Dark, noisome shadows thumped and hovered over the plateau, the night optics and thermal imaging clearly seeing the enemy gun positions, their barrels still hot from the day’s long work in bombarding the base. Now the deadly fire of modern precision weapons began to rake the positions with terrible effect. The hiss and roar of ground attack missiles split the night as they lanced in. The four Shturm AT missiles found old Iraqi Armored cars and blew them to pieces in a heartbeat. Then the gunners on the ‘Big Blue Pig’ rotated the long barrel of the 30mm autocannon, and its rapid pulsing fire punctuated the night, sending hot streaks of tracer rounds down on the enemy below.
The rocket pods of the X-3s soon joined the action, their missiles blasting into the enemy machine guns and 3.7-inch howitzer positions. Several guns were blown into the air, and went tumbling down the slope, and the whole scene on the plateau dissolved into utter chaos. Then Troyak heard the snarl of the four barreled rotating Minigun on the KA-40, a grim smile on his face as it began raking the unseen enemy. He waited, eyeing his service watch until the hands struck midnight, which was the time designated for his advance. The seconds ticked off, and then he shouted to his men in a hard voice.
“Marines! Follow me!”
The Black Death surged up the furrowed wadi, reaching the crest of the plateau where they saw the chaos of the battle. Fire of burning trucks and tent sites was masked by rolling smoke, and there came an enormous explosion as the autocannon hit a supply dump and ignited the ammunition there. The helicopters were now well to the east, having raked their way along the entire enemy position with their lethal guns and missiles, and now swerved off into the sky, like evil black fire-breathing dragons.
They heard the full throated shout of the teams on their left: “Argos Fire!” Then the Argonauts charged up the slope, their assault rifles soon barking out fire as they advanced. Between the two forces there were no more than sixty men, but each man carried a modern assault rifle, and every squad had a machinegun. They had firepower exceeding that of the entire battalion of the King’s Own Rifles on the north side of the plateau, and they were using it.
Troyak worked his way forward, crouching low and leaping into what was once an enemy dugout. He whistled for his Marines to move up, establishing a line, and then using his night optics to surveill the situation. There was one brave Vickers MG position that had survived the helo assault, and it was chattering at the Argonauts as they advance with wild indiscriminate fire.
“Zykov! RPG!”
The corporal was ready with the weapon, and quickly blasted the bunkered position with a thundering roar. Then the sound of the auto grenade launcher the Russians had used so effectively in their mission to Ilanskiy cut through the night, and a hail of deadly bomblets saturated the ground ahead of their advance. The Iraqi soldiers that caught a glimpse of the Marines were terrified by these big men looming out of the night, with faces blackened and studded with night vision equipment that looked like devil’s horns, eyes that seemed to glow with an ungodly light. They heard them speaking and growling in a strange language, then saw the horrific fire erupting from their weapons.
One officer, trying to rally his men, instinctively fired a pistol at Troyak, but the heavy reinforced Kevlar body armor took the glancing round, and he was unharmed, gunning down the man in reprisal. The word soon spread that demons from hell had risen in the night, men so fearsome that they could not be killed. Hundreds dropped their rifles and simply fled, their eyes wide with fear.
This was the last resistance of any consequence. There were upwards of 9000 men on the plateau, but they were all wildly streaming to the east, abandoning their guns, leaping onto any truck that would still run, or atop horses and camels as their officers vainly shouted at them, waving curved Scimitars in the night. The rout had begun, and the line of sixty men moved forward, driving it relentlessly on with withering automatic weapons fire cutting down any group of the enemy who had the thought to turn and fight.
On the north side of the plateau the King’s Own Rifles watched the helicopter assault in utter disbelief. Some first thought that the planes had been sent up to support them, but Colonel Roberts knew that was not so. He gaped at the fireworks in the sky, hot missile fire, the rattle and pock of the auto cannons, the howl of the miniguns. It was as if a host of wild Jinn had swept in from the dark lake, breathing terror and death as they came.
When Lt. Colonel Everett saw the enemy lines break and run, he finally took heart. His men would have braved their task in spite of the odds, wearing down the will of the Iraqis to resist, day after day, as the Tiger Moths bombed from above, and he continued to mount aggressive night forays against the flanks and shoulders of the plateau. But they did not have to work quite so hard this time around. Men from another world were coming up the high, stony plateau like banshees in the night. Though he could not see the commandos and Marines, he could hear their assault, and when the Iraqi troops turned and fled in terror, he blew hard on his whistle and gave the order to charge on up the hill.
Up above, one of the X-3s was observing and putting in additional fire support when they noted the movement by the British troops. Popski was just behind the advancing Marines, listening on a headset that had been given him, delighted with the gizmo. Troyak had showed him how to pinch off the send button when he needed to communicate with the Sergeant, and now he called up with the news that friendly troops would soon be on their left.
Troyak stood up, raising a fist to halt his men, and he looked to see the Argonauts had done the same. He took a look at the enemy troops fleeing madly before their advance and knew the hour was won. There was no point pressing the attack now, and it was decided to leave the action to the Kings Own Rifles, and the Number 4 Company of the Assyrians who came rushing in for support. He ordered his men to go to ground, dark shadows that suddenly seemed to be swallowed by the earth. Then, with precise and well coordinated movements, the fire teams broke off and withdrew towards a pre-designated position where they were to meet up with the helicopters.
Their work here was done.
Twenty minutes later they boarded in a storm of dust, rising up into the desert night. Popski’s cheeks were red with the cold night air and the exhilaration of the action he had witnessed.
“Damn good MGs on these birds,” he said to Troyak. “And where can I get me one of those handy rifles of yours?”
The Sergeant handed him his own assault rifle. “I’ll have to show you how it operates, but with a little training you’ll fall in love with that in no time.”
Popski nodded, looking down onto the plateau that was now a broiling, smoking scene of devastation. Of the thirty guns the Iraqis had brought in to shell the base, twenty seven were destroyed or captured. The three that escaped had been moved earlier by trucks to the far side of the Euphrates. The Kings Own Rifles reached the scene in utter amazement, and groups of weeping Iraqis fell at their feet to beg for mercy. Colonel Roberts two companies quickly had over 500 prisoners, and the rest were fleeing madly east, their war on the British over for the moment.
The four helos turned west into the night, their mission plan now calling them back to Tango-1 just across the Jordanian border. There they would suck up the last of the aviation fuel they had ferried in earlier, and begin the ride to Palestine. Along the way they saw the long column of King Column en route to the relief of RAF Habbaniyah. They would leave the rest of the action there to the British who would now try to use the tiny garrison and these small flying columns to good effect, relieving the base, and then toppling the incipient rebellion of Rashid Ali and sending the German Ambassador fleeing to Mosul.
But it was far from over. When he got news of the rout of the Iraqi Army at Habbaniyah, he could hardly believe it. He was immediately on the phone to higher authorities, his voice angry in the night. “It’s the British!” he exclaimed. “They have driven off all the troops we sent to capture Habbaniyah, and now I have word more units have arrived from India at Basra. They will be coming fo
r Baghdad next! You must launch your operation immediately, before we lose everything here!”
Then he stormed away to his motor car and the long ride to Mosul. But “Operation Anvil,” a plan that had been simmering in the mind of the Führer for some days now, would become a timely reprisal to face the emergency, and the hammer was about to fall.
Chapter 9
The mobile force arrived in Palestine amid the final preparations for Operation Scimitar. It had taken two weeks to move all the troops into position. The entire Australian 7th Division, all three brigades, was now positioned south of the Lebanese border. The troops had been advised to lay low, with all leave cancelled, and even told to remove their characteristic hats so as not to be identified as Australians. Fedorov knew this force was now a third stronger than the old history, where only two brigades of the division had been available for Operation Exporter. It would be the main advance on Beirut up the coast road and as far inland as the Jordan River. Additional support here would come from the Royal Scotts Greys and Stafford Yeomanry battalions, moving up the road from Haifa in universal carriers and trucks.
Further east, the 5th Brigade of the 4th Indian Division was assembling in Jordan near the town of Irbid. It’s mission was to cross the Syrian border and seize Daraa, the town where the fabled Lawrence of Arabia had been captured and tortured by the Turks in the First World War. From there they would drive north, providing the right flank defense for the central column, where the Free French had two brigades.
This column would drive through Golan and up the main road to Damascus, but Fedorov knew these units had not been as effective as hoped, and so the troops sent by Brigadier Kinlan for “Sabre Force” would be assigned here. The French column would be led by Kinlan’s tough Gurkha battalion, and the three troops of Scimitar tanks. It was here also that the X-3s would operate as a fire support unit, and both the Argonauts and Troyak’s force would advance on the ground with the Gurkhas. Kinlan had provided some Dragon AFVs for transport for the Fairchild men and the Russian Marines by pulling from HQ troops in his brigade. The Gurkhas were going in British trucks. The Attack was set for the pre-dawn hours of March 12, and began with every hope of achieving a rapid success.
They would be up against about twenty battalions of French Colonial troops. Fedorov had been able to lay out the entire order of battle for the Vichy French in Syria. It was a mottled collection of troops from Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, local Circassian cavalry, and other tribal forces. There was one regular regiment of French Infantry, and four good battalions of the Foreign Legion that would prove to be tough, veteran troops. They also had many battalions of artillery, mostly 75mm howitzers, and 90 R-35 French tanks in the 6th and 7th African Chasseurs. Another 36 older FT17 tanks dating back to WWI were also available from the training schools. These added to a good number of old “White” armored cars, gave them a little mechanized punch, and there were plenty of trucks in the Levant to give their forces good mobility.
All in all, the Allied force had been strengthened by no more than a single Australian brigade and Kinlan’s troops, so Fedorov still expected a tough fight. He had every confidence that the British would now master the situation in Iraq, but did they have five weeks to slug through the rugged terrain of Syria and subdue the Vichy French? These were the last questions discussed before Churchill departed for England, a new lightness in his step with the godsend he had received from a distant future.
As for Fedorov, he was now back aboard Kirov at Alexandria on the eve of the operation, where the British fleet was consolidating and replenishing. Admiral Cunningham would be assigning two small task forces to support the operation as it moved up the coast. Two light cruisers would operate on the first days of the attack, designated Force A for the lead cruiser Ajax, along with Phoebe and six destroyers. They would escort the Glengyle, with three sections of Royal Marine Commandos, the No. 11 Scottish Commando tasked with trying to seize the coastal bridge over the Litani and interdicting the movement of enemy reinforcements down that road. It was this ill-fated operation that Fedorov had shared with Churchill when he tried to advise him on the difficulties of this campaign. Now he hoped the troops would fare better this time around.
If heavier support was needed, the heavy cruisers Kent and York were assigned as Force K, with four more destroyers. The battleships would stand ready at Alexandria to sortie in the event there was any sign of heavy units operating on the other side, though intelligence still had most of the Axis capital ships in Toulon and La Spezia. Tovey viewed the movement of Jean Bart and Richelieu to Toulon with some misgiving, as he knew there was yet another day of reckoning with the French Fleet, and the question of who ruled the waters of the Eastern Mediterranean had not yet been decided.
With only Invincible and Warspite now operational at Alexandria, the enemy still had a considerable advantage in big ships, even if several were still mending bruises and damage sustained in the last confrontation. For the moment, the presence of Kirov and Argos Fire was heartening, though he did not know how long he could hope to rely on those ships. So he took Churchill’s suggestion and decided to send for both Rodney and Nelson, leaving Somerville only the Valiant in Force H, as there was no longer a major threat from the French at Casablanca. The plodding battleships would be ten days steaming to Cape Town at 18 knots, and then another twelve days to Alexandria. With time for refueling at Cape Town, they would not arrive until the 5th of April.
* * *
The first word that British intelligence had of “Operation Anvil” had come from wireless intercepts from the Hindenburg, when Lütjens had used the name. Analysts thought it might refer to Crete, as the course set by the Franco-German fleet had been heading that direction before the recent engagement. Yet now the sudden buildup of planes on the Italian outpost island of Rhodes gave them second thoughts.
The Italians had controlled the Dodecanese Islands off Turkey since a treaty had ceded them the territory in 1911. Rhodes had been built up into a major aerodrome and military base, and there were fine airfields on Karpathos, and also on Leros, along with an excellent deep water port that prompted Mussolini to call the place “The Corregidor of the Mediterranean.”
JU-52 transport planes had been flocking to these islands, heavily escorted by German fighters, and landing at Klathos in the south, and at Maritsa in the north. British Gladiators had a look at the airlift, but were quickly driven off, and with only six operational Hurricanes on Crete, the R.A.F could not impede the operation, which looked to be a prelude for the German invasion of their own island. The force being moved was considerable, and there was also frenetic activity now observed at airfields all over Greece, and in the Dodecanese Islands at Kos.
That same night a number of fast cruisers and destroyers had sortied from Toulon, where the Vichy French fleet had been reinforced with the recall of ships from Casablanca. That far distant port was still a valuable outpost on the Atlantic, but after the losses they had sustained in the action against the British, Admiral Darlan had decided to consolidate his naval strength at Toulon. So it was that the powerful battleships Richelieu and Jean Bart slipped out of the harbor and raced north to Gibraltar, too fast to be caught by Rodney and Nelson. With HMS Glorious ordered south around the Cape of Good Hope, there was no Fleet Air Arm to speak of with Somerville’s Force H, as his relief carrier, Ark Royal, had not yet arrived from Home Fleet. The French took advantage and stole a march on the British, moving the two battleships, several cruisers and many super-destroyers to Toulon. There they made hasty preparations for the operation now underway, a plan that was to shift the history of the war in a sudden new direction.
So it was that the pieces were set for the opening of the battle that would soon decide the fate of events in the Middle East. Operation Scimitar was just about to begin, but the Germans had not been sitting idle, at least not the Führer, and he now had grand ideas of his own.
* * *
Hitler had fretted over the strategy for some time, with
the whispers and urging of Ivan Volkov in his ear, and the irritating disagreements of his senior officers at OKW. He became so frustrated at one point that he very nearly decided to call off the entire operation, preferring to husband all the units assigned for Barbarossa. It was then that he spoke with Erich von Manstein, listening to his cogent appraisal of the situation, and his assessment of the southern flank on the Black Sea wing of the big invasion plan. Then he determined that by using a few divisions now, before Barbarossa launched, he might make some considerable territorial gains, and intimidate the stubborn Turks into submission.
When I have Turkey in a vise of steel, he thought, with troops secure on every quarter, then we will see if they continue to equivocate. He gave orders that another Korps from the southern wing of Barbarossa would stage on the Turkish frontier, and then assembled OKW to order a new operation, bearing the same old code name to fool the British— Anvil.
The Germans still had a strong hammer that had already proven itself against the obstinate island of Malta. Student’s 7th Flieger Division had taken the British stronghold in seven days. Now only Crete and Cyprus remained as strong British outposts in the Eastern Med, and all the territory of Greece and her many islands in the Aegean had fallen under the Axis shadow. Rommel had been driven back, an annoyance that still embittered the Führer, but the bold plan in his mind had fired his imagination again. When German intelligence got word that the British were shifting an infantry division from Mersa Matruh east towards Palestine, Hitler decided to act. He called in all the senior officers and staff of OKW, his eyes glaring at the map table as he spoke.
Hammer of God (Kirov Series Book 14) Page 8
