Go Tell the Spartans c-5

by Jerry Pournelle

  "Task Force Wingate is to shift to fallback communications and maintain nominal transmission. Maximum alert; reduce movement, prepare for meeting engagement."

  "Righto."

  The interlock chimed, and the com technical looked up from his board at the rear of the command-car's hull.

  "Sir, priority report from Captain Collins."

  "Put him through. Kicker Six, you understand Jericho?"

  "Roger Jericho, sir. Sir, I've got multiple detection sensor and tripwire-detonated mine sightings all along my line of advance here."

  "Merry times." Owensford looked down at his map; wheeled vehicles could advance through this section of the southern Dales, only about four-tenths of the ground was under forest, but if you counted that and very broken terrain it channeled an attack quite nicely. Channeled it down to about four alternative angles of approach within the fifty klicks on either side of the arms sighting that had started this whole affair.

  "Check for command-detonated devices within your perimeter, Lynn," he said.

  "Shit, I never thought-sorry."

  "Quite all right," Owensford said with a bleak smile. "We're only four klicks south. You have your orders, Kicker Six. Stand by one." He turned. "Andy, how do I say 'Use explosives to clear mines. Conserve troops.'?"

  "GLOSSARY. HILDEBRAND."

  "Got it. Captain, your codes are Glossary, I say again Glossary. Hildebrand. I say again Hildebrand."

  "Roger. Glossary, Hildebrand. And TIGER to you, too. Out."

  "Andy, check confirmation all units acknowledge condition Jericho," Peter said. "Then get me Task Force Atlas, Lieutenant-Colonel Barton." They were all wearing their Royal Army hats tonight, that was the central reserve, in Dodona. The line there at least was secure.

  A wait of a few minutes. "Barton here. Ready to scramble."

  "Ready. Scramble." There was a tell-tale sing-song background in his earpiece. "Scrambled."

  "Scrambled," Barton confirmed. "OK. I've been following it."

  "You get the same feeling I do, Ace?"

  "That joyful, tingling sense of anticipation that comes just before you jam your dick into the garbage grinder? Yeah."

  "How do you figure it?"

  "Could be either an agent in place, a pirate tap in the satellite, or both. They know more than we thought, and they've got more force than we expected."

  There was no visual link, but it took no imagination for Peter to see Barton's face, cynical grin, toothpick moving rapidly from one side of his mouth to the other. "Status of the reserves, Ace?"

  "Nominal. Of course we're using up Thoth at a fearful rate, ditto ARM."

  "Any effect?"

  "Sure. Their jamming's just about stopped, and Miscowsky and Katz are having a field day. Between them, they've taken out the equivalent of a battalion."

  "Think we got all their antennas?"

  "Hell, no."

  "Yeah, I agree," Peter said.

  Owensford looked at the map again. Four Brotherhood battalions with his Task Force Erwin column in the south, and the reinforced battalion of the First RSI. The same with Task Force Wingate in the north. One company with the feint. The mechanized battalion of the First outside Olynthos with two squadrons of armored cars, ready to back up Wingate. Four companies of Legion troops in Dodona, with all the ground-effect transport that the Middle Valley could provide, fast enough to reinforce either Wingate or Erwin. On the map the advancing columns looked like the jaws of a beast, closing around the south-central Dales. On the ground it was fewer than ten thousand men moving through an area of rough terrain larger than many countries back on Earth.

  Plenty of troops in reserve, if you counted the militia, Ace had been working miracles with them. Another full brigade of first-line mobilized Brotherhood fighters along the river ready to intervene if it must, and the twenty thousand or so of the second-line were standing to arms on the defensive, giving him a secure base. Five times that number of third-line, women and older men, not field units but ready to fight and doing noncombatant work. None of them very mobile, unfortunately. Sparta's blessing and curse, the Eurotas; it made bulk transport in the settled regions so easy that there was an overwhelming temptation to put off developing a ground-transport infrastructure.

  Should I have taken more of the militia in with me? he thought. Then: no, the reasons are still valid. Risky enough to have them standing by as emergency reserves.

  Good militia were still part-time troops, unpracticed in large-unit maneuvers. The Brotherhood fighters were first-rate in their own neighborhoods. That was one reason nobody had ever taken a serious crack at Sparta, the Brotherhoods could field better than a third of a million at a pinch. The problem with that Swiss Militia system was that if you called everyone to arms, there was no one left to do the work; and Sparta's economy was in bad enough shape as it was.

  Losing too many of them could be absolutely fatal; at a pinch, Sparta could stand heavy casualties to its offensive force, but the Brotherhoods were the iron frame that kept this section of the Valley under government control.

  "All right, we probe, but carefully," he said at last. "This operation is primarily a reconnaissance in force, anyway." The best way to learn about an opponent was to fight him. "It all depends on what they've got and how good it is. We've already learned something about that."

  "Yeah; they're pretty good, and they've got a secure communications system in there. Which is more than we do." Owensford nodded thoughtfully; it looked unpleasantly like the enemy had been preparing this for years. The whole of the Dales could be linked together with optical thread-cable and permanent line-of-sight stuff.

  "The main thing is not to get hurt," Peter said. "Get that out to all units. If the other guys want to play, dig in and pound them. They're better than we thought they were, but they're still just light infantry.

  "Meanwhile, let the SAS teams come home, but keep sending them fire support as long as they can spot targets. After all, it's what they're out there for."

  "I ain't worried about them," Barton said. "But there's something sour about this whole operation."

  "I got that feeling too."

  "And we're blind. Pete, I suggest we wait for new satellite pix before we commit."

  "Trust them?" Owensford asked innocently.

  "Oh. Now that you mention it, no. Guess I don't."

  "So we have to try something else. Bring up the birds; one with me, one with Task Force Wingate. Keep them well back." Tiltrotor VTOL aircraft, commandeered from the RSMP for the seismic-mapping project. They could transport a complete platoon of infantry; right now they were crammed with other stuff. It would not do to put them in harm's way, of course. Aircraft over a battlefield had been an impossibility since good light seeker rockets became common. The enemy certainly had those.

  "You're the boss," Barton said.

  "Bring up, code-" He did a quick search on his data base. "The code is Babylon."

  "Babylon." A pause. "Babylon it is. Anything else?"

  "That's it."

  "Task Force Atlas, out."

  "Out," Peter said.

  Next. "Andy, let Heavy Weapons company dig in and prepare to fire support missions. Have Scout company pull all forward units inside artillery support range." Not many proper guns, most of it was big mortars, but still enough range once the scouts drew in.

  "Roger. SAS teams report enemy activity slacking off."

  Peter glanced at the munitions expenditure readouts. "I should bloody hope so. Haven't you got a better report than that?"

  "Miscowsky reports 'DYANAMO.' That translates as 'heavily engaged.' "

  "Other teams?"

  "Much the same. Heard from Katz finally. His report prior to acknowledging Jericho was 'JESUS CHRIST!' Now reports, 'Heavily engaged, am hurting enemy.' "

  "Good." The SAS teams are doing their job, but I don't like this. Ace doesn't either. "Bring them home. Send out escort patrols to assist."

  "Suggestion," Captain Lahr said.

&
nbsp; "Spill it."

  "This is all by the book," Lahr said. "They'll set up ambushes for the escorts, sure as hell."

  "Gotcha. Yeah, send an SAS Thoth controller along with each escort team. With luck they'll find some targets going in while the teams kick ass coming out."

  "Roger that."

  "Now get me Collins again."

  "Can't guarantee security."

  "Understood."

  "Coming up," Andy Lahr said.

  There was a pause. "Kicker Six here."

  "Jericho."

  "Understood."

  "Captain, I need an estimate of how far that mine obstacle stretches. . . ."

  "About five hundred meters to my left, sir; three hundred to the right, and it's anchored in a ravine. About fifty to a hundred meters thick. We estimate a minimum of three hours to clear a path suitable for vehicles."

  "Stand by one." Owensford studied the map. The western end of the minefield ran down toward a valley; there was a lip to that hill, a traversable slope beyond the mines, and then broken wooded ground down to the low point.

  What was it Ace said about garbage grinders? That gap might as well have a sign on it, "Please insert male generative organ here." Well, a trap you know is a trap is no trap.

  "Stand by for orders," Peter said.

  No point in having Collins waste troops on mines. Use fuel-aid to blast hell out of the area and be done with it. The main thing was to stay out of trouble. Owensford typed orders.

  "DIG IN. STAY DUG IN UNTIL MINEFIELDS CLEARED. USE ARTILLERY AND HE TO CLEAR MINE AREA. DONT RISK TROOPS ON MINES. PREPARE TO PUNISH ENEMY ATTACKERS."

  "Andy, put this through the data base and give me the codes. Thanks."

  "OK. Attention to orders. Code DECEMBER. Repeat December. Code TRILOGY. Repeat Trilogy. Code ELK HILL. Repeat Elk Hill."

  "DECEMBER, TRILOGY, ELK HILL. Roger."

  "Code TIGER."

  "Tiger it is."

  "Okey Doke. Out." Peter Owensford reached up and undogged the hatch, climbing up to stand with head and shoulders in the chill air. Cythera was up, shedding patchy moonlight through scud clouds. He cycled the facemask until the scene had a depthless brightness. The main body of Task Force Erwin was moving at the equivalent of a quick walk, no more. A dozen armored cars were leapfrogging forward, moving in spurts and then waiting in hull-down positions while the flanking infantry companies swept through the wooded areas to either side in skirmish line; behind both the bulk of the expeditionary force marched in company columns, enclosing their mule-born supply trains.

  That changed even as he watched. The APCs halted and spilled their eight-man crews to begin setting up the heavy weapons. Shovels and the 'dozer blade of the engineering vehicle began preparing firing positions for the mortars, well spaced out and downslope from the crest. Still further down, the Headquarters troops were digging in as well, spider-holes and pits for their heavy machine guns and perimeter gatlings.

  "Sir, Senior Lieutenant Fissop." The commander of the HQ company. "He requests permission to blow standing timber for entrenchment purposes."

  "By all means," Owensford said, studying his map again.

  Assume there's a blocking force near that minefield, he thought. Can't be too large. Now, what avenues of attack are there . . . ahh.

  "Message to Third Brotherhood. Close up to two klicks west of us and advance using this ridge"-his light-pencil traced it-"having his mortars ready for support"-mule-born l25mms-"and begin a probe here." That ought to put them right behind whoever was waiting for him to swing around the mines.

  "Twenty-Second is to maintain distance on the Third's left, ready to move in support. Eighteenth is to close up to within five klicks to our rear, and Fifty-first to deploy in place for the moment on the right." A good well-rounded position, ready to attack, retreat or switch front at need, and capable of interdicting the low covered ground on all sides.

  "Sir, CO Task Force Wingate."

  "Patch."

  "Slater here," a familiar voice said.

  "Copy, George," Owensford said.

  "I've run into a spot of trouble."

  "Details?"

  "Mines, snipers and teams of rocket launchers infiltrating between my columns. Lost two armored cars and about fifteen casualties; we've counted about five times that in enemy dead. They're willing to take casualties to hurt us."

  "Interesting."

  "Isn't it? Also, two of my forward support bases along the route back report harassing fire from mortars. One twenty-five millimeter stuff, shoot-and-scoot, they're working counterbombardment."

  With locally made counterbattery radars; Owensford had no special confidence in them. SingIe-frequency, and the innards were positively neolithic, hand-assembled transistors and chipboards salvaged from imported consumer electronics.

  "Stand by for orders." He looked up "Conserve Ammunition" and "Fire if target under observation and located." "Code HAWKWOOD. Repeat Hawkwood. Code ARAGON. Repeat Aragon."

  "Hawkwoqd. Aragon. Roger."

  "Stand by one."

  "Roger."

  "Intelligence. What's on Elint?" Electronic traffic interception.

  "Nothing, sir."

  There were ways to handle movement without any radio traffic at all, but not many. One way was to move everything according to a prearranged plan. Like terrorists. That would be interesting. He switched back to the commander of the northern column.

  "We'll know more in a bit. Hop to it."

  "Roger. Wingate, out."

  "Come on, birdie," Owensford murmured to himself. "Because here I sit, bloody blind."

  "Senior Group Leader," the communications tech said, "Base One reports there was a three-minute lapse in enemy satellite-link commo immediately after the SAS teams were attacked. They are now using alternates, and code book."

  "Thank you," Geoffrey Niles said. "Results?"

  "Heavy casualties, sir. The SAS teams are calling down some sort of smart weapon bombardment, and they're all well dug-in. They've shredded our people, some have already cut and run." He touched the earphone of his headset. "The consultants say the weapons are being lofted by short-range rockets from the main enemy columns. Antiradiation missiles are giving our jamming serious problems."

  "Damn." He frowned; overrunning the SAS teams would have been a significant blow to the enemy's capacities. Skilly's orders had been quite specific, though. "Break off the attacks. They'll probably try to send someone to pull the scouts out. Have the attack teams set ambushes on the likely approach paths. Otherwise, stay out of visual observation range and harass with mortar fire."

  "Counterbattery hits our mortar people every time they fire."

  "Poor babies." Niles looked at his chronometer; 0200. "Time to surveillance satellite overpass?"

  "One hour twenty-seven minutes, sir." A pause. "Sir, Base One reports two enemy aircraft are lifting off-schedule from Olynthos and Dodona." They had agents in place in both towns. All you needed was someone with binoculars, and a zeroed-in laser transponder aimed at a spot in the hills to the west and south. A negligible chance of someone having detection gear in the path of a tight beam during the few seconds it was in use.

  "Tiltrotors. Looks like they're heading for the rear zones to do Elint and remote-sensor interpretation." The pickups would be forward. "ETA forty minutes."

  "Very good," he said with a fierce grin, looking back at the map. The enemy were quick on the uptake, but there were still things they didn't know. "I'm moving forward to take personal command of the blocking force. Sutchukil," he continued to his adjutant, "keep me notified of the status of the aircraft."

  "Sir," the Thai transportee said; he was a short stocky man with a grin that never reached his eyes, an aristocrat and would-be artist shopped to BuReloc in some local power struggle.

  Outside the tarp shelter it was growing rapidly colder in the gully under the light of the sinking moon; Niles stopped for a second to pull on his thin insulated gloves and fasten the top of his parka. B
reath puffed white as the headquarters section fell in around him; there was little other movement in the rocky draw where they had left the vehicles. Those were simple frameworks of wood on skis, holding little but a light airship engine with rear-mounted propeller and a fuel tank. The troops' skis and the sleds that carried heavy equipment were stacked nearby, several layers thick against the rough limestone of the cliff wall.

  "La joue commence," he murmured to himself.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Crofton's Essays and Lectures in Military History (2nd Edition)

  Professor John Christian Falkenberg II:

  Delivered at Sandhurst, August 22nd, 2087

  The nature of the societies which raise armies, the economic resources available to the state, and the nature and aims of the wars which the state wishes to, or fears it must, wage, are all mutually dependent.

  Thus for the last two centuries of its existence, the Roman Republic kept an average of ten percent of its total free citizen population under arms, or half or more its adult males. This was an unprecedented accomplishment, made possible in a preindustrial world only by mass plunder of the whole Mediterranean world-directly, by tribute, and through the importation of slave forced labor-and a very high degree of social cohesion. When Hannibal was at the gates of Rome and fifty thousand of Italy's soldiers lay dead on the field of Cannae, the Republic never even thought of yielding. New armies sprang up as if from the very earth, fueled by the bottomless well of patriotic citizen-yeomen. By contrast, under the Empire a mere three hundred thousand long-service professionals served to guard the frontiers of a defensive-minded state. No longer could the provinces be plundered to support a total-mobilization war effort, and it was precisely the aim of the Principate to depoliticize-and hence demilitarize-the citizenry. By the fifth century, relatively tiny barbarian armies of a few score thousands were wandering at will through the Imperial heartlands.

  Eighteenth-century Europe saw another turn of the cycle. The "absolute" monarchies of the period brought limited wars, with limited means for limited aims. They had neither the power nor the wish to tax heavily or conscript; their armies were recruited from the economically marginal-aristocrats and gutter dregs-and waged war in a formalized, ritual minuet. A few years later the French Republic proclaimed the levee en masse, and the largest battle of the Napoleonic Wars involved nearly a million men. The cycle repeated itself with a vengence in the next century; in 1840 the combined armies of Hamburg, Bremen, Lubeck and the Grand Duchy of Oldenburg numbered some three thousand men. In 1914, those same territories contributed in excess of thirty thousand men to the forces of Imperial Germany, and replaced them several times over in the holocaust that followed.