With nothing more to do for the moment, Lewis listened to the reports and watched Smithson and the S-2 plot the progress of the battle. The scouts continued to engage, drawing back slowly. Somehow the first report of a loss in the scout platoon passed unnoticed, until the number six listed as the number of operational Bradleys for the scouts was changed to a five.
It's begun, Lewis thought, the dying has begun. That the same thought had not occurred to him when the destruction of Soviet tanks had been reported was not unusual. After all, the scouts were killing tanks; the crews of the T-80 tanks had no faces, no names. The men in the scout Bradleys, however, were very real to Lewis. They were people who lived in Memphis with him.
They were the people he worked with, had gone to annual training with, dealt with on a daily basis. Sam Cane, a young teacher who taught Ed's youngest son, commanded one of the Bradleys in the scout platoon. Was Sam dead? Or was it Tim Wheaton, owner of the gas station just off the interstate exit, now a scout-squad leader? Was it his track that had been hit? The black grease-pencil figures on the chart next to the situation map translated into very real people. Real people whom Lewis knew.
Slowly the Soviets drew near. The scouts ceased fire and pulled away.
Now the companies, in their hasty defensive positions, began to report sighting the Soviets and their readiness to engage. The tension began to build again. Everyone waited, the silence broken only by the traffic over the artillery-fire-control net as artillery lieutenants with the companies requested fires and submitted corrections after observing the impact of adjustment rounds. All waited for the battle to be joined in earnest.
There was no doubt that the regiment had run into an American force of some size. The increasing tempo of artillery, and its accuracy, betrayed the fact that someone was watching and directing it upon the 3rd Battalion. Vorishnov, his head raised slightly out of the turret, saw no sign of more TOW-missile firings. That, however, was not comforting. It could only mean that the forward elements were finished and were pulling back to clear the way for the main body of the enemy force. Vorishnov wondered whether the Americans had been in defensive positions that were missed by the regimental recon or whether the battle developing was a bona fide meeting engagement in which the Americans now had the upper hand. The truth, however, did not matter at that moment. What did matter was that the battalion was again going into battle, regardless of how it had come about. Their orders were to find and fix the Americans. Once the situation had been developed, the tank battalion behind the 3rd would move to the left or the right to seek the Americans' flank. The quickest and most effective method of finding the enemy was to continue the attack. Once contact was reestablished, the battalion would turn and attack whoever did the firing.
The bright flash, the dazzling shower of sparks caused by the impact of a kinetic-energy round on a T-80, followed by the sharp crack of a tank cannon, told Vorishnov that they had found the enemy's main body. Just as the battalion began to reorient on the source of the tanks firing, it was hit by a wave of antitank guided missiles, artillery and artillery-delivered mines. In less than a minute, command and control vaporized as the attacking force was overwhelmed with superior firepower and with confusion.
Having nothing left to control but his tank, Vorishnov joined the battle.
With his hatch buttoned up, he searched for a target. In his sight, the flash of an American tank firing caught his eye. 'Target tank! Traverse left.' The gunner turned his control handle and searched for the target.
Vorishnov saw it first. The green image of a tank's turret was protruding above a mound, its gun pointed in another direction. 'Target twelve o'clock. Fire!'
The gunner now saw what his commander saw, Lined his sight on the center of the target, depressed the laser range-finder button and waited for the system to input the data. When he was ready, he announced, 'Firing!' and pulled the trigger.
The T-80 rolled on, its sights continuing to track the tank they had just engaged. In the distance a brilliant light cut through the obscuration kicked up by the firing of the gun. Vorishnov watched as a ball of fire rose into the black sky, casting long shadows on everything around. The American tank was dead.
Without waiting for its crew, the T-80's automatic loader was already preparing for the next engagement. The gun jerked into the loading position, slamming the breech open with a bang. The mechanical arm reached down and scooped up the next projectile and guided it into the breech.
Finished, the arm reached down and scooped up the powder bag, ramming it home behind the projectile. As his gunner searched for targets, Vorishnov watched the loading of the main gun, careful to stay out of the mechanical arm's path. It's too slow, he thought, too terribly slow.
Targets were now plentiful. Less than four hundred meters to their front an American Bradley appeared out of nowhere. As Vorishnov prepared to engage, the reports of the follow-on battalion could be heard over the regimental command net. He was not concerned with those reports, however. The regimental battle was no longer his. His battle had degenerated to a one-on-one contest: his tank against whatever crossed its path.
'Mike Four-four, this is Oscar Six-eight. I have negative contact with my one six. I am assuming command. Over.' The tank-company commander was dead.
Lewis watched the situation board as he listened to the reports and the orders.
The S-3 responded without hesitation, 'Oscar Sixeight, this is Mike Four-four. I roger your last transmission. What is your current situation? Over.'
'Mike Four-four, this is Oscar Six-eight. Five tanks and two Bradleys left that I know of. Enemy tanks are now passing to-'
There was a break in the transmission, then a moment of silence while everyone waited for the XO of the tank company to continue. But he did not.
The S-3 tried to reestablish contact. 'Oscar Six-eight, this is Mike Four-four. Say again all after enemy tanks passing. Over.' There was no response. Odds were that the XO's tank had also been hit. God, Lewis thought, I don't even know that kid's name.
Reports were no longer clear, concise or, for the most part, even rendered.
The battalion-command net was now cluttered by a series of short, incomplete radio calls between the battalion commander, the S-3 and the surviving company commanders. When both the battalion commander and the S-3 failed to reestablish contact with the tank-company commander, they tried to contact the mech-team commander on the western flank.
That effort also failed. Assuming that both the company in the center and the one in the west were overrun, Alpha Company, the mech company in the rear, was ordered to swing to the left and cover that area. No doubt the enemy was attempting to blow through the battalion there.
That maneuver, completed in less than ten minutes, ran head on into the bypass effort of the follow-on Soviet battalion. The focus of the battle now shifted slightly to the west as Bradleys went to ground and disgorged their infantry, preparing to fight T-80s. Bravo Company, on the eastern side of the sector, was running out of targets. The battalion commander, seeing the same thing that Lewis did, ordered it to shift farther to the west, move behind Alpha Company and swing around to the north, heading off another Soviet bypass attempt. As with Alpha Company, Bravo ran into the Soviets in the dark as the battle continued to slide to the west.
Lewis watched and listened, wondering how much longer this could go on.
Smithson, ever attentive to the reports, kept wiping off the grease-pencil numbers on the battalion status board and entering a new, lower number.
Turning to the S-2, Lewis asked how much more the battalion could expect to encounter. The S-2 did not answer, merely shrugged his shoulders and shook his head. Lewis understood. No one, neither the people on the ground nor the people in the TOC, could follow what was happening anymore. Whatever ability the battalion commander had to influence the battle had been lost when the last company was committed.
It was now up to the tank and Bradley commanders.
As they listened to the calls and the fragmented reports, Smithson stepped back and looked at the status board for a moment, then turned to Lewis.
'Let's hope this was worth it.'
Lewis did not answer. He watched the figures change, each loss hitting him like a blow. No, it can't be, he thought. It isn't worth it.
The pilot of the AC-130 began to bring his huge aircraft to bear on their target. Called Spectar, the AC-130 carried three 20mm. mmiguns and a 75mm. automatic cannon. It was the modern version of Vietnam's
