Chieftains (20 page)
He could smell diesel fuel, exhaust fumes, and the throbbing of the motor was louder. There were men beyond the clumps of bracken and bramble that skirted the clearing. He could see the head and shoulders of a guard patrolling the edge of the woods. He knew there must be others concealed throughout the forest.
It took a long time to inch his way forward until at least be had a clear view of the encampment. The clearing itself was almost empty, but there were vehicles parked close to the trees on the side farthest away from him, and bivouacs beside them. He recognized the radio vehicle, with its dish aerials, seventy meters ahead. A few meters from it was the BMP in which he had been imprisoned before his interrogation; the GRU officer's truck, the BTR command post, was on the left of the clearing, isolated.
There was a lot of activity. The radio vehicle was operating, a dim glow showing though its open doors. A group of cooks were working in a halo of mist around a hid-kitchen beneath the trees, and there was a small queue of infantrymen waiting nearby. Camouflage was being improved over several of the BMPs, as though the men intended to remain in the present position for some time.
To his left, beyond the BTR command vehicle, was a slit trench. He noticed it only because one of the guards paused and spoke to the men inside, before continuing his patrol. Studley crawled towards it.
He was only a few meters from the trench when one of the men it contained stood, stretched himself and then climbed out. He said a few words to a man below him, laughed, then walked away across the clearing. Studley watched him go. The man joined the end of the queue waiting by the field-kitchen. Studley wriggled his way closer to the trench. He could see the helmet of another guard; there might be a third man stretched out beside him, but it was a chance Studley realized he would have to take. He had already decided that if something went wrong, then he would fight with his bare hands until they killed him; they would shoot him anyway if he were captured again. And this time there would be no carelessness.
He slid closer, keeping low in the shadows of the thin scrub. The man was an arm's length away now, and if he looked over his left shoulder would be staring into Studley's face. Studley pushed himself silently to his knees. The Russian infantryman was sitting on a box behind a machine gun. His head was cupped in his hands, the strap of his helmet was beneath his chin.
Studley took a deep cautious breath, paused for a fraction of a second gathering his strength, then grabbed at the front of the helmet with both hands, jerking it fiercely backwards. The man's legs kicked away from him and his hands clawed at Studley's arms. As with the advice he had been given about escaping, Studley knew there would be no second chance. A combination of anger and determination made him stronger. He ignored the pain of his injuries, and swung himself around until he could get his knees against the man's back, then with as much power as he could find he wrenched the head and helmet sideways.
Bone snapped. For a moment Studley thought the strap of the helmet had broken. He changed his grip quickly to gain more purchase on the man's head; it moved strangely, loosely in his hands. The infantryman struggled weakly for a few more seconds as his life died away, and then was still.
Studley felt exhausted; throbbing agony had returned to his wounds. His clothing was soaked with sweat. He wiped it from his eyes with a sleeve, and felt it stinging in the cuts of his lips and face. Every movement of the past few seconds had sounded terrifyingly loud and he expected at any moment to hear shots and feel the thud of bullets ripping into his body.
He glanced towards the field-kitchen, the queue had lengthened, the cooks were not hurrying their work. Men stood chatting while they waited, swinging their arms across their bodies or stamping their feet to keep their circulation moving in the night air. They were far enough away from the front tines to still feel secure; in probability, they had not yet seen any action, he thought. Men who had faced shells and bullets did not relax their vigilance so easily.
He quickly examined the machine gun: a 7.62mm PK on a bipod, simple to operate unless it jammed. If it did so, then he would discard it instantly; there was no time to study its mechanism.
He moved the body of the dead guard. The box on which the infantryman had been seated held additional magazines of bullets, and to Studley's greater satisfaction contained ten RGD-5 grenades. Beneath the body he found a loaded AKM rifle.
The slit trench overlooked a long valley sweeping down towards the west. Studley debated quickly on the choice of weapons; he would not be able to carry them all. He pushed half a dozen of the grenades into his pockets and then dragged the machine gun with him over the brow of the hill, where he was able to move around the perimeter of the camp out of sight of the guards.
He was within twenty meters of the radio vehicle when there was a shout from across the clearing in the direction of the slit trench. Studley jerked the pin from a grenade then hurriedly tossed it underhand through the open doors, scurrying back into the undergrowth like a disabled crab as it exploded inside the armoured vehicle, belching flame and smoke through the buckled and split metalwork. The tall radio mast collapsed sideways into the trees. He threw another with all his strength towards a running group of men near the centre of the clearing, and several crumpled bodies were hurled away by its blast.
The camp was panicking, the men unable to identify the whereabouts or nature of the attack, mistaking the grenades for mortar bombs. Studley limped towards the nearest BMP. Its crew were scrambling inside, and the troop hatches were fully open. Studley's grenade bounced off the rear of the turret and exploded within the hull. A sheet of fire roared upwards as the fuel tanks ignited. He caught a glimpse of the driver, crawling away from the hull, his overalls alight.
There were no more close targets for his grenades. Studley dropped behind the machine gun. He worked the first round into the breech with the bolt, and mentally crossed his fingers.
On the far side of the clearing were a group of men Huddled around the BTR command post. It moved, its driver reversing it towards the woods. The men moved with it, using its hull as protective cover. Studley squeezed the trigger and felt the satisfying shudder as the gun reacted. He kept the burst short; it was unlikely he would have more than two hundred rounds in the magazine, and this gas-operated weapon would get through more than six hundred and fifty a minute. As the bullets struck, the BTR began smoking. He gave it a second burst, low alongside the driving compartment. The smoke became flame which billowed and swelled like the fireball of a miniature atomic bomb. He raked a longer burst through running figures then scrambled deeper into the undergrowth, moving further to his left, dragging the machine gun.
One of the BMPs was thundering blindly towards him, crashing through the light woods, its tracks slapping and squealing. He threw himself aside and the vehicle road past. There were shots crackling viciously in the trees...unaimed, indiscriminate, shouted orders, more explosions. Vehicles were revving, moving. A wounded man was screaming.
'Bastards...you bastards,' yelled Studley. He knew he was invincible; better than invincible, he had become death itself. He grabbed the machine gun under his arms and staggered into the open, firing it from his hip at a BMP that was dragging itself out of its camouflage, trailing the netting. Its rocket exploded in the launcher, ripping the vehicle's turret off backwards as neatly as if it had been removed by a cutting charge. Fires had brought eerie daylight to the clearing, the contorting shadows and smoke adding to the stygian chaos. One of the BMPs exploded for a second the as its ammunition overheated, scattering flaming debris high into the air. A UAZ Jeep bounced out of the woods and spun in the open ground. Studley caught it with his final burst, firing until his gun stopped. The Jeep accelerated for a few meters, hit the wreckage of one of the BMPs and rolled on to its side.
Studley dropped the machine gun and pulled out his two remaining grenades. He removed the pin from each and stood waiting defiantly. The only remaining undestroyed target he could see was the field-kitchen.
'I'm here, you bastards...' The reply was the digestive sound of the fires, the sharp crack of small-arms ammunition as it exploded amongst the burning wreckage. The madness left Studley. He said, quietly, 'I'm here.' There was a sense of anti-climax, unrealness.
He stared around him; nothing moved but the shadows.
The fatigue, exhaustion, and the pain were returning. He must get away; find somewhere where he could lick his wounds. He needed a weapon, though. Not another machine gun, something convenient, light, a pistol. He could see a holster on the belt of a body lying beside the upturned Jeep. He staggered over to it. It was the GRU captain; the man was unconscious. Studley looked at the two grenades he was holding in his hands; the pins were lost somewhere on the far side of the clearing. He had never expected to replace them. He considered tossing the grenades into the woods, then changed his mind.
Carefully he wedged them beneath the GRU captain's body, the man's weight holding the levers against their casings, then he took the pistol from the man's holster.
He was about a kilometer away down the long slope of the woodland when he heard the two grenades detonate. The sound gave him no more satisfaction than had he killed a rabid dog.
FIFTEEN
DAY TWO
A canopy of ponchos hid the white-blue light of the cutting torch as the men worked on the jammed track of Utah,. the Abrams of November India Squadron. The Bundesgrenzshutz platoon, with the exception of one engineer who was helping Adams, Ginsborough and Podini, were scattered on the lower slopes of the hill above the crippled tank. Master Sergeant Will Browning and the BGS lieutenant lay below the crest of the ridge and watched the activity on the three bridges now completed across the river.
The engines of the Soviet vehicles muffled the sound of gunfire, but distant fires were colouring the sky towards the west.
'There's one hell of a lot of supplies down there.'
The lieutenant nodded. 'Too many. It should not be so. They are holding them...waiting for something.'
'Reinforcements?'
'No. I do not think they need them yet. I think they wait because they have delay.'
'We're holding them?' It was a good thought, but Browning wasn't convinced.
'Maybe, yes. How far do you think it is to the combat zone?'
Browning studied the horizon. It was difficult to estimate distance at night, but the gunfire he could see was well below the rim of the night sky. 'Eight or nine kilometers.'
'Not much more than this afternoon. I think the American and German corps begin counter-offensive.'
'Counter-offensive? Jesus man, we don't have the strength. You've seen the amount of their armour.'
'We now have French armour...and French aircraft.'
'French? When the hell did we get the French?
'Yesterday morning. They join us.'
'Could they get their armour up this fast?'
'It is possible. The distance is not so great.' The German was lying on his stomach, his chin resting on his forearms. 'You know what we must do?'
'If I had any sense, I'd tell you we should get the hell out of here while we've got a chance.' Browning stared down at the bridgehead and supply dump. The loss of ammunition, fuel, food and vehicle supplies would be a serious blow to the Soviet division, and if it could be achieved at the expense of a single NATO tank, then it had to be justifiable. The trouble was, it was his tank, his crew and his life; and he had already made himself a few promises. He attempted to weigh up the odds.
The lieutenant misunderstood Browning's hesitation. 'How do you want to fight this war, American? From twenty kilometers the other side of the front line...firing shells at an enemy you can't see? In a tank, you fight close, like infantry. And sometimes it is necessary to die.'
'I know my job, Lieutenant, and I know about dying.' Browning was silent for a while. A lot of memories he had forgotten had been revived in the past hours, and almost as though it were Armageddon ghosts had risen from graves. He had called Adams 'Jackson' during the battle, but Jackson had died near Dong Ha; he had looked out through the episcope in the earlier minutes of the counterattack and for a few moments been unable to recognize the XM1s of the squadron, he had expected sand-coloured M48s. Dying? He was an expert. They had offered him a commission once...suggested he train to become an officer. He had refused, because he knew too much about death. As an officer you decided how a battle should be fought, and then you gave the orders to your men to fight it. As a sergeant you took the orders, but then made decisions to try to keep your men alive while you obeyed them. He preferred the latter responsibility.
'You have visited my village before, Sergeant?
'Gunthers?' Browning saw the German officer nod. 'I passed through it a couple of days ago. It was a nice place.'
'Yes, a good place. Small, but good. And my school was good, too. I took my last class three days ago.'
'Teacher?'
'Yes, I am a teacher, art. I took my class on Tuesday afternoon. Boys and girls, fourteen years old. And they painted the bridge across the Ulster, from memory. I should have taken them down there, and let them sit by it...by the bridge. Now, it has gone, and with it the old
gasthof,
many memories. Yesterday morning, I blew them to pieces.'
Adams had repaired the track; cut it loose, replaced the severed link, repositioned the track on the sprockets and adjusted the tension. The XM1 was operational. There would be no opportunity to warm up her engine; once it was started every Russian within a kilometer would know there was an armoured vehicle somewhere close by. For a while they might think it was one of their own, but it wouldn't be too long before someone decided to investigate. The sound of Utah's Avco Lycoming turbine was distinctive.
Podini and Ginsborough had cleared most of the rubble from behind the tracks and with luck the Abrams would be able to reverse straight out. The men were waiting now for Browning's orders, anxious to be moving.
The BGS lieutenant asked: 'Well, Sergeant?'
'How long will it take to get your men in position?
'Four minutes.'
'Will you be using your missiles?'
'It's not easy in the darkness...but yes, we will try.'
'Okay,' agreed Browning. 'You have exactly four minutes.'
Podini's voice was anxious in Browning's earphones. 'What's going on? How many minutes to what?'
Browning had pulled down the hatch and was settling himself in his seat. 'We're going back to war.'
'I thought we were going home...'
'Afterwards, Podini...'
'You had to mention a nuke,' interrupted Adams, wearily.
'It ain't no nuke...I made a mistake. You're kidding us, Sarge.'
'Two minutes,' warned Browning. 'When you get her out of here, Mike, go right. Keep her close to the wall below the hill. After three hundred meters the ground dips below another section of wall that runs towards the river. I want her hull-down there for three shots, all HE...you get that, Mike...just three shots? You with me, Podini? Okay! There's a fuel bowser this side of the bridge...that's your first target. The missile you saw is under net some three hundred meters further up the bank, in a grove of trees, that's your number two. I want that rocket taken out... so no mistakes. It may need a couple of shells...otherwise, we'll see what we've got afterwards. Mike, once you move, move fast. Head straight into them...Podini, you're on your own, I'll be using the point five; and keep it cool, guys.'
'Cool? Shit!'
Browning said, 'Okay...let's roll.'
Browning was watching the scene ahead of the XM1 through the light-intensifying lenses. They did not bring daylight, only dusk. There was no colour, soft shadows...the light of the minutes before nightfall.
The XM1's turbine had started with a roar that Browning knew must have been heard clear across the border. If anything was calculated to jerk the Soviet ground radar operators back into full alert, nothing much more suitable could have been invented. At any moment he expected shells to begin bursting around them.
Adams quickly settled the tank in the dip of the ground behind the low stone wall. Browning would have been happier if the hollow had been deeper, but it was the best cover available; the near three meters height of Utah didn't make her the easiest of armoured vehicles to conceal.
Podini hadn't wasted time. He wanted to get it over so they could leave the area. He was talking nervously to himself, running through the firing drill. 'Target...laser range-finder...firing-switch on...computer adjusts...fire!' The M68 gun roared, lifting the XM1's bow. A fraction of a second later the fuel bowser, a thousand meters away, exploded into a billowing wall of fire that turned the river into brilliant gold. 'Target...where the hell is the nuke...?'
'It ain't a nuke...' Adams' voice. 'Please God that ain't no nuke.'
'Left some,' advised Browning. He was thinking along much the same lines as Adams, but didn't think there would be a nuclear explosion even if the missile was armed with a nuclear warhead, which he doubted. Aircraft had crashed when they were carrying nuclear weapons, and hadn't exploded. 'Left more...eleven o'clock...yeah...'
Podini said: 'Countdown begun...ten...nine...'
'Very funny you Wop nut...'Adams wasn't amused.
The explosion of the bowser had stirred wild activity into the area; a group of infantrymen were hurrying across the open ground in front of the nearest of the bridges. A twin automatic anti-aircraft gun with a high rate of fire began loosing off indiscriminate bursts into the hillside above the XM1. It wouldn't take them too long to find their target...the Abrams had got off the first shot without being seen, but plenty of eyes would be scouring the darkness watching for the source of the second:
Podini fired. The explosion of the shell was unspectacular. 'Come on Gins...come on...move your ass...'
'Loaded...'
'Go you shit...' The XM1 surged as Podini fired again.
'Okay...move out, Adams,' shouted Browning.
Adams slammed the Allison transmission into reverse and spun the XM1 sideways, then ten meters back along the gulley into the open field. As he did so the hull vibrated to the rapid explosion of a dozen high explosive rounds in the hollow where they had been hull-down. Adams changed to forward gear and accelerated fast. He hit the low wall and the XM1 bucked wildly, the stone glancing off the hull like shrapnel and scattering into the darkness.
Browning hadn't seen the gun's third shell strike. Near the first bridge the fuel bowser was still blazing furiously. He thought he could make out the position of the anti-aircraft gun, and was bringing the .5 to bear when the entire strip of ground that was his night vision horizon burst upwards in a blinding flash of white fire. He saw trees blasted out of the ground, and huge pieces of unidentifiable debris hurled from the centre of the explosion. The tight was so fierce he was forced to cover his eyes with his hand, but the vision of the towering explosion remained. The XM1 hit the shock wave as though it were being driven into a deep snow drift.
'Christ!' Browning didn't know whether Podini was cursing or praying.
Adams had his feet on the brake and the XM1 was almost stationary.
'Keep her going, Adams...move the cowson...' Browning found that so long as he was looking directly towards the raging fires near the bridges he could see, but the remainder of the landscape which had formerly been twilight through his night-sight was now pitch-black.
The whole stretch of woodland beyond the dump where the missile launcher had been conceded was blazing, as though a hundred napalm bombs had been dropped within the small area.
'HE, I told you it was HE,' Podini was shouting joyfully. 'Boy, see that rocket go...Jesus Christ...'
A Russian truck was being driven furiously but blindly on a diagonal collision course towards Utah. Browning expected Adams to change direction; he didn't. Utah struck the truck a third of the way along the body, tore it apart and tossed the wreckage high into the air. The tank shuddered. Behind them the front end of the truck somersaulted across the field shedding bodies, and then burst into flames.
Browning began using the .5 machine gun, concentrating on the riverbank where some of the anti-aircraft defaces had been positioned. He could not see a clear target, but hoped his bullets were encouraging the AA gunners to keep their heads down. 'Adams....right a bit...Podini...go for the bridges...' As he spoke the nearest bridge erupted into a mass of fire and twisted metal. 'Forget it...leave them to the BGS...hit the transports.'
Podini was firing as fast as Ginsborough could get shells and charges into the breech, and Adams had cut the speed again, keeping Utah close to the cover below the hill. The first of the PG-7 anti-tank rockets exploded three meters ahead, followed by a second more to the right. Adams accelerated. He saw a group of infantry twenty meters ahead and drove for them; three chose the wrong direction and were pulped beneath the XM1's tracks.
Two shells fired by one of the twin 23mm anti-aircraft guns shrieked off Utah's Chobham armour, the third exploded on the turret ring, failed to penetrate, but jammed the Cadillac Cage turret drive.
Podini yelled, 'Let's get the fuck out of here...'
Utah rocked as an anti-tank grenade exploded close to the hull. Browning could see a platoon of enemy infantry charging towards the hill. 'Okay, Mike...let's go.'
