible. The President wishes to maintain flexibility in this crisis. Is that understood?” The other end was dead. “Hey, the line is dead! Get the Pentagon and get the colonel back on the phone! Shit, I wonder how much he heard?”
Donna Klein smiled from behind her hands. The colonel probably heard what he wanted to hear. She hadn’t liked the tenor in the White House since she arrived at five in the morning shocked to find the President and his key advisors pulling an all-nighter while spiraling down into a deeper pit of defeatism. The Marines may win this thing in spite of the White House, she thought.
* * *
Colonel Alexander was nearing the end of the longest day of his life. It started that morning with a wake-up at 0300 in Alaska, crossed seven time zones and the International Date Line, and almost killed him twice (first the E-bomb, then the nervous Taiwanese airport security troops). It was now 7:00 PM in Taiwan some 23 hours later.
For the first time since boarding the C-17 that morning, Dan was eating. It wasn’t really his idea, but rather one of his NCOs, Staff Sergeant Peña, Traveller’s (Alexander’s M1 Abrams) gunner. Examining his tired officer, Sergeant Peña said, “Sir, you have to eat something.”
“Yah, yah, I’ll get to it. I’d like the ACE (Armored Combat Earthmover) to dig one more position. . .”
“Sir, they can dig without you. You need to eat. Now, sir.” Sergeant Peña was persistent.
Dan knew when he was defeated, “Yes, sergeant! What’s for chow?”
“Room temperature MREs, sir,” relieved that he talked his officer into conducting personal body maintenance, the sergeant smiled.
Dan let out a sigh as he ripped open the tough light brown plastic bag. It was marked as a “vegetarian” meal. The men often joked that the “namby-pamby” vegetarian meals were unfit for warriors, but Dan was secretly glad for the variety. MREs had too much meat and fat in them. At home, Dan was used to pasta several times a week—too much meat made him feel sluggish. “Sergeant Peña, what’s the word on Colonel Giannini?”
“Sir, last I heard the Taiwanese took him off to a local hospital. His copilot went with him.”
That squared with Dan’s recollection too. He was starved for information. A war was swirling around him—he could hear it in the skies above him, but he really knew very little about the situation. He and his 82 men were in Taipei along with eight Air Force crewmen. They had one operational tank, an ACE, four scout Humvees, four MP Humvees, and a medical track. None of the three surviving C-17s had an operational radio. He knew that Taiwan had suffered both chemical and nuclear attack. One of his men bummed a couple of city maps from a Taiwanese security officer, so at least Dan and his men knew where they were in relation to the rest of the city. They also knew which way the enemy would come from (assuming they didn’t jump out of the sky right on top of them).
Dan thought about his last assumption—where the enemy will come from. Did they have an enemy? Was his nation at war with the People’s Republic of China? If they weren’t at war, what were the imp
lications of his actions? Dan recalled Taiwan’s increasingly independence-minded rhetoric. He knew that the U.S. was somewhat committed to Taiwan’s defense—especially if the PRC attacked a Taiwan seeking the status quo fiction of “one China, two systems.” Taiwan was moving away from that policy—and rightly so, Dan thought, if they wait any longer, China will be too strong to resist. Dan stopped himself realizing it was all a moot point. China had already moved to head off a full Taiwanese declaration of independence—any other thoughts were now academic, it was war, and he was in the middle of it. All of this once again begged the question, what should he do?
Dan was taking another bite of his vegetarian crackers and cheese on the turret of his M1 tank—pretty good stuff, nicely spiced—when two young Taiwanese men with a TV camera and a small communications relay unit walked up to him followed by one of his NCOs.
“Sir, these men claim to be reporters with a local affiliate of CNN News.”
In spite of his misgivings, Dan smiled for the reporters (he was a courtroom attorney, after all), “Oh?”
“Yes sir. I figured since I saw them talking to the airport security troops they couldn’t be all bad.”
“Good assumption sergeant. Thank you,” Alexander nodded at his NCO and turned to the reporters, “How may I help you gentlemen today?” As he was talking, he reluctantly put his MRE down on the turret. He stood up, got dizzy for a second, and hopped off the tank (normally about a five foot jump, made only a foot-and-a-half due to the three-and-a-half foot hole the ACE dug for the tank in the grass strip between the two runways).
The man carrying the relay unit knelt to place the box carefully on the ground, then spoke. “Sir, my name is Wong Kwok Pui. I go by Edward when I’m on TV for English speaking audiences,” he said this a bit expectantly, as if he thought Dan would recognize him. His English was near flawless.
“My name is Lieutenant Colonel Dan Alexander, California Army National Guard.”
“Welcome to Taiwan. I wish it were under other circumstances. Mind if I interview you for CNN?” By this time the cameraman had set up a tripod, placed his videocam on it, then broke the communications unit out of its box.
“Sure. Mind if I ask, how can you get a signal out? Isn’t your equipment damaged?” Dan was curiously hopeful.
“Well, this camera and commo box were in storage in the basement of the television studio. I don’t know what happened. There’s no electricity anywhere in Taipei. Our backup generator works, but the studio’s electronics don’t work. With this setup we can get a direct signal out to the low Earth orbit satellites that CNN leases time on. If they want to, we can go live from the scene. Pretty neat, huh?” Edward grinned broadly. It was obvious he went to school in the U.S.
“Well, let’s do it, what do you want to say?” Dan figured this was the only way he had a chance of showing America—and his wife and children too—that he was alive.
Dan absent-mindedly grabbed for the bottom of his BDU blouse to straighten it, only realizing after a few fruitless pulls that he was still wearing his bulky green chemical protective over-garment. So much for looking the poster boy soldier. Dan heard the three by five foot American flag snapping in the easterly breeze from midway up one of the tank’s whip antennas. Dan and his men put the flag on the tank reasoning that the Chinese might think twice about shooting at an American tank if, in fact, they hadn’t intended to make war on the Americans. The flag would now serve as a nice backdrop for the TV interview. The task force operations sergeant major’s Humvee was parked next to the tank. Strapped to the back of the Humvee, facing the camera crew, was Task Force Grizzly’s unofficial guidon: a long yellow surfboard with the tank and crossed saber emblem of the U.S. Army Armor Corps. Emblazoned around the Armor Corps emblem was the slogan, “TF Grizzly—Charlie Don’t Surf.”
Dan heard the TV reporter begin his lead in, “This is Edward Wong with CNN reporting from Taipei, Taiwan. A few hours ago China attacked Taiwan in a sudden and crushing attack. We have very little information from areas outside the capital, but here’s what we do know: early this morning at eight o’clock, China sortied hundreds of jet fighters across the Taiwan Strait, as Taiwanese fighters moved to intercept the air attack, China detonated two nuclear missiles over Taiwan. This nuclear attack disrupted power and communications over much of Taiwan. Several civilian aircraft were also destroyed or crippled. Joining me here right now is Colonel Dan Alexander of the United States Army. Colonel Alexander, can you tell me, why are you in Taiwan right now?”
Dan was suddenly nervous, “Well, the four aircraft my soldiers and I were on were attacked by the Chinese. We were forced to land here at Taipei.” By the time he finished the sentence, Dan was much more at ease—No different than the courtroom.
“So the People’s Republic of China attacked the U.S. military?” Edward Wong was inwardly smiling, this colonel was giving him and his people an excellent propaganda boost.
“Yes. I don’t know whether it was by design or not, but the net effect of it was that we probably lost two aircraft, a C-17 and a KC-135. In addition, one person died on board the aircraft I was riding on due to a massive electrical surge caused by the nuclear detonation.”
“So there have been American casualties?”
“Yes.”
“What will you do now?”
“We have been attacked, we will defend ourselves until otherwise directed.”
“Does this mean you will. . .”
Machinegun fire punctuated Wong’s next question. It sounded like it was coming from about 300 meters away to the northeast—probably from atop the roof of one of the buildings abutting the airport. Alexander knew the Taiwanese security troops had set out a perimeter to protect the airport from a modest air assault or parachute-landing attempt. He hoped it was outbound fire even as he was climbing back on to the deck of the tank yelling over his shoulder, “Mr. Wong, I suggest you take cover!”
* * *
Someone turned up the volume on the TV and all eyes in the Situation Room were fixed on the set. “. . .up next, we have breaking news from Taipei, Taiwan,” the anchor said. Then a commercial came on. Most eyes turned away and someone moved to turn down the volume a notch.
“No, turn it back up,” Donna said, “I want to see this.”
The TV was beaming forth an inspirational montage of ships, aircraft and computers, “. . .America’s strategic trade partnership with China benefits America in many ways: a stronger economy, better jobs, more opportunity for people on both sides of the Pacific. . .” It was a damn ad for China on CNN! Donna was shocked, then suddenly filled with admiration at the timing and boldness of it all—The coincidence is too great, this had to be planned.
“I wonder how much money the Chinese poured into our media outlets to affect American public opinion on the eve of their war?” Donna said it loud enough that even the President looked up from his quiet conversation with Lindley. “Isn’t there an easy way to find out? Political campaign media specialists can get the data quickly—is there anyone here who can find out when the Chinese made the media buy, how much they spent and how long the spots are supposed to run for?”
Another NSC staffer, a military officer in civilian clothes, picked up Donna’s cause, “We ought to shut down those commercials right now! Our enemy is seeking to deliver propaganda right to our own people.”
Lindley spoke up, “The term ‘enemy’ is little premature. . .”
The President stepped on his advisor, “Still Bob, I think he’s right, call the FCC and tell them to get the stations to pull the ads. Also, get the information the young lady requested—even I’d be interested in that.”
The commercial promoting Chinese-American trade ended and the TV showed a young reporter summarizing the situation from Taipei. General Taylor started taking notes. The scene panned from the reporter to an American military officer whom he began to interview. The officer looked tired, but poised, even photogenic, ready for battle in his chemical weapons gear with a
n American flag occasionally fluttering into view in the near background.
“What the hell is that?” someone asked, pointing at the surfboard. The man was hushed to silence when the realization hit everyone in the room that this American officer was in Taipei and had said he had been attacked by the Chinese.
“Damn!”
Donna didn’t see who said this, although it came from close to where the President was sitting.
Machine gun fire was heard in the distance on the TV. The colonel quickly jumped aboard his tank. The camera shot followed him as he climbed through the commander’s hatch, then the picture began to shake, wildly at first, then rhythmically as the cameraman took the camera off the tripod, then shouldered it and began to back up to get a good wide-angle view. The reporter kept up a commentary as the tank’s engine could be heard starting up with a whine. Suddenly, a figure appeared at the turret roof three feet from where Colonel Alexander’s head and shoulders could be seen. The outline of a man grabbed at a machine gun mounted to the turret. Colonel Alexander pointed up. The crewman aimed the machine gun skyward and began firing. The noise level shocked the Situation Room into silence. It was very hard to adjust to the fact that this was live television and not a war movie. Not a word was spoken; everyone just stared at the TV.
“Oh my God!” the President said.
* * *
Moments after climbing into the tank, Dan saw a small unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) circling over the airport at a low altitude. Alexander yelled at his loader, “Jones, damn it, you’re supposed to be pulling air guard! Get up here and shoot the damn thing down!”
Jones popped up through his open hatch, chambered a round and acquired his target. It took about ten five second bursts, but Jones finally hit the little reconnaissance drone enough times that it sputtered silent and fell out of the sky, crashing like a large toy on the cement of the runway.