Invasion: New York

“What’s going on?” Penner asked his wingman.

“I don’t have any idea, sir,”

Then an air controller began to explain it to them. The THOR missiles had just taken out the majority of the GD invasion fleet.

“Say again,” Penner said.

He listened as the air control officer explained it. THOR missiles, what in the world were those.

As Penner wondered, he noticed that the US fighters amongst all those GD air began to shoot down the enemy planes.

This is turning into a turkey shoot, he realized.

Penner laughed. It felt wonderful to be alive. Then he sobered up. He still had a task to do, and maybe now he would be able to accomplish it.

It was time for the air force to destroy whatever was left of the enemy ships out there.

The air traffic controller told them to concentrate on GD infantry and ground-vehicle transports.

Penner nodded. That’s exactly what he planned to do.

TORONTO, ONTARIO

General Mansfeld stood in a hushed operational chamber. Screens lined the walls, with technicians seated below them. His staff officers stood as a group, silent and staring. They had been doing both for the past few minutes.

Mansfeld stared at a screen in disbelief. He found it hard to comprehend what he saw. His eyes were fine. His brain worked to full capacity, but the switch from conquering brilliance to catastrophic defeat left a bitter taste in his mouth and a cold black hole in his thinking.

The luminous trails from space had already dissipated. The Americans had found a way to harness meteors. It was amazingly brilliant and cleverly done, and it had just annihilated his chances of ending the campaign in a crushing German victory.

On the screen Mansfeld watched yet another enemy cruise missile. The sleek thing skimmed over the waves.

It’s going to hit a troop transport. I can’t afford that.

True to the prediction, the missile stuck and blasted a surviving troop transport at the waterline. The transport began to list. Mansfeld watched as panicked sailors and infantrymen jumped overboard into the sea.

That’s the wrong thing to do. You must keep your head. That was the only way to survive a disaster.

Another cruise missile skimmed the sea. It destroyed a hover-carrier holding a large number of Sigrid drones.

A disaster, this is a disaster. The Americans have broken the closing jaw. I cannot believe this.

A hard knot of anger washed through General Mansfeld. This technologically advanced blow could ruin his hard-won reputation. Historians would pen down that he had miscalculated. Instead of a great victor—the greatest of modern times with far-seeing vision and—

“No,” Mansfeld said. He turned to stride away into his study, but he realized he needed to rally his command staff.

Clearing his throat, Mansfeld said, “The Americans have done well. It would be petty to say they haven’t. But this will not save them. Nothing came save them from their coming dismemberment.”

“General?” one of the staff members asked. “How…what will we do now?”

Mansfeld forced heartiness into a mocking laugh. “Why, we will close the trap, Colonel.”

“But we needed those ships. We needed those soldiers.”

“Oh,” Mansfeld said. “I admit this will make things more difficult, to be sure. But the Americans have already shown us their panic by using the ICBMs.”

“Maybe we should use some of ours on them, sir,” the staff officer said.

Yes, maybe we should at that. I will have to contemplate the possibility. Who expected space weapons from the Americans? They abandoned space long ago.

“We badly needed those troops, sir,” the staff officer said.

“Yes,” Mansfeld agreed. The man spoke truth. It was always good to see the truth, no matter how harsh it was.

“You will instruct whatever ships survived the disaster to head out to sea,” Mansfeld said. “Get away from the American air. Afterward, we’re going to swing the troop transports around and bring them down the Saint Lawrence into Quebec.”

The staff officers gazed at him like dumb bovines. The nearest had glazed eyes and a slack mouth, looking as if he’d been hypnotized. It was clear they couldn’t perceive just yet. They let a disaster shake them. But disasters happened to everyone, even to geniuses of war. He would recover from this and find his victory that much more gratifying. Enough of that, though. He needed to galvanize these men.

“We must salvage what we can from this,” Mansfeld said. “A single defeat does not a war lose. We have the enemy on the run, gentlemen. This would have been the deathblow, to land Kaltenbrunner’s soldiers in New Jersey and New York. Now we’re going to have to finish this the conventional way. We’ll trap the US Fifth Army in the Niagara Peninsula and, and…”

“Will a reduced Twelfth Army be able to break through Syracuse, sir?” the staff officer asked. “Can the Twelfth Army smash through Albany and race to New York City, all while keeping the line intact and sealing the enemy in our trap?”

“I’m well aware of the odds,” Mansfeld said. “We need reinforcements across Lake Ontario. That’s why we’re swinging the surviving transports wide east and then to the Saint Lawrence. We’ll use those troops in New York yet.”

“Begging your pardon, sir,” the staff officer said. “But maybe we should consider pulling out of New York State. Maybe we should cut our losses before the Americans—”

Mansfeld strode to the defeatist staff officer. Normally, the man was a brilliant colonel of logistics, a real go-getter.

In a cold voice, Mansfeld said, “You are dismissed and relieved of your position.”

“Sir?” the staff officer asked.

“I will not countenance defeatist talk,” Mansfeld told him. “What you gentlemen have witnessed is a single American success. They will not get any more. I will personally see to that. Therefore, I will not tolerate even a hint of a defeatist speculation. We have the enemy on the run. That is the time to ride him down and stick a spear in his side.”

We’re on the tiger, and you cannot stop such a monster and climb off. No, we must stay on until the very end. There is no turning back for any of us, especially not for me.

The staff colonel must have seen something in the general’s eyes. He did not argue. Instead, he saluted crisply, turned and marched out of the operational chamber.

“What about the rest of you?” Mansfeld asked. “Is there anyone else who wishes to spout defeatist talk?”

The staff officers shook their heads.

“Very well,” Mansfeld said. “Carry on and make sure you get the surviving transports headed east first and then north to the mouth of the Saint Lawrence. We’re going to need all the troops we can…gather.”

He almost said, “Scrape together.” That would have sounded wrong. This was a time for confidence. This was not a time to panic and to lose one’s head.

General Mansfeld strode for the door to his inner office. What am I going to do? This is a disaster. What will the Chancellor say?

Mansfeld didn’t bother shaking his head. The Chancellor might panic. Well, he would cross that bridge when the time came. Right now, he had to push the attack on Syracuse and the Niagara Peninsula. The Americans must be congratulating each other right now. He would give them something to worry about, and then he would give them a surprise that would wipe away this bitter sea defeat.