by Andy Farman
Oz could not get inside the CP, all the signallers had been roused and there was no space but CSM Tessler saw him peering through the blackout and squeezed his way out to join him above ground.
His eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness and he inhaled the smell of the trees and damp earth about them.
“How’s it going Oz?”
“That depends, is the platoon in trouble?”
The earlier high rate of fire in the distance was ebbing and flowing with periods of silence in between.
“They may have bumped the point section of a company, and not another patrol. They just fought off one attack and Col is digging in and calling for mortar fire support.”
Oz nodded.
“I passed the mortars on the way here, they aren’t firing though?”
“Brigade have tasked an Apache to do an over flight with infra-red to get a handle on opposition numbers, they won’t fly with rounds going down range…as soon as they are done then Colin gets his fire missions.”
Oz frowned but in the dark Ray Tessler couldn’t see the wrinkled forehead. “A handle on numbers, am I missing something here?” Irritation was growing within him. “…just shoot the sodding missions and worry about sodding numbers later, for God’s sake!”
Ray let the fit of pique pass before gesturing toward an unattended Warrior, which he headed towards whilst fishing a packet of cigarettes from a breast pocket. Once inside where the light wouldn’t show he handed one across.
“The company commander doesn’t like me smoking, he thinks it sets a bad example to the boys and is bad for my health…like being an infantryman in a war zone isn’t.”
When they had both lit up he blew out a lung full of smoke.
“There’s the remnants of a soviet airborne brigade wandering around somewhere in our rear, the brigade commander wants to know if this is some of them trying to regain their lines and the recce that got spotted was them looking for a safe route, rather than an attack on our support units.”
Sat across from him in the darkness Oz took a drag on his fag, illuminating his features in orange light.
“If it is a small group they’ll call it a day and try to find another way around Ray, but if it’s more than a company they may try to fight their way through.”
“I think that has occurred to them up at brigade Oz, and they will see it as a chance to take out some of those soviet airborne.”
Oz stubbed out the cigarette angrily.
“That’s my platoon and my mate out there, Ray.”
“And your platoon and your mate are British soldiers Oz, doing a soldiers job.”
“Yeah I know, I don’t have to be ecstatic about it though.”
Back in the forest a panting Guardsman crawled through the undergrowth dragging a pair of Bergens. Rounds cracked through the trees above him but only enough to harass the Guardsmen and remind them they weren’t alone.
The sounds of feverish digging by men hampered by the necessity of having to do it lying prone, filled the air. On arriving back at his position he found CSM Probert had carried on digging a shell scrape for him, and he uttered a word of thanks as the CSM picked up his bondook and crawled back into the trees, taking six of the riflemen and a gimpy with him.
Now that each of his men were reunited with their Bergens and the extra ammunition they held, Colin set up shop in the centre of the location where he could best control things. He sent a pair of riflemen to reinforce each of the flanks and kept the remaining two with the GPMG as a quick reaction force, only then did he begin digging some cover for himself.
So far they had been bloody lucky, the last attack had showed that the soviet airborne troops did not know the disposition or numbers of those they were taking on. It had come at his right cut off group from directly across the track, and half the paratroopers had unknowingly entered the original killing zone dominated by the killer group, and a combination of small arms and Claymores had chopped them up. They hadn’t been quite as fortunate with the remainder though and Colin had to bring up the remaining gimpy from the killer group in order to beat them back, but they had still managed to get within grenade range of the Guardsmen, killing one of his men and slightly wounding another.
His own shell scrape was only a couple of inches deep when someone screamed a warning, and mortar rounds began exploding on the position.
Seven and a half miles north an oblong shaped radar array sat at the rear of a Foden truck, pointing toward the forest. It picked out each mortar round twice during its time of flight and the information allowed the operators of ‘Arthur’, the artillery locating radar, to backtrack the flight of the rounds to within ten feet of the base plate positions they had been fired from. The information was passed along until it arrived at B Battery, 17 Field Regiment Royal Artillery, and the barrels of its AS 90, 155mm self-propelled guns swung around to the required bearing and elevation, but remained there without firing.
Colin lay in the shallow depression with his hands pressed to his ears as yet another belt of mortar rounds straddled the Guards enclave, one striking a tree and amputating the top twenty feet from the rest of the trunk, splinters of wood found soft tissue below as the severed section crashed down.
Colin didn’t hear the beat of rotor blades passing overhead, but the Apaches occupants noted the fall of shot matched the point on the map they had been told the friendly forces were, they reported that important item back and continued with their task.
Once the last round had impacted Colin called for another sitrep before again switching to the company net, requesting once again the defensive fires that would bracket his position and give them some breathing space to carry out a quick reorg. He didn’t hear the reply because the ground rose up and smacked him in the face, filling his mouth with mud and pine needles as more rounds slammed onto the position.
It takes bags of guts and discipline to make maximum use of supporting fire, because it entails the risk of taking casualties from it. While the rounds were still landing a Russian paratrooper captain rose to his feet just across the wide firebreak from the Guards right flank and ran forwards, firing from the hip. Two dozen men followed him, well spread out in a line and screaming like banshee’s as they did so.
Nikoli grunted in pain as he was struck in the right thigh, but the leg didn’t collapse so he ran on, borne along by a mixture of fear and adrenaline.
Halfway across the firebreak the sound of his men firing was replaced by two tremendous explosions, and he flinched and faltered, deafened by the blasts and robbed of his night vision by the flash of the detonations.
Falling to the ground he squeezed his eyes closed to rid them of the after image left by the flashes, and on opening them again he looked to his left and right, seeing that two men were still with him, but of the rest they either lay screaming in wounded agony or broken and motionless where they had been flung.
Pure luck had guided him to this spot; the Claymore that had covered this area had been fired on the previous assault, which was cold comfort for the men on the left and right.
Raising his head a fraction Nikoli could see they were just twelve or so feet from the tree line, and muzzle flashes from the dark interior showed the NATO troops perimeter was about ten feet beyond that.
Fresh firing came from behind them and Nikoli knew the next wave was about to begin its assault. His right thigh was now throbbing in earnest but he ignored the pain and reached inside an ammunition pouch for a grenade, showing it to the other two men who did the same, and when all three pins were pulled he raised himself on one arm and they threw them towards the nearest enemy position.
When all three grenades went off he pushed himself to his feet but stumbled as his right leg gave way and was then knocked over backwards by the falling body of one of the men, his right leg was bent backwards, trapped underneath him and he screamed in agony, pushing at the dead paratroopers body that bore him down.
In his pain Nikoli was only distantly aware of the ground bucking
beneath him, with the detonation of 81mm mortar rounds impacting on the next wave of paratroops, and the more distant explosions of 155mm artillery rounds creating ruin on the soviet mortar line. With a final heave he rolled away the dead body and freed his injured leg, but relief brought a roaring in his ears and darkness dimmed his vision as the rain began once more, beating down upon the already sodden terrain.
Colin lay on his side and planted a foot on the prone body of a soviet para that had breached the perimeter, entering through a gap created by the grenading, and gripping the pistol grip of his SLR with both hands he pulled backwards, freeing the attached bayonet that emerged from the dead man’s chest with a sucking sound.
His hands shook and he had to take a deep breath to compose himself before leading his tiny reserve at a crawl towards the sound of screaming at the point of penetration. A Guardsman thrashed on the ground with both hands pressed before his eyes, and Colin could only remove a morphine syrette and jab it into the blinded man’s thigh. He emptied the man’s ammunition pouches, handing one of the magazines and a grenade to a rifleman before unzipping the casualties smock, extracting a belt of fifty rounds which he snapped in half, tossing one half to the gunner. He repeated this with the wounded man’s oppo after confirming no pulse remained, but stuffed everything inside his own smock for redistribution elsewhere, and finally he removed the I.D tags from about the neck and put them in a pocket.
Colin left his pair of Guardsman plugging the gap and hauled the wounded soldier back to the centre of the position by the yoke of his webbing, where he left him.
The Army Air Corps AH Mk 1 Apache finished its sweep at the forests southern edge and egresses to the north east to take up a holding pattern whilst someone decided what next it should do.
Standing in the open and listening to the sound of it depart a soviet paratrooper removed his helmet and raised his face toward the falling rain. The droplets made little effect on the grease based camouflage cream that broke up the contours of features made gaunt by half rations and near exhaustion, and failed to absorb into the matted greying hair that was normally shaved almost to the scalp.
As if accepting that the rain could not wash away the weight of responsibility he shook his head as a dog rids its coat of unwanted suds, and replaced the headgear.
He viewed the members of his small staff that crouched beneath the bows of the trees.
“Gentlemen, I do not believe that taking cover fooled that aircraft for a second, they know we are here now.”
Reaching down he assisted one of the men to his feet but the man could only grunt his thanks, a dressing about his head held a shattered jaw in place and the often cold soup he was forced to ingest did not provided sufficient calories. He was desperately weak and for a few moments he clung to the arm of Colonel General Alontov as he fought for balance. “It’s alright Stefan, one way or another our trek is coming to an end.”
Without aid from their own forces Alontov had led his units back towards the east, largely avoiding the limited forces SACEUR had been able to spare for mopping up.
Their radios had failed even before leaving Braunschweig, because there is a limit to how much an airborne unit can carry and without a single re-supply drop the radios had lasted only as long as their finite stock of batteries.
The route east had been a zigzag affair of forced marches by night and mainly sleepless days after they had gone to ground to avoid detection during the daylight hours. Fires were out of the question and the inclement weather had denied them much in the way of sleep.
“I do not know what forces are currently ahead of us but I think we can be certain that they will increase, come the dawn.”
Those present watched him divest himself of all equipment except that needed to fight, and then they too removed their packs and filled pockets with the spare ammunition they held.
“Send runners out to each of the battalion commanders, inform them that NATO knows the brigade is here in this forest and they are to act as they see fit in their own individual circumstances. Either to dig in or to try and break out…just cause as much mayhem as possible to draw NATO reserves away from the front”
Standing quietly on the fringes were the two company commanders of his own elite Spetznaz troops who had jumped into Leipzig with him a hundred years ago, or so it now seemed. Over a third of their number had fallen since that night, and now an equal number carried wounds.
Serge left his staff to complete their preparations and led the pair away.
“Well now boys, we have some proper work to do, no more of this skulking in the woods and avoiding fights with half trained Bundswehr reservists. The funds we appropriated from the late Comrade Peridenko have been divided up equally and someone I trust in Moscow will be delivering it in gold to the next of kin of everyone in the companies, the dead and the still living.”
Neither man replied, accepting the deeper meaning of the words with fatalism.
“Go and bring up your men to the track junction we just passed, I have some final details to go over with the staff and then I shall join you there.”
The more senior of the company commanders had shared many adventures and adversities with his boss and had obeyed without question every order he had been given, be it to torch an Afghan hill village or act as chauffeur to a beautiful blonde air hostess, returning her home from a burning dacha.
“What are your orders Colonel General?”
Serge smiled in the darkness.
“Someone picked a fight with us tonight Mikhail, and we are going to finish it.”
CHAPTER six
The defensive fires bought the beleaguered platoon of Guardsmen the time to shorten their perimeter, bring the wounded into the centre of the position and do a proper redistribution of the ammunition. Relocation also necessitated a resumption of digging, the hacking out of fresh shell scrapes to replace those they had abandoned.
Twice the Guardsmen stopped the digging to defend the position against attacks coming from their left, and the second of these was unhindered by Claymores. In that second attack on their left, soviet paratroopers breached the perimeter and the fighting became a hand-to-hand melee of fists, boots, bayonets and entrenching tools before they were driven off.
The attackers left nine behind, seven lying inside and outside of the position and two wounded, who Colin had moved to the centre with his own wounded once they had been stripped of weapons.
Ammunition could become a problem later, so he had each rifleman give up twenty rounds which the gunners No.2s made up into belts using expended links. Those belts would be all ‘Ball’, with no tracer included but at the ranges the fights were taking place at there was no need.
He added another two sets of ID tags to the six already in a pocket of his smock and wiped off blood and hair from the edge of his entrenching tool, before continuing with his shell scrape.
Not too far away, the opposition had backed off and were carrying out their own reorg after the failure of their hasty attacks upon the British position, and following this there was a lull until more mortars could be brought up in preparation for a deliberate attack.
The Apaches thermal imager couldn’t provide an exact head count for the heat sources they had found but they reported between fifteen hundred and two thousand men were down in the trees, and headquarters 3(UK) Mechanised ordered the immediate reinforcement of the rear screen before requesting permission from SACEUR to employ MLRS on those concentrations not engaged or gravitating toward the Guards platoon in the forest.
Lt Col Reed had sent for Jim Popham, ordering him to take a company worth of the 82nd men in Warriors to the point where 1 Platoon was supposed to pass through into the rear of 7th/8th Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders lines.
Once he had taken a platoon from each of the American companies Jim mounted the lead AFV and was about to give the signal for the ten vehicles to move off, when he heard the sound of someone rapping on the troop hatch door. It opened to admit Sergeant Osgood.
“Sir, may I have your permission to come along, sir please?”
Major Popham did not immediately give that permission. “Sergeant, I have all the men I need, why should I bring you?”
“Interpreter sir, you don’t speak Geordie.”
Jim opened his mouth to deny the request, but there was an edge of desperation in the man’s voice and he nodded his assent instead.
“Okay, let’s get this show on the road then, climb in and shut that hatch.”
Oz started to close it but a large meaty paw appeared in the open hatchway, followed by Arnie Moore’s broad frame.
The RSM didn’t ask the major for permission he just clambered in and growled at a young trooper, who hurriedly budged up to make room for him.
Jim’s voiced his exasperation.
“Sarn’t Major, just what the hell are you doing here?”
Arnie seated himself opposite Oz.
“Interpreter sir.”
The major gestured towards the Guards sergeant. “Apparently that alleged need has already been met, thank you.”
“Yes sir, I see that.” Arnie replied, and then nodded at Sergeant Osgood sat opposite.
“But he doesn’t speak American.”
Jim clambered into the fighting vehicles cupola, muttering something about his wife having more control over the second graders in her school than he had over grown men in a military unit.
During the lull L/Cpl Bethers found that a weariness had come over him, a reaction from the adrenaline that ceased its infusion into his system and he caught himself doing neck breakers, the involuntary nodding of the head as the brain switches off. Removing his helmet he bent his head to allow the rain to fall unhindered onto his neck in an effort to revive himself, but the exhaustion was too great and his eyes closed.
