by Adam Yoshida
Admiral Edgar Sapin had watched in silence as the British forces that had been accompanying the rest of the fleet executed a sudden turn. With each passing moment his initial suspicions of treachery had seemed to be confirmed as an ominous silence reigned.
“Still nothing?” he asked.
“No, Admiral,” came the reply. The Admiral threw up his hands in frustration.
“Of course they cannot be trusted, the British I mean,” he said, “they could never be trusted. We always knew that. We should never have let the bastards in.”
The Admiral hunched over his computer console and watched as the seconds ticked away. The options raced through his mind. He could probably do fairly great damage to the British if he were to strike first. His orders, however, did not permit that and Paris had yet to offer him anything other than equivocation in response to his increasingly frantic messages. The British ships were miles away now, far enough that they’d be able to fire some defensive weapons if he fired. Not, mind you, that he looked forward to the prospects of a close-quarters knife-fight.
“Admiral,” the young Lieutenant who headed the communications team said, “we have a signal from the British.”
“Put it through to me,” replied Sapin. After a few seconds he saw a light appear on the panel of the telephone in front of him and he picked up the receiver.
“Bonjour,” said the Admiral.
“Hello Admiral,” came the voice of Admiral Travis Childers, “obviously by now you’ve realized that there is something going on.”
“Oui,” replied Sapin.
“I have been ordered by my government to prevent any hostile action against the other British forces in this region, using whatever force should be necessary. As well, I have been ordered to ensure that the other Democratic Union forces here should relocate to a position from which they will pose no threat to Great Britain.”
“I am surprised,” said Sapin, “that your government would issue orders so contrary to the spirit of the Union.”
“There have been some changes on that front,” replied Childers.
“My orders are clear,” said Sapin, “and they do not permit us to surrender control of the sea to any hostile force. Perhaps - and I should have to clear this first - you might be allowed to retire, along with your American friends, somewhere beyond the boundaries of the combat zone.”
“That isn’t how this will work,” said Childers, “we have a strong overall margin of superiority in every possible category that may be measured. You have three choices. First, you may join us in opposing the tyranny of the Democratic Union. Second, you may sail your force to a location outside of the present combat zone, where its demobilization will be supervised by such persons as my government may designate. Third, if you do not accept these options then you will be engaged and destroyed. You have thirty minutes.”
Unified Army Group Headquarters, Brossard, Quebec
“They’re across the St. Lawrence in considerable force and they’re not slowing down,” reported Colonel Chernow as he sifted through the latest reports from the north. He was sitting just a few feet from General Wesley who was engaged in the same exercise.
“They moved fast,” said the General flatly. He got up and walked towards a larger map on the wall.
“The forces that we sent to the north are lost,” said Wesley with a sigh, “they’re being torn apart by the tanks that are coming our way and there’s nothing that we can do that would save them.”
“We’re in a good position in Montreal,” said Chernow simply.
“For whatever that’s worth. Our entire position across the theatre is entirely unsound,” said Wesley, “we need to think about a strategic withdrawal.”
“I’ve considered that contingency,” said Chernow, “I believe that the way to complete a fighting retreat that will undermine the enemy’s plans will be to continue our offensive in the Montreal sector.”
“And head where?”
“We should head to the west, back towards Ontario and from there try and slip into Illinois to join the rest of our surviving forces,” said Chernow.
“The lines of retreat to the east are more natural,” commented Wesley.
“Yes sir,” replied Chernow, “but the Army of Northern Virginia is manoeuvring somewhere out there and so is the Fifth Fleet. I don’t think that we have any reliable reports on them but, given the generally depleted state of the air forces in this region, their appearance would be impossible to counter.”
“Hypothetically, how would this look?” asked the General.
“We’d follow the river to the southwest,” explained Chernow, “though we’d try and slow them down a little first by pressing the fight in Montreal. After all, if we hold the island they’re going to have a harder time claiming a victory and, furthermore, they’ll be leaving an intact force in their rear.”
“Trapped on an island,” said Wesley.
“To an extent,” agreed the Colonel, “but they won’t know to an absolute degree of certainty what our amphibious capabilities are or how many boats and other small craft we happen to have available to us. For all they know we’ve been hoarding them in some undisclosed location.”
“This is hoping to complete a straight with the river,” said Wesley, “but I don’t have a better idea, either.”
Bravo Troop, 2nd Squadron, 7th Cavalry, 1st BCT, 2nd Armored Division, Mount-Royal, Montreal
They were counting their bullets now. The morning resupply mission had managed to bring a little water and some medical supplies with the ammunition. It had been badly needed, but it also meant that some of the surviving soldiers of Dumont’s Troop now had been reduced to just a few magazines worth of ammunition.
The survivors of Bravo Troop, which was now under 50% of its original strength, had dug themselves in amidst a series of ruined high-end houses in the residential neighborhood. Dumont, so tired that he could feel his feet physically dragging, had spent most of the morning moving from one firing position to another to attempt to provide some sort of reassurance to the men.
Of course, he reflected, in my condition I must frighten them at least as much as I comfort them. But it’s good for them to see that I share in all of the hardships.
Dumont stepped forward of the fighting position that a group of exhausted troopers, their nerves simply shot, had just held against a desultory infantry assault. The other side, the Captain knew, were just as punch-drunk as they were. The assault force, a light platoon, had come straight in against the well-fortified positions that Bravo Troop had maintained for more than a day as FNASA forces had attempted to mop up one force after another. The bodies of the enemy soldiers were laid across the ground. Dumont walked over to one and stopped.
“Have we looked through these?” he asked the Squad leader, a grime-covered Corporal who was standing nearby.
“No,” said the Corporal.
“Well, Jesus,” said Dumont, leaning forward and reaching to open up the bloodstained jacket of the dead teenager who lay before him, “they’re using the same kind of fucking rifles as we are. Use your heads.”
The Squad simply stood by, immobile. Dumont fished around through the man’s pockets and found a full magazine worth of ammunition and two grenades. He took them and slammed them into the hands of the Squad leader.
“Here you go,” he said. The Squad leader took the proffered items with evident disgust.
“None of us asked for this, Corporal,” said Dumont, “but we all have fucking work to do. Take anything that you can use off of these corpses. If you find more than you can practically use, then distribute it.”
The man looked dumbly at him.
“That’s a fucking order,” he said. Slowly the Squad leader began to move towards the large pile of bodies.
Dumont lowered his own rifle and turned around as he heard a vehicle in the distance. It took a moment for his dulled instincts to provide him the general location of the sound and several moments more for him to realize that
it was friendly. A HUMVEE with a dented front end came to a stop about ten feet from his position and Major Olafson hopped out. Dumont saluted and the Major returned his salute.
“I don’t know about you, Captain,” said Olafson, “but I think that it’s high time that we got the fuck away from this dump.”
“No truer words, Major, no truer words,” replied Dumont.
“Get your men ready to move in an hour,” ordered Olafson, “we’re trying to gather up the entire brigade, or what’s left of it with a rallying point around a mile to the north of your position, around the Rockland Centre mall.”
USS Cape St. George (CG-71), North of the Azores
Rear Admiral Olivia Collins watched in silence as the seconds on the clock in front of her ticked away. Admiral Childers had given the French ships to their north a mere half hour to decide whether or not they would either join the Anglo-American task force, sail away to a neutral location to be disarmed, or give battle. The best that they could tell, some twenty-nine minutes and thirty-three seconds later, was that the French were unwilling to fully commit to any of the above.
Both sides had already scrambled all of their aircraft into the air. As a result there were twenty-four Rafale Ms facing off warily against the nearly seventy F-35B Lightning II fighters belonging to a mix of Fleet Air Arm, RAF, and USMC units. Both sides had missiles spun up and ready to go.
The final seconds passed and the readout on the clock before Admiral Collins read zero. The Admiral looked around the Combat Information Center for a moment and found only silent blank faces.
Finally, after nearly fifteen seconds had passed with nothing except for electronic noise, the radio came to life.
“All units,” said Admiral Childers, “engage.”
5th Ave. and 59th St, Manhattan
There had been a lot of fuss, even among those in New York City who were staunch supporters of the Federation of North American States, when the decision to base permanent combat forces in Manhattan had been announced. That controversy had, unsurprisingly, multiplied several-fold when it had become obvious that the only place where the 2e Régiment étranger de parachutistes could build themselves a long-term camp within the limits of Manhattan Island was in Central Park. Nevertheless, human beings are extraordinarily adaptable creatures and so it had not been long before most of the people who still lived in the city had acclimatized themselves to the sight of French soldiers encamped along the southern edge of the park. When, a little while later, they had been joined by several units of the FNASA the protests had been both muted and widely ignored.
For Detective Juan Mancini the decision to turn part of Central Park into a military encampment was particularly fortuitous. The park would be a lot easier to reconstruct than any of the city’s great buildings, many of which were practically irreplaceable.
Word had come at the last possible minute. The city government had only been marginally functional since the assassination of Mayor Engels during the previous attempt to take the city, but having it formally pass back into the control of people who were loyal to the government of the United States would be a coup nonetheless. With the Army of Northern Virginia in Washington and XII Corps fighting the bulk of the FNASA along the St. Lawrence River, the timing was simply too perfect to pass up for a second attempt to take the city.
However, the leaders of the resistance had insisted, they would not have a repeat of what had happened the last time when they had risen up only to be massacred in the streets along with the Marine battalion sent to support them. That meant that they had to have the capability to neutralize the military forces in the city and to prevent them from being used in any kind of counter-offensive.
Mack Dallas was one of a dozen operators who had been issued a AN/PED-1 Lightweight Laser Designator Rangefinder. The thirty pound piece of gear allowed him to designate a target with a laser at a range of over five kilometers. However, the effective use of such a piece of equipment was at least a two-man job as someone who was carefully picking out targets for laser-guided bombs could hardly be expected to also keep watch on events in the surrounding area. With Roman Moore dead, Dallas had not had many options for finding someone else he could trust with so sensitive a task and so he had turned to Detective Mancini.
“What a clear and beautiful afternoon,” said Dallas as he carefully trained the laser on a visible French APC that was guarding the edge of the camp in Central Park.
“Yeah, it’s nice,” agreed Mancini.
“Better than nice, it’s killing weather,” said Dallas with an edge in his voice.
Taking a few more seconds, he carefully adjusted the controls on the rangefinder and then looked back up.
“It won’t be long now,” he said.
Bravo Troop, 2nd Squadron, 7th Cavalry, 1st BCT, 2nd Armored Division, Mount-Royal, Montreal
At first the soldiers had grumbled about leaving their positions. It might well have been true, as Dumont repeatedly pointed out, that they were incredibly vulnerable to artillery and air strikes and that they had been overrun more than once by more-powerful units, but at least they were used to the place and more than a few had already made peace with the notion that it would be a comfortable and pretty place to die. At length, however, Dumont had roused them and put them on the road. At least, the men agreed, they would be reunited with the rest of their comrades. They would get to see who’d made it so far and who hadn’t and swap the new stories that they had.
In a way the movement had been good for the cavalry troopers. As the began to pack up and hit the road, the level of chatter had picked up and everyone seemed to regain just a little bit of energy. That level had continued to rise as they approached the shopping mall and it reached a crescendo when they began to assemble in the parking lot of the vast Rockland Centre.
As the men began to unpack, the same battered HUMVEE that had brought Olafson to visit earlier circled back and the Major stepped on out.
“Congratulations,” he said, “you’re one of the first units to arrive in the assembly area.”
“Duh!” called out one of the soldiers to general laughter among the crowd.
“Yes, yes,” said Major Olafson waving his hands, “you’re not the only ones who haven’t been able to sleep in days, you know.”
That evoked a laugh from the punch-drunk soldiers.
“Alright,” said Olafson, “the enemy is coming this way. I know that we’re tired and hungry and damned near out of ammo. And I can’t do a fucking thing about two of those three things. But we can do something about the hunger.”
The Major swung his hands towards the mall.
“The mall hasn’t been touched yet. It lost power, so I’d stay away from anything perishable, but as for the rest of it: go nuts.”
It wasn’t necessary for him to say anything more than that. The soldiers immediately began to surge forward towards the mall.
“I think that someone will have a problem with this,” said Dumont as he quietly walked up to Olafson.
“Yeah?” said Olafson, “well fuck those people.”
Fleet Air Arm F-35 Lightning II, Over the Celtic Sea
Lieutenant-Commander Henry Windsor had only had a few seconds to react when the order to fire came through. The first wave of AMRAAMs flew forward towards their target in just seconds. The French Rafales, both outnumbered and caught by surprise, had not had much of a chance to do anything. Here and there a few of them managed to return fire with their own Meteor missiles, causing the squadron next to that of the Prince to take rapid evasive action, but most of them just tried to scramble and get away.
Windsor watched as the two missiles that he’d let loose from the rails of his F-35 flew rapidly downrange, tracking two of the French fighters the entire way. The Prince watched as the missiles made their impact, disintegrating two of the fighters.
The Prince continued to accelerate forward, watching on his display as the battle unfolded beyond visual range. It was, he quickly concluded, just about a
s one-sided an air battle as had been ever fought. The French aircraft had the twin disadvantages of being both outnumbered and surrounded. Fewer than half of the French fighters, despite their desperate evasive manoeuvres, had managed to evade the first rush of the Anglo-American missile storm.
A second wave of missiles quickly followed the first. The French pilots, having already witnessed the deaths of half of their comrades, attempted to make a quick escape. The eleven surviving Rafales turned in every possible direction and went to maximum speed. It did them little good as the British and American fighters continued to press relentlessly towards them. Ten of the fighters fell to the second wave, leaving only a single aircraft off of the Charles de Gaulle still in the air. Moments later this lone survivor was dispatched by an American-made missile.
Windsor and the other pilots held their breath in the air, waiting for what they knew had to come next even though most of them were praying to be asked to do anything else.
Onboard the Charles de Gaulle and the rest of the ships of the Democratic Union task force, the officers stood still, paralyzed by indecision. All of them knew that messages had been sent to the proper authorities asking for instructions on how to proceed. They all also knew that such instructions were not yet forthcoming. Perhaps the people in Paris and Brussels were busy arguing among themselves over what to do next. Perhaps they did not know. Everyone waited.
Finally, the radio in Prince Henry’s fighter came to life again.
“Proceed with the attack,” ordered Admiral Childers.
USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76), Off the Atlantic Coast
I’m pretty sure that this wasn’t in any of our old war games, thought Admiral Layton as he watched planes take off from the decks of the Ronald Reagan, Harry Truman, and Theodore Roosevelt. The three Carriers, having already assisted in the re-taking of Washington, had been quickly repositioned to the north in order to assist the forces who were fighting there. Launching air strikes within the five boroughs was, of course, a horribly delicate business - the Admiral could very easily imagine the sort of negative public relations consequences that a miss that left graphic images of dead and wounded innocents streaming across screens all over the world - but it was also fundamentally necessary.
