by James Rosone
The captain opened the discussion. “One of my officers called and woke me up an hour ago. He said they saw landing ships heading to the beach, so I got dressed and came to the station immediately. Then, you guys show up. I want to know what’s going on and why you Americans are here.”
“Captain Anand, our president issued an ultimatum to your prime minister two weeks ago. India needed to withdraw from the Eastern Alliance and end the war, or India was going to face severe consequences. We are here to secure the city of Chennai and the port before we move inland to hunt down and destroy the remaining army units and force your prime minister to surrender,” Slater explained.
The police captain shook his head before responding. “You realize we have over a billion people living in India. If we wanted you gone, it wouldn’t take us long to drive you from our country. Putting that aside, what do you want with my police department? This was clearly the first place you came to.”
“As I said earlier, we don’t want to fight the people of India,” Slater answered. “Our disagreement is with your government. What we want is your help. We want your police officers to continue to do their jobs. Arrest criminals, man traffic corners, and go about your daily duties. We’re going to set up our headquarters across the street at the maintenance depot. I would like to coordinate the movement of other units through this part of the city with you.”
The captain snorted. “I suppose you Americans are making this same proposal to other police stations around the city as well?”
“Yes, and to your local and city officials. Again, our disagreement is not with the people of India, it’s with your government. Until your leaders end your alliance with the Chinese, we are going to stay here.”
The two of them stared at each other for a few tense minutes, not saying anything as they sized each other up. Captain Anand eyed the oversized Private Leiter standing in his door and his huge machine gun. He shook his head.
“Fine,” he replied. “My men will go about their normal duties, just like any other day. We’ll work with you to keep our part of the city calm and under control. I can’t control what happens in other parts of the city or what the government does.”
“None of us want to see any more bloodshed, Captain. We have an opportunity to make the best of a bad situation. I hope you understand that. This situation will hopefully be resolved in with your government in a few days now that we’ve arrived.”
Slater stood, then instructed his interpreter to tell the captain to bring his officers in so they could all be briefed on what had been agreed to and what they would be doing next. What happened in the next few hours could very well determine if their sector of Chennai would be peaceful or turn into a complete mess.
*******
Chennai Container Terminal
Major General Alan Morrison stood near the terminal building as he observed the second RO-RO ship pull up to the dock to begin offloading its equipment. The first ship had docked half an hour ago, and already, 1st Armored Regiment had B Squadron offloaded and ready to go. The thirty-eight M1A1 Abrams battle tanks were even now moving to a marshaling point near the port entrance. Morrison’s hope was to get his entire brigade offloaded before sunup, so the unit could begin to get their part of the city secured before the area became a zoo. The Americans would then move in with their own RO-RO ships and get the rest of their divisions offloaded.
“Any word yet from our scout units? Have they made it to the Ripon building and secured it?”
“Yes, General,” replied a major who was coordinating the brigade’s operations. “Captain Foster’s unit just checked in. They’re securing the building as we speak. He said we probably won’t be able to make contact with most of the government officials until later in the morning.”
“Good,” said General Morrison. “I also want to know immediately when SAS makes contact with the mayor and the governor. They should be securing them both by now.”
“Sir, the mayor and governor have already been secured and are being driven to the Ripon building as we speak. They’ll be there waiting for you when you arrive,” replied the major.
An hour later, as the light of dawn began to push away the night, Major General Morrison found himself sitting across a table from the governor of the state, the mayor, the head of police and a couple of other senior members of the city government. None of them looked very pleased to be speaking with him.
“I demand to know what you are doing in our country!” shouted Governor Bakshi, who looked disheveled and out of sorts. The SAS men clearly had not given him much time to throw some clothes on before they’d carted him away in a vehicle to be at this meeting.
“Governor Bakshi, please calm yourself,” General Morrison said in his thick Australian accent. “Our quarrel is not with you or your city. However, until your prime minister renounces his unholy union with the Eastern Alliance and makes peace with the Allies, I’m afraid we are going to be turning Chennai into an Allied base camp of sorts.”
This announcement generated a lot of looks of concern from the politicians.
“You can’t simply occupy our city like this,” countered the mayor hotly.
“I can’t?” asked General Morrison, who was clearly enjoying himself. He waved his hands around and gestured out the windows. “I believe I already have. By the end of the day, I’ll have 12,000 soldiers in Chennai, and in three days I’ll have over 50,000…and more will continue to come. I’m not sure if you are aware, but the Allies recently defeated the Russians. Where do you think that large European army is headed?” he asked.
Wisely, the chief of police replied, “What do you want?”
A smile crept across Morrison’s face as he surveyed the men before him. “I’m going to offer you two options, although I hope you choose the first one. In option one, we would leave you in power to govern your city as you see fit. In time, as we secure the state, you’ll continue to administer it as you previously have. There would be no immediate changes. The police would continue to do their jobs, and life would go on as our army steadily makes its way to the countryside to do battle with your army. The second option is this—I will have you all removed and replaced with those that will comply with our requirements. You will be locked up as enemy prisoners of war until the war is concluded and prisoners are either released or swapped. I’ll give you all five minutes to discuss this amongst yourselves, but I advise you to take me up on option one. Being a former Commonwealth member, I do hope we can keep things civil, but the Americans are not as understanding as I am.”
He then stood up and left the room to let them deliberate for a moment and to check in on the rest of his units. The first six hours of this landing were critical. Either things were going to go smoothly, or there were going to get ugly quickly.
*******
Chennai
Hill Five
The sun was fully up and so was the city. Hundreds of people had come out to see who these odd-looking soldiers were that had suddenly taken over this hilltop position overlooking the airport. The main highway running next to the airport had been closed off and so had nearly every entrance to the highways in the city. Tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, helicopters and fighter planes could be seen everywhere as the sleepy city woke up to suddenly find out it had been not only invaded by a foreign power, but seemingly been completely occupied without so much as a shot fired.
“Sergeant Price, what kind of plane is that?” one of his soldiers asked, pointing at a propeller-driven plane that was being offloaded. It looked like nearly a dozen of them were being pulled out of the cavernous bay of the giant cargo plane.
Lifting his pocket binoculars to his eyes to get a better look, Price smiled. “That, my friend, is our close air support. It’s one of the Air Force’s new Beechcraft AT-6 Wolverine turboprop ground-attack planes. It’s a freaking beast.”
The soldier grinned. “Good. We may need them if the Indians don’t surrender.”
“It’ll work out, Specialist
. If not, that’s what we’re here for,” Sergeant Price replied good-naturedly.
His radio chirped. “Zombie Five, this is Zombie Six. How copy?”
Price depressed his talk button. “Zombie Six, this is Five. Go.”
“I need you to report to my location,” his captain explained.
“Copy that. I’m on my way,” Price responded. He bade the group farewell as they continued to watch the Air Force offload additional helicopters, vehicles and other equipment they would need.
Trudging through the camp that the Airborne troopers had quickly begun to set up, he made his way over to what appeared to be a headquarters area. Spotting Major Fowler and Lieutenant Martinez, he walked over.
“What’s going on, Sir?” Price asked.
Major Fowler replied, “We’ve got a new mission and some wheels. Major General Morrison—you know, the Australian general—he’s given us a mission. We’re going to head to a small village by the name of Voyalanallur a couple of kilometers outside the city here. Once we get there, we’ll need to identify a suitable location for an artillery regiment to set up shop, establish a firebase, and create a base of operations for reconnaissance.”
Sergeant Price looked at the map they’d handed him and traced his finger across it from their current position to where the little village was located. It was an ideal position to set up an artillery base; any guns set up there could provide support to any location in the city and twenty plus kilometers beyond it, which would certainly be helpful if they ran into any serious trouble.
“OK, sounds good. When do we leave?” asked Price.
“As soon as our vehicles arrive from the airfield. That said, the rest of the company is going to do this mission,” explained Fowler. “I’m personally tasking you, your platoon and Lieutenant Martinez here with gathering intelligence on an Indian air base.”
Price and Martinez exchanged a surprised look.
Fowler continued, “Arakkonam Air Base is roughly 75 kilometers from our current location. I need you guys to figure out what sort of military presence is still there and what condition the runways are in. I was told the Navy didn’t crater the runways, just hit the aircraft hangars, etcetera. If the runways look to be in good condition and the base doesn’t appear to be heavily occupied by the enemy, then the battalion may assault it and expand our military footprint deeper into the country.”
They talked for a bit longer, making sure they had a fallback plan in case they ran into trouble.
Fowler concluded, “I was told by our Air LNO that within an hour, the first several Wolverines will be ready to provide close air support should we need it, and we’ll also have some Apaches on standby as well.”
With the meeting officially finished, Lieutenant Martinez and Price walked back to their platoon area to let the guys know about the new mission.
“LT, when are they going to give you your captain bars? I heard you made O-3 last week,” Price said lightheartedly to Martinez.
Martinez shook his head. “No idea. I think I pissed the major off and he’s holding my bars on me until he feels I’m good and ready for them. I don’t really care. I checked my LES statement and I’m getting paid O-3 pay. That’s all that matters.”
Sergeant Price grunted. “Lucky you,” he shot back. “I checked before we left, and they hadn’t bumped me up from E-6 to E-7 yet.”
When they approached the platoon area, the men crowded them, looking for info.
“Have we got a mission yet, or are we still on babysitting duty for the airborne?” one of the specialists asked snarkily. He obviously was not happy about being stuck on QRF duty.
Smiling, Martinez responded, “We have a mission, a real mission. We’re going to scout out an enemy airfield and see if it’s operational. If it is, then the battalion is going to capture it.”
A few whistles and hoots could be heard from the men.
“Calm down, girls,” said Sergeant Price with a laugh. “I need everyone to make sure your rucks are ready. I want three days’ worth of food and a triple combat load of ammo. We have no idea what we’re driving into, and we’re a long way from help. Understand?”
The guys nodded and went to work getting their supplies organized while they waited for their vehicles to show up. Twenty minutes later, eight SOF-outfitted JLTVs rolled up to their position, fully armed and ready to go. Unlike the conventional Army JLTVs, the SOF ones had machine guns mounted on special swivels on the sides of the two front doors, an M2 .50 or Mk19 grenade gun mounted on the turret, and a M240G mounted in a rear position in the bed of the truck. These small vehicles packed a whole lot of firepower and made for great scout vehicles.
Once their rides had arrived, the platoon started loading up their rucks and double-checking the weapons, ammo, water, and fuel. The few 82nd Airborne soldiers nearby just looked on, seemingly jealous of the exciting mission that they were missing out on and the sweet ride they were traveling on to get there.
The Rangers, for their part, made it look like this was just an everyday vehicle to them. Once the platoon had their equipment fitted out, Lieutenant Martinez called them all over to gather around him and began an impromptu mission brief. Since he didn’t have a lot of information, or really even maps to show them, he used the GPS map built into the vehicles. For the most part, they’d stay on the highway since it would give them the fastest route to get there. Once they were roughly ten kilometers out, the platoon would break into squads and envelop the base from multiple positions, approaching as close as they dared to get a peek at what was waiting for them.
*******
As the day turned to evening, the Rangers had taken cover in various locations around the air base and the surrounding city.
“It looks like the base is empty,” Lieutenant Martinez said. Sergeant Price saw Martinez shoot him a look, asking for confirmation.
Sergeant Price pulled out his binos and surveyed the scene anew. “The runways look clear. The parking ramps and taxiways, however…well, they’ve seen better days.” Burnt-out wrecks of several aircraft and helicopters dotted the area, along with the charred-out remains of the buildings on the base. “I think whatever enemy units were at this base have long since abandoned it. I’ll bet our platoon could seize this base right now.” Price lowered his binoculars. Night was almost upon them, and soon they’d have to switch over to their night vision goggles.
Depressing the talk button on his radio, Martinez radioed in what they were seeing. Sergeant Price smiled when he heard the lieutenant suggest that they attempt to take the base at nightfall. Some chatter took place between Martinez and Fowler for a few minutes while their options were discussed.
After a few minutes, Martinez walked back to the vehicle and singled out Sergeant Price. “You really think we can seize that base after dark?” he asked.
“The other squads have all checked in and they haven’t reported any movement,” Price answered. “We’ve watched the base now for several hours. Whoever was there has probably long since left after the Navy paid them a visit. I think going in after dark using the NVGs is the best approach.”
Martinez thought about that for a moment and nodded. “OK. I’ll let Major Fowler know we’re going to do it after dark. He offered to get us some gunship support in case we need it. Do you think we should request it or just keep it on standby?”
Price didn’t think they would need it at all, but having it on standby, ready to help them should they need it, couldn’t hurt anything. “Let’s keep them ready to assist in case we run into trouble, but I think we’ve got this, Sir,” he answered.
An hour after dark, Sergeant First Class Price and half a dozen Rangers slowly crept along the outer edge of the base perimeter where it came closer to an access road. Once they found the point where the two ran next to each other, Price reached for his Gerber and began to cut the wire while the other men in the squad took up a defensive perimeter around him. In a matter of minutes, he’d cut the five strands of barbed wire that made up
the external security and pulled the wires back to the nearest pole, creating a twelve-foot gap in the fence.
He depressed his radio talk button. “Zombie Six, this is Zombie Five. Entrance is open. Heading in now,” he announced.
Price’s thirteen-man team broke out into three four-man teams as they headed to their respective sections of the air base. Using their NVGs to see through the night, they quickly made their way past the outer perimeter of the base to the main facilities, stopping every so often to listen for sounds of movement.
Thirty-minutes after entering the base, Price’s team found themselves sitting in a thicket of trees just opposite a road that led to the main headquarters building of the air base, or at least what was left of it. Pulling a thermal scope out of his ruck, Price turned it on and looked at the structures across the street for any signs of life.
He spent roughly ten minutes examining the entire area before he made the call that it appeared to be abandoned. Price ordered his team to move across the street so they could begin to search the structure.
Running past the base sign, he read, Welcome to Arakkonam Naval Air Station. Home to the longest runway in Asia. In minutes, his team was in the ground floor of the building, moving from blown-out room to room and finding nothing. They went to explore the second floor, but both stairwells had been destroyed, leaving them no viable way to access the upper floors.
Once this first building had been searched and cleared, they moved to the next set of buildings, and so did the other teams. It took them nearly an hour to clear through the building, but the only notable thing they found was the burnt-out wrecks of half a dozen Indian Navy Tu-142s, one newer Poseidon P-8I, and half a dozen helicopters. They also found a lot of dead and charred bodies in the various buildings and maintenance hangars.
Seeing no obvious signs of danger, he radioed in for the rest of the platoon to bring the vehicles on in. Twenty-minutes later, they consolidated their vehicles in the tree line, near the bombed-out headquarters building. With the rest of the platoon present, they finished doing a more thorough sweep of the buildings and the rest of the perimeter, ensuring Price’s initial team hadn’t missed something.
