by Andy Farman
On the hill the majors tank was struck on its right side, on the turret ring, the joint where turret meets chassis. The depleted uranium tip was ten times denser than water and not even the Chobham armour of the British tank slowed it. The energy created by the impact turned the armour plate molten, and the round passed through into the interior of the turret, decapitating Darcy’s gunner and instantly raising the inside temperature to 560’ centigrade. The flash point for the propellant inside the British tanks bag charges was considerably less than the furnace like temperature of the turret and they exploded, setting off the stored HESH warheads as they did so. If Colonel Eskiva’s gunner hadn’t been staring at the ruined head of his colonel, whose still twitching body had tumbled back into the turrets interior, he would have seen the Challengers turret part company with the chassis, spinning end over end, down the hill and into the river with a huge splash.
Guardsman Morgan had grown anxious to the point of desperation as the return fire from the Czech’s indicated how much closer they were. He had lost the telephone cable he had been following and could not find it again in the pitch dark, nor could he find his small torch, with its tiny aperture, made smaller still by strategically applied masking tape. Cursing and shaking he was close to panic as he pulled a chemical light stick from a map pocket. He fumbled with the wrapping until he got the thing out and bent it at the middle, breaking the glass tube inside the plastic casing, allowing the chemicals inside to mix.
Lt Col Hupperd-Lowe and his nine strong escort were feeling their way through the darkness towards 1 Company’s headquarters CP when the colonel saw a bright green, fluorescent light suddenly appear. Recognising it for what it was he was almost speechless with rage, not fifty metres from the CP some idiot was showing a naked light, a sodding bright one at that and he made towards it, shouting as he went.
The Czech Su-17s reached the valley but could not raise the regimental commander of the attacking unit on the radio. They could see firing and knew roughly what ground the enemy held but no more. The leader of the formation cursed as a Starstreak missile slammed into one of their number, sending it into the earth in a pillar of flame. Quite suddenly there appeared directly ahead on the top of the enemy hill a bright light. It was not a big light but in the pitched dark on top of the hill it acted like a beacon of bright green. He could see no future, quite literally, in hanging around without some instruction from the ground forces as to where they should place their ordnance, so he called the other three aircraft and ordered them to dump their loads on the light ahead before egressing the area on burner.
Guardsman Morgan was gaping at his furious commanding officer when the first of eight canisters of napalm hit the ground and burst open twelve feet away, engulfing him, the CO and the entire section in flame. He did not die an easy death, none of them did. As the ‘Fitters’ turned hard for home the last two canisters landed atop 1 Company's CP, tearing a gaping hole in the command and control ability of half the battalion’s area of responsibility.
Coming in low and fast under control of the RAF forward observer on the ground, two pairs of RAF Tornado GR4s approached on different bearings in order to make the job of the enemy AAA harder. The first pair was tooled up with HARMs for the AAA radars and the second pair with Brimstone, anti-armour missiles. Five minutes behind them were another two pairs; these carried one HARM apiece amid their anti-armour ordnance.
The first four split ten miles out; their paths would converge over the ruined crops of the fields just east of the Guards position, but separated by several seconds. If any arrived too soon they risked a mid-air collision or damage from ordnance dropped by the aircraft preceding them. If they arrived too late, then the shock effect would be lost and the AAA that much more ready for them.
The first Tornado located targets for its four HARMs whilst still several minutes out and west of the river, popping up for a look-see its threat panel lit up, the enemy saw them too. It broke their locks by descending again and once the panel was clear it turned hard right toward the river, keeping a low hill between itself and the action. The Tornado was low when it reappeared, pulling four G’s in a hard left turn to follow the river north and pickling off anti-radiation missiles as it did so.
Just inside the woodline to the east, three heat seeking, ground to air missiles leapt from launchers and 30mm cannon reached out for the British bomber.
All four HARMs scored on ZSU-23-4 and Strela-1, SA-9 vehicles but the Tornado took a 30mm cannon shell through its vertical stabiliser which did not explode, as it punched out chaff and flares. The air in front of the aircraft seemed to be filled with tracer, all coming straight at the cockpit and the ‘missile launch’ warning was constant. The flares that the aircraft’s threat suite automatically discharged were enough to defeat the missiles fired at them, it was the tracer and subsequent loud impact behind him that caused the young pilot to break left, flying straight into the hillside that was being fought over, at 600 knots indicated speed above ground.
The last aircraft of the four scored kills on armoured vehicles with all its weapons and chose to turn east to egress, banking on the ground to air missiles in the wood line having poor head-on engagement abilities. Both crew members chuckled with relief at escaping the conflict unscathed but neither man saw what killed them, as they collided in mid-air with one of the first wave of four regiments of Su-25 attack aircraft, inbound to pound the NATO mechanised brigade across the river.
From his vantage point, just behind a row of trees in the elevated rear seat of Mi-28A/N Havoc, the Czech staff officer utilised the two-seaters surveillance TV system to watch the battle. He became aware of the colonels death when he noticed that the regimental commander’s voice was now absent from the airwaves. Switching frequencies he assumed command of the battered regiment, giving brief orders before switching back to the Corps frequency where he spoke directly with the Corps commander, logically arguing his point. After three minutes he changed back once more to urge those commanding the companies to begin the forced crossing of the Wesernitz.
The 2 i/c of the 1st Battalion Coldstream Guards was unaware that he was now the boss. A heavy air attack was underway, the commander of the attached tank squadron was not answering calls and he had now lost radio communications with 1 Company’s command post as well as the landline link. In short, he was very, very busy.
It took fifteen minutes for a runner from 3 Platoon to establish what had happened to their company headquarters and contact the battalion CP direct, by which time the platoon in the hamlet opposite Barraute reported enemy dismounted infantry clearing the buildings on the east bank and heading for the bridge. The 2 i/c had hoped that the enemy would try to cross it at speed, using vehicles but that was not the way it looked. Rather than have the enemy infantry start ripping out wires from the demolition charges, he gave the nod to the engineers to blow it now.
Freddie and Big Stef were now staring at burning armoured fighting vehicles and the wreckage of fighter bombers, British and Czech that littered the fields before them. Only three of the eight Tornados had escaped unscathed and these accompanied two damaged aircraft westward.
The Guardsmen decided it was time to bug out and rejoin friendly lines, quitting the hide they breathed fresh air for the first time in days, wrinkling their noses in disgust at the flavour of death it carried from the battlefield. They had recce’d a fordable point on the move-in and this was clear of the enemy, who were north of them now and had crossed the railway to begin the assault of the river. As they reached the bank they heard the sound of engines from behind them, emerging from the eastern treeline as the remainder of the enemy division advanced. The flanking motor rifle regiments were aiming either side of the Guards positions, heading for the Light Infantry to the north and Argyll’s to the south of the promontory.
Although 1CG now only faced a formation half the size it had been when it began, they were not out of the woods by any means. By the time the amphibious PT-76 tanks and APCs would reach t
he crest, the divisions tank regiment, 5th Tanks, would be half way across the fields, following in the late Colonel Eskiva’s footsteps. The dead Guards COs intention to hold for 24hrs at the very least was starting to look very optimistic indeed.
With the loss of their company command post the platoon commander of No.3 Platoon took command of the 1 Company, as the senior officer. Unintentionally, the Czech’s had crossed the river at the juncture of 1 and 2 Company’s real estate, which presented the young lieutenant with the prospect of trying to deal with two assaults on each flank of his company’s front. After a quick call to the battalion CP for the ok, he liaised with 2 Company and passed control of the right flank platoon to them before calling in fire missions on the east where his own platoon was engaged in a fierce fire-fight with the enemy troops in the town.
The anti-tank section moved forward into the copse opposite the fordable section of river below the town where it was joined by two Yeomanry rovers with their Milan posts.
Across the river the Czech commander of the 23rd MRR facing them, was fairly certain that the main British resistance was on the high ground to the south of him and only infantry held the hamlet across the river. The bridge had been blown but he was not unduly put-out by this, the original crossing of the river in years gone by was the wide ford that still existed to the south side of the bridge. His problem was the lack of artillery support as the following division was still road marching forward and the air support was in exclusive use against the high ground, attempting to make up for the lack of artillery, which would normally ‘shoot them in’ to the target with a rolling barrage. The T-72 and T-90s of his lead company would remain on the east bank to provide direct fire support but they were not to expose themselves until all the companies AFVs were in position and about to cross the start line.
Back at the centre of the battalion line, the Challenger IIs of the Royal Hussars could no longer depress their gun barrels enough to engage the tanks and APCs which were now moving down the river bank to begin their assault. They were instead engaging the follow-on tank regiment at extreme range, leaving the closer enemies to the infantry Milan and LAW-80 teams of the Guards.
The Czech 21st Motor Rifle Regiment, to the south of the Guards hill had just begun to emerge from the eastern treeline and orient itself to charge across the flood plain, at the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders regular battalion in its defence positions to the Guards right rear. They were too far off for the Hussars tank guns but the lieutenant who had inherited the squadron contacted the Argyll’s CP to warn them that trouble was a-comin’.
Major Sinclair, the Coldstream Guards 2 i/c, did not have time to send anyone to look for the missing commanding officer and his infantry section escort. The CO was old enough and ugly enough to look after himself, he reasoned, and got on with fighting the battle in his absence, ordering the Hussars to despatch a troop to cover the old road that ran from the, now blown bridge, diagonally through the battalion area to their right rear. At present only a platoon from 3 Company and CSM Probert’s quick reaction force was covering it, should the enemy break through at the ford. Although the Hussar squadron attached to the Light Infantry were waiting for the enemy armour to enter the fields in front of their positions, their Challengers guns would be useless if the enemy swung south into the trees behind his own battalion, on clearing the ford. Only one tank reached the desired location though as the other two threw tracks.
In the copse near the ford, the anti-tank section was watching the build-up of armour across the river. They could not see the vehicles of the 23rd MRRs lead unit as they were forming up out of sight, but they knew where they were by looking through their thermal sights. The unoccupied buildings were all cold with no inhabitants to warm them, but the vehicles exhausts and sundry heat sources warmed the brick work on the exterior walls near the tanks and APCs, these showed up in white on their sights. The damage inflicted on the Tornados by the AAA vehicles in the far woods made the RAF reluctant, to send more to run the gauntlet until their threat had been minimised, if not destroyed. Tube artillery had been firing blind at the AAA in the woods, with little effect so it now switched the small town beside the river in the north, a young lance sergeant calling in the fire.
“Hello Zero Delta, this is India Six One Charlie…fire mission, over!” With the loss of the 1 Company CP he was forced to change to the battalion net to call down the artillery.
“Zero Delta, send over.”
“India Six One Charlie, shoot Delta Foxtrot One Nine now, over.”
“Zero Delta…wait out!” The business of calling in the mission was speeded by the pre-arranged DF plan.
There was a delay of over a minute before the artillery rep at the battalion CP confirmed the mission with a brief, “Hello India Six One Delta…shot One four five, over,” meaning that the first rounds were on the way, arrival time in forty-five seconds. This information is important, because had the unit requesting the mission been in direct combat with the target, the shells would arrive when friendly forces were as exposed as the enemy was. Knowing the time of flight of the shells allows the commander to keep up the its own units efforts until just before the shells arrive, when they take cover.
The artillery already knew the targets range and bearing, so conventional shells tore into the target or airburst above it without need of correction.
Inside the small town the barrage pre-empted the assault before the Czechs were set up. They could not turn around in the confines of the narrow streets, nor could they stay where they were and risk being trapped by falling buildings or taking a direct hit on the thin roof armour of the AFVs, they had to go forwards.
With the appearance of the first BTR and BMP APCs the lance sergeant commanding the anti-tank section held his fire as the enemy vehicles raced for the ford. By some fluke the lead vehicle, ahead of its mates by about 50m, made it to the river and began to cross, whereas the next six hit the mines buried by the Royal Engineers. The wrecked vehicles impeded the approach to the water but did not block it completely and the lead vehicle commander wrongly assumed that the vehicles behind had been hit by tank fire. He began shouting for their own tanks to get their fingers out and get out of the town and give them some support. He was still busy on the radio when his BTR reached the western bank and hit a mine all of its own. Five minutes later the eastern bank was littered with the burning hulks of eighteen APCs and closed to traffic until they could be dragged away. The anti-tanks finally got to let-rip as the enemy tanks poked their snouts out from behind buildings, far too late to support their infantry comrades. Five were knocked out in short order by the Guards anti-tank crews who had the advantage of a heat signature to at.
JSTARS, far to the rear was watching the movement forward of vehicles behind the assault and eventually classified them as self-propelled artillery. The divisional headquarters were informed that they had about fifteen minutes before enemy artillery would again be supporting the assault. This in turn was passed on down the line until it arrived at 1CGs CP where Major Sinclair decided to pull out his forces in the cops and move them to a north facing position with the single Challenger that had not thrown a track from that troop. He dispatched three Warriors from the rear and ordered the young NCO and his section to bug-out with the two Yeomanry call signs.
The Challengers on the hill were steadily taking their toll of the tank regiments T-80s but they had been firing continuously for almost an hour and ammunition was running low. Three of the tanks had been destroyed and three had thrown tracks. Of the six that remained there were just five to take on the second wave approaching the hill. The lieutenant in command informed the battalion that he was withdrawing three of those five to the rear for an ammo replen. He then rounded up some of the infantry on the rear slopes to form a chain and remove the ammunition from the disabled vehicles, transferring it to his tank and the one that remained with him.
To the south of the main action, the motor rifle regiment there went totally unhindered between t
he minefields before spreading out and accelerating across the cultivated flood plain toward the 1st Battalion Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders. If they thought they were fortunate, they were not, many sets of eyes, mostly electronic, watched them come on and the NATO forces MLRS oriented their launchers to the correct bearing and elevations and waited. It was an exercise that had been practised many times, they were not aiming at the tanks and APCs but assigned areas of ground. Computers worked out the sequence of firing, taking into consideration wind, temperature and humidity, range and times of flight.
Forty-one thousand, seven hundred and fifty sub-munitions arrived simultaneously in an area of terrain occupied by one hundred and forty-one armoured personnel carriers, main battle tanks and self-propelled anti-aircraft vehicles. In the OPs along the southern edge of the high ground, young men watched one of the most expensive fireworks displays in European history. Secondary’s, the vehicles own exploding fuel tanks and munitions, were more spectacular than the detonations, which caused them, and like a fireworks display the results were accompanied by appreciative “Oohs!” and “Aaghs!” from the spectators. A grid square had been removed, along with the 21st Motor Rifle Regiment.
On the forward slopes the Guardsmen were unable to prevent the enemy crossing the river and this was unfortunate because the APCs disgorged their infantry on reaching the western bank, these men deployed and began the assault on foot, clearing the way for the AFVs. The riflemen and gun groups in the trenches beyond the crest moved up to the crest and forward slopes and began the business of killing their counterparts.
Southwest of Leipzig: Same time.
Coming out of the Czech Republic at treetop level, skimming the Bohemian Forest, were twelve exceedingly futuristic looking aircraft. They were swing-wing, high performance combat aircraft previously seen only at air shows in its experimental prototype form during the late 1990s. Their wings swept forward instead of backwards, in a reverse of the conventional norms and the horizontal stabilising canards at rear of the cockpit, were more familiar on Sweden’s Viggen and Drakken airframes.