Invasion: Alaska

by Vaughn Heppner

  The general noticed. Many considered him brash and arrogant, but he was also perceptive. The monster enjoys this. He enjoys my grief. He likes to break a person’s spirit even as he pretends he doesn’t.

  “I understand,” Nung managed to say. “I will do my utmost to insure your survival.”

  Commissar Yongzheng frowned, and he cocked his head. “You must also achieve victory for the homeland.”

  “That is my honor, Commissar.”

  The frown deepened. Then Yongzheng flicked his hand. “Go on then, check your vehicles. Make sure we survive this dreadful weather.”

  General Nung opened the hatch and staggered into the freezing, brain-blasting blizzard. His wife and children—maybe everyone in the High Command and in the government were monsters. He gripped the towline and dragged himself away. Once this was over, he’d gain his revenge.

  Nung shook his head. He couldn’t even think those thoughts for now. He would have to bide his time and wait for his chance. If it came, he would strike at his tormenters then—and crush them thoroughly as one would a poisonous spider. Until then, he would wait, seeking his one chance. Before that occurred, however, he’d have to keep his taskforce alive in this bitterly alien environment.

  COOPER LANDING, ALASKA

  Stan stood beside wounded Major Williams. The commanding officer was stretched out on two fold-up tables of the data-net. There were dead soldiers littered nearby, here behind the two guarding slopes. One of the dead included the master sergeant of the communications net.

  There had been a lull in the fighting for the granite hills guarding this small section of the Number One Highway. Already, American reinforcements had been rushed forward along the highway. They climbed the hills to take the place of the dead and dying. Each new soldier carried a heavy pack stuffed with ammo.

  On the two fold-up tables, a bloody bandage covered half the major’s face. A standing medic used his fingers to probe Williams’ black-and-blue torso.

  Major Williams winced. “Careful, man,” he whispered.

  “You have broken ribs, sir,” the medic informed him.

  “Inject me with painkillers,” Williams said.

  “Sir, I need to send you back to a medical unit.”

  Clenching his teeth, Williams strained and grasped the medic with his good hand. “You listen to me, soldier. The Chinese are coming back. I need to be on my feet by then.”

  “You’ll be dead if I inject you with—”

  “I don’t have time to argue with you,” Williams whispered. “Look around. There are lots of dead soldiers. Why? Because they held their positions. Because they threw back the Chinese. We stopped them cold and that’s buying us time for reinforcements to arrive from the mainland states.” Major Williams gave the medic a nasty leer. “We’re all dead-men here. It’s just that a few of us don’t know it yet. Now inject me with painkillers so these men can see I haven’t deserted them.”

  Turning pale, the medic snatched a vial from the medkit on his belt. Using his index finger, he flicked the vial and inserted a needle into the yellow drug.

  Williams watched the procedure. Now he lay back with a groan and he turned his head so he could see Stan with his good eye.

  “How many of your Abrams are left?” Williams wheezed.

  “All of them,” said Stan.

  “Don’t worry. That will change.”

  “Sir?” asked Stan.

  “The Chinese have to break through,” the major said. He scowled fiercely as the medic stabbed him with a needle. “Get back to your tanks. I don’t know what the Chinese have—”

  “Sir!” the last data-net operator shouted, as he leaped up from his fold-up chair. “The Chinese destroyed our 155s with low-level bombers.”

  “We weren’t going to keep our artillery forever,” Williams said. “The Chi-Navs are better than us at counter-battery fire.” His eyebrows thundered. “Okay, we’re down to the mortar-teams, but at least we have a new infusion of blood with—what are those men?”

  “Sir?” asked the data-net operator. “Oh, I see what you’re asking.” He glanced at the soldiers climbing the hills. “They’re National Guardsmen, sir.”

  “Good boys, the National Guardsmen,” Williams said, looking at Stan. “Listen, Captain, you keep your tanks in reserve on those slopes behind the trenches. The Chinese have a surprise and it ought to be coming soon.”

  “What have you heard?” asked Stan, who failed to hide his worry.

  Williams grabbed the edge of one of the fold-up tables and pulled himself to a sitting position. “One of our fighter jocks saw it,” Williams said. “It was huge, he said, before the Chi-Navs knocked the jet-jock out of the air. He told us the monster had three turrets.”

  Stan felt faint. “One of the Chinese multi-turreted tanks, sir?”

  “Can your Abrams knock it out?”

  “If it’s the T-66, it has two hundred millimeters of Tai composite armor in front. That’s near the limit of what our sabot rounds can penetrate, if they hit perfectly.”

  Stan knew the key to the coming fight were the APFSDS rounds: Armor-Piercing Fin-Stabilized Discarding Sabot. After being shot out of the 120mm smoothbore gun, the skin of the sabot round dropped away during flight. That gave greater velocity to the remaining spent uranium ‘bullet.’ To increase penetrating power, the bullet was actually a long, thin rod. Unfortunately, long thin rods tended to tumble in flight instead of going straight. It was the reason for the fins, to stabilize the spend uranium rod. That hardened rod slammed against the enemy at hyper-velocity, boring through the armor. Whatever made it into the enemy compartment was usually enough to kill the crew or cook off any shells lying around, and those killed the crew. The Abrams only had ten such sabot shells in each of the ten tanks.

  “You’ll have to hit the T-66s in the sides then,” the major said.

  “If we try to maneuver around them here, that will expose us, sir, which isn’t a good idea. What the enemy can see, he can kill.”

  “You have tanks!”

  “The T-66 is more than one hundred tons, sir. It—”

  “I don’t give a rip about its specs, Captain. I just want it dead. Use your little tank trick to smash it and however many friends it brings along.”

  “How many tri-turreted tanks did the pilot see?” Stan asked, trying to keep his composure.

  Major Williams slid off the two tables, swaying as sweat trickled down his face. “We have to hold this place, Captain. We have to buy our side time. Do you understand?”

  “Maybe we should pull back,” said Stan. “We’ve made them bleed here. That’s how the Israelis soundly defeated the Syrians back in 1973. During the Yom Kippur War, the Israeli tankers retreated from one hill to another, blowing away the charging Syrian tanks. Now we need to—”

  Williams staggered to Stan, grabbing one of his arms. The major blew his foul breath into Stan’s face. “We can’t run forever, soldier. Sometimes you have to stand and die to win. Have you ever heard of the Alamo?”

  “I’m a history teacher, sir.”

  “This is our Alamo. Here’s where we make the Chinese bleed. If they want our country, they’re going to have to buy it over our dead bodies.”

  Stan shook his head. “Old General Patton said the way to win a war was to make the enemy S.O.B. die for his country.”

  Williams shoved Stan. “Go. I don’t think we have much time. And soldier?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good luck, son, you’re going to need it.”

  ***

  The second assault on their position was worse than the first. The Chinese had time to prepare and they poured material on the exposed areas. Rocket-assisted artillery shells screamed down, sweeping the hilltops and slopes. Low-level bombers swept through the Wyvern and Blowdart barrage to release napalm. As the napalm fires crackled, Marauder light-tank drones appeared out of billowing clouds of smoke laid down by the Chinese artillery.

  Enough Americans were alive, however. The
y had crouched deep in their foxholes. Now a few popped up and painted the drones with laser-targeters. Seconds later, tank-killing mortar rounds rained on the drones.

  The Chinese were ready for that. With radar and patrolling drone recon flyers, they pinpointed the mortar-teams’ positions and fired huge tubes from mobile guns. 200mm anti-personnel rounds whooshed over the guarding hills, plunging on the hidden mortar-teams. One-by-one the teams fell silent. Then IFVs roared out of the smoke and charged the short distance to the slopes. They clanked past burning drones and reached the edge of the granite hills. Bay doors opened on each IFV and Chinese dinylon-armored infantry poured out. They clawed and climbed the steep granite mountainside.

  The last Americans on the hilltops rose up, hurling grenades, firing recoilless rockets and spraying the enemy with assault-rifle fire. They fought with bitter tenacity, and their position was a strong one, their pitted body-armor giving these soldiers another few minutes of life. At last, as the Chinese crawled near the top, the Americans couldn’t fire directly on the enemy. Each side lobbed grenades at the other.

  Then attack choppers roared in. Like a mechanical insect, they hung over the Americans and ripped with massed 25mm chainguns. As the chainguns fell silent, grim-faced Chinese infantry crawled the final distance to the top of the hills. They’d taken the twin positions, but at a bitter cost.

  Now the Chinese battlefield commander unleashed his secret weapon. Three big T-66 multi-turreted tanks moved on the Number One Highway. No doubt, the Chinese commander meant to finish the fight fast and reduce his losses. Maybe he was a mind reader, maybe he’d gotten an inkling of the American commander’s thinking. Either way, he was right. Major Williams was about to play his last card of this Kenai Peninsula Alamo.

  ***

  Inside the Abrams, Stan used his sleeve to wipe his sweaty face. It was cold out there but hot in here in the tank.

  “They’re coming,” said Jose, who crouched over his gun’s controls.

  T-66 multi-turreted tank, it was a World War One dream that had finally come to life: a land battleship. Stan had read up on it before, a U.S. Army paper on possible Chinese design specs. It had three turrets, each with a 175mm smoothbore gun. It fired hyper-velocity, rocket-assisted shells. It was over one hundred tons, making it nearly twice as heavy as an Abrams. Six 30mm auto-cannons and twenty beehive flechette defenders made it sudden death for any infantryman out in the open. Linked with the defense radar, the T-66 could knock down or deflect enemy shells. The main gun tubes could fire Red Arrow anti-air rounds, making it a deadly proposition for attack-craft trying to take it out. It had a magnetically balanced hydraulic-suspension, meaning the gunners could fire with deadly accuracy while moving at top speed.

  Stan opened the hatch, climbed out and jumped to the snowy ground. He crawled to the slope, carefully peering over. The sight froze him.

  Three monster tanks moved fast along the highway. He knew why. Extendable inner wheels allowed it. If needed, the wheels could retract into the tank like an aircraft’s wheels. Then the armored treads would churn.

  Cursing softly, Stan dug out his binoculars. He focused on the massive lead tank. Could any of his Abrams knock it out? Probably only at close range. How many of these had the Chinese brought with them to Alaska?

  Sweat trickled into his eyes. He wasn’t going to survive this battle. He knew that now. Down below, Stan could see Williams shouting and gesturing at the men waiting in foxholes and in the trench. Dirt covered the snow around each hole and each trench. The enemy must know the major and his men were there despite the amount of Wyvern and Blowdart missiles they’d fired at the various recon flyers.

  At a distance, IFVs followed the three T-66 tanks.

  Just then, Pastor Bill Harris, sergeant of the twenty Militiamen assigned to the Abrams, plopped down beside Stan. Bill’s men remained on the slopes up here with the tanks and well behind the major’s trenches and foxholes. Although he was a pastor, Bill Harris was a tough man, a bulldog of a basketball player.

  “Can you stop those things?” asked Bill. For the first time in Stan’s life, he heard fear in Bill’s voice.

  “Remember the Alamo,” Stan told him.

  Bill nodded slowly, with his eyes on the Chinese monsters.

  Stan used to read about the Alamo with a grand sense of adventure. As a boy, he’d always wanted to be there with the great American heroes. They had faced the Mexican Army and died almost to a man.

  Just like today, only this time the Chinese are killing us.

  Stan didn’t want to die. He wanted to get up and run away into the woods. If he did that, all those men who had died up on the hills and who would soon die in the forward trenches….

  “Susan,” he whispered, speaking his wife’s name. He wanted someday to hug his wife and kiss her again. “I can’t let the Chinese reach Anchorage. We have to stop them here.”

  “Do you mind if I pray?” asked Bill.

  “What? Oh. Knock yourself out.”

  “Help us, Jesus,” said Bill. “Let all of us be brave today, amen.”

  Stan realized he needed to get inside his tank. He gripped Bill’s shoulder. “Thanks, Pastor. See you…see you up there after this is over.”

  “You destroy those tanks,” said Bill. “You destroy them and keep your Abrams intact. I don’t know of anything else that can stop such things.”

  “Good luck,” said Stan.

  “God bless you, brother.”

  Stan nodded. Then he slid backward out of sight of the approaching tanks and shoved up to his hands and knees. It took an effort of will. Then he was up. He stood there. With a curse, he ran for the Abrams, knowing that today he was going to die.

  As he climbed onto the tank’s hull, Stan shouted at the open hatch to Jose and Hank, “They’re coming! It’s time to rock and roll.”

  Four minutes later, Stan was cold. He was wedged in the hatch, half his body outside and half his body in the tank. He wore durasteel body-armor and an extra-armored tank commander’s helmet. To steady himself, he gripped his .50 caliber machinegun.

  The ten M1A2s were in hull-down position behind the slope. That slope was behind and above the major’s foxholes and trenches. From the trenches, desperate Americans fired ATGMs, LAWS rockets, recoilless guns and assault rifles. Everything bounced off the big T-66s. In retaliation, the Chinese monsters murdered exposed soldiers with mass beehive flechette blasts, while the 30mm auto-cannons chugged endlessly.

  Stan froze momentarily as the first T-66 reached the trench line. The one hundred-plus ton tank spun on its treads. Blood spurted from the crushed trench. In fear, Americans crawled out of foxholes and the remaining trenches and sprinted like mice. Beehive flechettes blasted from the vehicle’s sides, causing a bloody mist to spray. When the vapors cleared, there were no bodies. Metallic raining sounded as the T-66s peppered each other, but that did nothing to halt the massacre. There was no retreat as such, as Major Williams had planned. There was simply annihilation.

  Stan could hardly speak. There was no moisture in his mouth. He clicked his receiver anyway and said in a husky voice, “Everyone concentrate your fire on the lead tank, over.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Jose.

  The nearest enemy tank was five hundred feet away. The Abram’s 120mm gun roared and a sabot round sped at the enemy.

  Stan watched wide-eyed. The round hit, burning itself partway into the Tai armor, but not making it all the way through. Three enemy turrets began to traverse around, bringing the big guns toward his partly hidden tanks.

  “Jose!” shouted Stan.

  Several of the Abrams began to fire from hull down. Each sabot round either burned partway into the enemy armor to no effect or bounced off the incredibly thick Tai composite hull.

  From one T-66, three enemy cannons roared. The shells were loud, blurs in the air. Two American tanks exploded. The third shell missed, blowing up a geyser of dirt. Metal from the destroyed tanks hissed past Stan.

  “Turtle!”
he roared into his receiver. Like a submariner, he dropped through the hatch and clanged it shut behind him.

  The tank shook as Jose fired another shell.

  Stan pressed his eyes against his scope. Jose’s shell punched through turret-armor and the enemy turret froze in place. Black smoke poured out of a small shell-hole in the turret. They’d done it! They’d hurt a T-66. It was possible. That T-66 still traversed its other two guns. The 175mm cannons recoiled again as each sent a round at two different Abrams tanks.

  With a sick groan, Stan used his scope to inspect his company. Henry Smith’s Abrams—the turret and gun-tube spun in the air like a Frisbee. It landed fifty feet away. Stan swiveled his scope in the other direction. The next Abrams was burning. One T-66 had taken out four Abrams tanks in less than a minute. How were they supposed to defeat such an enemy?

  “Focus on the turrets!” Stan yelled into his receiver. “Don’t try to penetrate the central mass. Just knock three turrets out and they’ll be effectively disabled.”

  More Abrams fired sabot rounds.

  Stan stared through his scope. Oily smoke billowed from another enemy turret in the tank already hit. A hatch opened and a Chinese tanker began climbing out. A fiery blast hurled the Chinese tanker into the air. The shells in that turret must have started cooking off.

  The T-66’s single remaining cannon fired. It sent a 175mm shell through the dirt, destroying yet another Abrams hiding behind the slope, bringing its total to five kills.

  That made Stan sick. “Listen!” he shouted. “Fire at the enemy turrets! Aim at the turrets and we might win this battle!”

  Then Stan saw a running man. It was Pastor Bill. He ran down the slope as if he was driving to the hoop for a winning basket.

  “What are you doing?” whispered Stan.

  The pastor heaved a sticky round. Wired to it was a cluster of grenades. The pastor dove into a foxhole and the sticky round stuck to the T-66’s tracks. The cluster exploded, knocking off a tread and halting the deadly tank. An anti-personnel machinegun opened up, sending rounds in the pastor’s direction.