“There isn’t any,” Lam said.
“Got to be some somewhere,” Jaybird countered.
They were near the middle of the slope of rocks and dirt that led up to the peak.
“Off to the left more,” Murdock said. “Another wash. Looks big enough for half of us. The rest can stay back farther and be out of the line of fire.”
“Might work,” Dewitt said. “But that gully still puts us six or eight hundred yards from the target.”
Murdock used his lip mike. “Ching, ask Captain Radiwitch to come up for a conference.”
A few minutes later the Russian commando sat down beside the others. Murdock showed him the situation, letting him use the NVGs to check out the top and the new gully.
“What we suggest is that half of our force move into the gully,” Murdock said. “Then I’ll take one squad of SEALs and work up silently as close as we can get to the top. We think that rock field to the left is the access route to the top. Once there, the squad will have cover from any fire from above.”
“Your sleep guns. Can you use them?”
Murdock shook his head at the Russian. “The angle is wrong. We can’t hit the Japanese and we can’t get any bounce effect up there the way we did the last time. We’ll have to move in closer and probably use our regular weapons.”
“How many men up there?” the captain asked.
“We’ve captured or killed nine or ten. That should leave him with maybe ten or fifteen.”
“It’s a good defensive position,” the Russian captain said.
“We’ll try grenades,” Murdock said. “But the overhang on that cliff is going to deflect all but a few chance rounds that get inside.”
The Russian stared at the slope. “You take squad of ten?”
“No, we use eight men.”
“Then I take squad of eight men, we go together.”
Murdock had expected it. Russian pride. “Agreed. Bring your men up. Automatic weapons, lots of grenades, hand and rifle.” The captain nodded and slipped away.
“First Squad, get up here,” Murdock said into his lip mike. “We’re going for a walk in the park.”
Ten minutes later, the sixteen men crouched in the ravine. The rest of the SEALs and twenty handpicked Russian commandos filled the area behind. The rest of the Russians were farther back.
Murdock had been checking the slope above with his NVG. He had monitored the lip of the cliff looming over them, but could detect no bodies and no movement.
He spotted what looked like a trace of a trail that wound through sedan-sized boulders fifty yards ahead of them. Lam checked it and nodded.
“Sure as hell looks like a trail, Skipper. Let’s give it a try.”
Murdock and his men moved out first, slipping quietly up the rocky slope toward the rocks. Lam reached them first, and Vanished behind a huge boulder. Murdock and the rest slid in between the giant’s marbles.
The Russians were close behind.
Murdock looked around his big rock at the cliff above. It was still fifty yards away. He grinned. Now he saw the path. Someone had cleared away most of the smaller rocks and pushed aside larger ones.
The path wound around some of the large boulders slanting upward to the end of the shelf. They provided what could be enough cover for an assault on the cliff. The cave must be just behind it.
Murdock waved at Ching, and he edged up beside him. “Stay undercover and call out to the Japanese general. Tell him we come for his surrender. Enough men have died. He should send his men down without arms.”
Ching moved closer, then called the message over a protective rock.
When he finished, there was a long pause. Then a short reply came back.
Ching looked back at Murdock. “He said never, just the one word.”
Captain Radiwitch came up and heard the exchange.
“Time for Russian power,” he said to Murdock. “My men will blow them out of there with grenades.”
“Captain, it’s only fifty yards. The shelf over the cave extends well out. It’s a hard shot to get a rifle grenade in there. Coming up here, I thought it might work. Now I’m not so sure.”
“We can do it. Do not worry. Russians good with rifle grenades.”
Murdock shrugged. “Go ahead. I hope that none of the misses start a landslide and cover this place up with rocks.”
“Russians never miss,” Captain Radiwitch said. He turned and spoke quickly in Russian. Six men with grenade launchers on their AKMs came forward and found firing positions.
Murdock touched his lip mike. “Our friends are going to try to use rifle grenades to soften them up. Let’s watch it. Some of those little bombs could set off a landslide in this unstable part.”
The Russians began firing. Murdock watched the flight of two rifle grenades. They sailed high, came down short on the bare rocks outside the ledge, and exploded. A few rocks loosened and tumbled down the slope. None came toward the SEALS. Half a dozen more grenades exploded. Murdock saw two shatter inside the parapet around the cliff.
Then three more went off on the face of the cliff below the cave.
It began slowly. Then more and more rocks loosened. A moment later it was a full-sized landslide rumbling down the mountain straight at the SEALs and Russians.
“Watch out,” Murdock shouted. “Incoming from those damn Russian grenades.”
25
Thursday, 22 February
Mt. Kunashir
Kunashir island
Kuril Chain, Russia
The dirt and rocks in the landslide cascaded down the slope. The larger rocks rolled faster, bounced, landed, and bounced again. The first few hit the huge boulders. Some shattered, others bounced once more and went past the men.
Tons of rocks and dirt pounded down. The group of huge boulders the men crouched behind acted as a divider for much of the landslide.
The first roll of rocks and dirt hit the boulders and split to each side; then more of the Plymouth-sized rocks nudged the flow of dirt and rocks farther to the side.
The sixteen men in the forward position huddled behind their boulders and waited. The roaring, grinding sound of the landslide enveloped them, then passed by and was gone. The men were covered with a foot of dirt and small rocks, but none of them was injured.
Murdock did a net check, and all seven of his SEALs reported in.
“Just hold in place while we figure this,” he told them on the Motorola.
Captain Radiwitch came up brushing the dust and dirt off his uniform. Lam moved over as well and motioned to Murdock.
“Commander, might have a suggestion. Look at the layout of the rocks up the hill, the big ones. With a little covering fire, we can leapfrog up there to the end of the rock field. The boulders are plenty big enough for cover up to thirty feet from the ledge where the cave is.”
The Russian listened. Murdock took another look at the rock field and nodded. He turned to the commando. “Looks possible, Captain. What do you think?”
Captain Radiwitch stared up at the rocks, then the path the men would take. At last, he nodded. “Eight men fire, eight men move. We go first, you give cover fire.”
“Sounds good.” Murdock brought his SEALs up in a rough line with fields of fire on the top of the ledge, and told them the plan.
Radiwitch got his men in position and pointed at Murdock.
“Let’s do it,” Murdock said to his men. “Sustained fire, real ammo, but don’t run short on rounds. Fire.”
The eight weapons spoke, and then again, and again. The eight Russians darted from rock to rock, working up the hill thirty yards.
They slid behind boulders, and Murdock called a cease-fire.
A moment later the Russians set up a fire pattern on the top of the mountain, and Murdock led his men in a charge toward the spot the Russians had claimed.
They made it, and Murdock tried to remember if there had been any return fire from the top. He couldn’t remember hearing any.
“Hand grena
des,” the Russian officer said. His men threw six grenades into the mountaintop fortress. All went off with a thunderous roar. Just after they exploded, the Russians charged up the last twenty yards to the shelf of land. They went in with assault fire, the AKMs and the AK-47’s blasting on automatic. Then the firing stopped.
Captain Radiwitch stood on the top of the ledge and waved.
“Nobody here,” he called.
Two minutes later, Murdock and his men were in the temporary fortress. All they found were three dead Japanese and several weapons that had been ruined by exploding grenades.
Lam explored the cave, then the sides of the mountain. He came back a minute later.
“Small cave to one side of the large one. It has a back door, and a good trail down the mountain on the back side. We’ve been snookered.”
Murdock and the SEALs rushed out the opening and looked downhill.
Five hundred yards down the mountain, they saw two forms slide behind some cover in a gully. Murdock checked the route they had to follow.
There was a large rock slide well down the mountain the Japanese would have to cross.
“Machine guns and Bradford. Set up here and zero in on that rock field. You’re going to have some targets down there soon. Bradford, what’s the range?”
“Eight hundred yards.”
Joe Douglas shook his head as he spread the bipod on his H&K 21E chattergun. “Got to be closer to a thousand.”
“Work it out. The three of you cover that slide area. The minute you see any men on it, start firing. It won’t be us. The rest of you SEALs on me. We’re going hunting.”
Captain Radiwitch listened. He had no machine gunners in his team.
When the SEALs left moving quickly down the trail, he put his men in line behind them.
It was almost ten minutes later when the three gunners spotted figures in their NVGs as they worked into the slide area. The gunners charged their weapons and opened fire. Bradford was short, even firing downhill. Douglas and Horse Ronson blasted the rock slide with five-round bursts. They saw at least two of the Japanese who did not continue the trip. The rest hurried, and some slid down the slope, creating a new, small landslide.
After three minutes of sporadic firing, the gunners checked with the NVGs again. There were no more Japanese moving across the slide.
“Let’s pack up and haul ass,” Bradford said. He had slammed fifteen of the big .50-caliber rounds into the area. He wasn’t sure if he’d hit any targets, but he must have scared hell out of them.
The three big men trotted down the trail, making as good time as they could.
When Murdock and the SEALs came to the rock slide, the guns firing above had silenced. They found three bodies there, and evidence that the rest of the general’s army had kept to the very edge of the slide in some small growth to mask their movements. The SEALs followed.
The moon seemed brighter now. Murdock noticed that it was three-quarters full, and thanked the heavens for their help. The SEALs hurried forward, then stopped to listen. Each time they could hear the Japanese rushing through the brush and more trees below.
The SEALs took a quick break in an open area. Murdock called the captain up. “What’s the maximum range on your rifle grenades?”
“Four hundred meters.”
Murdock grinned in the darkness. “What would you think of sending six rounds out at max range where we think the Japanese general is?”
Captain Radiwitch smiled. “Yes, I like.” He turned and spoke to his men, who quickly readied their rifles and fired six rifle grenades forward where their captain pointed.
They waited for the six distinct cracking explosions of the grenades. They heard no shouts of surprise or wails of pain.
“Worth a try,” Murdock said, and got the men moving again.
An hour later, the sixteen men were in heavy pine timber working down another small hill. Lam said they were still on the right trail.
“They leave a highway of signs,” Lam said. “Some of the troops must be discarding equipment to make their load lighter. I’ve found a pistol, a shirt, and three loaded magazines. They are still ahead of us and we’re gaining on them.”
Murdock looked at his watch. The soft light glow showed him that it was 0505. An hour, maybe two, to daylight. He talked to Lampedusa on the point as they walked through the brush.
“Any logic to his route?”
Lam shrugged. “Not that I can see. Downhill is his trademark right now. I’d guess we’re heading toward the coast. We’re on a small stream that must come out at the beach sooner or later.”
“Any way to cut him off at the pass?”
“Not so you could notice, Skipper.”
“Afraid of that.”
Ten minutes later, the small stream had grown to a roaring river.
Lam figured that the Japanese couldn’t cross over now if they wanted to.
The brush thinned out in the pine woods, but there was still plenty of protection. Lam didn’t consider an ambush by the Japanese. They were running, not looking for a fight.
“Figure there are no more than eight of them, Skip,” Lam said. “My guess is we’re about a half mile behind.”
“Double time?” Murdock asked.
“Yeah, no brush, ground is stable. Let’s do it.”
Murdock told the Russian captain the plan. He shrugged.
“SEALs do it, Russians do it.”
Murdock set up a ground-eating trot that he figured was seven miles an hour. That would be about an eight-minute mile. They should be able to sustain that for an hour.
Lam stayed out in front by thirty yards, and Holt made a connecting file to him. They jogged down the bank of the river, across small feeder streams and up a slight rise, then down to the bank again.
A half hour later, Lam stopped and held the rest. They all listened. Ahead they could hear talk.
“Japanese words, but I can’t understand them,” Ching said. They moved ahead again slower, but on full combat alert. Lam spotted them first. The Japanese had taken a break. None was on sentry duty watching the rear. Two were drinking at the stream.
They were forty yards ahead.
“Don’t kill them,” Murdock said into his mike. He caught the Russian captain. “We capture them. We don’t kill them.” The captain nodded and whispered to his men. Murdock sent Lam and three SEALs into the brush to get even with the Japanese. Lam clicked his mike when he was set. Murdock had moved up the other four SEALs and set up a field of fire.
“Shoot over their heads, three rounds each. Then, Ching, sing out and talk the general into surrendering.”
Murdock began the firing with a three-round burst from his MP-5.
For a moment the woods rang with the gunfire. Then, just as suddenly as it began, it stopped.
Ching bellowed at the Japanese, who had frozen in place. None of them even reached for a weapon.
“General Nishikawa, you are surrounded. You must surrender or your men will be slaughtered like pigs and you will have to watch them die.”
The general stood and turned toward the voice.
“We surrender. My men will lay face-down. No more need to die.
They have been loyal and true. You must urge world opinion to consider the plight of twenty thousand Japanese who can’t worship at their ancestors’ graves. You may approach now.”
The general moved away from his men and sat down on the ground with his back to the others. Murdock and the SEALs moved forward cautiously.
They kept their weapons ready, but none of the Japanese made a move to protest. They were cuffed by the wrists as the SEALs came to them.
Murdock walked over to where the general sat. He took Ching with him.
“Tell the general we respect his military moves, but it’s time now to surrender.”
Ching said it, but there was no comment from the general.
Murdock told Ching to speak to the general again. Ching said the same words, but the general did not turn.
When they got there it was too late. General Raiden Nishikawa lay on his side with a ceremonial samurai short sword in his stomach. He had thrust it in, turned it sideways, and sliced through his bowels.
He had died in the few minutes it took the SEALs to approach his position.
Murdock crouched on the ground in front of the general. The man had had a mission and had been willing to die for his cause. At least now he would be with his ancestors. The world would have a martyr for the cause of giving the Kuril chain back to Japan.
Murdock had an idea that he let ferment and grow and expand as he thought about it. Why not? What would be better for this small Japanese man than to be left here on Kunashir with his ancestors?
How? They had no entrenching tools, no shovels, nothing to use to dig a grave. Murdock called Jaybird over and put the problem to him.
“Easy, Skipper. We do like the Indians used to. We find a low place in the land, scoop it out with sticks, lay him in it, then cover him with rocks out of the stream. Then we pile brush on top of that so no animals can get to him. Makes a fine grave.”
Captain Radiwitch came up frowning. “Why didn’t you use your sleep guns on the Japanese?”
Murdock smiled. “Hey, if we had, then we would have had to carry them out to the coast. This way, they walk.” The Russian laughed and went to talk with his men.
“We get him and his Ruskies out of here, then we bury the general,” Murdock said. “We’ll make up a story that the general killed himself and fell into the river and we couldn’t find his body.”
Ten minutes later, Murdock had convinced Captain Radiwitch that he should lead the way downstream to the coast, then contact the Russian hovercraft to come get them. He still had his walkie-talkie, but he couldn’t use it here in the mountains. He also took the Japanese prisoners, who were now willing captives.
When they were gone, the SEALs made a grave for General Raiden Nishikawa, much as Jaybird had suggested. They finished it with a stack of dead limbs and brush that no animal could get through.
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