Air Battle Force

“Use your smoke! Use your smoke!” Turabi shouted on the radio. Their smoke grenades were very effective — the smoke hung close to the ground, obscuring the Turkmen’s sight. Finding the spider holes turned out to be relatively easy: The Turkmen had dug them in an almost perfect circle, so once one of Turabi’s men made contact, all they had to do was search left and right for another hole. But the machine-gun fire, although not accurate — the gunner could not see his target, although he knew they were out there — was devastating. One by one his men were going down, usually clipped in the upper thigh or near the waist by big twenty-three-millimeter shells. The screams of his own men, dying and maimed, started to engulf him. Surrounded by smoke, sand, stones, and dead comrades, Turabi felt disorganized, disoriented, and helpless — but he kept on moving forward.

He practically fell into a spider hole, plopping right down onto the headless body of a Turkmen soldier. He scrambled out of the blood and gore, keeping down below the rim of the hole while machine-gun fire zinged all around him. He reloaded and checked his ammo — just four magazines left, plus his sidearm with two extra mags. He had used up over half his ammo already, and they hadn’t hit one thing at the airport. Turabi had to assume, since he was frugal with his ammo, that his men were probably much lower. Once he used up another mag, he decided, they would pull back. This attack was going nowhere.

Then he saw it: a field telephone, a simple, old-style crank-and-talk box. The Turkmen soldiers didn’t even have radios out here! Turabi found the dead soldier’s headphones, rubbed the blood and brains out of the ear cups, and put them on.

He was desperate — he could think of only one thing to try. He cranked the phone and, summoning all his Russian-language skills, pressed the talk button and shouted, “Astanavleevat’sya! Eta vazmooteeteel’no!” he shouted, doing his best impersonation of a pissed-off Russian officer. “Who in hell are you shooting at?”

Someone responded, in even worse Russian than his.

“I cannot understand you!”

“Sir, there are intruders in the perimeter!” the Turkmen soldier said in terrible Russian.

“I hope to hell you haven’t attacked my security detail returning from patrol!” Turabi shouted, trying to run his words together to make it sound more authentic. “Now I want every one of you to get up out of those damned holes, without your weapon, and search for the wounded! I am sending trucks out to assist. If you come out of your holes with your weapons, you’re likely to be shot by my men — or your own! Now, get moving!”

“Da, tovarisch,” the soldier responded. He heard frantic calls in Turkmen broadcast on the phone. Turabi peeked out of his hole — and sure enough the Turkmen soldiers were standing up and searching the ground around them with big, boxlike flashlights. Hold your fire, damn it, Turabi silently ordered his men as he pulled his pistol out of his holster, hold your fire….

They did. And then as if by another silent command, shots rang out all around him all at once, and the Turkmen soldiers fell.

“Viper team, Alpha, report,” Turabi radioed.

“East One point secure, three down.”

“Center One point secure, four down.”

“West One point secure, three down.”

One by one, each of the platoons reported in. The east mortar platoon, the only one attacked as soon as it started launching rounds, suffered the worst casualties. Only two of the twelve members survived, and they had lost all their tubes and mortar rounds. Out of almost a hundred men who attacked the airport, they had lost thirty- one — but they had killed over a hundred Turkmen soldiers.

“What are we going to do now, Colonel?” Turabi’s second in command said. “More Turkmen security forces will be on their way any moment.”

“We’re not going to wait for them,” Turabi said. A few soldiers hung their heads — in exhaustion or shame, it was hard to tell. “We’re going to take those artillery batteries. Have everyone find a Turkmen uniform and weapon, and get ready to move.”

About thirty minutes before sunrise, General Zarazi himself strode into the communications center. Captain Aman Orazov put down a pair of headphones and met the general. “Well?” Zarazi asked.

“Still no contact with Colonel Turabi,” Orazov said. “Khamsa Company has not had contact with Turabi either since they took up positions at the power substation north of Chauder.”

“The last report was Turabi’s company making contact at Khodzhayli?”

“Yes, sir,” Orazov replied. “Several platoons encountered a dug-in company-size security force surrounding the airport. Looks like the colonel marched right into an ambush. Their forces were of equal size, but Turabi lost several men at the substation, so he was undermanned.” He paused, then said, “I should have led that force, sir. I know my country’s tactics. I could have gotten around a simple spider-hole security perimeter. And getting ambushed by a couple scout platoons at that substation — how could he let that happen? He couldn’t see a force that size in a small, enclosed area?”

“This was not Turabi’s shining moment,” Zarazi had to admit.

“The colonel is very good at smash-and-grab, small-unit guerrilla tactics against paramilitary forces, sir, but conducting a raid with a company-size force against army regulars is another matter,” Orazov said. “Turabi’s company may have been wiped out completely. We should consider the very great possibility that some of our men, perhaps even the colonel himself, will have been captured. If that is so, they will use unspeakable methods to extract information from them. We must assume that the Russians and Turkmen know our current position, manpower, and order of battle.”

Zarazi turned away and stared into a corner of the communications tent. “We… we must make preparations to shift forces… move forward, perhaps to Chauder….”

“We do need to shift positions, sir, but we should not go forward — we need to retreat,” Orazov said. “Those men at Chauder and at the substation are dead when the Turkmen begin their counterattack. We should pull back to Esenmengli—”

“Esenmengli? That’s… that’s seventy kilometers!”

“We have no choice, sir!” Orazov said. “Turabi has failed, and his failure has stalled our entire offensive. We can’t afford to waste time crossing the river to Imeni Kalinina. If we’re caught while we’re crossing, we’ll be slaughtered. The only stronghold on this side of the river we can retreat to is Esenmengli.”

Zarazi turned and straightened his shoulders. “Very well—Major,” he said. “Deploy security forces along the river to assist in the withdrawal of our remaining forces at Chauder. Then give the order to move quickly to Esenmengli.”

“Yes, sir,” Orazov said proudly. “Once we are secure, sir, I will be honored to lead the men in a new offensive. Just give the order, sir.”

“I am disappointed in Turabi,” Zarazi muttered. “He has proven himself a good fighter in the past, but it should have been obvious to me that his heart was not in this campaign. My friendship for him blinded me to the reality of the situation.”

“The deficiency was in Turabi, sir, not you,” Orazov said. “But the battle is not yet lost. We can still—”

At that moment they heard a loud boom! off in the distance, followed by several more in rapid succession.

“Artillery!” Orazov screamed. “The Turkmen artillery positions at Khodzhayli — they started up again! This can only be a prelude to a full-scale attack on our position! We need to get out of here!”

“Launch the attack helicopters! Commence attacking the artillery positions and any advancing armor immediately with everything we’ve got!” Zarazi shouted. “Notify all battalions to prepare to repel attack!” Just then he stopped and listened. He could hear the artillery pieces booming in the distance — but no rounds had fallen yet. “What is going on? Whose artillery is that?”

Orazov picked up the headphones again to listen to the reports coming in from their security patrols and scouts. His eyes widened in surprise a few moments later.

“What is it, Major?”

“The scout helicopters report the artillery units at Khodzhayli are… they are firing toward Charjew!” Orazov exclaimed. “The scouts report heavy aircraft losses and heavy bombardment of armor-marshaling areas at Charjew Airport. They report—” He paused, listening intently. “Sir, Turkmen infantry units are in full retreat! Entire companies… no, entire battalions! — are evacuating north