Red Storm Rising Part 79

"Heavy enemy air activity at Salzhemmendorf," an Air Force communications officer reported.

That's where 40th Tanks is, Alekseyev thought. The B unit had been badly chewed up by the German spoiling attack- "Fortieth Tanks reports a major enemy attack under way on its front."

"What do they mean by 'major'?"

"The report comes from the alternate command post. I can't reach the divisional HQ. The a.s.sistant commander reports American and German tanks advancing in brigade force."

Brigade force? Another spoiling attack?

"Enemy attack in progress at Dunsen."

"Dunsen? That's close to Gronau. How the h.e.l.l did they get there?" Alekseyev snapped. "Confirm that report! Is it an air or ground attack?"

"Hundred twentieth Motor-Rifle has a full regiment across the Weser. They are advancing on Brkeln. Eighth Tanks' leading elements have the Weser in sight. SAM units are setting up to cover the crossing point."

It was like having people read different parts of the paper to him simultaneously, Alekseyev thought. General Beregovoy was at the front, coordinating traffic control and setting final a.s.signments for the post-crossing maneuver. Pasha knew that was his proper place, but, as before, he was annoyed to be far from the real action, giving orders like a Party boss instead of a fighting commander. The artillery from all the advancing divisions was well forward to protect the crossing against counterattack.

My rear areas are awfully weak . . .

"Comrade General, the attack at Dunsen is composed of enemy tank and motorized troops with heavy tactical air support. The regimental commander at Dunsen estimates brigade strength."

A brigade at Dunsen, and a brigade at Salzhemmendorf?

Those are B unit commanders. Out of practice, inexperienced. If they were really effective officers, they'd be in A units, not shepherding out-of-shape reservists.

"Enemy ground units at Bremke, strength unknown."

That's only fifteen kilometers from here! Alekseyev reached for some maps. It was cramped in the command vehicle, so he went outside and spread them on the ground with his intelligence officer beside him.

"What the h.e.l.l's going on here?" His hand moved across the map. "That's an attack on a twenty-kilometer front."

"The new enemy division is not supposed to be in place yet, and Theater Intelligence says it will be broken up for spot-reinforcement use all over the northern front area."

"Headquarters at Flziehausen reported a heavy air attack and went off the air!"

As if to emphasize this latest report, there was a ma.s.sive explosion to the north in the direction of Bremke, where 24th Tanks had its main fuel and ordnance dump. Suddenly aircraft began to appear low on the horizon. The mobile command post was in woods overlooking the small town of Hunzen. The town was largely deserted, and the unit's radio transmitters were there. NATO aircraft had so far shown a reluctance to damage civilian buildings unless they had to- Not today. Four tactical fighters leveled the center of the town, where the transmitters were, with high-explosive bombs.

"Get Alternate One going immediately," Alekseyev ordered.

More aircraft swept overhead, heading southwest toward Highway 240, where Alekseyev's A units were moving toward Rhle. The General found a working radio and called CINC-West at Stendal.

"We have a major enemy attack coming southeast from Springe. I would estimate at least two-division strength."

"Impossible, Pasha-they don't have two reserve divisions!"

"I have reports of enemy ground units at Bremke, Salzhemmendorf, and Dunsen. It is my opinion that my right flank is in jeopardy, and I must reorient my forces to meet it. I request permission to suspend the attack at Rhle to meet this threat."

"Request denied."

"Comrade General, I am the commander at the scene. The situation can be managed if I have authority to handle it properly."

"General Alekseyev, your objective is the Ruhr. If you are not able to achieve that objective, I will find a commander who is."

Alekseyev looked at the radiotelephone receiver in disbelief. He had worked for this man-two years. They were friends. He's always trusted my judgment.

"You order me to continue the attack regardless of enemy action?"

"Pasha, they make another spoiling attack-nothing more serious than that. Get those four divisions across the Weser," the man said more gently. "Out."

"Major Sergetov!" Alekseyev called. The young officer appeared a moment later. "Get yourself a vehicle and head for Dunsen. I want your personal observations on what you find. Be careful, Ivan Mikhailovich. I want you back here in less than two hours. Move."

"You will do nothing else?" the intelligence officer asked.

Pasha watched Sergetov board a light truck. He could not face his officer. "I have my orders. The operation to cross the Weser continues. We have an ant.i.tank battalion at Holle. Tell them to move north and be alert for enemy forces on the road from Bremke. General Beregovoy knows what he's supposed to do."

If I warn him, he'll change his dispositions. Then Beregovoy will be blamed for violating orders. That's a safe move. I prudently pa.s.s on a warning, and-no! If I can't violate orders, I cannot co-opt someone else into doing so.

What if they're right? This could be another spoiling attack. The Ruhr is a strategic objective of vast importance.

Alekseyev looked up. "The battle orders stand."

"Yes, Comrade General."

"The report of enemy tanks at Bremke was incorrect." A junior officer came over. "The observer saw our tanks coming south and misidentified them!"

"And this is good news?" Alekseyev demanded.

"Of course, Comrade General," the captain answered lamely.

"Did it occur to you to inquire why our tanks were heading south? G.o.dd.a.m.n it, must I do all the thinking here?" He couldn't scream at the right person. He had to scream at somebody. The captain wilted before his eyes. Part of Alekseyev was ashamed, but another part needed the release.

They had the job because they had more battle experience than anyone else. It had never occurred to anyone that they had no experience at all in this sort of operation. They were advancing. Except for local counterattacks, no NATO unit had done very much of that, but Lieutenant-he still thought like a sergeant-Mackall knew that they were best suited to it. The M-1 tank had an engine governor that limited its speed to about forty-three miles per hour. It was always the first thing the crews removed.

His M-1 was going south at fifty-seven miles per hour.

The ride was enough to rattle the brain loose inside his skull, but he'd never known such exhilaration. His life was balanced on the knife-edge of boldness and lunacy. Armed helicopters flew ahead of his company, scouting the route, and p.r.o.nounced it clear all the way to Alfeld. The Russians weren't using this route for anything. It wasn't a road at all, but the right-of-way for an underground pipeline, a gra.s.sy strip one hundred feet wide that took a straight line through the forests. The tank's wide treads threw off dirt like the roostertail from a speedboat as the vehicle raced south.

The driver slowed for a sweeping turn while Mackall squinted ahead, trying to see whatever enemy vehicle the helicopters missed. It didn't have to be a vehicle. It just could be three guys with a missile launcher, and Mrs. Mackall would get The Telegram, regretting to inform her that her son . . .

Thirty kilometers, he thought. d.a.m.n! Only a half-hour since the German grenadiers had punched a hole in the Russian lines, and zoom! goes the Black Horse Cav! It was crazy, but h.e.l.l, it was crazy to have stayed alive ever since his first engagement-an hour after the war started. Ten klicks to go.

"Look at that! More of our tanks southbound. What the h.e.l.l is going on?" Sergetov snarled to his driver, even talking like his general now.

"Are they our tanks?" the driver asked.

The new major shook his head. Another one pa.s.sed through the gap in the trees-the turret had a flat top, not the usual dome shape of Soviet tanks!

A helicopter appeared over the gap and pivoted in the sky. Sergetov didn't mistake this for a Russian, and the stubby wings on either side of the fuselage marked it as an armed attack-chopper. The driver lurched to the right just before the nose-mounted machine gun flashed at them. Sergetov jumped clear as the tracers reached out. He landed on his back and rolled toward the treeline. His head was down, but he could feel the heat blast when the machine-gun tracers ignited the spare gas tank on the back of the truck. The young officer scampered into the trees and looked around the edge of a tall pine. The American helicopter flew to within a hundred meters of his vehicle to ensure its destruction, then spun off to the south. His radio was in the overturned, burning truck.

"Buffalo Three-One, this is Comanche, over."

"Comanche, this is Three-One. Report, over."

"We just popped a Russian truck. Everything else looks clear. Roll 'em, cowboy!" the helicopter pilot urged.

Mackall laughed at that. He had to remind himself that this wasn't really fun. Quite a few tank drivers had gotten into trouble by getting just a little too unwound on the German countryside, and now they were being ordered to! Two more minutes and three kilometers pa.s.sed.

Here's where it gets tricky.

"Buffalo Three-One, we show three Russian vehicles standing guard on the hilltop. Look like Bravo-Tango-Romeos. All the bridge traffic seems to be trucks. The repair shop is on the east bank north of the town."

The tank slowed as they came to the last turn. Mackall ordered his "track" off the road, onto the meadow gra.s.s, as it edged ponderously around a stand of trees.

"Target BTR, eleven o'clock, twenty-seven hundred! Fire when ready, Woody!"

The first of the eight-wheel vehicles exploded before any of their crews knew a tank was near. They were looking for aircraft, not enemy tanks forty kilometers in the rear. The next two died within a minute, and Mackall's platoon of four tanks dashed forward.

They all reached the ridge three minutes later. One by one, the huge Abrams tanks crested the hill overlooking what had once been a small city. Many days of continuous air attacks and artillery fire had ended that. Four ribbon bridges were in operation, with numerous trucks crossing or waiting to cross.

First the tanks located and engaged anything that looked even vaguely dangerous. Machine-gun fire began working on the trucks, while the main guns reached into the tank-repair yard established in the fields north of the town. By this time, two full troops were in place, and infantry vehicles took on the trucks with their light 25mm cannon. Within fifteen minutes, over a hundred trucks were burning, along with enough supplies to keep a whole Russian division in business for a hard day of combat. But the supplies were incidental. The rest of the squadron was catching up with the advance party, and their job was to hold this Russian communications nexus until relieved. The Germans already had Gronau, and the Russian forces east of the Leine were now cut off from their supplies. Two of the Russian bridges were clear, and a company of M-2 Bradley infantry carriers darted across to take up position on the eastern edge of the town.

Ivan Sergetov crawled to the edge of the gra.s.sy road-he didn't know what it was-and watched the units pa.s.s while his stomach contracted into an icy ball. They were Americans, at least a battalion in strength, he estimated, traveling light. No trucks, just their tracked vehicles. He kept his wits enough to begin a count of the tanks and personnel carriers that raced before him at a speed that he'd never really appreciated before. It was the noise that was most impressive. The turbine-driven M-1 tanks did not make the roar of diesel-powered tanks. Until they were a few hundred meters away, you couldn't even know they were there-the combination of low noise and high speed . . . They're heading toward Alfeld!

I have to report this. But how? His radio was gone, and Sergetov had to think for a minute to determine where he was . . . two kilometers from the Leine, right across that wooded ridge. His choice was a difficult one. If he returned to the command post, it was a walk of twenty kilometers. If he ran to the rear, he might find friendly units in half the time and get the alarm out. But running that way was cowardice, wasn't it?

Cowardice or not, he had to go east. Sergetov had the sickening feeling that the alarm had not been sounded. He moved to the edge of the trees and waited for a gap in the American column. It was only thirty meters to the far side. Five seconds to cross the gap, he told himself. Less.

Another M-1 blazed past him. He looked left and saw that the next was nearly three hundred meters away. Sergetov took a deep breath and ran into the open.

The tank commander saw him, but couldn't get to his machine gun fast enough. Besides, one man on foot without even a rifle wasn't worth stopping for. He reported the sighting on his radio and returned to the mission at hand.

Sergetov didn't stop running until he was a hundred meters into the trees. Such a short distance, but he felt as if his heart would spring from his chest. He sat down with his back against a tree to catch his breath and continued to watch the vehicle pa.s.s. It took several minutes before he could move again, then it was up the steep hill, and soon he was once more looking down at the Leine.

The shock of seeing the American tanks was bad enough. What he saw here was far worse. The Army tank-repair yard was a smoking ruin. Everywhere there were burning trucks. At least it was downhill. He ran down the east side of the ridge right up to the river. Quickly stripping off his pistol belt, Sergetov leaped into the swift current.

"What's that? Hey, I see a Russian swimming!" A machine gunner swiveled his .50 caliber around. The vehicle commander stopped him.

"Save it for the MiGs, soldier!"

He climbed up the east bank and turned to look back. The American vehicles were digging into defensive positions. He ran to cover and stopped again to make a count before proceeding. There was a traffic-control point at Sack. Sergetov ran all the way.

After the first hour, things settled down. Lieutenant Mackall got out of his tank to inspect his platoon's positions. One of the few ammunition carriers to accompany the troop stopped briefly at each tank, its crew tossing out fifteen rounds each. Not enough to replace what they'd fired, but not bad. The air attacks would be next. Crews were out chopping down trees and shrubs to camouflage their vehicles. The accompanying infantry set out their Stinger crews, and Air Force fighters were already circling overhead. Intelligence said that eight Russian divisions were on the west side of this river. Mackall was sitting on their supply route. That made it a very important plot of real estate.

USS INDEPENDENCE.

Quite a change from the last time, Toland thought. The Air Force had an E-3 Sentry operating out of Sondrestrom to protect the fleet, and four of their own E-2C Hawkeyes were also up. There was even an Army-manned ground radar just coming up on Iceland. Two Aegis cruisers were with the carriers, and a third with the amphibious force.

"You think they'll hit us first, or the 'phibs?" Admiral Jacobsen asked.

"That's a coin-toss, Admiral," Toland replied. "Depends on who gives the orders. Their navy will want to kill us first. Their army will want to kill the 'phibs."

Jacobsen crossed his arms and stared at the map display. "This close, they can come in from any direction they want."

They expected no more than fifty Backfires, but there were still plenty of the older Badgers, and the fleet was only fifteen hundred miles from the Soviet bomber bases: they could come out with nearly their maximum ordnance loads. To stop the Russians, the Navy had six squadrons of Tomcats, and six more of Hornets, nearly a hundred forty fighters in all. Twenty-four were aloft now, supported by tankers while the ground-attack aircraft pounded Russian positions continuously. The battles.h.i.+ps had ended their first visit to the Keflavik area and were now in Hvalfjrdur-Whale Bay-providing fire support to the Marines north of Bogarnes. The entire operation had been planned with the likelihood of a Russian air-to-surface missile attack in mind. There would be more vampires.

The loss of northern Norway had eliminated the utility of Realtime. The submarine was still on station gathering signal intelligence, but the task of spotting the outbound Russian bomber streams pa.s.sed on to British and Norwegian patrol aircraft operating out of Scotland. One of the latter spotted a three-plane Vic of Badgers heading southwest and radioed a warning. The Russian aircraft were roughly seventy minutes from the fleet.

Toland's station in CIC was immediately below the flight deck, and he listened to the roar of jet engines overhead as the fighters catapulted off. He was nervous. Toland knew that the tactical situation was very different now from that on the second day of the war, but he also remembered that he was one of the two men who'd escaped alive from a compartment just like this. A flood of information came into the room. The land-based radar, the Air Force E-3, and the Navy E-2s all linked their data to the carriers. There was enough electromagnetic energy in the sky to cook the birds in flight. The display showed the fighters proceeding to their stations. The Tomcats reached out to the northern Icelandic sh.o.r.e, curving into loitering circles as they awaited the Russian bombers.

"Ideas, Toland. I want ideas!" the Admiral said quietly.

"If they're after us, they'll approach from the east. If they're going for the 'phibs, they'll come straight in. There's just no percentage in deceptive tactics if they're heading for Stykkisholmur."

Jacobsen nodded. "That's how I see it."

The pounding on the flight deck continued overhead as strike aircraft landed to rearm for new bombing strikes. Aside from the expected material effect, they hoped to wreck the morale of the Soviet paratroopers by violent and continuous air attacks. Marine Harriers were also in action, along with attack helicopters. Initial progress was somewhat better than expected. The Russians did not have their troops as widely dispersed as they'd thought, and the known concentrations were being subjected to a hurricane of bombs and rockets.

"Starbase, this is Hawk-Blue-Three. I'm getting some jamming, bearing zero-two-four . . . more jamming now." The data was linked directly to the carrier, and the thick yellow strobes came up on the electronic display. The other Hawkeyes quickly reported the same information.

The fleet air-ops officer smiled thinly as he lifted his microphone. His units were fully in place, and this gave him several options.

"Plan Delta."

Hawk-Green-One carried Independence's air-wing commander. A fighter pilot who would have much preferred riding his Tomcat for the mission, he directed two fighters from each Tomcat squadron to seek out the Russian jamming aircraft. The converted Badgers were spread on a wide front to cover the approach of the missile-armed bombers and advanced at five hundred knots, three hundred miles now from the line of radar-picket aircraft. The Tomcats homed in on them at five hundred knots as well.

Each jammer created a "strobe," an opaque wedge shape on the U.S. radar screens, so that they looked like the spokes of a wagon wheel. Since every such spoke was particular to each of the radar transmitters, the controllers were able to compare data, triangulate, and plot the position of the jammers. The Tomcats closed in quickly while the radar-intercept officers in the back seat of each fighter flipped the Phoenix missile seekers to home-on-jam guidance mode. Instead of depending on the aircraft's own radar for guidance, the missiles would seek out the noise transmitted from the Badgers.

Twenty jamming aircraft were plotted. Eighteen fighters headed for them, targeting at least two missiles at each.

"Delta-execute!"

The Tomcats launched on orders forty miles from their targets. Once more, Phoenix missiles streaked through the air. Flight time was a mere fifty-six seconds. Sixteen of the Badger jammers went off the air. The surviving four all switched off when they saw the smoke trails of missiles and dove for the deck with Tomcats in pursuit.

"Numerous radar contacts. Raid One is fifty aircraft, bearing zero-zero-nine, range three-six-zero, speed six hundred knots, alt.i.tude three-zero thousand. Raid Two-" the talker went on as the enemy aircraft were plotted.

"We have the main raid, probably Badgers going for the 'phibs. This one will be Backfires. They'll try to launch on us, probably far out to draw our fighters off," Toland said.

Jacobsen spoke briefly to his operations officer. Hawk-Green-One would control the defense of the amphibious force. Hawk-Blue-Four from Nimitz would defend the carrier groups. The fighters divided according to plan and went to work. Toland noted that Jacobsen was leaving control of the air action to the officers in the control aircraft. The fleet air-defense officer on USS Yorktown controlled the SAM s.h.i.+ps, all of which went to full alert but left their radar transmitters on standby.

"The only thing that worries me is they might try that drone c.r.a.p again," Jacobsen murmured.