Paul put both hands on the table and stared at Romo. Maybe the whiskey did a bit of talking now. Maybe he should just keep his mouth shut. But Paul Kavanagh didn’t think so.
“You’re my blood brother,” Paul said in the loud bar. “I’m saying this because you’re my friend. Find a woman you love—I mean one you would fight through Hell to defend. Find her Romo, and maybe…I don’t know. Just find her and forget about banging every piece of tail you can find.”
“It is too late for me,” Romo said.
“It’s too late for Zelazny,” Paul said. “He’s dead. You’re alive. Do you see what I mean?”
Romo shook his head. “It’s far too late, my friend.”
“Think about it,” Paul said. He straightened, and he turned around, making his way through the bar.
It was another lonely night in America, but he would win through. By all that was holy, he would fight to the bitter end so he could see his wife and son again in a land of freedom.
WASHINGTON, DC
Anna sat with the President and the rest of the team down here in Underground Bunker Number Five. It was cold, with a hint of antifreeze odors drifting about the room.
“I have some rare good news today,” General Alan said.
It was days after General Zelazny had died and the surrender of the Toronto Pocket. It was also several days after a Militia corps had led the attack of the US Fifth Army against Hamilton. The various divisions and battalions had impaled themselves on the GD spears before the Canadian city. The survivors had dug into the Earth and awaited further reinforcements as they arrived from New England.
The two incidents had depressed the people down here several days ago. Didn’t anything ever change? That had been then and this was today. Zelazny’s bitter struggle in the sewers had prolonged the Toronto fight. Despite their mauling, the Militia corps must have disrupted Holk’s finely tuned calculations. The GD air force had made many runs into the Niagara Peninsula, attacking the long-range artillery, but SAMs and tac-lasers had taken a toll of the enemy. Even better, for once, the GD ground forces hadn’t leapt like greyhounds at the start of a new offensive. The GD attack toward London moved slower, almost lethargically compared to former assaults.
Anna had read before about something called friction. She knew about regular friction. If she rollerbladed, she used muscles to skate forward. The wheels rolled against cement. The friction of those wheels against the cement finally slowed them down enough so she came to a stop. The wheels halted due to friction.
In war, she’d read, everything was simple. But the simple became difficult due to friction. If three families planned a trip to go to the lake in a caravan, things would happen to slow down the well-laid plan. A child might need to use the restroom as soon as one family buckled in. That would take time as they waited for the child to run back into the house and go. Maybe the mother would forget an item, and the family would have to turn around to get it, or the father would stop at a store and buy it. That would all take time. If one of the engines blew a gasket, that family would have to borrow or rent a new car. If the others had to wait for them, the entire caravan took longer to reach its destination.
Now three families in three cars would be easy to move compared to a thousand vehicles in a division with ten thousand men. Add in the enemy firing artillery, rockets, missiles and sending commandos…
Problems added up. Training helped overcome friction. Good leadership also helped. Great morale made a huge difference. Given everything being equal, it was harder to attack a defender than to sit and await an attack.
The point was that normal friction and some hard but flawed American fighting had slowed the GD timetable. Friction and fighting had slowed the GD offensive long enough so the Heidegger jamming company had joined the first reinforcements from Georgia. The fresh army division made it north of London by several miles to face the GD terminator battalion spearheading the assault.
General Alan played images on the screen. Anna had seen such combat scenes before. Smoke billowed in places. Blasts caused fountains of dirt to spew up from the ground. GD drone tanks and Sigrids trundled across the landscape, moving past trees.
A sharp whine emanated from the underground bunker’s speakers.
“It sounds much worse for the jamming teams,” General Alan explained. “Frankly, the equipment wears out personnel at an alarming rate. But look at the images. What do you see?”
Along with others, Anna craned forward. She watched a GD drone tank come to a halt. The turret turned, but it stopped. Behind it, Sigrids stopped, and bullets no longer hosed from the tri-barrel machine guns.
The whine grew worse. Then soldiers sprinted forward. They wore US patches. One team scrambled up a GD tank.
“Who are they?” the President asked.
“We had a recovery team ready,” General Alan said. “We actually managed to capture a few enemy vehicles intact.”
“Why didn’t you capture all of them?” the President asked.
The answer became apparent half a minute later. Sigrids and drone tanks began to explode for inexplicable reasons.
“GD fail-safes,” Alan said. “Our jamming slipped a little and the fail-safes engaged.”
“Did any of the recovery team die?” the President asked.
“Unfortunately, sir, half the team perished,” the general said.
Anna felt the stab of that. Here something went right for once, and half the recovery team died. That was awful, and that was the friction of war in action.
“Then we’ve stopped the London-aimed assault?” the President asked.
“No sir,” Alan said. “The attack is going on even as we speak. But we have blunted it, and I believe we’re going to have time to bring the rest of our reinforcements into play. What’s more, our jamming system works. The Germans are going to have to rethink how they use their drones against us.”
“Yes,” the President said. “I can see that.”
“We’re going to stop them, sir,” Alan said. “They’re not going to get to Detroit. We’re gathering artillery, and the enemy is going to face hurricane bombardments from now on. The GD is still moving, but we have numbers and we’re whittling them down a little at a time.”
David Sims nodded. “This doesn’t mean we’re out of the woods.”
“No, sir,” Alan said. “It’s far from that. But the great emergency has passed, at least I think so. We barely pulled it off, but we’re containing the GD in Southern Ontario. We’ve bought ourselves time.”
The President nodded.
Anna sat back. She felt relief flood outward from her heart, causing her fingers to tingle. Finally, something had gone right. The GD had created havoc, and they had destroyed a large part of the Canadian Army, but at least the US had finally contained them.
“The Behemoths,” someone said. “We’ll have to wait until we can bring two or three Behemoth regiments against them. Then we’ll clean the Germans out of Canada.”
Or the THOR missiles, Anna thought to herself. Soon it will be time to use them, as long as we can hold the Germans in place.
-9-
Strategic Interlude II
From Tank Wars, by B.K. Laumer III:
The Lake Ontario Amphibious Assault
The Germen Dominion Expeditionary Force fought a brilliant North American campaign. Before we proceed further, it would be well to keep in mind one of the key operational decisions of the GD High Command.
In almost every encounter, the GD military had fewer personnel but greater machine numbers and quality, together with heavier firepower than their Canadian and American adversaries. The GD ability to sustain heavy machine losses was offset by its inability to sustain heavy human loss. It was their Achilles heel.
In actual numbers and at this time in the campaign, the GD already possessed fewer soldiers than the Americans and Canadians did in the theaters of action. In terms of fighting power, however, they still had a clear superiority.
In w
eighted combat power, the situation looked like this:
Along the Quebec-New England border region: GD Army Group C faced US Army Group New England 610,000 vs. 489,000.
Along the Kingston-Cornwall region between Lake Ontario and the start of the Saint Lawrence River: GD Army Group B faced US Army Group New York 315,000 vs. 295,000.
Along the Lake Superior Coast-London-Lake Erie Coast of Southwestern Ontario: GD Army Group A faced US Army Group Southwestern Ontario 686,000 vs. 811,000.
Uncommitted theater reserves: GD Twelfth Army of Army Group B faced the US XI Airmobile Corps along the New York and New Jersey coast: 412,000 vs. 24,000.
These weighted numbers show that despite their inferior equipment, the Americans and Canadians had stabilized the situation and brought the GD blitzkrieg to a halt. It was doubtful whether any American commanders realized the extent of GD reserves. But in any case, the stabilization had occurred without weakening the US Midwestern Defenses against the Pan-Asian Alliance and the South American Federation. At this time, Chairman Hong pushed for a 2040 Offensive, but the Ruling Committee voted to continue to remain on the defensive as they resupplied and reequipped their North American armies.
At a calculated risk, General Mansfeld had brought the situation on the various fronts to near equilibrium. This left him with two large uncommitted offensive forces, and it had stretched the Americans, with their only reserves being some resting battalions and a relatively small Atlantic coastal defense. The first GD offensive force was part of Zeller’s Army Group B. Since the beginning of the campaign, his numbers and equipment had been reduced by twenty-two percent through wastage and combat losses. Zeller’s uncommitted Twelfth Army possessed roughly 200,000 soldiers with a 400,000-strength equivalent as compared to American forces. These troops waited on the Canadian shore of Lake Ontario. Mansfeld’s second amphibious force waited in Cuba: the 400,000-strength equivalent of General Kaltenbrunner’s Army Group D. They readied themselves for the great assault against the New York-New Jersey shores that would snap the jaws shut of the great GD trap.
With masterful skill, General Mansfeld had brought the situation to the point where the two amphibious forces could wreak immense damage. They would also net the GD at least one million American prisoners and capture the New England and New York states for the German Dominion in North America. Combined with Ontario, it would give the GD a large area from which to base their attacks in the coming year.
From Military History: Past to Present, by Vance Holbrook:
Invasion of Northeastern America, 2040
2040, June 19-28. Siege of Toronto. The devastated forces of General Zelazny hung onto parts of the city far beyond what anyone would have imagined. The last battles took place in the sewers in vicious hand-to-hand conflicts. The Stuart Doctrine as broadcast by the Prime Minister fired up Canadian partisans. In Southern Ontario, bypassed Canadian and US Army personnel aided the growing resistance. The combined efforts slowed GD supplies. General Mansfeld began draconian reprisals, using Quebecer nationals in the internal security forces.
In Quebec south of the Saint Lawrence River, the siege armies of General Fromm continued their static occupation, facing nearly twice their number of American opponents, although force multipliers and drone systems gave them a greater machine and firepower advantage.
2040, June 28-July 7. Stiffening Resistance. With the death of General Zelazny, 29,000 Americans surrendered in Toronto. Afterward, GD Army Group A broke through and encircled Canadian and American defenders in Hamilton. Afterward, the GD withstood a US Militia offensive directed at the city coming from Buffalo. The rest of the newly-arrived US Fifth Army gathered in the Niagara Peninsula behind the Militia remnants.
At the start of the GD London Offensive, Holk’s tankers lacked the former dash of their earlier blitzkriegs. Still, they made solid initial gains. Unfortunately for the Germans, the stubborn defense in Toronto and the Militia offensive directed at Hamilton cost Holk several critical days delay. Those days allowed the first American reinforcements from Georgia and North Carolina to settle into position. Combined with the first experimental Heidegger jamming equipment, the US slowed the rate of Holk’s advance.
The increase of East Coast reinforcements streaming into Southern Ontario together with more Heidegger jammers and massed American artillery turned the GD advance into a crawl. The New England reinforcements heading for Buffalo and the US Fifth Army there, prompted Mansfeld to order the Fromm Offensive.
In the first several days, GD Army Group C out of Southern Quebec gained five to ten kilometers in upper State New York, Northern Vermont and New Hampshire. At the President’s orders, US Army Group New England halted all troop transfers southwestward and began to reorganize a defense in depth.
Through immense expenditure of munitions and the heaviest loss of Sigrid drones and AI Kaisers to date, Holk captured London and began the slow grind toward Detroit. East of Hamilton, the GD fended off every US Fifth Army attack. The cost in American lives proved horrendous, particularly among the Militia and predominantly among the new penal battalions.
The fighting in Southwestern Ontario grew increasingly savage as the weight of machines and firepower slowly swung toward an American-Canadian advantage. The GD failed to reach Lake Erie in any force. This initiated the critical Montreal Conference between Chancellor Kleist and General Mansfeld.
COMMENT: In retrospect, the GD drive on Detroit had three distinct phases. The first was the initial surprise against the Canadians on the Ontario-Quebec border. The GD military achieved masterful success during this stage. Each technological superiority came as a rude shock to the Canadians, and they needed time to adjust—time the GD didn’t give them. The second phase started with the arrival of American reinforcements from the US strategic reserve. The Expeditionary Force still achieved stunning victories during this period. Despite those victories, the sheer volume of US reinforcements combined with their tenacity finally slowed the blitzkrieg, which culminated in the siege of Toronto. Phase Three started with General Zelazny’s death. During this stage, the US gained a new addition: jammers applying the Heidegger Principle. The second addition was an even greater number of reinforcements from New England and especially from the Gulf and East Coast garrison troops. The jammers increasingly blunted the distinct GD machine advantage, although it did not altogether eliminate it. The massed US formations in a narrow region together with heavy concentrations of artillery finally ended any thought of GD advances in the final portion of Southwestern Ontario.
However, because Detroit had never been Mansfeld’s final objective, the American victory came at a heavy cost. They were weak at the wrong place—The Erie-Ontario Lowlands of New York State Interstate 90—and the GD now threatened to achieve its true campaign objective.
-10-
Beachhead
MONTREAL, QUEBEC
Under the personal escort of the Chancellor’s bodyguards, General Walther Mansfeld rode an elevator down into an underground chamber. His stomach lurched from the speed, and he momentarily felt light on his feet. Five big men towered around him, although they had acted deferentially to him ever since helping him out of his armored limousine.
Mansfeld had rushed back to Montreal, expecting to meet the Chancellor, but without anyone confirming or denying it. Like many heads of state, Kleist feared assassination and took extraordinary precautions against it.
The Americans fought hard. They fought well and they had become cunning with their special jamming companies, moving from hot spot to hot spot. The enemy had finally forced caution into General Holk. The man must have phoned back to Europe. Holk had become fainthearted in his use of the drone battalions, and that as much as anything had slowed the offensive to the ridiculous crawl.
The elevator lurched to a halt, the doors opened and the biggest bodyguard gently pushed against Mansfeld’s back, propelling the general out of the elevator.
More big men in black suits waited. Mansfeld counted seven this time
. Three already stood. Four of them played cards at a table.
“General Walther Mansfeld,” the chief bodyguard in the elevator said.
“You’re late,” a blond giant of a bodyguard told the other.
“Traffic.”
“You want me to write that down?” the blond giant asked.
“It’s the truth.”
“That’s not what I asked,” the blond giant said.
“Go ahead. Put it down.”
“Suit yourself.” The giant bodyguard turned to the card players, snapping his fingers.
One of the players set down his card hand, took out an electronic device and made a notation.
The guard who’d pushed Mansfeld stepped back into the elevator and pushed a button. The doors closed as the lift pinged, taking the first set of bodyguards away.
Without seeming to, General Mansfeld examined his new surroundings. He stood in a large, underground concrete corridor. Condensation caused water to form on the ceiling. A drop dripped, and there was a smell of fungus in the air. The place felt like a deep tunnel, and he didn’t like it here. He doubted anyone would.
The general didn’t see any signal, but now all the bodyguards set their cards on the table. Chairs scraped back and guns appeared.
No one said a word to him. No one apologized. Two of the smaller guards approached and gave him a thorough pat down, even to running a hand down his butt and feeling his groin. It was insulting, and Mansfeld would have liked to strike the man doing it. He knew better. There was a time and place for anger. This wasn’t it.
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