weapon they had. He just hoped some hothead didn’t open up without his say-so. He’d hate to get killed just because some kaffir pilot couldn’t resist showing off his brand-new, shiny toy.
The Hinds were still nose-on, closing fast just ten meters above the ground at two hundred kilometers an hour. They flew steadily, changing neither course nor speed. Orders or no, Boshof knew he couldn’t wait much longer. They’d be across the border in seconds. He tensed, readying a shouted command to open fire…
And held it in as the Hinds pulled up, glass-canopied noses wobbling as they suddenly slowed. The two gunships came to a complete stop, hovering twenty meters above the ground and about a hundred meters away, still inside Mozambique.
Boshof studied the two craft closely while waiting for his pounding heart to slow down. Their sloping front fuselages were almost completely glassed in. He could clearly see each Hind’s gunner, seated low and close to the nose. Their pilots were seated slightly higher and behind.
Both gunships hovered, motionless. Dust whirled away to either side, blown skyward by powerful rotors.
The Afrikaner sergeant shook his head angrily. What in God’s name were these kaffirs playing at?
Boshof trained his binoculars on the gunner in the left hand Hind, noticing that, whenever he turned his head, the gunship’s chin-mounted rotary cannon pivoted-mimicking the man’s movements. Interesting. And frightening. It made the helicopter seem more like a living, breathing predator than a simple machine.
Long seconds passed before he realized that both the gunner and the pilot were white. He snapped his binoculars over to the other Mi-24. Both its crewmen were white as well. Advisors? Mercenaries?
Boshof ‘s unspoken question was answered sooner than he would have wished.
The left-hand gunship started to swing right, moving across his front.
As soon as it turned, he saw the insignia on its side. A blue circle covered by a red triangle-with a white
star in the center. Jesus! That was the insignia of the Cuban Air Force!
He dropped the binoculars and grabbed his rifle.
“Fire! Fire! Fire! “
Boshof’s scream was all it took to free his troops from their paralysis.
Assault rifles cracked all around his small perimeter. Half a second later, their Vickers machine gun opened up with a hoarse, full-throated chatter-spraying steel-jacketed rounds toward the left-hand gunship.
At such short range, the South African machine gun couldn’t miss. Sparks jittered and bounced off the Hind’s streamlined fuselage, boxy heat suppressor, and tail rotor visible signs that its bullets were slamming home. But they were hitting without effect. The Mi-24 was just too well armored.
A fraction of a second later, both gunships cut loose hammering the shallow foxholes surrounding the South African border post with hundreds of 12.7mm machinegun bullets. Dust and dirt billowed high into the air, hiding a scene of sheer butchery.
Sgt. Uwe Boshof and his men were cut to pieces before they could figure out how to shoot down armored gunships with weapons meant only for infantry combat.
ADVANCE HEADQUARTERS, CUBAN EXPEDITIONARY FORCE, NORTH OF MESSINA,
SOUTH
AFRICA
Two bridges spanned the rugged Limpopo River gorge, soaring high above a vista of sheer rock walls, foam- flecked rapids, and mist-cloaked waterfalls.
One, a steel-girder railroad bridge, was empty. In sharp contrast, the highway crossing next to it was full- choked by bumper-to-bumper columns of
Cuban tanks, APCs, and trucks streaming endlessly south along South Africa’s
National Route 1.
Dozens of SAM launchers and turreted ZSU-23-4 antiaircraft guns were parked on both sides of the gorge, their radars ceaselessly scanning the sky for signs of South African air craft. To the north, sunlight winked off the sleek, missile studded wings of
MiG-29s orbiting in slow, fuel-conserving racetrack patrol patterns.
Gen. Antonio Vega stood watching his First Brigade Tactical Group wend its way deeper into enemy territory. From time to time, he turned to study the southern horizon. Pillars of black smoke rising there marked several burning buildings on the outskirts of the copper mining town of
Messina-fruits of the brief and hopeless resistance put up by a mixed force of South African reservists and policemen.
“A glorious day, isn’t it, Comrade General?”
Vega turned toward the shorter black man standing at his side.
“Indeed it is, Colonel.”
He carefully controlled his irritation at the other man’s appearance. Col.
Sese Luthuli, commander of the ANC’s military wing, Umkhonto we Sizwe, wore camouflaged battle dress, a blue beret, a polished leather pistol belt, and a bayonet-tipped AK-47 slung over his shoulder. It all struck Vega as being ridiculously theatrical.
Luthuli’s presence was also a reminder of unwelcome political constraints imposed on him by Havana and Moscow. Leaders in the two capitals were eager that Cuba’s invading armies should be seen as liberators by both the black
South Africans themselves and by the larger world public. As a result, they’d insisted that each of his three attack columns be accompanied by ANC guerrilla units.
Vega frowned at the memory. Most of the ANC troops he’d inspected seemed poorly disciplined, badly led, and ill prepared for full-scale conventional warfare. Even worse, they filled trucks and personnel carriers he desperately needed for more effective units and supplies.
Luthuli missed the frown and grinned.
“I’m looking forward to leading my men into battle beside your troops, Comrade. Together, I’m sure that we can crush these white fascists once and for all.”
With their engines howling, two shark-nosed Su-25 attack aircraft flashed past at low altitude, sparing Vega the need to reply through suddenly clenched teeth. Fifty meters away,
the long columns of tanks and armored personnel carriers kept clattering south along the highway-moving steadily past the tall, grim-faced figure of their commander.
ADVANCED GUARD, FIRST BRIGADE TACTICAL GROUP, ON NATIONAL ROUTE 1,
SOUTH OF
MESSINA
Senior Capt. Victor Mares leaned far forward in the hatch of his BTR-60 as though he could somehow urge the wheeled command carrier to go faster.
Although his men were already advancing at a tremendous pace, at this moment, even a jet aircraft would have seemed much too slow.
Sooner or later, he knew, those buffoons in Pretoria were going to wake up.
So far their stupidity had cost them more than twenty kilometers of their territory. With any luck, it would cost them far more than that by the time this day was through. Still, this joyride was bound to end sooner or later.
And Victor Mares wanted to be deep inside South Africa when that happened.
“Scouts report men working on the road five kilometers ahead. ” His radio operator poked his head out of a top hatch, grateful for the excuse to get some air.
“They may be setting up a roadblock.”
Mares calculated rapidly. His BRDM scout cars were only lightly armed, and he didn’t know what kind of weapons the South Africans up ahead possessed.
It might be more sensible to call his scouts back and advance with the BTRs and BMPs.
No. It would take at least half an hour to deploy his lead company for a hasty-very hasty-attack. By that time, those bastards might have finished their defensive preparations. In any case, time was too precious. Even slowing long enough to deploy his troops would give the South Africans a minor victory. Certainly, if Vega heard about it, he would have his ears.
“Pass control of Axe and Dagger flights to the scouts. Have them attack as soon as the Su-25s have finished one pass. And tell the Hinds to back them up. Clear?”
