Stormtide Rising (Kirov Series Book 29)

by Schettler, John

  “We might make good use of the 29th Independent.”

  “My thinking exactly. The other two can stand as a garrison well enough. Now then, after that, we have more troops being organized by General Giffard in Africa. He’s used units of the Royal West African Frontier Force and teed up two divisions for service in Burma, or the planned counterattack at Ceylon.”

  “Ceylon can wait,” said Churchill glumly. “We’ve lost the rubber plantations, but losing the oil rigs is out of the question, and the Germans have already occupied Baba Gurgur.”

  “Well, we’ve taken Abadan from Persia in compensation.”

  “Which we should have done long ago,” said Churchill. “The Persians have been flirting with the Germans ever since Turkey became a wayward bride. Now they’ll throw in with them completely.”

  “It couldn’t be helped,” said Alanbrooke. “Don’t worry, they’ve little to contribute militarily, though they did cross the border into Iraq and they’ve occupied Amara after we took Abadan and Ahwaz. We did have plans to go all the way to Tehran, but that operation had to be shelved when the Germans pulled Operation Phoenix out of their hat—that’s what it’s being called.”

  “Well named,” said Churchill. “They took an old plan that we foiled with our own Operation Scimitar, then gave it to an old General that had gone into semi-retirement after falling out of favor with Hitler. Well it seems there was a good deal of mileage left in that warhorse after all.”

  “Indeed,” said Alanbrooke. “I agree that under these circumstances, our attack on Ceylon will have to be postponed.”

  “These two new divisions Giffard has organized,” asked Churchill, “will they be any good?”

  “Decent fighting men,” said Alanbrooke. “But they’ll have no transport—not even for artillery or any of the heavy equipment. They were both to be organized using porter squads to carry everything—jungle warfare has little use for trucks. That may be good for Burma, but they’ll have limited offensive capability if sent to Iraq, unless we can motorize them.”

  “We’ll have to do so. Trucks we have in abundance, but it’s a long voyage by sea to get them there. What else can we find—good experienced troops?” Churchill was pacing.

  “The 70th Division is still with Slim in Burma. It’s perhaps the most experienced division there.”

  “We’ve already stolen away his 2nd Division. No, I think we’ll have to leave the 70th where it is.”

  “Then there’s the Canadians,” said Alanbrooke. “1st Division under Guy Simonds is training up for the Med. The 2nd and 3rd Divisions are just sitting about here in the Kingdom on garrison duties, and training for the eventual invasion of France, whenever that might happen.”

  “That’s the ticket,” said Churchill. “How good are they?”

  “Now that we’ve re-equipped them, they’re up to snuff, and I think they have good fighting men there as well. But again, even if we did send one, it would be six weeks getting there.”

  “Which brings us back to our friends in Australia and New Zealand,” said Churchill. “Prime Minister Curtin was very adamant that his Aussies return home, but he can’t honestly think the Japanese are about to land at Sydney any time soon. Those are well hardened soldiers, and what are they doing over there now watching the home front? MacArthur has landed on New Caledonia, and Halsey has troops in the French New Hebrides. The Americans are getting a good head of steam up, and that should have eased the concerns of our friends down under. I must make an appeal to Curtain for at least one division again. There’s too much at stake.”

  “For that matter,” said Alanbrooke, “what about the Americans? They have troops just sitting about in Australia as well.”

  “What? Rob MacArthur? He’s been moaning about being short changed all these months. No, I don’t think we can count on help from the Americans, at least not for troops in this matter. The Commonwealth will have to do the job. Alright. I think we’ll have to take the best of our own forces in Africa, even if some of those units aren’t fully equipped. See to that, will you General Brooke?”

  “Of course, sir. The 11th East African would be at the top of my list there.”

  “Good. Then, if I can’t get my hands on anything down under, we’ll have to send the Canadians. But all these infantry divisions… will they be enough?”

  “Put enough on the line and they can be very tough,” said Alanbrooke. “As for any offensive aimed at kicking the Germans out, that’s another matter.”

  “Yes,” said Churchill, “what we need is more armor.”

  “Everyone wants more armor,” said Alanbrooke. “Alexander has been hankering for more, and so we’ve had to gut the 8th Army and take it from O’Connor. I have no doubt that Monty will soon put in a similar request. Here in the Kingdom we still have the 9th, 11th, and 42nd Armored Divisions, and Hobart’s Funnies in the 79th. They’re all in the cupboard for future operations against France.”

  “That’s a long way off, in spite of what General Marshall and the Americans are proposing with this Sledgehammer nonsense. We’ll have to win through in Tunisia first to even contemplate any further offensives in the Med, let alone against France. So tell me about these other divisions.”

  “Of the lot, the Black Bull is the best—the 11th under General Burrows. It’s built out with two good armored brigades, and with our best new tanks. Then there’s the 9th Armored Division. It only has one armored brigade in it, but we’ve added a support group, and an infantry brigade. The 42nd Division has two armored brigades, but no infantry aside from a small support group.”

  “I think we’ll have to hold on to the 11th, but might we put together something by mixing the other two? We can call it the Provisional Armored Division, or anything else that suits your fancy.”

  “Yes sir, neither one is doing us any good here at the moment, so I suppose we might pick and choose from the litter to build something new, and there you have it, your Provisional Armored Division for Iraq. Send it on its way with one of the Canadian Divisions, and the situation in Iraq will look a good deal better, I can assure you.”

  “Let me see what I can get out of Curtin.”

  On that matter, the Curtin would remain closed, and Australia continued to insist it needed its only real fighting divisions to serve at home, training up new divisions that were all in the works. But Churchill would have more luck with New Zealand. The 2nd New Zealand Division was a veteran unit that had fought in the Western Desert before being withdrawn. In Fedorov’s history, it never was recalled home, continuing to fight in Tunisia and the Italian Campaign, one of the best Commonwealth divisions of the war. Something in the history of these events would now continue to pull that division into the orbit of the Kingdom, and Prime Minister Peter Fraser, attuned to the gravity of the situation in Iraq, said he would be willing to release his 2nd Division again if it was needed.

  It certainly was.

  All these deliberations showed just how resilient the British Empire and Commonwealth truly was. Within just a few months, forces had been found to reinforce 10th Army in Syria, and build out an all new Paliforce Army in Iraq and Persia. By taking units from India, Burma, East and South Africa, and now New Zealand, Churchill had the makings of an entire new Army.

  It was decided that the Provisional Armored Division would be created and sent from the Kingdom as soon as possible, but in the short run, 2nd New Zealand Infantry Division was much closer and soon to be welcomed again. The 11th East Africa Division was also scheduled for deployment to Iraq, and it would be the first to arrive, along with the independent 29th British Brigade from Madagascar. Churchill was then prepared to send both the new African divisions if necessary, though he preferred to keep them on track for Burma. Yet he instinctively realized that the gravity of the war had shifted dramatically, and much might be won or lost in Iraq that could not be gained or lost anywhere else. As far as he was concerned, even the campaign in Tunisia would take a secondary role now, until Iraq was deemed secure.
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  Bletchley Park revealed that the Germans seemed to be of the same mind, and that an old nemesis, once thought vanquished, would soon return to the field. So Churchill was absolutely convinced that the entire war effort must make Iraq its number one priority.

  “Rommel again!” he said. “We thought he was finally beaten in Tunisia. The Italians were calling for his head and he was sent home. But now we see that Herr Hitler was only huddling with his Desert fox, and all the while finding him a new desert. He’s been appointed the commander of all German forces in Syria!”

  “A serious matter,” said Alanbrooke. “We thought Rommel was thoroughly knackered, and that they were giving that man a much needed rest, but there’s no rest for any of us in this war. Hitler has doubled down on this whole affair.”

  “He has indeed,” said Churchill. “This is what the loss of Turkey precipitated. That was a very heavy blow. So we’ll pull all the stops and play to win there at all costs. Yet I’m thinking that Jumbo Wilson may be overburdened there in Iraq.”

  “He’s a good man,” said Alanbrooke. “I’ve already told you that I second his every decision concerning Baghdad.”

  “It’s not that,” said Churchill. “It’s just that he’ll be juggling a good many divisions soon, and perhaps more than he can manage.”

  “Auk is there,” said Alanbrooke.

  “Yes, but he’s been administering things on the higher level. I’m told he’s quite good with operational matters.”

  “One of our best,” said Alanbrooke.

  “Then let’s use him. Tell him I want him to roll up his sleeves and take charge of the ground operations more closely. He can coordinate with Wilson, but I want Auchinlek to get into the thick of things.”

  “All right sir, that may be wise. After all, this thing is much bigger than it initially seemed. Bletchley Park thinks all these German operations are part and parcel together. They see Operation Phoenix and the big push now underway in the Kuban as closely related. But I’ve read the latest reports very carefully. There may be a silver lining in some of these storm clouds.”

  “Pray tell,” said Churchill.

  “BP says Hitler has issued some unusual directives of late, and they all have to do with the interface of German units with those of the Orenburg Federation. He’s sent his Italian contingent in the east to man the line of the Don, posted military police on all the bridges, pulled his troops out of the Volga sector, and now we’re told that there’s been some tension between the Turkomen Divisions Volkov sent through Northern Persia to Iraq, and the German troops garrisoning Baba Gurgur. Jerry pulled all those crack paratroopers off Crete and replaced them with a mountain division. Now they’re on the way to Kirkuk.”

  Churchill’s eyes narrowed. “Interesting,” he said slowly. “Most interesting. Might there be cracks in the wall Volkov and Hitler have been building together?”

  “It would seem so,” said Alanbrooke.

  “That would be marvelous!” Churchill smiled for the first time in the whole discussion—for the first time since he left the Casablanca Conference with FDR. Since that time, he had been shunned by the Turks, then visited Palestine in the midst of that sudden new threat developing to undertake the sad duty of moving Wavell along to India before flying home to the UK. “Yes,” he said, “that would be blinding good news if those two ever came to blows. If there’s anything we can do to encourage that, we ought to be about it. Just when things look like they’re all going to pot, your enemy gets a mind to make a first class mistake. Let’s hope they get into a nice kerfuffle together. Brilliant—just brilliant!”

  * * *

  The army that Rommel was to inherit had been built as a holding force, composed mostly of light mountain troops. Now it was being reinforced with two line infantry divisions, a strong 16th Panzer Division which had been provided with all new tanks. Then the vaunted 5th SS Wiking Division under Otto Gille would arrive from the South Front in Russia, eager to dry out and warm up in Syria again. It was one of the heroes that had stopped Operation Uranus, Steiner’s old division, and he hated to see it go. This unit was still structured as a fast heavy Motorized Division, with the Nordland, Germania and Westland Regiments. It also included a Panzer regiment with 121 more tanks, as it had not been replenished after fighting in the opening rounds of Operation Edelweiss. That brought Rommel’s AFV total to 292, so before he flew to Aleppo, he made a special request..

  He knew that any number of independent Panzer Brigades had been sent to the East Front, and wanted to get his hands on one. When he learned that one had been rebuilding in France, he asked for it as a personal favor, and Hitler granted his request. It was really restructuring as a heavy Panzergrenadier Brigade, the 101st, but it would add another 45 of the new Panther tanks to Rommel’s force, with a Schwere Company of 15 new VK-90 Lion Kings. They were prototype models, a little gift from the Führer to his favorite General. With good grenadiers included, this brigade would add a good deal of punch to any attack. All these units would gather under the newly designated III Panzer Korps, and including odd Marders and older tanks scattered among the Korps formations, Rommel would enter his new command in Syria with just over 375 tanks.

  So while Jumbo Wilson struggled to administer his safe withdrawal from Baghdad, and Guderian cleared that city, the force that would finally make the German Army in Syria an offensive threat was being loaded onto the long steel rail lines and was heading south from Istanbul. They would arrive and take up positions near the T4 Pumping station and Palmyra, and a week later, on the 15th of March, Field Marshall Rommel would arrive at Aleppo. He had little time to rest after leaving Tunisia only three weeks earlier, convincing his personal physician that he was fit and ready for duty.

  As soon as he reached his new HQ at Homs, his eyes played over the lists of units included in his new command, and the numbers and types making up those 375 tanks. The old desert warrior knew just what he would do with them.

  Part XI

  Turncoat

  “ Some men, like wine, are inherently turncoats—first a friend, and then an enemy.”

  — Henry Fielding

  Chapter 31

  In Orenburg, Ivan Volkov was watching the progress of Operation Phoenix very closely. He had not been informed by the Germans about it, and the dramatic advances achieved by Guderian were quite startling in February. At the same time, the Germans were massing troops just south of Rostov for Operation Edelweiss. He knew it was coming, and welcomed it in many respects, but it also made him somewhat edgy.

  Shaking hands with the Germans on the Volga was one thing, he thought. There was no oil there, but now these new campaigns seem entirely aimed at the oil rich centers of the Middle East… and my holdings in the Caucasus.

  He also could not fail to notice the changes that had recently been introduced on the battlefield, his astute mind keenly aware of the subtle message they were sending. Six months earlier, when German troops had linked up with his forces and the battle for Volgograd was being fought, he had been very pleased with the outcomes. The Germans drove back the stubborn Soviet defenders, and both sides cooperated, particularly north of the city at the Rynok Bridge, where he committed one of his Guards Divisions to make the assault.

  As German troops concentrated on the city fight, he gladly offered to send elements of his 2nd Kazakh Army, and 5th Orenburg Army to man quiet sectors of the line. His new ‘Ally’ was doing what his own armies had failed to accomplish over decades of bitterly contested fighting with Sergei Kirov’s Army of the Volga. As that river extended north, it also stood as the demarcation line between the Orenburg Federation, and Soviet Russia.

  As circumstances came about, the Commander of Armeegruppe Sud, Eric Manstein, had little use for the city of Volgograd itself. He saw it as a liability, extending his troops into a difficult city fight that his panzers were ill suited for. General Zhukov helped that thinking along when he launched his Operations Uranus and Saturn against Manstein’s lines of communications to V
olgograd, prompting him to withdraw Steiner’s elite SS Korps to parry those attacks. After that, the Germans committed twelve infantry divisions to slowly reduce the Soviet defenses in the city, and then quietly turned the whole affair over to Volkov. Those divisions were needed elsewhere, and one entire Army, the 11th under Hansen, was instead sent south into the Kuban to join 17th Army for Operation Edelweiss.

  Volkov was elated to gain complete control of the Volgograd sector, his forces now taking over all the ground between the Volga and Don. Then came the subtle message, when German troops that had been covering the west bank of the Don were pulled back to the Chir, which forced the local Orenburg Army Commander to quickly shift assets to cover the Don bridges. What was Hitler doing, or was this another expedient ordered by Manstein?

  Volkov soon learned that it had been a direct order from Hitler himself, and noted how shortly thereafter, the Germans moved Italian troops all along the line of the Don, many soon crossing to the south bank to cover the rail line between Salsk and Kotelnikovo. That route was used by Hansen’s 11th Army on its march to the Kuban, so Volkov thought little of it… Until the Italians showed up. He quickly summoned the German Ambassador, formally requesting a meeting with the German Foreign Minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop. He had engineered the tense German-Soviet Pact in 1939 and 40, before Operation Barbarossa made an end of that, and he was also the man who had negotiated Orenburg’s Pact with the Reich.

  “Mister Foreign Minister,” said Volkov. “It has been a long time since we met face to face, and perhaps that is best between two parties with similar minds and aims. The need to discuss matters is always a sly indication of hidden discord, so forgive me if I come right to the point. I wonder if you can explain the recent troop movements made by your southern group of forces along the Don? I make specific note of the presence of Italian troops south of that river, in territory liberated by the forces of Orenburg.”