Final Storm (17 page)

Only death as far as the eye could see. No motion, no life, just death. Once again the Black Spectre had visited Europe. Centuries before it had come in the guise of the plague and had wiped out more than a quarter of the population. Now it needed no natural mask—man had invented terrifying new means to improve on nature’s destructive powers.

“Vengeance is mine,” thought Hunter as he flew over the grisly tableau of pestilence below. He looked over at Jones, who was scanning the countryside too, undoubtedly thinking much the same thoughts. There would be vengeance enough to go around …

B
ACK AT ROTA, HUNTER
landed directly behind Jones, bringing the F-16 in for a flawless three-point landing.

He taxied off the main runway onto a cross-strip, waiting as a long stream of C-17s and C-5As trundled across his path, lining up for their takeoffs back to the States on a parallel strip.

He felt their jet wash rock his plane from side to side as their big engines pushed them along at faster and faster speeds, finally heaving the groaning behemoths into the air near the end of the runway. Hunter watched, thinking how improbable it must seem to those less familiar with aerodynamics to see more than a hundred tons of metal machine become airborne.

The transports went past, and he slowly maneuvered the fighter toward the specially constructed hardstands that now housed the aircraft of the 16th TFW.

Inside the gray caverns were fueling stations, munitions loaders, and repair facilities for the F-16s. The thick concrete walls were designed to withstand almost anything the Soviets could throw at them, short of a nuke. And if it got to that point, Hunter reminded himself, it wouldn’t much matter where the hell the planes were if they were still on the ground.

Oddly the hardstands and hangars still carried the markings and insignia of the US Navy, and their overlarge dimensions bore testimony to the fact that they were actually designed for the big P-3C Orions of the Navy’s anti-sub patrol. When the war broke out, a flight of Orions had been shuffled around to provide a home for the 16th TFW’s smaller F-16s.

Originally the F-16s would have been based up north at the NATO base in Torrejon, near Madrid. That sprawling airfield and support facility had been constructed at great expense by the Air Force, and it was virtually dedicated to the F-16 fighters which had been its primary residents. The 16th would have shared the base with the 72 Falcons that formerly comprised the 401st TAC Air Wing, joining in their defense of NATO’s vulnerable southern flank with close air support and interception missions.

But several years before, politics had reared its ugly head to deny NATO the use of the base. The Spanish government at the time thought the bases were too “provocative.” So the F-16s were stuck on the “ass-end of Europe” instead of being hundreds of miles closer to the battle.

Hunter forced himself not to dwell on the stupid political decision that had forced the F-16s to fly out of Rota. He wasn’t a politician—he was a soldier. As such, he was supposedly trained to fly and fight anywhere.

After turning the F-16 over to the ground crew, Hunter quickly headed for the briefing room to get the lowdown from Jones on their recent mission.

He found the small room nearly overflowing with pilots. The general was already there, analyzing the communiques and trying to evaluate the results of the surprise anti-airfield strike they’d just conducted. Still in his flight suit and puffing on a fresh cigar, the senior officer was sifting through a mountain of paper, poring over the coded messages coming through from airbases around Europe, and from the mission coordinator in Belgium. Finally, he made some notes, tapped a few numbers into a small handheld calculator, and turned to the pilots who were buzzing around in small groups or talking to the debriefing officers at tables around the room’s periphery.

All eyes turned toward the small podium as Jones approached it, paper in hand.

“Gentlemen,” he begun formally, “it gives me great pleasure to report the preliminary results of Operation Punchout, our strike against the Soviets’ forward air bases. We won’t be able to verify all the data for some time, but the indications are that we did considerable damage to most of their forward airfields.”

Spontaneous cheering erupted from the tired pilots, elated to know their mission had been a success.

“Intelligence estimates that most will be inoperable for at least two weeks,” Jones continued. “Some even longer …”

There was another round of cheers.

“We also have a preliminary report that states we took out more than three hundred enemy aircraft during the operation, most of them on the ground.”

More cheering.

Then Jones’s voice took on a sobering tone.

“NATO losses,” he said gravely, “were thirty-seven aircraft. Ten Weasels went down either over the SAM belt or the Soviet airfields. The biggest single loss involved a squadron of twelve Luftwaffe Tornados coming in for Roundhouse. They were jumped by MiGs that managed to get off the ground early. All were lost. A dozen decoy planes in all were shot down, including DuPont here of the Sixteenth.”

An awkward hush fell over the roomful of pilots, remembering their comrade who would never return. Jones quietly explained that a NATO search and rescue team had been sent to the crash site minutes after it happened, but there was nothing that anyone could have done.

The mood only got worse as Jones revealed another map of the battle zone, this one indicating the latest intelligence on the ground fighting.

Despite the vast success of Operation Punchout, it was clear to everyone in the room that the situation on the ground was getting worse for NATO. Judging from the spreading red arrows on Jones’s briefing map, it was apparent that Soviet armor, obviously equipped with CBW decontamination gear, had began pouring into desolate, lifeless West Germany like an iron tidal wave. All indications were that the main force of the Red Army was driving fast and furiously toward cities like Frankfurt, Mannheim, Karlsruhe and Bonn.

And the only thing in between were the scattered NATO rear guard ground forces.

Even before the Red Army had made its move into West Germany, SACEUR (Supreme Allied Commander, Europe) ordered most of the NATO heavy armored units to fall back as planned in a measured withdrawal to more defensible positions, behind the Rhine. Within 12 hours of the Soviet attack, most of these NATO units were in motion, moving deliberately westward through the chemical-contaminated wasteland that Germany had become.

But not everyone was taking part in this dreary, strategic retreat.

Someone had to stay behind and slow the Red surge. In one area—it being designated by several blue dots on Jones’s map—this unenviable task fell to several US and German artillery units both equipped with big 155mm self-propelled howitzers, some US Army Armored Cavalry forces, and a brigade of German national guard forces, the
Landwehr.
With little more than sheer guts, this delaying force would stay behind and set up ambushes for the Soviets advancing on roadways in central West Germany.

The cluster of blue dots was labeled NATO Blue Force Charlie. Jones pointed to their position on the map and said grimly: “Of all the rear guard groups, these guys are going to get hit the worst—almost point-blank. But they’re buying precious time for the armored units, who are going to need every second of it to establish positions west of the Rhine.”

Poor bastards
, Hunter thought. He knew the projected casualty rate for the lightly armored anti-tank units was more than ninety percent, and that was under a normal battle scenario.

And there would be nothing normal about this …

But he also realized that their nearly hopeless stand might make the critical difference between the clash of armored titans that would surely follow. Without their rear guard effort, the Soviets might catch up and overwhelm the retreating NATO armor before it had a chance to establish a defensible position behind the Rhine, and that would seriously affect NATO’s “strategic withdrawal” plan.

So the artillerymen and the Armored Cav and the German national guardsmen would all have to be thrown to the sacrifice. It was a grim fact of war, but that didn’t make giving the orders any easier.

“Now, depending on the results of their initial encounter, we’re going to give these guys in Blue Force Charlie as much help as possible,” Jones said. “Well be taking off soon to provide close air support for the main armor counterstrike.

“Of course, other air units will be doing the same all up and down the line, and, judging from our success against the enemy forward air bases, enemy air activity should be scattered at best.”

Jones took a puff of his cigar, then continued: “Now if we’re successful, we can stall the main Soviet thrust and the Army boys will have some breathing room to set up some better defensive positions behind the Rhine.”

“And if we fail?” JT asked. “What happens if the whole front collapses?”

Jones didn’t so much as wince. “Then,” he said soberly, “the Soviets will reach Paris in less than two weeks.”

In the cold sunlight of the central German plain, the first steps of the deadly dance had already begun.

Oberleutnant Gunter Wessel of the
Bundewehr’s
Second Artillery Battery shivered inside his parka as he stood beside his massive 155mm self-propelled gun and watched the empty stretch of road before him through his powerful Hasselblad binoculars.

He knew that very soon a torrent of Soviet armor would be moving down this particular section of rural roadway. And with the pullout several hours before of the last of the other NATO armor units, he and his men and their six big guns were alone against the Red Army.

Wessel checked his watch, then barked out a command to his gunnery sergeant. The sergeant yanked the lanyard of the M-198 155mm howitzer and a deafening report echoed through the woods where Wessel’s mobile guns had dug in. The howitzer leaped back a few feet from the recoil of the shot and spat a long cylindrical projectile out into the frigid afternoon sky.

At precisely 200 feet over the spot they had aimed, the howitzer shell opened, allowing nine small parachutes to escape and float to earth. The chutes gently deposited their loads onto the hard-packed frozen road surface some three kilometers in front of Wessel’s emplacement.

The German officer did some quick calculations, then called out another order to fire. Another explosion shook the ground beneath his feet. This time the small parachutes came to rest just beyond the first set, slightly off to the side of the road.

Four more shells, 36 more parachutes. Five minutes later, Wessel was confident that the road was adequately sewn with the deadly, air-delivered mines.

He nodded curtly at the gunnery sergeant and gave a new order to train the howitzer’s long barrel down at the highway a few hundred meters beyond the spot where the mines were laid. Satisfied with their preparedness, he climbed up on his 155mm self-propelled gun, directing the driver to move the clanking artillery piece to a position further forward and to the left. Now all they had to do was wait for the enemy armored column.

It seemed like an eternity, but actually only forty minutes went by before they first heard the sound.

It was faint at first, but relentlessly, it became louder and louder. While the tanks were still unseen in the distance, the German artillerymen almost had to block their ears, so deafening was the remorseless squeaking, clanking, and grinding of hundreds of tracked metal monsters rolling down the road in front of them.

The tension was maddening as they waited for the advancing armored column …

Finally the enemy armor came into view on the narrow road. In the lead was a Soviet T-80, their newest main battle tank. Like the rest of the column, the leader’s tank was completely “buttoned-up”—hatches sealed to protect the crew inside. The column stretched out behind him in a seemingly endless green line, a traffic jam of weaponry, dwarfing the country road and even the forest around it.

Closer and closer the lead T-80 came, nearing the spot in the road where Wessel’s artillery had lobbed their lethal surprise. But the Soviets were moving too fast to see the thin wires projecting up from the flat discs on the roadbed.

Evidently, they had been ordered to make a rapid advance, and that was exactly what they were doing, though not as cautiously as the situation dictated.

Wessel’s grip instinctively tightened on the binoculars.

“Just twenty-five meters more, and for you, the war will be over,” the young German officer thought darkly, his eyes on the lead enemy tank, hoping it would continue its blind advance.

It did. The lead T-80 made contact with the first artillery-scattered M718 mine, pushing the thin detonating wire forward until it triggered the powerful explosive charge contained in the shallow conical disc.

The force of the mine’s explosion was directed upward at the heavily armored belly of the T-80, punching a hole in the tank’s armor just underneath the driver. The driver never heard the exploding mine, since a jagged piece of shredded armor plating tore through his head, entering just under his chin and exiting through the back of his helmet.

The driver collapsed on the tank’s controls, lurching the vehicle across the highway until it struck a second mine, which tore its left tread to pieces.

The serpentine track flattened itself out as the roller wheels and sprockets continued to spin, ratcheting more of the steel tread through the one-way cycle until the torn end escaped the last wheel and the fifty-ton metal monster ground to a halt.

A second tank, moving at the same speed, had attempted to go around the leader’s stricken vehicle on the right. But it too struck one of the artillery-scattered mines and exploded in an ugly black cloud. The third tank in line slammed into the leader’s lurching, track-thrown T-80 as it plowed around to the left.

The rest of the tanks and armored personnel carriers came to a shuddering stop, blocked by the three wrecked tanks in front of them, and penned in by the thick woods on either side of the road.