Patriot Dawn: The Resistance Rises

by Velocity, Max

  Given the wind direction, the fires would be set mainly out to the western edge of town to provide best thermal cover to the activity on the ground. Finally, Jack would locate his Company headquarters central to the action in the buildings of the town center. He had a group of key players, including his communications guys and a mortar and machine-gun fire controller.

  They had given some thought to the use of radios and it would certainly be a lot easier to coordinate the battle with them. They had considered the possibility of the Regime using electronic warfare to jam the radios, but they concluded, based on their own deployed experience, that the Regime would more likely view their radios as a source of Intel and direction finding.

  As such, the Company would use the radios to coordinate fires and movement as necessary, minimizing as much as possible; employing veiled speech and codes rather than communicating in plain language.

  It was knowledge of the technology available to the Regime that was behind the thermal screening smoke, because armored vehicles as well as aircraft were equipped with thermal imagers. The intent of the smoke was to degrade the advantage that this technology would have, and to mitigate Regime aerial FLIR surveillance.

  Also mortar locating radar was a concern. In order to avoid counter-battery fire vectored in by such radar locating systems, it was essential that the mortar firing points were mobile. Having them split into three squads in three dump trucks allowed them to essentially conduct fire and movement, one truck moving while the others continued to engage targets.

  Following the concept of the operation, Jack handed over to Jim to cover service support, which was the nitty-gritty of logistics and administration. Following that, Jim handed over to Ned, a recent recruit and communications expert, to cover command and signal, which was basically the communications plan, codes, and location of the chain of command, including command succession in case of casualties.

  After this detail, some of which was mind numbing to the less experienced members of the Company, Jack stood back up.

  “Ok, listen up everyone, put your notebooks down, and listen in to my summary of execution. This is going to be an urban defensive battle, dirty nasty dangerous stuff. We will be facing a full battle group. It is imperative that you keep your mission in mind and keep nimble and light on your feet. There will be no ‘Alamos’ here. Do not stand and die. Hit, run, hit again. Ok, now we’ve had the detail of the plan, here it is in plain speech.”

  Jack launched into a simple verbal summary of what he intended to happen, painting the picture of the coming battle. He looked them in the eye and threw his soul into it. When he was done, and had asked for any questions, he looked around at the team for feedback. Some were hard to read, but most looked inspired. He looked over at Jim, who nodded assuredly.

  “Good job Boss,” said Jim as they walked back to the office afterward. “Now let’s get this show on the road.”

  They were planning to move out for Harrisonburg the following night. It was important to get there as early as possible to prepare the area for defense, before the enemy arrived. It was a busy time, and although he could have headed back to Zulu to see Caitlin and the kids, he felt that it was not appropriate; all hands were to the grindstone getting the operation ready, and no-one else had the opportunity of home leave. Jack took Andrew for a walk around the training base.

  “Dad, I want to come with you.”

  Jack looked at him, “No way Andy, no chance.”

  Andrew looked crestfallen.

  “Look,” Jack continued, “it’s simply too dangerous this time. When you turn eighteen, I will try and get you out on some operations.”

  “But Dad, I’m old enough, I’m sixteen!”

  “Look Andy, what I need you to do for me is go back to Zulu tomorrow. I’m not going to get a chance to see Mom and the babies. Give them my love and keep them safe for me. Ok?”

  “Ok.”

  Jack put an arm around Andrews shoulders, gave him a squeeze, and then they walked on in the darkness, each in his silence.

  The Company infiltrated in small vehicle packets by various routes into the north western outskirts of Harrisonburg. They consolidated into a forward operating base inside a large warehouse belonging to the dominant grain company in the area. It gave them a covered assembly area out of view of aerial observation.

  Jim had some people marshaling and organizing the arriving vehicles, and placing the various fighting elements into administrative areas in different parts of the warehouse.

  Megan and her aid station arrived in a couple of discrete vans decked out as mobile ambulances, towing a couple of gators on trailers. The gators would be used for casualty evacuation back to the aid station, once the casualties could be pulled back from the fighting. Megan was a force of nature; she had taken and molded a team of medics, both for the aid station and field medics to deploy with the platoons.

  Jim allocated her a permanent area because this warehouse would be the home for the aid station for the duration of the battle, unless exigent circumstances forced relocation. Jack watched the interaction between Jim and Megan, it always made him grin. There was definitely a chemical reaction there, but neither of them would admit to it, and pride made them bristle towards each other. The sooner they admitted it and got on with it, Jack thought, the better.

  Once they were consolidated in the warehouse they pushed out an OP screen for security and bedded down for a couple of hours sleep. They were up with the dawn and Jack gathered the leaders around him. They were going on a recon into the town and it was going to be low key, for the benefit of any drones or spies that were in the area. It was civilian clothes, no rifles.

  Leaving the warehouse under Jims command, Jack took his leadership team on a ground recon.

  He had a pretty good idea from the map of where he would establish his defensive sectors and phase lines, but it was vital to get out on a confirmatory recon. There was no Regime presence in the town; they were waiting on the coming operation to establish one. The only recent activity appeared to be convoys running through on the I-81, and Jack had historically had IED teams targeting the stretch of road as it ran past the town.

  They noticed that the town really seemed deserted; it appeared that the warnings from Bill’s network had been heeded. They ran into a checkpoint run by a local militia unit that had stayed behind. It seemed more of an ad hoc citizen’s force, armed mainly with hunting rifles and the odd AR-15 and AK, than an organized militia.

  They pulled up to the checkpoint and Jack had to explain that they were a Resistance company operating in the valley and they had come to conduct operations in the town for a short period of time.

  One of the local men went to get his leader. He came back with a grizzled looking character with a Vietnam Veteran ball cap on.

  “Good morning sir, how are you?” said Jack.

  “Well, who do we have here?” replied the man.

  “Sir, we are a Resistance company, we’ve been conducting anti-Regime operations around here, based out of the hills west of here?

  The man peered at him “You the fellas that shot down that Apache?”

  “Yes, that’s us.”

  “Well hell yea! Let me shake your hand young man. Next time, just introduce yourselves right; you’re known round here as the Mountain Men.”

  Jack grinned, “The Mountain Men?”

  “That’s right, you’re the ones been living up in the forests and coming down to blow up those Regime convoys. And you brought down that Apache.”

  “That’s us.”

  “Ok, how can I help?”

  Jack explained to him that he could help with a tour of the town. He also explained that it would be best if the militia evacuated for the next few days, and apologized that it was likely the town was going to get chewed up some.

  It turned out that the militia was in fact an ad hoc force that had come together from the local community after the collapse. They had protected the town from the evacuating hordes
as they poured south down the I-81, manning roadblocks to prevent them accessing the town. It was the same up and down the valley.

  That night back in the warehouse Jack gave confirmatory orders, issuing the sectors and phase line information. The three maneuver platoons were to deploy that night and infiltrate on foot to the south east, occupying their initial lay-up positions in identified buildings.

  The OPs for the mortar and air defense controllers would also deploy up onto the grain silos, to set up concealed positions under thermal ponchos. The mortar dump trucks and air defense technicals would wait in the warehouse until the time came to deploy them.

  Once in their lay up positions, the initial job of the maneuver platoons would be to create their routes and rat runs, preparing the buildings for a mobile defense falling back through successive positions. This was easier to do closer to the town center, when enemy options were easier to identify. Further out towards the I-81 it was a case of establishing OP positions that would identify enemy approach routes. Once the approach was identified, assets could be switched to it, establishing hasty ambushes in pre-identified locations.

  As the platoons fell back, fighting by squads, towards the center of town, their defensive measures would be more thorough. The buildings were also more substantial towards the center of town. It was important for the squads to aim to move through and under buildings as much as possible, keeping out of view. Not only were the streets and open areas in an urban conflict kill zones, but there was the additional threat from aerial observation and attack.

  The platoons were equipped with their usual squad level weapons as well as AT-4 anti-armor rockets and an assortment of IEDs. They had victim operated EFPs that they could rapidly set up in advance of enemy movement, and also ones on command wires for observed command detonation. They also had an assortment of improvised claymores and pipe bomb devices, some of them set up as booby traps.

  Jack had identified three likely access routes into the city center, each of them originating from the I-81. There was State Route 11, which would amount to an enemy right flanking thrust from the north east. The main direct route in was the 33 from the east, and from the south west was the 11 again, forming a left flanking option for the Regime commander.

  The fighters worked for three days to prepare the defense of the town. They created obstacles, laid booby traps, reconnoitered ambush sites, cleared routes back through buildings and smashed ‘mouse-holes’ to crawl through. They located and identified successive firing positions to allow the squads to leapfrog back past each other while providing covering fire. They identified hide positions for their integral sharpshooters to fire from, creating a multitude of shoot options onto the likely approaches of the enemy.

  They had trained all this over the winter, using the training farm complex buildings. They had worked both urban and rural offense and defense. Jack had been thorough, and they had undergone an intense period of training. The ‘mountain men’ were ready as they ever would be.

  On the fifth day, dawn broke to the scene of the Regime armored battle group drawn up on the I-81 where it bisected the town. The OPs had picked them up the night before as they rumbled down from the north. They had laagered up on the interstate, established security, and readied for the morning assault.

  They were a mix of armored vehicles, M1 Abrams main battle tanks (MBTs), Bradley armored fighting vehicles (AFVs) and even some MRAP and armored Humvees. The three fighting companies were based around the Abrams and the Bradley but there were also a multitude of ancillary and support elements, from an APC mounted mortar platoon to an EOD detachment in large wheeled armored personnel carriers (APCs), looking like they came straight from Iraq.

  With the dawn, Jake had the fires lit. There was no sign of Regime aircraft yet, but there was the assumed presence of unseen drones overhead. With the drum and tire fires lit, and multiple buildings fired on the western edge of town, soon an acrid black smoke was drifting over the town, obscuring both thermal imaging and the naked eye.

  Shortly after, the Regime leviathan uncoiled itself from where it lay on the I-81, resolving itself into three armored columns as the Regime commander revealed his hand. Leaving a headquarters and security element back on the interstate, he was sending ‘thunder runs’ down each of the three routes that Jake had identified, in order to rapidly carve up the town, before conducting a detailed house to house clearance. The objective was the town center.

  The U.S. Military had forgotten many lessons of general warfare while engaging in the ‘global war on terror’ since 9/11. They had learned many lessons pertinent to the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Some of these lessons would do them no service. As the three columns started to extend and sniff down the routes they would take into town, it was apparent that they were moving mounted. This meant that the infantry remained loaded into their AFVs. A general principle is that if armor is to operate in an urban environment, it must be protected by dismounted infantry.

  As the Regime columns advanced, the OPs in front of the platoons picked up the routes they were taking. They relayed this in a quick series of code words and started to fall back to rejoin their elements. With this information, the platoons deployed from their separate squad areas, moving to the various pre-established hasty ambush positions astride the enemy approach routes.

  Caleb’s 1st Platoon was deployed in the central sector, responsible for the main route in on the 33, East Market Street, and ancillary side roads from the east. They were deployed forward in the largely residential area just west of the I-81. 2nd Platoon was deployed to the sector north and 3rd Platoon to the sector south of 1st Platoon.

  2nd Platoon was commanded by a former Marine Gunnery Sergeant, Owen Westbrook. He was a craggy veteran, built of granite as far as Jack could make out. He made Jack think of old school Wild West gunfighters or Texas Rangers whenever he saw him. 3rd Platoon was led by a friend that Caleb had brought in, a young Ranger Captain called Alex Lambert that Jack had not met. He was a laconic character, but a human dynamo when required on operations.

  Caleb’s 1st Platoon had established a series of consecutive ambush positions, into which they were now deployed, with the intention of having the squads leapfrogging back past each other after hitting the enemy. Caleb had intentionally asked his squad leaders to mix up the type and mechanism of their ambushes, in order to confuse the enemy and make countermeasures harder to adopt.

  Olson’s squad was on point. They had deployed just to the west of the 33, not far from where it intersected the clover leaf at the I-81. They were concealed in a residential area using the side of a house to provide a defilade position, concealed from view from the armored column moving towards them from the right. Caleb was crouched there in cover with Phillips and Gibbs, both of them holding AT-4 anti-armor rockets, ready to fire. They were the kill team.

  About two hundred yards to his west, again along the route of the 33, was his other team with both SAWs. They were in a position to act as the cover group. Olson could hear the whine of the turbine engines of the Abrams, the roar of the Bradley engines, and the clatter of tracks on asphalt as the column approached from the right. The acrid black smoke was drifting over the town; he could taste it in the back of his throat, where it kept good company with the taste of fear.

  He heard someone running behind him and turned to see McCarthy approaching. He had been on lookout. He was a young lad, only nineteen, enthusiastic but still a little wet behind the ears.

  “Hey Rob,” McCarthy said, breathing hard, “Yea, they’re coming.”

  “No shit Sherlock,” said Olson, dryly. He spat a stream of tobacco juice onto the sidewalk. “Get over there and pull security.” He pointed with his chin back the way McCarthy had run from.

  Turning to the two men, Olson said, “Ok, get ready.”

  Both men moved away from the wall and shouldered the AT-4s. They knelt next to each other, with Olson between them, facing the road but still with the corner of the building concealing them fr
om the approaching column, providing that all important defilade position.

  The roar of the engines and the clattering of the tracks grew louder as the first Abrams MBT came into view around the side of the house, its turret with its 120mm main armament swinging slowly from side to side as it scanned ahead.

  There were a few scrubby bushes providing a bit of concealment between them and the road, then an embankment sloping down to the road itself, about forty meters away. Olson put his hands up on each man’s shoulder.

  As the MBT came level with him, he firmly squeezed each man’s shoulder. They fired and the rockets streaked down together, impacting in a double explosion against the side of the tank’s armor. The tank was dead in its tracks, but they did not even pause to look. They dropped the empty launchers and the team sprinted away along the sides of the houses.

  As soon as the rockets were fired, the cover group opened up on the column with a stream of fire. They were in a good covered position and the idea was not so much to inflict damage on the armored column as to distract from the kill team as they ran. The lead tank was now burning, munitions starting to cook off inside. The vehicles behind started to push past and engage surrounding likely targets to gain fire superiority, hammering machine-gun fire out to their front and flanks.

  As Olson reached the cover of retail store just beyond, running through the smashed doorway, he shouted into his radio to the cover team, “Move, move, move!” as he ran with his team through the aisles.

  The cover team peeled out of their position just as the second MBT acquired them in its thermal sight and let loose a 120mm HESH round, impacting into their position moments after they had left it. Both teams were now sprinting back and they converged together before disappearing into a building and running back along a prepared route.

  The Regime column pushed on until three hundred yards later they hit another ambush from Caleb’s second squad. A hastily emplaced array of EFP devices were initiated by command wire. This time an MBT had a track ripped off to become a mobility, or ‘M’, kill and an AFV was destroyed, the squad inside torn apart by the spray of armor defeating molten metal from the EFP.