He glanced at the note again, this time with a look of incredulity.
“Gentlemen … this signal is from Moscow. Our government is demanding an explanation. The Kremlin has been informed by the International News services …” he looked despondently at his empty teacup. “It seems Lower Austria has been invaded, and that we have started a war.”
∞
Arjon sighed heavily, expending a suppressed curse beneath his breath.
“Hesta, please stop, I can’t live through any more.”
The BlindFold released its light pressure from his temple and went into standby.
He closed his eyes and re-ran the previous hour of Earth’s history in his mind. The events had unfolded as though the world were in the grip of a nightmare from which it could not awaken. When he compared that alternative to his own utopia, it was unnerving how easily those changes would have come about.
The Union of Nations had never really been formed. Instead, the recalcitrant communists of the Soviet Bloc had undermined the efforts to implement a truly global instrument of peace. The power of veto they attained over the Security Council meant that the UN merely became another platform for voicing the differences between conflicting ideologies.
Other critical events had revealed themselves in Arjon’s memory. He could see how they would have prevented his own world coming into existence. No prosperous, enlightened decades of progress and peace through the late twentieth century, instead, the mistrust, fear, and violence had prevailed.
I need to know more … to understand what this all means … for us now.
“Hesta,” he sighed with resignation, “I must continue … please prepare the next instalment.”
∞
Near Slavonice, Czechoslovakia
Feb 24th, 1946
Warm, acrid smoke had replaced the chill, clean air.
General Andrey Vlasov remembered the last time the clean fragrance of the forest had filled his nostrils. That had been two days ago. Now the forest was a sea of smoldering gray. The ground was bare except for snow hugging the trunks of trees, and the pockets of slick ice spread around between them, melting slowly under the heat of the fires.
They’d been retreating steadily for the past thirty-six hours. He felt no ignominy … it was part of the plan. The surprise attack on Jihlava on Day One had been followed by a twenty-mile advance toward Prague. Then the Red Army’s counter offensive had begun.
Not just a small scale, reflex, counter attack – they’d been well prepared.
Sixty thousand brave men … now we are only ten thousand.
Vlasov crushed his cigarette out under his boot. He’d taken them up again during the battle after a year-long abstinence. The Russian tobacco canceled out some of the taste of the pine-smoke from the fires, but not all of it. He’d give them up when this was all over. If you had the will power to do it once, you could do it again.
A shrill whistle split the relative calm. He hit the deck, following the cigarette butt as another artillery round landed nearby. A rain of hard, frozen dirt and ice crystals showered over him. A pre-dawn barrage before another attack.
He picked himself up. As he dusted himself off, he looked over to where the shell had landed. An empty, blackened crater would have marked a clean miss, but around it were shreds of dark green cloth and streaks of bloody gore. Another RLA soldier who would not be returning home … either as a liberating freedom fighter, or in chains as a captured traitor.
A bulky, overcoated figure came rushing out of a sandbagged command post, and began clambering up the steep slope toward him. He was bent over to help avoid the flying shrapnel and shell splinters.
“They’re coming,” the officer shouted. It was Vlasov’s 2IC, Major General Bunyachenko. He was so exhausted by the time he reached the top of the hill, that the General couldn’t tell whether he was about to laugh hysterically or begin to cry.
“Who’s coming Sergei?” he urged after waiting for him to catch his breath.
“Contact … whuh, huh …, we made contact, with 3rd Army!” For a moment, the smoke and death around him faded from Vlasov’s mind, at last!
“When!” the General shouted, trying to be heard over the incessant barrage.
He repeated, “When will they get here?”
“Tomorrow! They’re still twenty miles away, but have broken through … they’ve taken Brno!”
The two went downhill and into the heavily camouflaged command post.
Maps, topped by little wooded arrows and covered by dust caused by the shelling, lay scattered over a long timber table. Bunyachenko picked one up, blew off the dust and straightened it out before them. He pointed to their current position. They had fallen back to prepared defenses in the heavily forested region leading out of the valley from Königswiesen. A thirty-mile front stretching from Slavonice to Znojmo.
“We are here …” and he traced a line to the east, “… the Allied forward units are here … approaching from south of Brno.”
“The Red Army’s flank has been exposed, and has now been breached by the 3rd Army divisions attacking along this line … from Bratislava, through Brno … and now toward Prague.”
Vlasov slapped the Major General on the back. “It is working!” he exclaimed.
“All of the months of planning … of scheming for big surprises in the middle of the night!”
An earthquake-like shuddering sent pencils and wooden arrows dancing off the table. The muffled roar of the nearby explosion reminded them of their immediate situation.
The two men looked at each other. Vlasov’s finger pointed to the map, “We’ll have to withdraw further into these hills.”
He drew a line from Slavonice back toward their starting point almost a week ago, “Our line will swing back towards Königswiesen here … and pivot from our eastern flank … here, at Znojmo.”
He looked up from the map. Resolution showed on his face, as though he were willing the strategy he’d just proposed on paper, to come to fruition in the world of flame and smoke outside the bunker.
“The Bolsheviks won’t follow us for fear of what would come up behind them if they did.”
“Da, da …” agreed Bunyachenko. “We would draw them in to the hills and extend their supply lines.”
“Which would be further exposed to air attacks,” added Vlasov.
Bunyachenko thought for a moment then remembered information he had omitted in the excitement of the news of their relief, “We have also been given us news of the Allied advance to the west …”
The major General pulled out another map from beneath the others.
“From Linz, they have attacked north to Tabor, and are now swinging east below Prague.”
Vlasov immediately recognized the classic armored warfare strategy in motion before him, “Ah … of course, a pincer movement. General Patton must think he can encircle them.”
Bunyachenko agreed, “They will be in a position of strength to be trying such a maneuver, and they must have already achieved air-superiority to be attempting it!”
Vlasov looked at his 2IC with an optimism he hadn’t shown since the war started. “Da, and hopefully my friend, we may be seeing some of the air cover ourselves very soon.”
∞
The BlindFold shifted slightly as a startled Arjon sat up suddenly.
Atom bombs … again?
The scene before him was one of a white-painted building in Panmunjom, North Korea. The armistice talks intended to end the Korean War had been faltering, and threatened to fail once again. The discussion around the table then took a serious turn when the United Nations delegates mentioned the use of nuclear weapons.
The armistice was signed shortly after.
∞
Znojmo, Czechoslovakia
Feb 26th, 1946
A clear blue sky welcomed the early morning sun. Golden yellow splashed onto the parapets topping the ancient stone walls of Znojmo Castle.
General Vlasov walked around the rampart
overlooking the Thuya River in the valley hundreds of feet below. Across the frozen river, he spied some of the tanks and armored troop carriers of the 3rd Army’s 10th Armored Division which had arrived during the night.
I expect their Commander will be here shortly …
The previous night, the townsfolk had provided a banquet to celebrate the linking up of the two Allied armies … but delays in cleaning up the rear-guard units of the Red Army’s 25th Guards Rifle Division, had caused the event to be postponed.
Vlasov closed his eyes and turned his face to the sun. The warmth soaked through his exhausted body, and the silence was invigorating.
Bird song had replaced the continual thump of artillery.
A lull.
It was one of those days in a war where the fleeting peace between battles was to be savored, and every minute seemed like ten.
An olive drab figure walked out on to the battlements.
Vlasov nodded approval. “Good Morning Colonel. … I’m glad to see you made it here in one piece.”
“Like-wise General,” said Blackett, “although it was a rough night.”
“Da … we heard your fighting from here.”
He raised his hand at the serenity now surrounding them. “But today is a day to be relished.”
“Is Major Rhuzkoi with you?”
“Yes General, he’s with Major General Bunyachenko … exchanging details before our joint briefing this morning.”
“Good,” he sighed, “… there may be a respite from the war for the soldiers on the ground, but we officers do not get the day off.”
The two began to pace slowly along the top of the walls, enjoying the quiet for a moment more, before Blackett said heavily, “I have news from our engagement at Linz …”
Vlasov continued to walk steadily, but steeled himself for something he knew would be painful to hear.
“Air attacks caused the most casualties … we had little defense against them … we lost a lot of men.”
“And when the 3rd Army ground forces attacked?” enquired the General, coming to a halt.
“Your RLA troops fought as well as could be expected under the circumstances … we put up a token resistance and then surrendered as soon as possible.”
“As expected …” the general said softly.
Blackett shifted uncomfortably. They had all known it would be difficult, even tragic, to lose lives fighting in a battle between forces on the same side. It had been critical to stage it at the same time and in the vicinity of the 3rd Army maneuvers … and in front of the British and French observers.
“My condolences General.”
Vlasov’s angst turned to steely resignation, “Accepted Colonel … but they are not required. What we do require, Colonel Blackett, is the help of your OSS to rebuild the strength of our army.”
They stood facing each other; a shared determination filled the space between the two soldiers.
“My RLA will retreat back across the Danube to regroup. With our Lend Lease equipment we will appear as just another group of Allied divisions retiring from the front lines for a rest. There we will have the prisoners taken at Linz returned to us … but we will need more than a few thousand men to replace our losses.”
Blackett’s brow creased thoughtfully, where is this going?
“Colonel, we will need your help to recruit from the thousands who have been crossing the borders from Eastern Europe … defectors, Cossacks, ex-Nazis … I don’t care … as long as they hate the Bolsheviks as much as we do!”
Blackett leaned his arms on the lip of the stone parapet, thinking.
A long silence followed. Vlasov lit a cigarette and the birds seemed to sing louder.
“You’ve got it General. We’ll get your army back to strength–I promise.”
“Thank you, Colonel. It will take us many months, but we will return to this war … as a newly formed Russian Liberation Army.”
He squared up to Blackett, his expression told of the great sacrifice his men had made in bringing events up to this point. Blackett was compelled to meet his gaze, and confirm the bond of honor that existed between them, and also between their two causes. The RLA fighting to free their homeland, and the Allies fighting to free the world.
Vlasov spoke softly but with unmistakable intent, “Our armies will fight this war together across Europe, but it will be my army that marches into Moscow to end it.”
∞
But that two-handed engine at the door
Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more.
John Milton
Lycidas
Passau, Germany
March 25th, 1946
Colonel Lance Corday entered the HQ command post of his 558th Tank Destroyer Battalion and asked his staff, “Where are they?”
His officers were in a huddle, pointing and talking over the center of a map spread out on a large table.
“On the fifty-yard line sir,” answered Captain Peters, pointing to a white-painted wooden marker sitting on the map – the last known forward position of their men. The highly detailed map showed Passau, a town on the Danube. The center of the town was marked with a chess piece, a black rook. The lines of elevation were compressing around the castle, and the white marker was halfway up the slope.
Making good time then, Corday thought as he focused intently on his battalion’s dispositions. He glanced up from the table and scanned the interior of the building. The new command post had been set up overnight after the previous one had been hit by shellfire.
What was once a bank in the center of town was now merely a bombed-out shell. Most of the roof was still intact, however, which was why it had been selected as the new CP. The open wall-safe with its thick steel door pulled wide open, lay empty except for a layer of documents on its floor. It symbolized the state of the country they were now fighting in. Once strong and mighty, now laid waste. Its cities had been devastated by allied bombing, and then ravaged and looted by the Soviets.
Corday had spent the cool, spring morning in his jeep, touring the units at the front. The destruction was the same throughout the town, and on both sides of the river approaching Veste Oberhaus, the thirteenth-century castle overlooking the Danube.
He returned to the map. “Give me a rundown on the drive so far.”
The operations officer, Captain Peters, took a breath, preparing to take point on the briefing. It meant a lot to him to make a good impression, both to his CO, and to his brother officers. His chest filled out and exuded the air of his West Point heritage.
“The Reds put up strong resistance soon after kick-off … along the road to the north of the objective… here. The division had to slow the advance a couple of times because the infantry had to clear some bunkers that the tanks had overrun.”
He pointed out several key defensive points, now marked as occupied by their own troops.
“Have we confirmed the enemy units?” asked the Colonel. “As we expected it’s the 72nd Guards Rifle Division … we also suspect there is a mechanized battalion holding some T34s in reserve. We’ll find out as we close in on the objective.”
Corday looked up from the map, his eyes flashed expectantly at the officers gathered around him, “I want to know before we find out!”
“Yes sir!” Captain Peters replied.
Peters turned to Lieutenant Clay, the intelligence officer, beside him. Clay was a bird of a different feather as demonstrated by his shoulder insignia, a black knight, which was different to the red and blue triangle of the other officers.
Captain Peters said to him, “I want eyes in the air looking for that armor … and give me an update on weather.”
As Lieutenant Clay turned and left for the Comms section, Captain Peters continued to brief the Colonel.
“Overall, the resistance has been as we anticipated … for a rear-guard force, they put up a strong initial fight … then fell back once we took out most of their forward artillery with air-strikes.”
Colonel
Corday smiled. Once again, the story was unfolding as General Patton had said it would. Air superiority was going to be the decisive factor. The tactics developed by his 3rd Army during WWII were now standard throughout the US Army. Fast, relentless, armored advances closely supported by fighter bombers and other air assets, were a devastating combination.
“What about anti-tank?” he asked.
“They’ve got plenty … and we can expect more as we keep advancing.”
Corday pondered for a moment, Hmmm, still going to be a slog, even with tank-busters in the air and a mounting advantage from our own artillery. But it’s gotta be done.
He walked over to the theater map taking up most of the wall behind the tellers’ counters. The lines and marks on it weren’t up to date, that wouldn’t happen until the General visited again. The red marks on it showed the last known position of the Soviet lines retreating across Czechoslovakia. It also showed the same colored lines in northern Germany moving forward from the states around Berlin.
Shortly after Day One, the Soviets had attacked strongly out of Brandenburg and Saxony, pushing the Allies back toward the south west. They were attempting to divide the British forces in the north-west from the Americans to the south-east. And it had been working.
The US 3rd Army had sent divisions from Czechoslovakia to shore up their western flank. That was where Corday’s battalion was now fighting. All across Germany, desperate battles, costing thousands of lives had been fought to slow, and then halt the Russian advance. The outcome of the war was now hanging in the balance.
Corday stepped back from the wall, widening his view. The hill in front of them wasn’t even a pin-prick on this map, and held no strategic value. This was only a mop-up operation, but it was being watched closely by the General Staff.
Corday was being given an opportunity to demonstrate new tactics with tank destroyers using a game plan he’d developed. It was one he’d worked on after a meeting with General Patton some months prior. The 3rd Army commander had made a comment about the armored divisions being the “running back” of the army. Corday had taken this analogy to an American football team, and modified it so it could be applied to another level – that of his tank destroyer battalion.
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