The Invasion of 1950 (26 page)

“Advance,” the infantry
Oberst
ordered, and the infantry moved forward.  Bothe had half-expected a formal military parade, but that would have to wait until the town had formally surrendered or all resistance had been cleared out; until then, the soldiers would have to comport themselves as if they were going to be attacked at any moment. More infantrymen arrived as they pushed through buildings, breaking in and searching them in a hasty attempt to spring any ambushes before they stuck their head too far into the noose.

The panzer rumbled forwards behind the infantrymen and Bothe watched carefully as he saw the first barricade. The British had been busy; they’d dragged cars, lorries and even a military vehicle of some kind and turned them into a barricade. The cars looked like the
Fuhrer
-cars Volkswagen had been producing for the German people, the car that Hitler himself had backed; had they been sold over in Britain as well?  He nodded once as the infantry commander issued an order and repeated it to the gunner; a moment later, a high explosive shell shattered the barricade and the infantry raced forward.

The fighting surged backwards and forwards as the British fought for every inch of ground. The fire-power of the panzers wasn’t held back after the first few moments, and Bothe's crew put shells into every building that the British were using as firing points, reducing them to rubble. The British used the wreckage as shields and kept fighting, forcing the infantrymen to clear them out. A PIAT came close to killing Bothe and his crew; a second tank was set on fire by a Molotov Cocktail, dropped from one of the handful of remaining buildings. After that, they cleared a bloody path towards the centre of town, avoiding sniper fire and advancing in a hail of devastation. If Rommel had hoped to take Ipswich intact, his hopes had been dashed…

A shell landed near a building; a moment later, a small group of school-aged children fled from the remains, scattering out over the city. Bothe barked an order and the panzers ceased fire; the British, he noticed with some relief, did the same. They’d hit a school, he realised; the reports had suggested that the basement of a school was sometimes used as a bomb shelter, but he hadn’t realised what they’d been shooting at until it was too late. How many children had they killed?

A British officer stepped forward into the silence, blood streaming from one eye, carrying a white flag. Bothe watched as his infantry commander came forward, and the two officers talked briefly; the soldiers took the brief truce as a chance to catch up on their reloading and take a breath.

The reinforcements were already spreading into the city; he could still hear short bursts of firing as units bumped into their counterparts or aircraft duelled in the sky high above. They hadn’t seen much in the way of British aircraft – the
Luftwaffe
was clearly doing a good job keeping them off the panzers backs – but all it would take was a single aircraft pass with rockets, and half his column would be reduced to flaming wreckage.

“They’re surrendering,” the infantry officer shouted finally, a shout that was picked up by his people and the panzers. The firing in the distance ended abruptly as the word was spread through the streets. Bothe watched as a line of British soldiers, most of them wounded, came out of the rubble and were escorted rapidly towards the edge of the town. They looked as if they’d been through hell, and Bothe could understand their grief and despair; it was possible that they had accidentally killed some of their children. How many more civilians had died unnoticed in the fighting? Was there any way of finding out?

Dismissing the thought for the moment, he ordered his men to take up their planned positions. The main task now was to secure Ipswich and ensure that the roads and rail links were reopened as soon as possible. The army engineers would already be on their way and they would want protection; Bothe and his men would have to provide the support for the soldiers on protection duty. Rather more worrying, an SS occupation force would be coming into the city and they would take control of its day-to-day existence, not a fate that Bothe envied the British.

He glanced down at his map. The British lines had been broken and Commonwealth forces were on the run, fleeing back towards London. It wouldn’t be long before Rommel realised that a panzer unit wasn’t really cut out for securing a town and would send them down after the British, or maybe find them some other task to do when it came to mopping up the remains of the defenders. There were still pockets of British troops out there, and they would have to be dealt with before they could escape and join up with their fellows.

***

“
They forced us back,” Jackson admitted finally. It was a painful confession to make, even to a man he had come to respect in the last two days. “They broke the line and forced us back.”

“That was expected,” General Barron said, shortly. His face revealed nothing of his own inner stress, or his fury at having to vacate his command tent and move down south to Handyman Hall. “They have the fire-power advantage for the nonce.”

He shook his head. “I have some particular tasks for you and your men,” he said, looking over at Jackson. “Get some sleep, and then report back to me; the Germans are going to need a reminder, from time to time, that they’re in our country…and I’m calling on you to deliver that reminder.”

Near Felixstowe, English Channel

Lieutenant Nigel Molesworth tested
the air with one finger as the motor torpedo boat drifted down towards the German shipping lanes. It was dark, with the only light behind provided by the half-moon and the stars high above, but Molesworth knew that the
HMS
Hawthorn
was in desperate danger. As a tiny MTB, with only thirteen crewmen and a small arsenal of weapons, the ship wouldn’t survive even an indirect hit…and the Germans were out in force. Their main fleet was out there somewhere, providing cover for their convoys, and if no one stopped them, they would eventually be able to lay waste to the land Molesworth loved.

He peered into the darkness as the MTB drifted further down towards Felixstowe. Landsmen didn’t really understand just how treacherous the English Channel could be, even to an experienced sailor; the currents and tides could change with astonishing speed, at any time of the year. He’d served at the small base near Felixstowe and understood the waters as well as anyone else in the Royal Navy, but even he knew to be careful; the slightest mistake could be fatal, even without the Germans out there to shoot at them. The navy had warned him that the Germans possessed night-vision gear and radars, but they’d drilled enough against the Royal Navy’s battleships to be fairly sure that they could sneak up on the Germans, unless the Germans had a new trick they hadn’t shown the British before the war. The war had old certainties falling everywhere.

He could hear faint sounds carried across the water due to clear weather. According to the briefing, the Germans hadn’t slowed their replenishment convoys at all. They were pressing British ships and even seaman into service to help move an entire army from Brest to Felixstowe. He’d been told that the German destroyers were more effective at hunting down British submarines than anyone had expected, but a night attack under cover of darkness might just allow the British to land a few punches before the Germans had time to react to their presence. If the MTB were seen…a single shell would blow the ship apart, if the Germans could hit it. That wouldn’t be easy for the Germans…

They’d left Grimsby as darkness was falling, allowing the currents to push them down towards Dover, refusing to use the engine for fear of being detected by the Germans ahead of time. Molesworth’s ears were sharp enough to make out more than just the sound of lapping water and the occasional echoes of gunfire from the mainland; he could hear, very definitely, the sound of ships moving in the night…and, as they drifted further down, he could see Felixstowe lit up in the cold white light of electric lamps, turning the night into day.

The sight sent a cold shiver down his spine; he’d trained in exercises that had assumed a landing against hostile forces, and the significance of the German lighting was not lost on him. The Germans weren’t bothering to exercise any light-discipline drills at all, which spoke volumes about their confidence that the British forces would be unable to interfere with them, either on the ground or in the air.

For a long moment, he was gripped by a cold sinking terror, and then he forced it to the back of his mind. The strange glow was allowing him a chance to view the sea and he could make out the shape of a handful of German ships. They were moving out to sea, heading towards France on a least-time course, relying on their powerful engines to keep them stable in the currents and tides of the area. The Germans had it easy compared to some other invaders in the past; unlike Caesar, or the Armada, they didn’t have to worry about transient conditions on the part of the weather. They could sail backwards and forwards until they had built up enough of a force to take the remainder of the country.

No
, he thought, as he peered through his own night-vision goggles. The Germans had a small escorting force waiting for the three freighters, but while he was tempted to try to sink a German destroyer, or even one of their pocket battleships, he knew that he should concentrate on German shipping. If the Royal Navy sunk enough of their transports, the war would come to an end once the German forces on the shore ran out of supplies. If the Germans managed to keep control of the channel…

Molesworth's radar-man hissed a warning as he picked up signs of a German radar sweep; Molesworth winced as the MTB came silently around, preparing for a high-speed charge at the German ships. No gunfire came their way, and no shells splashed into the water; he concluded, hopefully, that the Germans hadn’t detected them. It wasn't easy to detect an MTB in darkness; the boat had been put through a rigorous blackout drill even before the Germans launched their invasion. He still didn’t understand how the Germans even managed to land on the shore and wreck so much of the Royal Navy, but he would do his piece to throw them back into the sea.

“One minute,” he whispered, as softly as he could. Whispers could carry a surprising distance over the waters. The crewman nodded as Molesworth took the helm for himself. He was younger than any of his crewmen, each of whom had forgotten more than he had ever learned about sailing. They were going to need his young man's reflexes. “Get the weapons ready.”

The crewman nodded as Molesworth carefully took them after the German ships. He tensed as he braced himself for the first incoming fire from the Germans; this was the most dangerous part of their mission. The engine had been tuned and muffled to make it as quiet as possible, but that presented an additional problem; if the Germans built up their own speed too fast, they would be unable to give chase without revealing their presence. He would have preferred to engage them in the open sea, but the Admiralty were determined that the ships be engaged as near to British soil as possible, warning the Germans that they wouldn’t have it all their own way. There was another reason…

“Pearson?”

“I got as much of the information as I could, I think,” Pearson said, his own voice a whisper. The Royal Navy Intelligence officer frowned. “They’re not worried about showing off what they’re doing, either. They even made small landings on the other side of Felixstowe, near Harwich. If they continue to do that, they’ll be able to ramp up their reinforcements quicker than we believed possible…”

A roar split the air as a line of German aircraft flew overhead, heading right for Felixstowe; Molesworth took advantage of the noise to gun the engine and send them flying right towards their target. The engine sounded terrifyingly loud in their ears, but the Germans didn’t react until a destroyer snapped on a searchlight, scanning the water for the boat. Molesworth swept the craft from side to side as the Germans tried to draw a bead on them. He saw a flash on one of the German ships. Moments later, a shell splashed down in the water, extremely close to his boat.

The Germans had been caught out of position, but it wouldn’t take them long to place the destroyers between the freighters and the oncoming threat. They would also bunch up. He would be forced to dodge them physically rather than evading from a safe distance once he had launched his torpedoes. That would make escape more complicated. He counted to ten under his breath. “Fire!”

The torpedo was almost invisible in the water, a streak of water moving rapidly towards one of the freighters, targeted perfectly. Molesworth altered course sharply so he could blow right through the German formation as the torpedo struck its target and exploded, sending one of the freighters heaving over. It was a large ship and it would take time, maybe even hours with a competent crew, to sink. Even so, it was no longer useful. The Germans kept firing at the MTB as he raced through them. He cursed as he saw a destroyer, turning to block their path.