The NATO forces’ response was immediate. The previous days had not been wasted. Satellites, air reconnaissance, the intelligence units working in the East German territory, ground radar and the pre-laid electronic sensors, had provided a vast quantity of information on the positioning of Warsaw. Pact troops and equipment. The pilots of the NATO air forces had been briefed and, rebriefed many times during the past hours in anticipation of imminent conflict, the artillery brigades closest to the border already knew of any concentrations of armour or mechanized infantry.
Although earlier defence plans had ruled that no NATO troops, vehicles, aircraft or projectiles should in any circumstances cross the West/East demarcation line, the enormous build-up of enemy war materials in the border areas, indicating the determination of a Sovkt invasion once it commenced, had forced the NATO military commanders to hastily revise their orders.
The first aircraft into enemy airspace were a USAF squadron of uprated F-11 1s, each with a full pay-load of 31,000lbs of explosives. Coming in from the air base at Zweibrucken to the west, snaking a way through the mountainous country, and crossing the borders only a little higher than the maximum trajectory of the shells of the heavy artillery, they launched a fierce attack on the headquarters of a Soviet mechanized rifle brigade at Wernigerode. Swinging north to bring themselves back across allied territory, two were destroyed by SA-3 Goa surface-to-air-missiles stationed close inside the East German border; the wreckage of the aircraft spiralled down unnoticed in the heavy concentrations of artillery fire across the dense woodland of the plain.
The West German Heeresflieger were in action within minutes of the landing of the first shells and rockets. Nine of their ATGW-armed Wiesels attacked a forward concentration of Russian assault armour to the east of Dannenberg.
The strength of the Soviet artillery barrage had taken a number of senior NATO officers by surprise. Many had come to believe that the effectiveness of artillery prior to ground attack was merely psychological and the Warsaw Pact countries were unlikely to waste time and ammunition by such tactics. They had thought the first signs of hostility would be the forward movement of enemy armour. The depth and power of the artillery fire caused some momentary concern until the pattern of the barrage became more obvious. The Soviet artillery, both gun and missile, were concentrating on the blanketing of known NATO positions, fortunately mostly unoccupied by the defending forces. Barracks and garrisons within range of the Soviet weapons were destroyed within the first, few minutes of the barrage. Sites which had been used in training exercises over the past ten years were all covered, as were many of the more obvious defensive situations facing the frontier. Casualties in the forward combat units of the NATO armies were minimal, though there were many amongst the unevacuated maintenance and civilian staffs of the garrisons, and in villages of the border areas.
A short break in the artillery barrage in the Helmstedt region east of Braunschweig heralded the entry of the Soviet air forces into the initial stages of the attack. A squadron of Mikoyan/Gurevich MiG-28s, the latest versions of the Flogger, swept across the borders at little more than tree-top height. They were picked up by NATO radar and, as they reached the plain to the east of Hannover, came under fire from three missile batteries deployed for defence of the city. At the same time, a formation of Antanov AN-22s, some of the largest aircraft in the world, made an attempt to deliver a diversionary paratroop attack west of Braunschweig. All eight aircraft were destroyed by a patrol of RAF-piloted Rockwell XFV-12s, vectored on to the troop carriers by the computer-linked radar. The Soviet aircraft, with low maximum speeds, were defenceless against the air-to-air missiles of the XFV-12s, powering in from the north in excess of a thousand miles an hour. Over eight hundred Soviet paratroopers were killed while still inside the aircraft. None reached the ground alive.
In several areas in the northernmost sectors of CENTAG, the first troops of the Soviet invasion forces were landed successfully on NATO soil from Hind-H helicopters and quickly formed into assault groups, aided by transport carried in by Mi-10s and Mi-14s of the 16th Frontal Aviation Army. The deepest penetration, and the largest number of men landed, was in the Fulva valley south-east of Melsungen, where heavy fighting resulted from almost immediate encounters with a NATO armoured reconnaissance unit of the Federal Republic Heer, mounted in their Spahpanzer 2 Luchs with 20mm Rh202 cannons and MG3 machine guns.
SIX
Sergeant Morgan Davis in Bravo Two heard his troop leader’s voice on the radio for only a few seconds before the first of the countless explosions that followed. Lieutenant Sidworth had sounded breathless, excited: ‘Hullo Bravo, this is Nine, deploy to battle positions…’ Christ, thought Davis, we’re already deployed, what… Sidworth corrected his orders. ‘Hullo Bravo, this is Nine, deploy to battle situation, cancel…’ The remainder of his words were lost in an eruption of sound that made Sergeant Davis flinch involuntarily, then duck lower in the fighting compartment. He swung his legs from the breech of the gun down the floor, feeling his boot catch Gunner Inkester on the side of his head. Inkester swore, loudly. The Chieftain bucked as the ground beneath it moved. The sounds Davis had encountered on the exercise ranges were nothing to those that now surrounded the Chieftain. He heard someone cursing in the HF, shouted conversation, then silence in the earphones. The Chieftain was pitched forward on its suspension by an explosion somewhere close to the rear of the tank. Another on the right made the hull ring and Davis’s ears throb with the shock.
He pushed himself upright in the turret and gazed through the episcope. The sky was bright with fire and the searing trails of rockets, the ground pocked by explosions that briefly illuminated drifting clouds of smoke. There were flames leaping above the trees somewhere two hundred meters to the right, along the troop’s position. It looked like a diesel-fuel fire, perhaps one of the Chieftains brewing-up. Davis hoped the crew had had time to bale out.
He didn’t want to use the HF so switched back to the tank’s Tannoy system. ‘Inkester!’ The metallic voice was loud in the compartment. He felt movement against his legs. ‘Keep your eyes to the sights, lad. DeeJay, you okay down there?’
He heard DeeJay Hewett’s voice, distantly. ‘Fucking stroll-on!’
‘Check your equipment.’ The HF interrupted him, and, outside the barrage had diminished briefly. He heard Lieutenant Sidworth the Bravo troop leader checking the tanks.
‘Hullo Charlie Bravo all stations, this is Nine, come in, over.’
Davis answered. ‘Charlie Bravo Two roger, out.’
Sidworth called again. ‘Hullo Charlie Bravo Three, this is Nine, come in, over.’
There was no reply for a few seconds and then Corporal Sealey of Charlie Bravo Four interrupted on the wavelength. ‘Nine, this is Charlie Bravo Four. Three is brewed, sir. We saw it. Direct hit. Over.’
God, there were troop casualties already! A few moments of war, and men, friends, began to die! It was unreal, terrifying, but Davis admired the cool way Sealey had made his report; the man had only recently been promoted, and David had helped with a recommendation.
‘Hullo Charlie Bravo Four, this is Nine. Any survivors?’
‘No survivors, Nine. Instant flare-out.’
‘Nine, roger. Out.’
No survivors. Instant flare-out. Four names to go on the first day’s casualty list. Four dead, but how many affected? There would be wives, parents, children! One bloody armour-piercing shell in the first half hour of a war! Although Davis had been trained for many years to expect death in battle, it was hard to accept it when it happened. It suddenly made him aware of the illusion of protection the tank’s puny armour gave to its crew. Men measured the strength of steel against their own flesh, it was a cruel deception!
The barrage returned suddenly, and for a moment Davis wondered if Soviet sensors had reacted to the troop’s HF transmissions. The dawn sky had lightened and he could view the open landscape below him. With horror he saw shell explosions, like an advancing tidal wave on a beach sweeping up the lower slopes of the hill, tearing aside trees and shrubs, building a terrifying wall of flame, smoke and hurtling debris. Before he could even react the explosions were upon them, around them. He ducked his head between his arms as the Chieftain was smashed sideways, tilted fifteen degrees to the left. The metal of the hull felt alive, shuddering, vibrating… and then there was an eerie silence. Davis could hear the rasping of his own breath. Something warm trickled down his chin. He wiped at it with his hand. It was saliva.
DeeJay called through the intercom: ‘Are we hit?’
