Parting Gifts

by gerald hall

  Operations Plan Kilo Mike Four meant that Caliphate armored forces had been detected moving in force towards Alpha Company’s defensive position. But that didn’t mean that Carl and his tankers were about to play pure defense. They were going to move to engage in a mobile battle that was intended to neutralize the numeric advantage that the Caliphate possessed. In this sort of battle, survival belonged to the superior tanks and, more importantly, superior crews.

  “We should have expected that the Caliphate was going to work its way around south through New Mexico and try to hit us on the flank, Sir.” 1st Lieutenant George Towson, Carl’s Company executive officer.

  “I’m sure the folks defending Pueblo thought the same thing, George. But they weren’t able to hold out for very long.”

  “I know, Sir. But you and I both know that the troops defending Pueblo were just a scratch force of Guardsmen and militia types. According to our Brigade S-2, the Caliphate has flown in a bunch of jihadists fresh from fighting in Australia and New Zealand.”

  “But those were troops, not tanks and artillery. We’ve got the best in the world of those. We also have some damned good troops manning them as well.”

  “I know, Sir. But it is still going to be hard. Some of our people have heard that there are Americans out there on the front lines being forced to fight for the jihadists against their will. It will make it even more difficult to decide to pull the trigger when the time comes. If anything, this will be harder than when we were fighting the same people who were willingly fighting us.

  “That is just one of the problems that our people are going to have to face. We are also going to have a hell of a time deciding who to shoot at, George. Half of the tanks out there used to belong to our military. So if any of our friendly militia types get intermixed with the bad guys in the middle of a melee, we will be facing some fratricide issues.”

  “I know, Sir. But if it is moving east, it is a bad guy. We will just have to shoot them all and hope that we don’t kill any friendlies. I guess that the only good thing so far is that the vast majority of the armored vehicles that we are seeing being used by the Caliphate in North America are older designs like the M-60 Main Battle Tank and the M-113 Armored Personnel Carrier.

  We haven’t seen any M-1’s or Bradley’s so far, nor any foreign designs like the Leopard. But I’m sure that there are some of those out there in the hands of those bastards. It will not be fun when they make their appearance on the front lines either, I guarantee you. ”

  Chapter Twenty Six:

  Ohio 14th Militia Company Headquarters

  Ashley, Ohio

  February 12, 2048

  Most of the remaining able-bodied adults remaining in Ashley and the surrounding area gathered in the old metal roofed warehouse where the militia held its meetings. Even Marilyn Barnes joined her children there.

  Hardin Knox had retired as county sheriff nearly ten years earlier. But when the militia was initially formed during the nuclear autumn, Hardin had been elected as the commander of the militia because of his military and law enforcement background. Most of the people still called him Jeff though because that was the name that everyone knew him as while he was the sheriff. For several years after the end of the civil disturbances, the militia became a shell of its original self as everybody tried to return back to a more normal existence.

  But with the collapse of the Western Republic to forces loyal to the Pacific Caliphate and the increasing threat from jihadist forces conquering Europe, Hardin began to recruit new members to the militia along with as many of the previous members as he could find. Within a year, the militia had grown to over two hundred and fifty men and women ranging in age from fourteen to seventy-five. About half of the members of the militia had at least some previous military training or service. But that also meant that half of the people there had never served a day in the military before. It could be a very rough introduction to combat for most of those.

  Because the militia was more or less a volunteer organization, there was little in the form of government funds available to it. But everyone pitched in to raise funds or to obtain materials for the militia’s use.

  Most of the people here at the militia meeting were wearing a bewildering mix of commercial and military surplus camouflage clothing. Many of them had managed to obtain some form of personal body armor. But like with the clothing, the armor types varied to the degree of protection that they provided.

  For over two and a half years, the Ashley militia waited as the battle raged to the west. In spite of losing thousands upon thousands of soldiers, the Caliphate was slowly grinding down the superb troops of the Alliance. The Alliance troops and warplanes slowly traded land for time, hoping to inflict such a toll upon the Caliphate’ forces that even their Emil would decide to stop.

  Instead, they found themselves in a bloody war of attrition that the Alliance could ill afford. Even with the Caliphate losing twenty or more personnel, aircraft or tanks for every Alliance counterpart that was put out of action, the Islamic invaders continued to push eastward.

  Now that the Mississippi River had been crossed by Caliphate forces, it was only a matter of time before the Ashley militia would have to fight. With the fighting getting closer, the war was the primary topic of discussion in town now. Many of Ashley’s militia members met at the town’s fire department for an informal meeting. The discussions were sometimes fiery, sometimes they were very solemn though.

  “We’ve got to defend our homes, don’t we? I’m going to fight until every last one of those jihadists is food for the worms.” One of the older militiamen noted.

  “I know, Uncle Doug. But how are we going to win against tanks and artillery, especially when we don’t have any of our own?” A younger man named Terry retorted.

  “We will just have to fight smart. We can perhaps hit these jihadists where they don’t expect it. There are always vulnerabilities. We just have to find and exploit them. But we can’t just roll over and give in. At the very least, we have to buy some time for the rest of the others who are trying to preserve our freedom. You’ve heard the stories coming out of the former Western Republic, haven’t you? Do you want to have to submit to the sort of oppression that they are having to deal with?

  “No, but sometimes it just seems pretty hopeless.” Terry admitted.

  “There were a lot of people who thought that surviving the nuclear autumn was a very hopeless proposition. But we worked and fought to create the means to keep ourselves warm, grow enough food and to stay alive back then in spite of all of the other people who died out there in the cold.”

  “The people who did that saved a lot of people’s lives. But now, Uncle, we are faced with a far different threat.”

  “I read once a quote from an old Air Force general that spent time as a POW in Vietnam. He said that to be born free is an accident, to live free is a privilege and to die free is a responsibility. Well, if I am going to die here, at least I am going to die free and maybe earn the privilege for a few others to be able to continue to live free.” Doug solemnly declared.

  “Amen to that.” The younger man responded. Eventually, the meeting ended after perhaps a dozen informal arrangements and agreements had been made among Ashley’s residents.

  After the meeting, some of the Ashley’s older residents were seen preparing other measures to do their part to defend their home also.

  “Aren’t you getting a little old for this, Marilyn?” Jeff Knox asked as he watched the brown-skinned bi-racial woman in her early sixties carrying around a large sniper rifle in one hand and a heavy box of ammunition in the other on the way to one of several ad hoc firing ranges on the periphery of town.

  “What I am definitely too old to do is stand around doing nothing while a bunch of misogynistic assholes come in from overseas to take over our land and crush our freedoms, Jeff. You know that I got a new lease on life when a certain very special person healed me back when my kids were still young. I was an athlete when I wa
s young and returned to some pretty decent shape after my healing too. Don’t let a little gray hair fool you, my friend.” Marilyn replied while pulling her shoulders back and standing erect like a person at least twenty years younger. Anyone who did know Marilyn Barnes would have sworn that she was no older than in her early-forties.

  “But the person who healed you is gone, isn’t he?” Jeff asked. It was an open secret that Stewart Williams had used his special gift to heal not only his wife Sarah, but also had healed Marilyn of the crippling injuries that had plagued her since a severe automobile accident.

  “Yes, Both Stewart and Sarah have been gone for a long time now. But their daughter is out there on Mars making a difference in the lives of so many people too.” Marilyn said while looking up into the night skies before continuing with a knowing smile on her face.

  “Yea, she was always that kind of a human being.” Jeff replied.

  “Oh, I’m sure of that. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if she can do everything that her dad could do and much more though.”

  “Somehow, I think that you are right about that too. I was pretty much convinced of that when the Mars Colony got saved from the big solar flare shortly after Deborah arrived there.”

  “Well, she’s done her share of miracles now. It’s about time that us ‘mere mortals’ create a few miracles of our own then, huh?”

  “Yea, Marilyn. I suppose that you are right about that too. But I’m afraid that we are going to need some serious divine intervention to save us from this mess.

  Anyway, I was wondering about what your kids could possibly do to help our militia’s equipment issues? The Alliance government is pretty threadbare financially right now because of the war. They haven’t been able to send us a lot of materiel support in several months now.”

  “They’ve already started producing more items for the militias here and elsewhere. Everything is pretty much standardized around the AR platform in terms of personal firearms already. We don’t have a lot of automatic weapons though. The Class III registries didn’t get opened back up until after the end of the nuclear autumn. But there were still very few fully automatic firearms available for import or sale after that point. But even with semi-automatics, we are pretty effective. You know anyway that most of us around here have some form of AR-15 pattern rifle chambered in the same 6.5mm Grendel cartridge that the Eastern Alliance’s military standardized on.”

  “Can’t your son and daughter use their manufacturing equipment to make new automatic weapons?”

  “I suppose that they could. But the legal requirements to become a new manufacturer of automatic weapons were still pretty onerous. Even producing components to convert AR-pattern firearms or Kalashnikovs from semi-automatic to selective-fire required a ton of paperwork to meet legal requirements. So the kids decided not to bother trying.

  Rather than going for fully automatic weapons, a lot of people decided to go for more powerful calibers instead. Some of our folks decided to have some firearms based on the larger AR-10 platform. They want to focus on long range sniping to hit enemy troops well outside of AK-47 range. They are using a far wider variety of calibers though. A lot of them have gone with the 6.5mm Creedmore round with a lesser number going with the 7.62mm NATO round. But there are a handful of people in the militia who want a really hard hitting AR to snipe with. They have gone with either the 300 Winchester Magnum or the 338 Lapua cartridge.

  Naturally, we have some traditionalists who have stuck with an old-fashioned bolt-action rifle. They feel that if it worked while hunting deer, then it will do just fine hunting two-legged prey as well.

  Of course, we do have one guy around here who has a Barrett fifty-caliber sniper rifle. I know because I special-ordered it for him through my store. But we are probably going to save that rifle for very ‘special occasions’, I suspect.”

  “It wouldn’t surprise me if also have a bunch of ‘Farmer Jones’ types who don’t have anything more than their old 12 gauge pump-action shotgun who are also nominally affiliated with the official militia too.” Jeff replied with a little chuckle.

  “Well, sidearms are not standardized at all. I’ve seen people bring in everything from a little .22 Long Rifle pocket pistol to one of those 12 gauge Shockwave quasi shotgun-pistols. Most people have some sort of 9mm semi-automatic pistol though from what I have seen. At least ammunition for the .22’s and the 9mm’s is pretty plentiful around here.”

  “In a rural area like this, you can bet that there is lots of 12 gauge ammunition around too.” The former sheriff noted.

  “Oh yea. Most of the people who own a shotgun also have reloading equipment and plenty of supplies to keep themselves in ammunition for quite a while too. I should know. My shop sold enough of the equipment and supplies over the years to them.” Marilyn explained.

  “You know, Wayne Turner over there, is a pretty darn good shot. He even competed in the three-gun competitions that used to be held every year at Camp Perry. I bet that he could outfit half the company out of his personal firearms collection too.”

  “We might just find out that Wayne isn’t the only person around here who has a wealth of personal firearms. The problem is finding enough willing and able people to use them effectively to defend the area around here. Even we lost a lot of people during the nuclear autumn. Our population never fully recovered from it, even with the handful of refugees from England that have recently arrived here.”

  “But to fully answer your original question, Jeff. It is actually pretty easy to adapt our 3-D printers and CNC machinery to make equipment for the militia. If I have the computer files and the necessary metal stock, my kids can make just about anything at their little factory here. We have even been manufacturing components for the Peregrine air-to-air missiles that the Alliance has been using to fight against the Caliphate’s aerial forces.” Marilyn proudly said.

  “Is there anything in particular that your kids might need to produce more equipment for us?”

  “Fortunately, we have plenty of electrical power available, both from local sources and from the LFTR nuclear power station at Mosquito Lake for now. We can use our induction ovens to melt scrap steel, aluminum, copper and brass to make new metal stock to feed into our machines here.”

  “I’m sure. That reactor was something that appeared during the First Event. It was a new design that employed a liquid fuel with uranium and thorium fluoride salts. When the Federal Government finally gave permission for the four LFTR reactor units in that plant to go operational, it provided a lot of power for the entire state.

  That power saved the lives of a lot of people during the nuclear autumn a few years later. The design of those reactors was then copied and put into series production. This mass production of standardized design LFTR power units drove the individual cost significantly. There are at least thirty new nuclear power stations in the Alliance that use those LFTR reactors now.”

  “Yes, nuclear power has helped the Alliance tremendously. I hope that the Islamists don’t start targeting them however. Anyway, the biggest problem that we have right now is obtaining enough propellant to make ammunition with. We don’t have a lot of chemical manufacturing companies around here. Most of them in the area are up around Cleveland or down around Charleston, West Virginia. We are in contact with a couple of the whiz kids up on Mars who are developing a quick and dirty way of making nitrocellulose using easily obtained local materials.”

  “Won’t that be dangerous?”

  “Could be… But not having enough ammunition when the bad guys show up would certainly be a lot more dangerous for our people. Besides, the formulas that we have been promised could allow us to make explosives for something a lot more potent that we could also make in the factory.”

  “What sort of things?”

  “The sort of things that go ‘boom’ like bombs and shells. It just happens that my kids also have computer files to make those as well. We also got permission from the State and Federal Governments
to manufacture explosive ordnance as part of being a legally organized militia. This way, we won’t be completely helpless if the bad guys come here. Hopefully, having our own support weapons will make up for our lack of fully-automatic firearms. Marilyn grimly replied.

  “Well, I need to get going now. Please let me know if there is anything that I might be able to help with.” Jeff replied with a nod of his head before turning to leave.

  A couple of days later, ‘Major’ Harden Knox then called the militia to attention and took a quick attendance roll to see who had come in. There were less than a dozen names of militia members who were not present to answer to the roll call. After the roll call was complete, he called the meeting to ‘at ease’ and began to speak to the group.

  “Good evening, everyone. As you all might have heard, things are getting pretty serious out to the west of us. Caliphate forces have managed to cross the Mississippi River as several points as of last week in spite of the demolition of many of the main highway and rail bridges. Eastern Alliance ground forces are engaged in very heavy fighting near those bridgeheads.

  It may not be long before some of those enemy forces could be entering our state. We are going to have to redouble our efforts to get all of our people trained on at least basic combat skills and to rectify our current equipment shortages.