me different, that the knowledge gained by that ancestor was passed down genetically. There is nothing you, or I, or anyone, can tell the sergeant major about setting up a camp that he wasn't born knowing.'
Joseph rolled his eyes at that.
'Don't believe me, eh?' Stauer raised his voice, 'Sergeant Major, how long to dig a six foot deep, twelve foot wide ditch around the camp, and use the spoil to build a wall, after cutting enough timber to palisade that wall?'
The answer came back in about half a second. 'To excavate thirty-two hundred cubic meters of dirt and build a wall with the spoil would take, if we had the entire complement here, by shovel, approximately a day and a half, sir. Another day for the logs, though that would delay the engineers building the strip. Do you want a fossa and agger, sir? I wouldn't recommend it; breed lots of bugs, it would, sir.'
'Negative, Sergeant Major. Just curious. By the way, how many shitters and pissers do we need?'
'Thirty-four shitters, sir, twenty-one pissers, assuming the naval contingent never billets here and the air contingent only does so intermittently. Those can be dug out in rather less time and are easier to control for bugs.'
'Ahem,' Stauer said to the doctor.
'Well if he's so smart and capable why wasn't he an officer?' Joseph asked.
Stauer shook his head. 'Lots of bright people don't want to be officers. And of those that are, some are simply happier, for purely emotional and instinctive reasons, at lower levels. Let me give you an example: Reilly.'
Joseph had only met the current adjutant and-so Stauer had finally determined-future mech force commander, a couple of days prior. 'What about him?'
'He is, without doubt, one of the smartest men I ever met. He is tactically and operationally deft . . . no, deft isn't a strong enough term. He's fucking great. He trains troops better than anyone I've ever met, too. Any kind of troops, combat, combat support, or REMF. He should have been a four star. You know why he isn't? He doesn't know. At least, I don't think he does.'
Joseph shook his head no.
'Because emotionally he is only really happy commanding a company, a group that is small enough for everyone to know everyone. He can deal with a battalion, well enough, but he's not really as happy there. See, he needs the fight, close up and personal. Without those things-'
Stauer was interrupted by a German accent, speaking breathlessly. That was the voice of Matthias Nagy, the leader of what would become the engineer section. Nagy was a half Hungarian, half German investment banker with a background in the German Army's Airborne Engineers. He'd been quite happy as a soldier but hadn't liked the direction his army had taken following the fall of Communism. When given a chance to be a real soldier again, he'd taken four months built up leave and jumped on it. His English was approximately as good as his German, with hardly even a noticeable accent.
Sweat poured off Nagy, as if he'd been running through the jungle searching for the area to put in the landing strip, and then run back again to report that he had. Stauer had no doubt he'd done precisely that. Nagy had been one of Reilly's acquisitions and came very highly recommended.
'I found a spot where I can put in a small airstrip, boss,' Nagy said. 'It will take maybe twelve days, including putting in the PSP. That assumes, of course, that my baby dozer, my grader, and my mini-excavator don't break and that everyone will collaborate in putting in the PSP . . . doctors included.'
'Will they? Break, I mean?'
Off in the distance could be heard Joshua's, for the nonce harsh, voice, shouting, 'No, you stupid bastards! The tent pins go straight in, not at an angle away from the tent. Yes, I know it's counter-intuitive, but otherwise, when the canvas gets wet and shrinks, the leverage pulls the pins too much, loosens ‘em, and causes the tent to collapse. Jesus, do I have to teach you people everything?'
Nagy shook his squarish head. 'Good man, your sergeant major,' he said. 'Anyway, sir, the excavator's a brand new Volvo, and the dozer is a brand new John Deere, and the grader's by Caterpillar. Doubt if I could break them if I tried.'
'How are you getting them off the boat?' Stauer asked. 'The bank's pretty steep and just dirt.'
Nagy looked only mildly concerned. 'We're going to cut some trees and lay the logs down. Then I'll land the John Deere and use it to get the Volvo ashore, and the two of them to get the Caterpillar out. I've got the cables. Later we'll be building a dock and off-loading ramp.'
'And how big does the strip have to be?'
'Cruz said that given the heat and high water vapor content in the air,' Nagy said, 'I'd better cut out a strip of twenty-four meters by about five hundred. A bit under eleven thousand pieces of PSP, three hundred tons and change. Course, I think he's being overly cautious. The planes are coming in laden, true, but they'll be leaving empty except for crew and fuel. Personally, I think we could get by with a field a half as long and two thirds as wide. Then again, the trees could pose a problem with a field that short.'
'And how many rubber and other trees are you going to kill to do that?'
'Few hundred, no more,' Nagy answered, with an indifferent shrug. Combat engineers loved knocking down trees. It was almost as much fun as dropping buildings and bridges. 'Well, a few hundred for the field itself. More for some of the other things. And to disguise the shape of the strip.'
'All right, then,' Stauer agreed, satisfied. 'Gordo Gordon has about two weeks to assemble what we need and begin flying it in here.'
D-110, Meridien Pegasus Hotel, Georgetown, Guyana
They didn't call Harry Gordon 'Gordo' just because it was the first five letters of his last name. In fact, he was fat. He'd always been fat and always had to struggle in the Army to keep within the strictures of Army Regulation 600-9. This was a shame, everyone agreed, since Gordo was one of the two or three finest logistic minds around. Then again, what could be expected of a regulation dedicated to the elevation of form over substance?
Still, he was fat and, as such, had a relatively high body mass to radiating surface. The short version of that was:
'God damn, this place is fucking hot! Reilly should be down here; he likes this kind of heat.'
'He's got his job up there, boss,' answered Gordo's assistant, retired Master Sergeant Warren. 'We've got ours down here. And it isn't'-Warren cast his dark eyes around meaningfully at the hotel, the Meridien Pegasus, with its view over the town and the Demerara River-'it isn't as if this is exactly hardship duty.'
As if to punctuate the point, a very womanly form in hotel livery swayed up, bearing a tray of drinks. Two of these she set on the table between Warren and Gordo.
Black women weren't usually to Gordo's taste. This one, however, looked to be a mix of black, East Indian, local Indian, and white and she was to anyone's taste.
'Forget it, boss,' Warren said. 'Tonight, she's going out with me.'
'No problem,' Gordo answered. 'The first of the Pilatus PC-6s is due in this evening and I want to meet the flight crew at the airport when they arrive. And speaking of arrival-'
'Four hundred and ninety sets, body armor, various sizes, due in, in four days,' Warren answered. 'And you have no idea what a bitch it was to track that number down from enough different suppliers to not be noticeable and have it sent to Reilly in San Antonio. Twenty-one hundred sets, battle dress, old style, three color desert, due in, in six days. I lucked out with that one, and found a lot of them through DRMO'-Defense Re-utilization and Marketing Office-'at Fort Stewart. Just, and I mean just, beat Third Special Forces Group to them. Hats, too. LCE'- Load Carrying Equipment-'I ordered from Israel; that's coming in by air in a week. Reilly's been budgeted fifty thousand bucks for boots for the boys as they show up. Belts, underwear and socks; they're on their own. I did order a couple of rolls of webbing and some generic buckles in case we have to make belts for anyone. The advance party's got enough food for three weeks and their field water purification equipment will do until we can send them the Zenon Mini-ROWPU'-Reverse Osmosis Water Purification Unit-'and, before you ask, that's coming in by air, too, scheduled for ten days from now, with the last of the PC-6s.'
