Come and Take Them-eARC

by Tom Kratman

  One Hundred and First Air Defense Artillery Caserne, Ciudad Balboa, Balboa, Terra Nova

  A few dozen commandos really hadn’t been sufficient to hold the caserne against the legion’s counterattack. Superb though the commandos might have been as light infantry, and relatively poorly trained though Balboa’s ADA people had been, as noninfantry, odds of nearly a hundred to one gave the Balboans a quality all their own. Sprawled and bleeding Gallic and Balboan bodies littered the grounds and rooms of the caserne. A few wounded prisoners, le Blanc among them, were being given first aid under guard.

  The commandos had had just sufficient time to damage a few of the launchers and gun systems. Most were still quite serviceable. The commander of the tercio, with his maintenance chief, was just now in the motor pool sorting out the good from the bad and sending the good to their firing positions as quickly as their crews could be assembled.

  Their munitions were not kept on board the heavy launchers. Balboa’s climate was far too wet for that. So the vehicles had to be taken to the bunkers and loaded. This was time consuming. Still, the ADA tercio, like most heavily equipped BDF units, had only forty or so percent of its equipment, enough to equip it to level II mobilization. The rest of the bodies, the militia, could and did speed the work of getting what they did have into action.

  For the moment, Balboa had nothing but tactical air defense, the batteries and battalions assigned to the tercios and legions. Within a half an hour, possibly less, that would change. It was changing with every passing minute.

  UEPF Spirit of Peace, in orbit over Terra Nova

  Her recent experiences in acting stood Esmeralda well for the moment. As the display being continuously updated by Khan’s crew showed the disaster unfolding on the Taurans, she was able to keep from cheering her distant cousins, the Balboans.

  Inside, though, she still thought, Die, you swine, die. I know where your society leads and death is still too good for you.

  The high admiral was past tears. She had to laugh at the scope of the disaster torrentially expanding below. She laughed again as one of Khan’s analysts exclaimed, “Shit, there goes another one.”

  That was a Anglian Navy aircraft, the fifth so far, fireballing in the skies over Herrera. The analyst couldn’t tell if the pilot had been able to bail out or not; the skimmer they’d sent down had only so much discrimination. And it was hard to sort an ejecting pilot quickly from the other debris that filled the skies.

  “Can you get locations on the launchers?” asked Wallenstein, pretty sure she already knew the answer.

  “Sure, High Admiral,” Khan replied, “for all the fucking good it’s going to do. They’re moving after each firing…moving them faster than we can report if not see. And we can’t always see, either. The skimmer is low in the sky. The Balboans are using the buildings and trees of the city and jungle to get out of sight when they move. This shit was never meant to see through buildings, you know.”

  “Are we feeding Janier what intel we can?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Khan said, “but he’s not been able to make any real use of it.”

  “Would it help if we broke in to the local telephone or radio net and began giving it directly to the Taurans at Cerro Mina?”

  “Oh, don’t do that, High Admiral,” said Khan, wife. “We don’t want our fingerprints on any part of this disaster.”

  “I think my wife’s right, High Admiral,” said the other Khan. “Besides, things are so far gone that nothing we can do short of dropping nukes—”

  “Don’t even joke about that,” said Wallenstein.

  “Yes, High Admiral. Sorry, High Admiral. But there’s still precisely nothing we can do.”

  Southern Perimeter, Herrera International Airport, Balboa, Terra Nova

  The commander of the airborne brigade entered the shack that served as his command post. The bodies had been moved but the bloodstains on the floors remained. He ignored them.

  He had been out trying to get a better feel for the battle than the radio would provide. Artillery fire was coming in steadily now, far heavier than it had been even a half hour ago. If the colonel had to make a guess he would have said that he thought it was coming from around Alcalde Flores. The colonel shuddered as another aircraft overhead made the dot to the exclamation point of a Balboan missile.

  “Well…at least the bastards are trying,” said the colonel to no one in particular. He turned to his operations officer. “What’s the word north and south?”

  “Not good, sir. The Second Battalion is meeting increasing resistance…if they’re still advancing it’s at a crawl. And Third Battalion in the south is only barely holding on against increasing pressure.”

  “All right…all right. Tell Second to hold on to what they’ve got. See what you can scrape up to help out Third Batt. If you can get a hold of the Navy or TUSF-B, put their air on helping Third.” The colonel swore, not for the first time that morning. “Goddamnit, I wish we had some kind of armor, even a couple of shitty light tanks. Anything. Damn.”

  “There’s one piece of good news, sir. The Balboans that were holed up in the terminal have been taken out. No survivors, sir.”

  “Well, that’s something.”

  “Yes, sir…but sir, the First Battalion commander reports that they were mostly kids, not more than seventeen years old, with two adults. Most looked younger still.”

  * * *

  Along the northern perimeter of the airhead established by the paratroopers the pressure was increasing rapidly. The Eleventh Infantry Tercio was finally making its appearance, fully self-mobile troops and whatever could be stuffed onto a truck or jeep coming first. The tercio’s light armor, Ocelots, and medium and heavy mortars were already driving the Gallic Paras into whatever cover they could find. There was little return fire from the paratroopers to interfere with the Balboans. Under cover of their supporting weapons they moved, mostly by squads and platoons, to assault positions close to the paratroopers.

  When the Eleventh’s commander decided he had enough combat power forward, he would order the assault…with bayonets fixed.

  Adjudant-Chef Jung knew this almost as if he were privy to the Balboans’ orders group. He had been trained as a soldier in his younger days, not a peacekeeper. This was not so true for most of the men of his company. They had initially been trained as soldiers, true. But years of worrying more about international peacekeeping than real fighting had dulled them. Still the Paras had been given less of this to distract them than other types of organizations had. They were not so dulled that Jung’s boot couldn’t send them back up to engage the Balboans. But he could only influence the men immediately around him. It would have taken many months of training for battle to have made them all risk their lives on their own.

  Meanwhile, the Eleventh Tercio grew stronger with each passing minute.

  East of Dahlgren Naval Station, Balboa, Terra Nova

  The remaining Haarlem Marines, wounded and unwounded alike, heard the ominous sound of diesel engines through the fog and smoke. For better than an hour they had been listening to the faint puffs of overhead mine shells dispensing their cargoes. Few had bothered to count the number of incoming shells. They were too exhausted with the morning’s fight.

  When the mines had first begun landing a fairly senior officer, a major, had walked the ragged line, informing the men what was happening. He told them to dig in as best they could. This they had done, shallow scrapings on the surface of the earth.

  Through the smoke a forward Marine, on Observation Post, faintly glimpsed the outline of an armored vehicle, a Balboan Ocelot. The vehicle eased forward cautiously. Even more faintly seen were several more behind it.

  Although Carrera had ordered the Jagelonian cavalry officer to move forward aggressively, his little command had been so subjected to attack by Tauran aircraft, and slowed by them as it took to side trails, that it had actually been caught up with by the bulk of the Fifteenth Cadets.

  Suddenly there came a great
explosion. The Ocelot lurched to a stop, smoke billowing from its open hatches. As the cadet crew began to disembark, those still alive, the Marines opened up, killing several. This may have been unwise as Balboan artillery was soon pounding the Marines’ line. Within a short space of time the Haarlemers were the unwilling recipients of a pounding steady and heavy enough to drive them down into their holes. They therefore could no longer see the mine field as cadet combat engineers began to clear paths through it. There were none of the aesthetically unappealing, multiculturally insensitive antipersonnel mines to slow the cadets’ work. These, influential elements in the Tauran Union had helped to outlaw internationally.

  Soon, through breaches made in the mine field, Balboan light armor was in and among the defending Haarlem Marines. Completely unaffected by the minefield that had no antipersonnel mines, the infantry of two cadet tercios simply stood up and, firing from the hip to upset the Marines’ aim, walked, then jogged, forward into the assault. The boys’ bayonets were fixed.

  The Balboan artillery lifted at the last possible instant. For some of the boys short-falling rounds made the lifting a lifetime too late. For most, it was salvation.

  The Haarlem Marines did not run but rather, outnumbered and outgunned, they died on their line. To some it seemed unfair somehow that their much vaunted long-range marksmanship did them so little good when the range had closed to under fifty meters.

  Chapter Forty-eight

  When given the German command, [Varus] went out with the quaint preconception that here was a subhuman people which would somehow prove responsive to Roman law even where it had not responded to the Roman sword. He therefore breezed in—right into the heart of Germany—as if on a picnic, wasting a summer lording it on the magistrate’s bench, where he insisted on the punctilious observance of every legal nicety.

  —Marcus Velleius Paterculus

  Tauran Defense Agency, Lumière, Gaul, Terra Nova

  Monsieur Gaymard, president once again of the Tauran Union under rotating presidency, was announced to Janier and the chiefs of land, air and naval forces, as, “The President of the Tauran Union,” just as if that office were real and meaningful, rather than an honorific passed among the true executives, the Cosmopolitan Progressives, or Kosmos, of the Tauran Union Security Council. The other chief members of the executive council—Anglia, Sachsen, Tuscany, and Castile—followed Gaymard into Janier’s private conference room.

  Janier was surprised at the presence of the Castilian. Perhaps he doesn’t know we did our best to destroy the Castilian battalion in mutiny in Balboa. Or perhaps he cares more for the rejuvenation being offered by the high admiral. Yes, I am sure that is it.

  “General,” began Gaymard, “what the hell is going on in Balboa and what can we do about it?”

  Janier sighed. This was a painful duty. After steeling himself for the inevitable, he said, “Right now, Mr. President, it looks something like equilibrium. That would be a false view, however. We began this invasion with six battalions of parachutists, two of commandos, one of dragoons and one of Sachsen Panzers. There were also three mountain battalions, six infantry battalions, plus a fourth that was, so to speak, visiting. We also had in place a fine battalion of Haarlem Marines.

  “Of those twenty-one battalions, some of which we call ‘regiments’ but are battalions all the same, at this point, and to our certain knowledge, we have lost three Paras, two infantry, the dragoons, and one mountain, and one commando. Most of the rest are badly attrited, as well. Also, most of the rest are fully pinned, unable to extricate themselves and with our forces in Balboa unable to help them in the slightest.

  “We further anticipate the destruction of the Haarlem Marines, the three Gallic Paras, two more infantry, and God knows what else. Lest you misunderstand, gentlemen, short of using nuclear weapons, those units’ destruction is inevitable. As is the loss of all of the troops we have in Balboa.”

  Gaymard chuckled mirthlessly. “Nuclear weapons? In the same hemisphere as the Federated States? Let us try to find some less radioactive way to commit suicide, shall we, General?”

  “Could not agree more, monsieur,” said Janier. “Further, the Balboans have managed to put up their air defense…navy is quite definite on that, they’ve taken appalling losses in aircraft.

  “Maybe worse…the Balboans started with maybe the equivalent of ten or eleven ground combat battalions, six of which we never suspected and not all of which were in a position to fight. The intelligence people have now identified maybe twenty-four battalions, which they call ‘cohorts,’ in or very near the combat area. Another six are moving from the Balboan training center at Cimarron and will be in action before nightfall. A further six or eight are moving down the highway from Lago Sombrero toward the Transitway. And they have managed to mobilize something like twenty battalions of artillery that are in range with even more on the way.

  “At those odds…we simply cannot win.”

  “I…see.” Gaymard’s face was ashen. He’d expected the news to be bad but this? This was beyond bad. “Is there any possibility of stopping the Balboans diplomatically?”

  Janier laughed. “Monsieur, at their current state of political, social, and philosophical development, the Balboans are centuries behind us. Centuries ago, was there a single state in Taurus that, attacked without warning in the dead of night, their soldiers killed and their citizens sent scurrying like rats for shelter, would then have said, ‘Oh, well, sure you can go home, no hard feelings.’”

  The general laughed again, this time bitterly. “No matter, in any case. A couple of days ago I had communications with their government. They have since become…’ah…unavailable.”

  The general then added, “Mr. President…they’re going for the kill. They won’t be happy with anything less than our complete humiliation and expulsion from their country.”

  “Can we reinforce them, General Janier?”

  Janier looked over at the Chief of Staff of the Air Forces. That officer answered, “My planes have another brigade of parachutists, the Sachsen Brigade of Fallschirmjaegers, en route. But I believe we should call them back. If the Balboans have a credible air defense…?”

  Navy answered, “It’s credible all right. We’ve taken up to twenty percent hits—though losses were less than that, thank God—on some missions. We just haven’t had the time to analyze their defense and put together the right packages to suppress it. Another thing…some of our smart weapons don’t seem to be acting all that smartly.”

  Air Force resumed speaking to explain. “The tight security and short notice we were operating under meant that we couldn’t alert more than a tiny fraction of our air power. And we expected to be able to reuse what we had alerted by refitting them at Arnold…which is lost now.

  “That’s starting to be corrected, but it will still be another two hours—at a minimum—before we can flood Balboan air space with power. The Sachsens are going to have to go in before that, or we’ll have to refuel them in flight. But, if we refuel them in flight, we’ll either have to reduce the bomb load being carried by the attack aircraft that are almost ready to take off or delay long enough for the tankers to land and top off again.”

  Gaymard said to the Air Force Chief of Staff, “I don’t understand this. It’s what?…a six hour flight to Balboa, less from Santa Josefina. What have we been paying for, if you can’t get there with overwhelming force in a few hours?”

  Air Force suppressed a sigh. “Mr. President. You and the security council gave us the order to attack with minimal notice. We had a choice. We could invade Balboa when they were fully mobilized and ready…and take unacceptable losses. Or we could use surprise. Surprise has its costs. Not every unit could be notified without word getting out. And if word had gotten out, you can be sure that Balboa would have gotten that word and would have been fully mobilized. That would have meant higher casualty figures.

  “But even if we had managed to keep surprise while getting all of our units ready…the B
alboans are a militia army. Most of the time there’s nothing to attack except maybe their bedrooms and workplaces.

  “What we intended, and expected, was that we would be able to take out their leadership with minimal destruction and maximum surprise, bringing combat packages on line in a neat orderly fashion after the fighting had started and delivering firepower as and when needed.

  “And again, even if we had put everything in the air in a few hours, and if we’d been able to keep surprise, it would have been anywhere from hours to days before those aircraft could return to action, hours to days in which our forces would have had little or no air support.

  “Mr. President, have you any idea how hard it is to change an air tasking order less than three days out?”

  Ignoring the implicit criticism, President Gaymard asked Janier, “Will dropping that brigade make any difference to the final outcome?”

  Janier replied, “We don’t think so, sir. We’re talking about changing the odds from seven or eight to one, against us, to at best six to one. The most we could hope for is to delay the inevitable…slightly. And drive up our own casualty lists…which are going to be impressive enough in any case.”

  Air Force spoke up again. “Mr. President, I can probably inflict more delay from the air than that one brigade can inflict on the ground, but only if we don’t hesitate any further…if delay is what you want.”

  “Delay? Yes. Until we can get the Balboans to let our people go.” Wearily, and with a genuinely aching heart—he was no so much a bad man as a very, very weak one—Gaymard said, “Recall the paratroopers. Please tell General McQueeg-Gordon for me.”