Conrad's Last Campaign (15 page)

I will march forward. I choose glory, and fame and family. I will fight for Poland, for my family and for my God. Those of you who feel the same will follow."

When we resumed the march, all but a hundred men followed me. The ones who stayed behind were left with two carts of food, the ammo in their saddlebags and whatever booty they had personally taken. They looked like a lonely and scared little group. I never found out if the rotten little cowards made it home, and never cared.

I don’t expect my God to answer me. I’ve raised armies in His name, prayed every day for years, vanquished His enemies and honored His name, but I’m also an engineer. I also believe in the laws of nature and understand that “God helps them that helps themselves” and “Prayer works, as long as you keep working your ass off while you pray.” are the real laws of prayer. Unlike my bumpkin friends, I don’t think God hands out favors to his friends and smooths the road ahead for the faithful

But you’d think I’d get a break once in a while.

Things went well for over two weeks. It became obvious that we were not going to make my thirty-day goal for the trip, but we weren’t going to miss by too much, and in a sudden plan like this, plus or minus fifty percent was right on target.

Despite Ivanov’s best efforts the old equipment picked up in Sarai couldn’t handle the pace we tried to set and after the first week, a couple of hours a day were being lost in cooking and repairing. There were also the usual streams and rivers and rough ground slowing us down even on the steppes.

Since the weather was holding, I decided it was best to reach
Mongolia with a well fed and rested army and I slacked off from a hundred ten miles a day to about seventy-five miles a day as a goal. I figured that as the old equipment dropped off and we leaned down to canned goods and modern wagons, we could make up a lot of the time lost in a final dash for the goal.

Then it rained. Ever wonder why the steppes are treeless grassland? Because it doesn’t rain enough to support trees. There’s no damned water on the steppes. It snows enough in winter to feed the groundwater and streams and grow some grass, but it rarely rains. As long as we got where we were going before the snows, we didn’t have a lot of weather worries.

Except this year, it rained; buckets and barrels and cats and dogs, it rained. I tried to keep going the first day, rain or not, but by the time we camped, I knew we were there until the rain stopped. One of the problems with armor is that the padding under it soaks up water and holds it next to your skin. When the wind blew, we were in danger of hypothermia, in addition to being miserable, dog tired and damp.

Each of the columns found the highest and driest ground around and pitched camp. In the morning, it was obvious that we were stuck for awhile, so I had each camp set up dry R&R areas by stretching canvas between rows of wagons using whatever they had for tent poles. It gave us dry places to cook and areas for the men to congregate for cards and lies and just to avoid tent fever.

It rained for seven days and seven nights. I felt like Noah without an ark At least I was in good company. I remembered Napoleon and Hitler both being destroyed by the Russian winter, the Mongol invasion of Japan twice thwarted by the Great Wind, and the Spanish Armada driven to sea by a storm. If this killed me, as least I was in good company.

We were screwed by nature, our second betrayal, and the one that hurt the worst.

It was a dark time for the Christian Army and for the country that it served. At the time, I was Komander Osiol of the Christian Army, assigned to central command.

We had experienced years of prosperity and success, but jealousies and power were pulling the army apart. We had been led ably by Lord Conrad for many years, but now the king was becoming jealous of Conrad’s power and influence and was casting a greedy eye on the wealth of the army. The final straw came when Conrad casually ordered the building a massive rail road over the Suez. When the king realized that the budget for that project alone was several times the annual income of the crown, he decided that the army was too wealthy to leave alone.

Conrad’s closest ally and friend has always been his wife, but she now said in private that she was tired of his whoring ways and wanted a man who at least remembered where his home was. I think she was mainly lonely and tired.

In truth, Lord Conrad brought on many of his own troubles. He disappeared for over a year and the fact that he re-appeared at the head of a conquering army did nothing to endear him to his wife, as he immediately set off on another adventure without even setting foot on Polish soil.

Fortunately, Lord Conrad still had some friends. Among them was the new Hetman Duke Piotr, a man of his word and therefore loyal to King Henryk, but also loyal to his old friend. Piotr managed to help by setting up an emergency
research
committee and then refusing to have any knowledge of what it was doing.

Our first meeting was productive, but less than momentous.

First meeting of the Emergency Contingency Planning Commission

I opened the meeting with introductions. “Gentlemen, I think that I am known to all of you. I am Komander Krzysztof Osiol and I am chairing this committee at the request of Hetman Piotr. Most of you know each other, but in dealing with a matter this serious, it is important that we are all comfortable with each other. So, would each of you introduce yourself to the committee?”

The first man to my left was perhaps forty-five, fit, and short-haired. He rested his arm on a clipboard that probably never left his side. “I am Captain Aleksander, head of production at the military aircraft factory. My main job at this time is designing the production methods for the new two engine metal aircraft. I worked side by side with Lord Conrad designing the first aircraft engines.”

The next man was ten years older and considerably wider. His shirt sleeves were rolled up, revealing muscles that belied his girth. “I am Baron Gwidon, representing the Military Naval Yards. I worked on the first concrete ships with Lord Conrad and now I oversee the yards in
Gdansk.”

The man next to him was fifteen years younger. The effect of his trim mustache and neatly cut hair was partly spoiled by his almost rumpled clothing. “I am Captain Gustav, and I am in charge of long-range aircraft research for the Christian Army. You all know that most of the research I have overseen for the past few years has been done without the involvement of Lord Conrad. However, I am his loyal liege man and feel that we are doing work that will benefit him in the future.”

Baron Aleksander said he was representing Count Vladimir, commander of the mounted infantry. “The count would prefer to be here himself, but Lord Conrad has need of his services in the Holy land. He asked me to keep you informed of the needs of MI units.”

Kolomel Jakub looked like a clerk. There is a “clerk look” shared by every clerk from the Sumerian grain counter to the teller at a Cracow bank. He was thin, slightly stoop-shouldered and despite his warrior’s muscles, quieter than the rest. “I would be representing Hetman Piotr, if the count were aware of this committee’s work. He has not asked that I file regular reports.”

Komander Edmund was head of weapons research. He was muscular man of about sixty. He had a reputation for a creative and brilliant mind, but he had the look of a man who really enjoyed swinging a sword. “I have been working for Lord Conrad for nearly forty years and if it were not treasonous to say so, I would say he is still my boss.”

The next two were obviously a pair. “I am Captain Feliks and the man to my left is Captain Fryderyk. We represent the Quartermaster Corps. There is an unsubstantiated rumor that one of our best men may be a long way away and need of resupply. We’re here to help.”

The last man really didn’t need to introduce himself. He was Count Grzegorz’s right hand man in the Wolves. He was a man proud of his nobility. His hair and beard were immaculate and he was shaved blue where the beard didn’t cover. His uniform was expensively cut and his boots were polished to a bright shine. There was a rumor that he could fall into an outhouse and emerge with his creases still intact. “I’m Baron Boleslaw. You all know who I am. You know that I have fought beside Lord Conrad for many years. I’m here to represent Sir Grzegorz. He is, unfortunately, unable to attend himself and has asked me to come in his stead.”

When the meeting got back around to me, I started with “For the record, let us record that the purpose of this committee is to form and test contingency plans for various emergencies, including, but not limited to: foreign invasions, natural disasters, stranded personnel, and the support of long-range missions.”

At that point, I was interrupted by a frantic finger wagging from Baron Boleslaw. “Are you serious about keeping minutes for this meeting? I had the distinct impression that the topics to be discussed here might be of a delicate nature and not fit for general consumption.”

“I assure you, baron, that nothing untoward will be done by this committee. We have been tasked with carrying out research and pilot programs that will benefit the entire Christian Army. As we are operating entirely on funds provided by the army and are using no crown funds we will not need individual authorization for any of our projects.

“If any of our projects provide unforeseen benefits to members of the army, we will cheerfully accept credit.

“As we are carrying out our mission with scrupulous honesty, we will keep careful records and forward them to Hetman Piotr as requested. I believe that the hetman has requested that we forward all project notes with our annual budget request.”

I turned to my secretary “Anna, we are going off the record for a minute to discuss matters not pertinent to this meeting. Please note that and close the minutes until we resume.

“Gentlemen, we all know what is going on. We all have a valued leader and friend in trouble. Of course, we can’t support treason, but nothing yet stops us from rescuing troopers in trouble, so our projects may have some unspecified goals.

“To make certain that we are never accused of treason or subversion, we will be the most open and honest committee in existence, with only two exceptions. We will discuss our friends in the East only theoretically as possible cases, and any slippage of the tongue that implies otherwise will be edited out of the record by Anna as irrelevant to our work.

“I have been chosen by the hetman to chair this committee because I have personally worked and sometimes drank and wenched with all of you. Most of you are the old guard, the ones who watched Lord Conrad build this army and this nation, and I can assure each of you as to the loyalties of the man sitting next to you.

“It won’t be all smooth sailing. I can’t guarantee what will happen if, through our efforts, Lord Conrad returns with another million Mongol heads and a snooty attitude, so, if I have misjudged the loyalty of any of you, this is the time to speak up. When I re-open the meeting, things will start to get serious.”

There was an awkward moment while everyone looked around the table, then Sir Boleslaw spoke up. “You can hem and haw all day, but you’re not going to find anyone at this table who’ll betray Lord Conrad. However, before you restart the record, there is something we have to discuss that we can’t hide later.

“How much time do we have? When Lord Conrad left Jerusalem, he assured my lord that he would be in Mongolia less than thirty days from now. If that’s our time limit, there isn’t much we can do.”

Baron Gwidon leaned forward. “I’ve been working with Lord Conrad for fifteen years. He’s a great engineer and a good leader, but he often refers to a great philosopher named Murphy, who seems to rule his life.

“If our lord says thirty days, we probably have sixty, and that’s only if nothing serious goes wrong. There’s even a good chance that he will still be on the road ninety days from now, so I wouldn’t rule out projects in that time frame.

“Sir Boleslaw is right, there isn’t much we can do to help if Lord Conrad makes his initial schedule, but if he does, we have lost little by planning for the chance that he will take longer.”

I stepped in, “To summarize, then, we seem to agree that we will try to get supplies and help to Lord Conrad in less than sixty days, but we will pursue anything practical that can probably be done in ninety days.

“Now, Anna, we go back on the record.

“Captain Gustav. As our first theoretical scenario consists on supplying a distant army cut off from the normal supply routes, it would seem that your work on the new two engine transport aircraft might be our best starting point.”

Gustav shuffled papers in front of him. “Unfortunately, we are postulating an extreme case here, and the planes as they exist now would be of limited use. We are postulating an army that is over twelve hundred miles from base now and moving away at about a hundred miles a day.

“The maximum range with a normal cargo load is only fifteen hundred miles, enough for a one way trip. By replacing the cargo with fuel tanks, and dumping the empties at the far point, we can double the range, but we wouldn’t have the capacity to deliver anything useful and all we could do would be to offer evacuation to a few officers or wounded men.

“As it is not the way of the Christian Army for officers to desert their commands, this ability is of no use to us.

“My staff has looked at the possibility of having the planes set up fuel depots for themselves. It is possible, but tedious and expensive. The concept would be that the planes would fly their normal radius, seven hundred fifty miles, with a cargo of fuel tanks several times, until there was enough fuel out there to set up the next stage.

“Unfortunately, the math looks bad. To reach out three thousand miles with seven thousand pounds of cargo and return home requires twelve round trips at extreme range. Eleven of those trips just deliver fuel to be used on the next leg or on the way home. Add another thousand miles and you need over sixteen round trips for each cargo delivered.

“However, in recognition of the importance of this commission and its mission, work has begun on a number of interesting solutions. The three aircraft we have finished are being relocated to a new base on the Black Sea, courtesy of our grateful friends in the Byzantine Empire. All ships in the area have been instructed to offload their supplies of aircraft fuel for the use of the land based aircraft, and more is on the way by fast steamship. That will cut almost a thousand miles off of our travel distance, when…
if
this scenario ever becomes reality.

“We already had three new airplanes under construction. By devoting all available personnel and supplies to them, we can finish all three in about ten days. They will join their sisters in the
Black Sea airport as soon as they are ready to fly.

“As we are working with hours here, the first missions to establish forward fuel dumps are expected to take place in less than a week.

“By temporarily suspending certain other projects, we can lay the keels for ten more aircraft as soon as the new plans are available. It is planned that those next ten aircraft will be tri-motors, scaled up about thirty percent from the current models. We have teams working in the wind tunnels and doing the math to verify that we will get extra range and cargo.

“We are also looking at every damned fool idea our staff has come up with, and a couple look promising. One of our younger engineers has suggested that we strap solid fuel rockets under the wings of the aircraft to assist with takeoff. They would burn for about a minute and then drop off. We have already tried to increase lift off capacity by hooking up two fighters to help pull the cargo plane into the air. It works, but is too clumsy for regular use and, of course, there are no fighters in the forward bases.

“Another group of technicians is running tests to determine the best altitude and speed for maximum range.

“These steps will not by themselves solve our current problems, but they are the most productive things we can do now. They also address King Henryk’s concern about the coming Mongol invasion. If we can patrol a thousand miles out from our borders it will be impossible to catch us unawares.

“On a final note, I received a message about two hours ago. A group of who worked on the first all metal fighter models are aware of our current problem and they want to propose another solution. According to the message, the idea came from an offhand remark that Lord Conrad made while working on the engine for the fighter. As the idea is
very original
they have asked to present it in its entirety at our next meeting.”

There was additional discussion about what supplies and equipment might help the “theoretical” stranded army, but the air force had offered the only firm plans, and we agreed to meet again in three days to hear the rest of their proposals.