They could see the dim outline of the end of the bay ahead, and Murdock checked the shore, then steered the boat into the edge of the water and grounded it. Six men jumped out and pulled the boat up the grassy bank. One man hit the valve that held in the air, and the boat deflated quickly.
Five minutes later both IBSS were buried under a scattering of dirt and leaves and tree branches.
"Now, let's remember where they are," Jaybird said. He found three flat rocks and piled them on top of each other near the shoreline. It would do.
As they worked on the IBSS, Red Nicholson had taken a quick scout beyond the woods and to the north. He came back with his report before they were ready to leave.
"Nothing between us and the boundary fence of the airfield, L-T. But you ain't gonna be happy with the view."
"Why, Red?"
"Can't see the planes at all. This is in a little low point and there's a rise on the runway and no fucking way can we hit them planes from down here."
Murdock noted the report and spread out his men in the usual formation. He put Nicholson on point, followed by himself and then his radioman, Holt. Besides their short-range Motorola MX-300 belt radios, they had a backpack radio. It was the new AN/PRC-117D. It weighed only fifteen pounds, was fifteen inches high, eight wide, and three deep. Holt carried it on his back, sometimes under protest.
The tactical radio operated on several modes and multiple frequency bands and replaced three different radios the SEALS had used before.
It picked up and sent UHF satellite communications called SATCOM. It could reach anywhere in the world through that linkup. It had a UHF line-of-sight ability to talk to aircraft and direct air strikes. It handled VHF or FM, used for tactical contact by most armies in the world, which was the same band their Motorola MX-300 walkie-talkies used.
Holt could change bands by flipping a switch and setting up an antenna. Power went anywhere from ten watts down to one-tenth of a watt. A special encryption system for coding transmissions was built into the radio. The crypto system could be changed at any time by entering a new set of numbers. They could also transmit with compressed data bursts that lasted only a millisecond.
With this radio Murdock could talk directly with the President, the CNO, or Coronado's Third Platoon day-room.
If they needed some help in a rush they could ask for it. Here in the wilds of China the odds of them getting any close air support, say, was not good. But they could ask.
Red led them through the woods and parallel to the fence. All growth had been cut back ten meters on both sides of the fence, which was chain-link with razor wire on the top. They could cut through it if they had to.
A half mile along the fence, the land rose and they could see the aircraft parked on the hard runway. They were at least seven hundred meters away.
"Too damn far," Murdock said. He sent a guard both ways thirty meters along the fence, then called on Gunner's Mate Second Class Greg Johnson, who had a pair of wire cutters with fold-out handles for lots of pressure on the blades.
"Right here, Johnson. We want a three-foot-high hole and we need it last week."
Johnson ran for the fence, touched it briefly with his fingers, then began slicing the chain-link fence wire. It took him four minutes to cut a line three feet high and three feet across the top. Then he folded back the far side and slid through the opening.
The rest of the platoon followed him and they established the point man again with Second Squad fanned out behind the First in a proper diamond. Dewitt served as rear guard.
The land had been bulldozed, some of it recently, and they found the remains of houses, stock pens, and water holes. It wasn't a neat job, but it had knocked down everything that would interfere with a jet plane landing or taking off.
Two hundred meters from the fence, Red Nicholson hit the dirt and the rest of the SEALS ate dust like dominoes. Murdock ran up to Nicholson bent over, and flattened out beside him. "What?"
"Mounted patrol. Looks like an old jeep. Coming along a dirt track about a hundred meters ahead of us."
Murdock could see the rig then and the lights. It did not have a searchlight that was turned on and probing.
"Let him pass," Murdock said.
Red nodded. He pointed to the left where a low building of some sort stood. It looked to be made of concrete block or stone. It had no electronics on it and was over two hundred meters ahead. If they could reach the building, it would put them in range of the middle of the parked transport planes.
Murdock watched the transports through his night-vision one-lens glass. He spotted figures moving around the planes. Service personnel or guards, he couldn't tell which.
The jeep rolled past, shifting gears to get out of what looked like a spot of soft dirt or sand. When the rig cleared, the SEALS waited two minutes, then moved again to the left at a slow jog to eat up the distance.
Thirty meters from the concrete block building, Red stopped and waited for Murdock.
"Nothing shows from this side. Thought I saw a shaft of light a minute ago, like a door in front had opened and let out some yellow rays."
"Let's check." Murdock and Red eased up to a crouched position and ran to the rear of the building. Now they could tell it was twenty by forty feet and had no windows in the back or the side they could see. They edged around to check the far side. There was no alarm. Evidently no sentry or guard was outside.
They checked the front. It had three windows, all wide and low. The structure was no more than eight feet high. One door on this side opened inward. As they watched, the door swung in and a khaki-clad man came out, walked ten meters away from the building, and urinated.
Red gave a throat-slash move, but Murdock shook his head. They held still as the man went back in the door. He didn't have to unlock it to get inside.
Murdock took out a fragger and a flash-bang grenade. He motioned to Red who took out one fragger. They both pulled the pins on the grenades but held down the arming spoons. Then they edged up to the door. Murdock went past it to the far side. He looked at Red and nodded. Murdock rammed open the door and threw both his grenades inside. Red pitched in his fragger and they let the door swing shut.
The five ear-shattering blasts of high explosives from the flash-bang was followed by a string of bright strobing light pulses. The flash-bang went off just before the two fraggers. The three windows in front blew out and the strobe lights winked through them.
When the last grenade exploded, Murdock charged through the door and covered the right half of the room spotting with his NVG. He saw two bodies on the floor writhing. He sent two silent rounds into both with his CAR-15 and swept the rest of the room with the night-vision goggles.
Red had fired three times, and Murdock saw the bodies spasming on the two bunks to the rear.
"Clear," Red said.
"Clear here," Murdock said. Then the Platoon Leader continued. "Make sure," he said. The SEALS went to the bodies and put a round in the head of each. Now they were sure.
Murdock examined the place. It was one large room. The fraggers had blown out any electric lights that had been on inside. Below the windows were panels that at one time must have been useful. Now they were scraped and torn and twisted from the shrapnel. The windows looked out directly down the first runway. The SAC-YD transports were parked cheek to tail fin on a taxiway fifty meters to the left of the runway. Murdock figured they were within two hundred meters of the near end of the line and four hundred meters from the far end of the parked transport planes. Fish in a fucking barrel.
"Bring up the squads," Murdock said into his lip mike. "We've found our firing positions."
As the men came up to the blockhouse, Murdock placed them. He put the four RPG men with two rounds each, including himself, on top of the building, which he found had a solid tarpaper and rock roof. The other men with RPGS would fire them from the sides of the blockhouse. These men also had their M-88.50-caliber rifles locked and loaded and ready to go.
M
urdock made a radio check. All thirteen gave him a quick "ready" on the Motorola. He had told them which areas of the line to fire in. Those on the roof took the far half of the line. The men on the ground drew the closer targets.
"Check your range and hit those motherfuckers," Murdock had told each man.
Now he sighted in on the center of the line of planes. As soon as he fired the rest would blast away. He concentrated on the sights, armed the rockets, and pulled the trigger.
The whoosh from behind him was always a surprise on an RPG. He could follow the trail of fire as it arched into the sky, then came down. Before it hit six more RPGS were in the air. Murdock watched his round hit. It blew up directly under one Chinese transport on the near side of the parking lot. A moment later the fuel tank exploded showering burning jet fuel over a dozen of the big SAC-YDS. He knew they had thirty-eight-meter wingspans. A lot of fuel in there.
Then the other RPGS began hitting. Three flew farther than Murdock's did. One fell short; two more landed among the parked planes and went off with a roar. Then RPGS began to fall on the planes closer to them. Three hit their targets, and one exploded beyond the planes in a hangar.
A moment later the heavy.50-caliber rifles began to speak. The rounds were aimed at the wing tanks and cockpits. Murdock caught himself watching the show, then remembered his last round. He fired his last RPG at maximum range, and figured they would not destroy the planes all the way to the far end with the RPGS. He watched four more hits in the row of planes. Sirens walled and red lights from fire trucks blazed through the night. He could hear loudspeakers blaring in Chinese.
Then he saw the domino effect take over. One plane exploded, and that set off two more, which roared into a firestorm exploding their fuel tanks, which set off half a dozen more planes as the whole row soon began burning.
He rolled off the roof, went below, and told the riflemen to concentrate on the far end of the row. One plane began taxiing away from the fireballs. Magic Brown put four slugs into the ship before it got far, and it burst into flames from the exploding rounds and kept on rolling as a blazing inferno.
Two planes closest to them had escaped the destruction. Murdock pointed them out and Ronson and Johnson drilled them with a half-dozen rounds, resulting in one of the planes blowing sky-high and taking the undamaged one with it in a flaming toast to Sino-American relations.
An armored car of some kind faded from the firelight and rolled toward the blockhouse. The troops inside the building began taking machine-gun fire. The sniper fifties returned fire and knocked out the rig with ten rounds. The armored half-track surged to one side, rolled, and wound up on its roof.
Murdock watched his handiwork. Not a single transport had escaped. He touched his lip mike. "Let's get the hell out of Dodge," Murdock said. They grouped up behind the blockhouse. A mortar round exploded fifty meters to the right. "Any casualties?"
He heard no response. "Let's move it then, double time. You know where we're going, to that hole in the fence. We'll have company before we get there. Let's keep our rough diamond formation. Go, go, go."
They trotted back toward the fence. All were considerably less loaded down than on the march in. They were still a hundred meters from the fence when a mortar round went off thirty meters in front of them. Another one bracketed them twenty meters behind.
"Right flank!" Murdock shouted. "Run like hell, we're bracketed!"
They charged to the right and before they had moved thirty meters, they heard the whispers of mortar rounds, then the flash of six fire-for-effect HE rounds as they exploded tearing up the airfield landscape where the SEALS had been moments before.
They hit the fence and moved to the left. They found the hole and were through it when two mortar rounds hit in the trees beyond the fence.
"Stay with the fence and run downstream!" Murdock bellowed. "Keep away from any airbursts in those trees!"
They ran again keeping a suggestion of a formation. More mortar rounds hit behind them walking through the trees to the bay.
Murdock cut their pace to a fast walk. "They think we're in the trees. The problem is they know someone is down here. Before we can get to our boats and inflate them, there will be some Chinese navy boats swarming all over this bay."
"We've still got our fifties," Magic Brown said.
"Sure, but they'll have mounted fifty-caliber machine guns and maybe some forty-millimeter stuff."
They cut to the shore of the bay and Red Nicholson swore. He had just stumbled over the pile of three rocks they had left as their marker.
Murdock had never seen his men work faster or with more skill. They unearthed the IBSS, inflated them, and had them in the water in platoon-record time. He put three men with the fifties in the front of each boat, and they began moving downstream on the bay toward the ocean.
Murdock looked at Jaybird. He had an amazing knack for tactics. "Shoreline or center of the bay?" Murdock asked.
Jaybird shook his head. "No contest. We stick with the shoreline. We can vanish in these trees a lot easier than getting sunk in midstream. We don't have the equipment we need to play frogmen this time."
"You're right."
That was when they heard the growl of the high-speed patrol boat heading their way from the mouth of the bay.
14
Saturday, May 16
0217 hours
Min River Bay
China Mainland Coast
"A Chinese patrol boat?" Jaybird asked.
"You guessed it, and coming fast," Murdock said. "Head for the tree side," Murdock ordered. "Up ahead there are some trees that overhang the water. If we're lucky we can get in there and be hard to spot."
Both IBSS headed for shore at what seemed to Murdock an agonizingly slow speed. The patrol boat growled closer. Now they could see the headlight. It wasn't a searchlight, but aimed the right way it could be dangerous to the black boats and cammie-outfitted SEALS.
It would be close.
The IBSS edged into the overhanging branches of the trees, and were almost completely covered by the time the Chinese patrol boat roared into the area. It had been making S-curve searches, scanning the bay and both shores. Here the bay was nearly half a mile wide and the boat had a lot of water to cover.
The craft paused as it sighted the overhanging branches. The headlight played on them for a moment as the forty-foot craft turned past them from fifty meters. Evidently the searchers saw no movement and nothing else suspicious through the thick growth. The patrol boat turned in another large S and moved on up the bay.
Murdock put the silent-moving craft back into gear. "We've got over two more miles to get to the ocean," Murdock whispered to Dewitt in the other boat. "If we make it, we charge straight east and hope for a pickup. If we get separated, same plan. You have a sonar signaler. We'll stick together if at all possible."
They hummed along the far shore, watching for more patrol boats. Surely the Chinese had more than one in the bay or available for use here.
The second, then the third patrol boat appeared quickly. Each seemed to be working one of the shorelines from the ocean inward. The near shoreline here had trees, but none that grew close enough to the water to hide under.
"If we get spotted, we use the fifties and blast the cockpit of that sucker," Murdock said. "Maybe we can kill any radio transmissions. Then we go for any mounted machine guns we see and then try to shoot out the waterline and sink her."
The word was passed to the second boat. Each had five of the.50-caliber sniper rifles.
Six minutes passed. Murdock checked his watch. It was 0232. Less than six hours of darkness left. If they got caught in the bay or on the land come sunup, they were as good as dead. They would have to take their chances swimming their way out the bay and into the ocean. They had fins and masks on the IBSS, but no rebreathers. They would have to dump all their weapons and ammo and hope. A damn lot of hope, Murdock knew.
The near-shore patrol boat had an active searchlight. It sent out a t
hree-foot beam with a lot of power behind it.
"Get ready to shoot and scoot, you guys," Murdock whispered to the five men in his boat with the big fifties. "We gonna have uninvited company in about two minutes. We shoot first. Brown, take out the searchlight."
Usually the squad leader or platoon leader opens fire first. This time Murdock didn't have a fifty, so he brought up his CAR-15 with the selector on full auto.
The Chinese patrol boat moved closer. It had slowed and the searchlight swept the shore continuously. The beam was twenty meters from the lead IBS when Murdock aimed at the lighted pilothouse of the forty-foot craft and fired a five-round burst.
The heavy fifties barked in immediate response. Bolts were thrown quickly, new rounds were inserted, and another blast of ten of the heavy.50-caliber explosive rounds jolted into the small Chinese craft. The first volley blew out the searchlight and most of the running lights and crippled the steering. The patrol boat slewed sideways. The fifties kept pounding, now aiming lower at the waterline hoping to hit an engine or fuel tank.
Just as the first five-round magazines were running dry on the Mcmillan M-88's, an explosive projectile hit the fuel tank on the patrol craft and it blew up. A huge fireball blossomed and slowly lifted upwards as the boat disintegrated. Parts of the patrol craft fell into the water fifty meters away. When the sound of the explosion faded, Murdock could hear a siren from upstream and then the angry growl of the other two patrol craft heading his way.
"A mile and a half," Murdock said so his men could hear. "We charge ahead, but these IBSS aren't exactly outboard racers." He turned his.50-caliber sharpshooters around the other way. "As soon as you can see any running lights back there, start shooting at them. We might discourage them enough to keep them back at long range."
"Yeah, and we might not," Magic Brown said. "We staying near the shore in case we catch a lucky round that deflates this little gem we're riding in?"
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