Castro's bomb

Chapter Eighteen

President Kennedy took his customary seat in his rocking chair. "Well, gentlemen, how are we doing? Can anyone finally tell me anything definitive? I understand all about that fog of battle crap, but somebody must know something definitive!"

Frustration was evident in his voice. The airborne attack on Cuba had begun during the night. Reports had been fragmentary and inconclusive. In frustration he'd gone back to his private quarters and attempted to get some sleep, or at least relax. Making love to a sleepy and unenthusiastic Jackie had provided some relief, but not much and not for long.

For the first time in his life, he was sending Americans out to be killed. His experiences in World War II were far from similar. While he'd been in combat, the orders were somebody else's, not his. He just obeyed them, didn't initiate them. His role in the Bay of Pigs didn't count. He was following someone else’s plans and, besides, they weren't Americans. They were Cubans out to liberate their own country, while now he was sending Americans to invade another land, Cuba. General Maxwell Taylor stood by the large map of Cuba and commenced. "We finally do have some news and I must admit that not all of it is good. As always, plans fall apart the instant they begin to be implemented and this is no different."

Kennedy nodded impatiently and Taylor continued. "During the night, elements of the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions landed at sites inland. The goal was to seize the small airfields and use them to land the rest of the divisions by plane; thus eliminating the need for additional jumps. Sadly, it hasn't worked out that way.

"First, some of the men from the 101st had the bad fortune to land almost directly on top of a battalion of Cuban militia we didn't know existed. Most of the militia either fled right away or put up only a limited resistance, but a number did fight hard and are being reinforced, and we suffered more casualties than anticipated. Worse, when we reached the airfield, the Cubans blew up the runway, which means no planes can land until the craters are filled and the paratroopers on the ground don't have the equipment to do that."

"Shit," Kennedy muttered.

"Sir, we are attempting to reinforce them by air, although that means additional jumps into enemy fire, and we may have to cancel those efforts. Cuban units are moving towards our men who are digging in. Our planes are bombing as best they can."

"And the other site?" the president asked.

"The 82nd jumped closer to the landing beaches and met little or no resistance on the ground; however, they too had the airfield they were to take destroyed by the Cubans. The 82nd suffered most of its casualties in the air when one Cuban MiG got in among the transports and shot them up. None of our planes were destroyed, but a number of them were damaged pretty badly and many men were killed or wounded. One plane had all of its troopers suffer broken bones when it had to duck and dive to escape the Cuban fighter."

Kennedy fidgeted uncomfortably. "Did we at least shoot down the bastard?"

"Yes, sir, but our pilots think the Cuban pilot ejected just before. In which case, he's on the ground laughing at us."

"How many casualties?"

"Rough numbers, sir, but maybe seventy dead and two hundred wounded in total at both locations."

"And our men are simply hanging on? Don’t we have helicopters that can reinforce or relieve them?"

Wheeler disagreed vehemently. "Sir, while we have helicopters on the ground in Cuba, they are small and few in number. Their primary usage is to scout and to ferry out casualties.”

“Can’t we bring more from the states?” Kennedy persisted. “Aren’t we forming a whole division of assault helicopters?”

Taylor responded, “That’s the 11th, and it’s barely in the training stage with only a few hundred men and a few score helicopters at Fort Benning.”

“Then fly them over. That’s feasible, isn’t it?”

“No sir,” said Taylor, “they would have to make long hauls over open waters in fragile choppers. Under the best of circumstances, a number of them would have to land early and that means putting down in the Caribbean. We would lose too many men. Nor is it feasible to place carriers and other ships along the way as staging areas. No sir, we might get the 11th in Cuba in a few weeks at best, and that would be by transports."

Kennedy sighed, "And the landings themselves?"

Taylor continued. "Here the news is somewhat better, sir. Elements of the First Armored and Second Infantry Divisions have landed on the north coast of Cuba, near the town of Moa. Resistance on the beaches has been light and we are expanding the perimeter. However, the men are running into one strange problem."

Kennedy rubbed his forehead. Did he want to hear this? Hell, did he have a choice? "Go on, General."

"Mr. President, thousands of Cuban civilians, mainly women along with some old men and a lot of children, are clogging the roads, lying down and halting traffic just like the civil rights protesters in Alabama, and sometimes actually fighting with our men who are understandably loath to use deadly force on women. The women are using fists, sticks and clubs, not guns."

McCone interrupted. "Havana radio is screaming that our men are molesting and even raping the helpless women. You can bet that the pinkos and Third Worlders at the United Nations will have a field day with this."

"Please tell me the women aren't being harmed."

"Sir, we are bending over backwards to not hurt them, at least not seriously. I cannot guaranty that there won't be bruises, cuts, and broken bones as we try to drag them out of the way."

"Can't these women's groups be bypassed?" Kennedy asked. "I mean, if the roads are clogged, why don't our troops go cross-country?"

"That only works sometimes, sir," Taylor answered. "Our tracked vehicles have that capability, but many of the follow-up vehicles are trucks and need to stick to the roads. If the tanks and personnel carriers get too far ahead, they run the risk of running out of supplies and fuel. Our troops are rounding up the women as best they can and sticking them in ad hoc internment camps. It'll get done, but it's definitely delaying our advance by at least a number of hours."

Kennedy felt ill. "And, in the meantime, somebody's out there with a nuke and our paratroops are hanging on."

"Yes sir."

"If there is a major delay, General Taylor, what will happen?"

"The marines will attack as scheduled on the south coast, between Santiago and Guantanamo. The First and Second Marine Divisions are ready and eager."

"Remind me, general, why didn't we hit the south coast in the first place?"

Taylor responded with mild annoyance in his voice. This had all been covered before, many times.

"Because it’s so close to Guantanamo, the south coast is the obvious place where we felt they would expect us. As a result, intelligence says it's where they have the bulk of their defenses, and, even though suitable landing sites for a large marine invasion force are limited, the Cubans believe we will invade from the south. That and the fact that the Cuban military isn’t large enough to defend everywhere, it was decided that the first landings would be in the relatively undefended north."

"Gentlemen, is there any good news?"

McCone spoke. "Sir, we have re-established contact with Lieutenant Ross and his people, including Miss Malone, although, as we suspected, they were bombed by our planes. Two of the marines with them were killed and just about all the others were injured to some degree. They are pretty well recovered, however. They also informed me that Lt. Col. Romanski of Roman Force has shown up with them along with a Sergeant Morton."

The thought of Americans dying from their own bombs dropped from American planes sickened Kennedy, even though he knew it happened in war, and had happened when he'd been in the navy during World War II. There had never been a war in which soldiers weren't killed by shots fired from their own side.

"Have we at least notified the families that their loved ones are safe?"

"No, Mr. President," Taylor said.

"And why not?" he said angrily. He was thinking that he could inform Mrs. Malone that her daughter was safe and sound. But then he realized what Taylor was implying — was she?

Taylor continued. "Right now they are fairly safe, but they are in a combat area and anything could happen and at any time. It would be worse than hell for all concerned to tell someone that their loved ones made it through only to have to go back later and tell them that they died from something else. We strongly suggest that we keep a lid on this info until this is all over."

Kennedy grudgingly agreed. He continued to remember the agony on Mrs. Malone's face. He did not wish to compound it. If this was what it was like to be a war leader, he didn't like it at all.

Private First Class Jimmy Lawson had mixed emotions about riding point for an armored column that was probing the terrain beyond the landing beaches. The good part was that he got a great view of what was going on and didn't have to eat other people's dust or crawl through the mud that other vehicles churned up when dust wasn't on the menu.

The bad news was that he was in an unarmored jeep and Lieutenant Phillips wanted to make captain by next week and Jimmy thought he was a little bit nuts about pushing forward and getting noticed by the higher brass. Jimmy and his family didn't have all that much money, which was why he'd been drafted. He'd been going to college part time and couldn't get a deferment like the rich kid full time students could. He had mixed emotions about deferments. Didn't deferment mean he'd have to go in sooner or later? He knew of college graduates who'd been drafted after they’d gotten their degrees, so why fight it? Get it over with. Then he could get on with his life.

Of course he could have gotten married and knocked up his new wife. That would have kept him out but it would have screwed up his life in other ways. He knew a lot of girls he wanted to screw, but none that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. No, being married to a woman he really didn't love and being a parent with diapers to change was too big a price to pay. Besides, the Selective Service people could always change the rules and start calling up fathers. Wouldn't that be a crock? Married, a father, and in the army anyhow?

What the hell, he thought. No use complaining about anything. He was in the army and only had four more months to go before he got discharged, unless, of course, this stupid fucking war with the Cubans lasted a while and he got his tour extended. At least he was stuck for only two years, while the enlistees, the so-called regular army were in for four years. Good for them. The difference in tour times was a cause of rivalry and not all of it good natured. The regulars thought the draftees were a bunch of candy-asses, while the draftees thought the regulars were knuckle dragging illiterates who’d joined up because they were too dumb to do anything else.

Nothing he could do about it, he thought as he scanned the road and the trees and bushes along it. What was it the guys said? Oh yeah, if rape is inevitable, lie down and enjoy it.

Funny, but the farther away from the beach he got, the less damage from American shells and bombs he saw. So much for everything in Cuba being either bombed or shelled, or both, he thought.

Yesterday had been a hoot when the Cuban women had swarmed the jeep and the vehicles behind it. Phillips had just about gone bonkers and wanted to shoot them. Lawson had convinced the lieutenant that killing unarmed civilians was not a good career move. Instead, they and others in the column had grabbed the women and dragged them out of the way, one screaming spic bitch at a time. It had taken hours to get the absurd scene under control.

The women had cursed at the Americans who retaliated by calling them putas, which they'd been told meant whore in Spanish. The women called the GI's pricks and dicks which they guys found an amusing cultural exchange. A couple of the guys managed to grab a little tit and ass during the scuffle, but no such luck for PFC Jimmy Lawson. All the women he pushed and shoved were too much like his grandmother.

Lawson was heading up a small column of new M113 armored personnel carriers, and older M48 tanks. They were all from the Second Infantry Division that, until a few weeks ago, had been in training at Fort Benning, Georgia. When the shit hit the fan in Cuba, it was obvious that the Second would be one of the first regular divisions to go. After all, wasn't Georgia just a hop, skip, and a jump from Cuba?

Lieutenant Phillips told him to drive faster. He said the rest of the column was catching up and he didn't want tanks tailgating him. Lawson thought that they should catch up, but kept quiet and concentrated on his driving. Jeeps were slow, thin-skinned, and had a disturbing tendency to roll over when they hit a bump. And, in the case of Jimmy's jeep, they only had a thirty-caliber machine gun for protection. Stemple, the gunner, kept swinging the damn thing from side to side. He was nervous and who could blame him. They were ahead of the column and might as well be alone in Indian country.

"Slow down," Phillips finally said and Lawson complied. He would have preferred to stop, but going slowly was okay. They'd entered an open field and there was dense foliage about a hundred yards to either side. Another stand of shrubs and trees was to their front. It smelled of ambush.

"Ride on the shoulder," Phillips ordered.

Lawson understood. The road might be mined. Maybe the lieutenant wasn’t that crazy after all. Of course the shoulder might be mined, too, but that was a chance that had to be taken.

He first sensed, then saw and heard the missile shriek from the bushes to his right. It slammed into an APC behind them. It burst into flames and men tumbled out of the rear hatch, some of them on fire and screaming.

Stemple quickly opened fire on where he thought the missile had been launched. As he did so, a Cuban machine gun opened up from their front. Bullets kicked up dust around the jeep and a couple pinged off the hood. Lawson frantically turned the jeep, screwing up Stemple's aim, but he didn't give a damn. Machine gun bullets were kicking up everywhere. Phillips was screaming something incoherent.

Lawson felt something slam into his chest. He lost control of the jeep and it rolled on its side on the road. There was an explosion and the jeep jumped into the air, launching Jimmy Lawson upwards. They'd hit a mine. Jimmy landed on the ground beside the ruined jeep. He saw Lieutenant Phillips lying close by, but the lieutenant didn't have any legs and the side of his head had been blown off.

Stemple grabbed Lawson by the collar and, ignoring his screams, dragged him away from the jeep which had begun to burn. Tanks and PCs were firing at something. Another Cuban missile hit a tank and knocked off a tread. Who said the Cubans were cowards?

"We're screwed," Lawson said. Stemple grunted something and tried to stuff a bandage onto Lawson's chest. Lawson felt something warm and sticky running down his chest. He was bleeding. He realized he couldn't feel his legs. He began to cry.

Golikov separated from the lovely translator, Oksana, and greeted Charley. Elena and the Russian woman walked off, chatting amiably, pretending they were friends, and in a small way, perhaps they were.

They were several blocks away from the White House and the perpetual ring of noisy, chanting demonstrators. This time the police presence was huge and they seemed to have everything well under control.

Golikov eyed Elena, "Very, very pretty. Tell me, are you fucking her?"

Kraeger stiffened, then realized the Russian was jerking his chain, "If I was I wouldn't tell you. Secrets, you know. How about you and the lovely Oksana?"

"Of course I'm fucking her. She's been my mistress for a year now and wants desperately to be promoted to Moscow, and I so like fucking her. She's absolutely wonderful and she will definitely be promoted. I also like when she sucks cock. But so much for pleasure," he sighed. "Let's talk about your invasion of the peaceful and wonderful working people's republic of Cuba."

"Those peaceful people are surprisingly efficient at fighting a war," Charley admitted.

Golikov nodded, his expression solemn. There was no humor in people dying. "Indeed they are. They ambush your paratroops and your armored columns, and then send their women out to harass you. You will ultimately prevail. Of that I have no doubt. But you will pay a very high price for your success. Unfortunately, your army hasn't fought in nearly ten years, which means they have few veterans and even they have forgotten much of what was learned in Korea and in World War II. I sometimes wonder what expensive and bloody lessons the Red Army would have to relearn the next time we go to war."

"Is that what you wanted to talk about? You want us to re-train your troops?"

"No. My government wants to know what your government has decided about Fidel. Are you going to overthrow him or not? Comrade Khrushchev wants desperately to assure the filthy bearded man and his idiot brother that they and their regime are safe. In so doing, it will shore up Khrushchev's position in the Soviet Union. I am certain you do realize that it is far better to have him in the Kremlin than some of the others who are so primitive, reactionary, and bloodthirsty."

Charley did not admit that his own government shared that opinion. Some underestimated Khrushchev, thinking him a table pounding buffoon, as evidenced when he'd pounded his shoe on a desk at the United Nations while an incredulous world watched on. Others, more prescient, recognized Khrushchev as both an ultimate survivor and a man who wanted to avoid war while appearing warlike in defense of communism and the Soviet Union.

Still, guarantees of any kind presented problems. "You know I cannot speak for the United States government."

"Be hypothetical, then, just like the missing nuke, which, I presume, you haven't found."

Charley ignored the jibe and continued. "Let me guess. Fidel is understandably nervous about his future. Therefore, he has surrounded himself in his Havana fortress with at least a quarter of a million regulars and militia, all of whom have sworn to die for him. If we announce that he is safe, then he will see no reason to keep so many good soldiers around him and will, instead, send them to fight the Yankee invaders. Thus, it is very much in our best interest to keep your hairy-faced friend guessing and insecure and with so much of his army well out of the war."

Golikov chuckled. "That was a very good hypothetical answer. I will inform my leaders that it is in everyone's best interest to keep Fidel off balance, at least for a while. If you do not go after him, which will be evident in only a few days, then Nikita will take credit for saving his lying ass. A few days will not matter much. On the other hand, I do not envy your President Kennedy. He cannot topple Castro without losing Comrade Nikita, and he cannot satisfy his constituents without toppling Castro."

Charley smiled wryly. "It's called American politics."

Elena and Oksana walked up to the two men. Elena slipped her arm in Charley's. Charley smiled wickedly. "Elena, my good communist friend thinks you're very pretty and wants to know if I am fucking you."

Elena reached over and patted a clearly flustered Golikov on the cheek while Oksana laughed hugely. "Comrade Golikov, if I told you I would have to kill you."

Major Sam Hartford was elated. The American army had commenced landing on the north coast of Cuba and was there any doubt that the marines would soon follow? It irked him slightly that the army had landed instead of his beloved leathernecks, but what the hell. Their day of liberation was almost at hand and the men of the prison camp were smiling happily and giving their now very nervous guards a hard time. Both Cuban and American radio stations were full of the news. The American stations had the army advancing steadily, while the Cubans said the hated yanquis were on the verge of annihilation. Hartford put his money on what the American stations were broadcasting.

That said, there was the nagging feeling that the prisoners should be doing something to help out the cause. The military's code of conduct said that prisoners should make every effort to escape and, if escape was not possible, then prisoners should not in any way help their captors. This was interpreted as screwing with their captors heads as much as possible.

For all the time they'd been prisoners, it was obvious that the idea of escaping was simply not practical. As they'd discussed a hundred times, where would they go and what would they do when they got there? They were on an island surrounded by both an ocean and millions of people who hated them. The best of a bunch of bad solutions would have escapees making it into the mountains and fighting a guerilla war against the Cuban army. That a large number of gringos who didn't even speak Spanish could hide in the wilds of a hostile country was never seriously considered. The second alternative, stealing boats and trying to make it out to sea was only marginally less foolish. Even though most of the POWs were navy, few knew anything about handling small boats, much less getting their hands on enough of them in the first place.

But now, with the army landing less than a hundred miles away and the marines just offshore, they felt a screaming urge to help out. Messages from the Pentagon, or wherever the signals were coming from, told Hartford that he and his men should sit tight and wait to be liberated.

Bullshit. Marines don't sit tight. Nor, for that matter, do the sailors who made up the bulk of his command. They all wanted to strike back.

But how was the question. At least it was the question until navy lieutenant Bill Skronski brought Hartford the information that Ruiz had provided. Now Hartford had the germ of a thought and had called the others together in his tent.

"If Skronski's man is correct, and there's no doubting him, something important is going on under that abandoned school building and we might just have it in our power to disrupt it, maybe even destroy it. Tuttle, one more time; just how many weapons do we have?"

Tuttle cleared his throat. "Not anywhere near as many as we'd like. Last count was a dozen working AK47s, thirty bolt-action rifles, mainly of the Springfield variety, and a dozen handguns of various sizes, along with two dozen ancient hand grenades that may or may not go off. Each AK has two full clips, enough for maybe a minute's worth of fighting. The other rifles and handguns have maybe a full clip each. The Cubans have cracked down on carelessness with weapons so they are now very hard to get our hands on, and getting ammunition is even more difficult. All of the men have been taking their arts and crafts lessons very seriously, and have made a ton of spears and knives, but I sincerely hope you're not planning on using them."

"Don't worry about it," Hartford said. "I'm thinking of something much smaller, like a raid on that headquarters building when we're certain either someone important is there or something important is going on."

"What's your man think?" Tuttle asked Skronski.

"Ruiz thinks it's Ortega's headquarters, or at least one of them. At the very least, it's a major communications center."

"Which means we should very seriously consider putting it out of action when the time is ripe," Hartford said. "I do not mean doing it now or even anytime real soon. We hit it and the Cubans take it back a little while later, we could wind up in bad shape."

"There is something else," Skronski said and Hartford signaled for him to continue. "My people are picking up rumors that the Cubans want to ship us by rail to Havana."

"I thought the lines had all been bombed?" Tuttle said.

"They have," Skronski replied, "but the sneaky little Cubans have been working every night to repair them."

Tuttle nodded. "If that's the case, then those spears and knives might come in handy to stop that from happening. The Red Cross people will have a kitten if armed soldiers try to take on virtually unarmed prisoners."

"The Red Cross will not be a factor," Hartford said. "If the going gets hot, the Red Cross people will get going to where it's safe and I don't blame them. They're not paid to get in the way of fighting."

"So what do you want us to do, major?" Tuttle asked.

Hartford smiled, "Two things. First, let's plan for a raid on that headquarters place. Second, we contact our people in the states and get them to keep hitting the rail lines in and around Santiago. Maybe they can use SEALS and Special Forces to make sure the train lines stay broken. Contacting the Pentagon will mean broadcasting our concerns in the clear, but fuck it. I'd almost guess that the Cubans are too busy with the landings up north and the possibility of marines landing down here to give a damn about our conversations with home."

Romanski had to be certain it was Che Guevara they'd seen and there was no way he could do that. None of them had ever actually seen the man and the few photos they'd seen were grainy, blurred, and unreliable. Even if he stared the man in the face all he would be able to say was that it was a scrawny little Cuban with a scraggly beard and who wore a beret.

But ignoring the possibility that Guevara was only a few miles away was a chance they could not take. Where Guevara went, there they would likely find the nuke. Romanski's decision was simple, they would locate the Cuban group they'd attacked, and trail them until they knew one way or the other.

Cathy Malone represented a dilemma. As Ross had realized just after the first attacks, the young woman could not simply be abandoned. She was an American and deserved their protection even if, ironically, it meant putting her in greater danger. There was just no safe place to stash her and he couldn't afford to leave her with one or two of his small command. If it came down to a fire-fight over a nuclear rocket, he would need every man and gun he could muster.

Cathy understood and agreed. She also convinced him that she knew how to use the AK47 she now carried. He had his doubts, but she showed she at least knew how to load, aim, and, oh yes, release the safety before pulling the trigger. Ward said he'd let her fire a couple of rounds a few a weeks earlier. Romanski wondered if she'd hit anything other than the earth. Ward grinned and declined to answer.

They moved out slowly. Romanski's leg still wasn't up to par and he wondered if they wouldn't be better off if they left him behind. Another reason they moved out at a slow pace was because they didn't want to blunder into the Cuban camp. The trail was fairly easy to follow and it appeared that the Cubans were making no effort at disguising it from the ground. They were doubtless far more concerned about threats from the air.

Nor were they so foolish as to follow straight up the trail. They moved from side to side and kept an eye out for obvious ambush sites.

They all cursed the necessity to be so careful, especially since the vehicle carrying the nuke could easily move much faster than they could. Romanski countered by reminding them that the launcher likely wasn't going to go far, and the tracks indicated it was heading towards Guantanamo Bay where it would have to halt.

Finally, they breasted a hill and looked down on where the tracks ended at a ruined barn, the exterior of which was partly covered by a tarp and tree branches. At least a dozen men were hiding under other tarps and in trenches.

They couldn't see it, but it was now very likely that the nuclear rocket was hidden less than a mile away from them.

"Now what, colonel?" Ross asked.

Now what, indeed. Romanski rubbed his jaw and tried to ignore the throbbing hurt in his leg. They were about two miles north of the coastline and maybe a mile from the boundary of the ruined American base. The Soviet built rocket could hit anywhere on the base or along the near shore line. Guevara, if that really was Guevara, had reached his destination. He would launch from where he was.

Romanski turned to the others. "First, we'll try to pinpoint this place and get an air strike or two. If that doesn't work, we'll have to do it the old fashioned way and just kill it ourselves."

Or get ourselves killed, he thought.