“You promise me I will get to take one shot?”
“My word as a Russian officer, comrade,” Aleksandrov pledged, with a bob of his head.
“Then I come.” Gogol was already dressed for it-the heat in his cabin was turned off. He shouldered his old rifle and an ammunition pack containing forty rounds-he’d never gone into the field with more than that-and walked to the door. “Help me with my wolves, boy, will you?”
“Gladly, Grandfather.” Then Aleksandrov found out how heavy they were. But he and Buikov managed to toss them inside their BRM, and the driver headed off.
“Where are they?”
“About ten kilometers back. We’ve been in visual contact with them for days, but they’ve pulled us back. Away from them.”
“Why?”
“To save you, you old fool,” Buikov observed with a laugh. “And to save these pelts. These are too good to drape over the body of some Chinese strumpet!”
“I think, Pasha-I am not sure,” the captain said, “but I think it’s time for our Chinese guests to get a proper Russian welcome.”
“Captain, look!” the driver called.
Aleksandrov lifted his head out the big top hatch and looked forward. A senior officer was waving to him to come forward more quickly. Three minutes later, they halted alongside him.
“You are Aleksandrov?”
“Yes, Comrade General!” the young man confirmed to the senior officer.
“I am General Sinyavskiy. You’ve done well, boy. Come out here and talk to me,” he ordered in a gruff voice that was not, however, unkind.
Aleksandrov had only once seen his senior commander, and then only at a distance. He was not a large man, but you didn’t want him as a physical enemy in a small room. He was chewing on a cigar that had gone out seemingly hours before, and his blue eyes blazed.
“Who is this?” Sinyavskiy demanded. Then his face changed. “Are you the famous Pasha?” he asked more respectfully.
“Senior Sergeant Gogol of the Iron and Steel Division,” the old man said with great dignity, and a salute which Sinyavskiy returned crisply.
“I understand you killed some Germans in your day. How many, Sergeant?”
“Count for yourself, Comrade General,” Gogol said, handing his rifle over.
“Damn,” the general observed, looking at the notches, like those on the pistol of some American cowboy. “I believe you really did it. But combat is a young man’s game, Pavel Petrovich. Let me get you to a place of safety.”
Gogol shook his head. “This captain promised me one shot, or I would not have left my home.”
“Is that a fact?” The commanding general of 265th Motor Rifle looked around. “Captain Aleksandrov, very well, we’ll give our old comrade his one shot.” He pointed to a place on the map before him. “This should be a good spot for you. And when you can, get him the hell away from there,” Sinyavskiy told the young man. “Head back this way to our lines. They’ll be expecting you. Boy, you’ve done a fine job shadowing them all the way up. Your reward will be to see how we greet the bastards.”
“Behind the reconnaissance element is a large force.”
“I know. I’ve been watching them on TV for a day and a half, but our American friends have cut off their supplies. And we will stop them, and we will stop them right here.”
Aleksandrov checked the map reference. It looked like a good spot with a good field of fire, and best of all, an excellent route to run away on. “How long?” he asked.
“Two hours, I should think. Their main body is catching up with the screen. Your first job is to make their screen vehicles disappear.”
“Yes, Comrade General, that we can do for you!” the captain responded with enthusiasm.
Sunrise found Marion Diggs in a strangely bizarre environment. Physically, the surroundings reminded him of Fort Carson, Colorado, with its rolling hills and patchy pine woods, but it was unlike America in its lack of paved roads or civilization, and that explained why the Chinese had invaded here. With little civilian population out here, there was no infrastructure or population base to provide for the area’s defense, and that had made things a lot easier for John Chinaman. Diggs didn’t mind it, either. It was like his experience in the Persian Gulf-no noncombatants to get in the way-and that was good.
But there were a lot of Chinese to get in the way. Mike Francisco’s First Brigade had debauched into the main logistics area for the Chinese advance. The ground was carpeted with trucks and soldiers, but while most of them were armed, few were organized into cohesive tactical units, and that made all the difference. Colonel Miguel Francisco’s brigade of four battalions had been organized for combat with the infantry and tank battalions integrated into unified battalion task groups of mixed tanks and Bradleys, and these were sweeping across the ground like a harvesting machine in Kansas in August. If it was painted green, it was shot.
The monstrous Abrams main-battle tanks moved over the rolling ground like creatures from Jurassic Park- alien, evil, and unstoppable, their gun turrets traversing left and right-but without firing their main guns. The real work was being done by the tank commanders and their M2.50 machine guns, which could turn any truck into an immobile collection of steel and canvas. Just a short burst into the engine made sure that the pistons would never move again, and the cargo in the back would remain where it was, for inspection by intelligence officers, or destruction by explosives-carrying engineer troops who came behind the tanks in their HMMWVs. Some resistance was offered by the Chinese soldiers, but only by the dumb ones, and never for long. Even those with man-portable anti-tank weapons rarely got close enough to use them, and those few who popped up from Wolfholes only scratched the paint on the tanks, and usually paid for their foolishness with their lives. At one point, a battalion of infantry did launch a deliberate attack, supported by mortars that forced the tank and Bradley crews to button up and reply with organized fire. Five minutes of 155-mm fire and a remorseless advance by the Bradleys, spitting fire from their chain guns and through the firing ports for the mounted infantry inside, made them look like fire-breathing dragons, and these dragons were not a sign of good luck for the Chinese soldiers. That battalion evaporated in twenty minutes, along with its dedicated but doomed commander.
Intact enemy armored vehicles were rarely seen by the advancing First Brigade. Where it went, Apache attack helicopters had gone before, looking for targets for their Hellfire missiles, and killing them before the ground troops could get close. All in all, it was a perfect military operation, totally unfair in the balance of forces. It wasn’t the least bit sporting, but a battlefield is not an Olympic stadium, and there were no uniformed officials to guard the supposed rules of fair play.
The only exciting thing was the appearance of a Chinese army helicopter, and two Apaches blazed after it and destroyed it with air-to-air missiles, dropping it in the Amur River close to the floating bridges, which were now empty of traffic but not yet destroyed.
What have you learned, Wei?” Marshal Luo asked, when he emerged from the conference room he’d used for his nap.
“The picture is still unclear in some respects, Comrade Minister,” the general answered.
“Then tell me what is clear,” Luo ordered.
“Very well. At sea, we have lost a number of ships. This evidently includes our ballistic missile submarine and its escorting hunter submarine, cause unknown, but their emergency beacons deployed and transmitted their programmed messages starting at about zero-two-hundred hours. Also lost are seven surface warships of various types from our South Sea Fleet. Also, seven fleet bases were attacked by American aircraft, believed to be naval carrier aircraft, along with a number of surface-to-air missile and radar sites on the southeastern coast. We’ve succeeded in shooting down a number of American aircraft, but in a large fighter battle, we took serious losses to our fighter regiments in that region.”
“Is the American navy attacking us?” Luo asked.
“It appears that they are, yes,” General Wei answered, choosing his words with care. “We estimate four of their aircraft carriers, judging by the number of aircraft involved. As I said, reports are that we handled them roughly, but our losses were severe as well.”
