Breakthrough (The Red Gambit Series) (101 page)

They were known as the ‘Red Eagles’, a homage to their divisional badge.

Their service during the Second World War was exemplary, from the 1940 campaigns in the
Western
Desert
, through East Africa and the rout of the larger Italian Forces,
Syria
and finally
Italy
, where the division earned undying glory in and around the bloodbath that was Monte Cassino.

The 4th was considered an elite formation, but it had taken heavy casualties in the process of acquiring its illustrious reputation.

Returned from a stint of armed policing in
Greece
, the 4th Indian Division had slotted back into the Allied order of battle alongside sister units with whom they had shared the excesses of combat, only to be swiftly transferred north and into the cauldron of the new German war.

It performed well against the new enemy, and swiftly relieved the exhausted 101st Airborne.

The new positions assigned to the 7th Indian infantry Brigade covered the routes out of Wolfegg, and the approaches to Vogt.

The 4th/16th Punjab Regiment, ably supported by two platoons of the 6th Rajputana MG Battalion, had stood firm in and around Vogt, British tanks from the 26th Armoured Brigade causing heavy casualties amongst the attacking T34’s.

As the Soviet probes continued, the 2nd/11th Sikhs were pushed hard along their defensive line, set in parallel with Route 324 to the north of Vogt.

On Route 314 to the north, British soldiers of the 1st Royal Sussex Regiment folded back, but did not give, forcing the attacking Soviet infantry and cavalry to retreat, leaving scores of dead on the field.

An unusual error in Soviet attack scheduling had delayed the central assault, enabling the defending artillery to concentrate on assisting the Sussex Regiment before switching to the aid of the forces defending Routes 317 and 323.

Company Havildar Major Dhankumar Gurung looked around him, able to make out the shape of one of his men here, a weapon ready and manned there.

8th Platoon was quiet, safely hidden behind their tree trunks, protected by the hastily scraped foxholes, or comfortable in the old German trench.

Not one man had suffered any injury as the Soviet artillery, weak by comparison to normal, had probed the defensive positions of the Sirmoor Rifles.

Part of their line was a trench dug months before their arrival, eight foot deep, wood reinforced and with firing steps along its length, a relic of the previous conflict.

Gurung’s soldiers had extended the trench, and taken advantage of natural depressions in the ground, as well as fallen tree trunks, creating a strong position from which to resist.

Thus far, the battalion had not seen an enemy, apart from the occasional flash of an aircraft overhead.

According to the legends of the British Army, no enemy relished fighting these wiry hillmen from
Nepal
, and, to a man, they were keen to get to close quarters with the new foe to put their
marshall
skills to the test against a strong and cunning enemy.

The Sirmoor Rifles, also known as the 1st/2nd [King Edward VII’s Own] Gurkha Rifles, waited in anticipation of the battle to come.

[Book Three of the Red Gambit series, ‘Stalemate’, should be available by January 2013 on Amazon Kindle as a download, and createspace.com as a book.]

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