Death Blow

7

The carrier’s wardroom was crowded with officers watching the large-screen TV that picked up CNN off a satellite. It was not yet noon on board and no one knew what time zone Nepal was in.

“Whatever time it is over there, they are in one shit pot full of trouble,” an ensign said. “China will walk all over them in three days and there won’t be anything left of that little country but a few high mountains.”

Murdock and DeWitt had just finished coffee when the reports came through on CNN.

“I can’t believe that China would waste a bomb on Nepal,” DeWitt said. “Hell, she could walk across the border there anytime she wanted to without turning a hundred thousand people into crispy critters.”

“CNN said this town they hit with the bomb used to have a population of a hundred and thirty-five thousand,” Murdock said. “Most of them must be gone by now. Of course maybe China wanted to prove she had a tactical nuclear weapon. India would return tit for tat with a nuke, so Nepal would be safer.”

Somebody turned up the volume on the TV.

So far that’s all the information we have. We have no correspondents in Nepal. As most of you know it’s a small country, only fifty-four thousand square miles, that’s a little smaller than the state of Kentucky. Nepal has just over twenty-four million people and Kentucky has only four million.

The military experts say that Nepal has a standing army of only 47,000 men. China has almost three million men under arms. Nepal is a kingdom with the highest mountains in the world. That is where Mount Everest climbs up to twenty-nine thousand twenty-eight feet. The Himalayan Mountain Range bisects the length of Nepal and has twelve more peaks that are over 25,000 feet. By contrast, Mount McKinley in Alaska, the tallest spot in North America, is only 20,320 feet.

Worldwide condemnation of China and Pakistan is pouring into the news media. We have statements from half the nations that are awake at this hour naming China and Pakistan as monsters, bullies, warmongers, outlaw nations, the devil’s spawn, and those are just a few of the nicer names that world governments are calling China and Pakistan that we’re allowed to tell you about.

Which brings us to the question of why. Why would a huge country with a billion and a quarter population, team up with a smaller nation and assault and devastate a tiny country with only twenty-four million residents? We’ve asked some outstanding experts on China, including a U.S. Senator who was rescued from South China less than a week ago. He has some interesting comments. First let’s go to the man who has made his reputation predicting what China will do, retired Army General—

Murdock felt somebody poke him in the shoulder and looked around to see Don Stroh in a garish blue, red, purple, and brilliant yellow Hawaiian print shirt showing tropical flowers, and matching pants. The vision slid into a chair next to Murdock.

“It’s really hit the fan, just like your favorite senator predicted.”

“Thought you had flown back stateside,” DeWitt said.

“Convinced my boss that your senator wasn’t as crazy as State said he was and wrangled another two weeks over here. Looks like it paid off.”

“Hey, Stroh, we’re not in this tussle,” Murdock said. “None of our people were nuked.”

“Haven’t you heard of the Joint Southeast Asian Defense Alliance?” Stroh asked.

“Not a whisper,” DeWitt said.

“Neither have I,” Stroh said, “but there’s something like that out there that damn well could commit us to take up the defense if one of the signatories is attacked. Could be something like that here. If we signed a treaty like that with Nepal, we’re committed to defend that little ridge of mountains.”

“Not another Vietnam,” DeWitt said.

“Whatever you call it, I’d say there is a high and big fucking chance that you boys will be busy here quickly, often, and up to your gonads in Chinese and Pakistanis.”

“But it still has to go through channels, right?” Murdock said.

Stroh gave a big sigh. “Oh, yeah. That little admiral who runs the SEALs is still in a bodacious snit. Wants another stripe on his sleeve. But if things get hot, we can go right with the CNO. The man himself told me so.”

“Stroh, you putting on weight?” Murdock asked. “You look a little pudgy around the waist again and those jowls are barfing out like crazy. You been working out at all?”

“None of your damn business.”

One of the mess stewards came up and stared at Stroh. The CIA man noticed and turned. “So?”

“Are you Mr. Stroh?”

“He is,” Murdock said.

“Sir, the ship’s captain requests your presence with Commander Murdock and Lieutenant (jg) DeWitt in his cabin at once. There is a guide outside to take you there.”

“Duty calls,” Murdock said.

Stroh didn’t move. He hadn’t touched the cup of coffee he brought with him when he sat down. “Be damned. This captain is getting touchy. He ordered me, that’s as in ordered me, to put on some fancy officer khaki uniform. I told him I never made it past corporal in the big war, so I couldn’t wear officer khaki; and he snorted, and said didn’t matter. Guess I’ll get a real ass chewing.”

“Not likely, Stroh. You’ve still got connections, and the captain is always looking for one more wide gold stripe on his arm. Let’s go see what he wants.”

Ten minutes later they were shown into the outer room in the captain’s cabin. It looked like a small living room with a sofa, two large upholstered chairs, a floor lamp and a small table. On one wall was a six-foot-wide map opened to large-scale views of northern India, Nepal, Bhutan, and Bangladesh.

“This is gonna be business,” Stroh said.

“Relived?” DeWitt asked.

“Damn right. I’ve got a boss, too, you know.”

They turned as a large man came into the compartment. He was nearly six feet six, with gray streaks in heavy black hair at his temples, and a face that looked like it had been assembled by committee. His nose was too large for his round face. His cheeks held a perpetual pinkness. Steel blue eyes surveyed the three men in front of him as he moved with an easy grace many tall men don’t have, and pushed behind his desk. He eased into the tall leather chair.

“Seated,” he said. An order.

“I’m Captain Robertson and this is my ship. I usually take orders through channels, and I’m not comfortable having the CNO of the whole damn Navy calling me on the radio.” He paused. “Which doesn’t mean a thing to you men. SEALs and a CIA officer. My lucky day. I don’t mind you taking board and room on my ship, but the CNO said you may have some work to do. He wasn’t specific, but said it had something to do with the nuke bombing this morning and the attack by China and Pakistan.” The captain paused and looked at the men with a steady gaze.

“From what the CNO said, you men have been through this procedure before. I haven’t. He told me that if we get a go-ahead on a mission for you, it takes total priority over anything else I might be doing or want to do, except the safety of my ship and my men. That’s an order I’ve never had before. In short, anything you need or want that I can provide, I give to you. In effect, you own me and my ship. I’m not pleased with that procedure. Whatever you need for your mission is yours. That could be a destroyer, a chopper, a COD, a squadron of F-18s, anything short of a nuclear weapon, which not even the CNO can initiate.

“The CNO told me to tell you that he’s putting orders through channels that you are temporarily assigned to my ship, and you will stand by under a red alert for further orders. My task force is to steam at once toward the South China Sea and generally closer to China off the Chinese island of Hainan. We have a twelve-hundred-mile move. Any idea why, Mr. Stroh?”

“Sir, that would put us closer to the conflict in Nepal.”

“True, but still twelve or thirteen hundred miles from the fighting. I understand that more than twenty thousand Chinese and Pakistani troops have entered Nepal, elite units by air drop, others from helicopters. Mounted troops are fighting their way into the small country by the few roads that link China with Nepal.”

“My guess is that in three days the war will be over,” Stroh said. “Nothing to stop them, and China and Pakistan will put as many ground troops in as they need. China alone has two point nine million men under arms; and as we remember from Korea, they don’t mind taking a high body count if it gets results.”

“At thirty knots it’ll be over long before we get there,” the Captain said. He rubbed his face with his right hand and winced, then massaged his right thumb. “Damned arthritis.” He looked up at Murdock. “Any requests, Commander?”

“Conditioning. We do need a place to run six to ten miles a day.”

“Try the flight deck when there’s no air operations. It’s almost eleven hundred feet long. Five laps to the mile. Talk to a white shirt down there before you run. He’ll help you work out a safe route. In fact he’ll find an area for you to run and work out even if we are having air operations. Anything else?”

“No, sir. If we get a mission, then I’ll want to talk to you, your CAG, and probably somebody in ordnance.”

“Will do, Commander. Now we head for the South China Sea and see what the big Chinese dragon does.” He watched them a moment, then nodded. “Yes, I think this will work out. That will be all, gentlemen.”

The three men stood, came to attention, then turned and left the cabin. When the door closed, Stroh let out a long breath.

“Oh, yes, I’m glad that’s over. Not a word about my shirt.” He grinned. “I guess the CIA has some clout after all. At least my clothes will make it easy for anyone trying to find me.”

Murdock looked down the companionway and shook his head. “What can we do for Nepal? Nothing. I guess we have an embassy there, but we’re twenty-five hundred to three thousand miles from that spot. Well, I guess we could have landing permission in India, if we pulled the right strings. India is to the south of Nepal if I remember right. New Delhi can’t be more than two hundred and fifty miles from that nuked-out Nepal city.”

“This is the biggest mistake China has ever made,” Stroh said. “She has stepped in a deep vat of shit and world opinion is gonna drown them in it. Reports coming in are all negative, especially from nations in the area.

“India pulled out her embassy staff from Bejing and broke off diplomatic relations. Gonna be all kinds of ugly shit flying around this one for years.”

“In the meantime China gobbles up Nepal,” DeWitt said. “What’s next for her? She want to take on India?”

“India has the bomb, too,” Murdock said. “We’re forgetting one element here. The official announcement of a state of war came from Bejing and it said the China — Pakistan forces are invading Nepal. What the hell is Pakistan doing teaming up with China?”

“I don’t see what Pakistan is trying for,” Stroh said as they worked their way through the big ship to the quarters assigned to the SEALs. They had one large compartment where they stashed their gear, weapons, and ammo and where they could hold meetings.

Murdock called the fourteen men around him. “The j.g. and I just came back from a chat with the Captain of this tub. He says he has orders to proceed to the South China Sea. We are assigned to stand by for possible work off this ship. That means we stay in top shape. Welcome to Fitness International. Senior Chief Dobler will take the platoon to the flight deck, check with a white shirt for a safe spot, and we will do an hour of calisthenics followed by a two-mile run. In case you wonder, this ship is almost eleven hundred feet long. Five laps to a mile. Uniform of the day, cammies. We have ten minutes before the Senior Chief leads us up to the flight deck. Any questions?”

“Yes sir,” Jaybird said. “What’s Pakistan have to do with this attack on Nepal?”

“Pakistan is supposedly an equal partner in the aggression; however, it was a Chinese nuke that opened the show. That’s all we know so far.”

“A week-long war?” Mahanani asked.

“The betting is for three days,” DeWitt said. “Take that long to get the Chinese and Pakistani troops in place. There won’t be much of a fight with only forty-five thousand troops with Nepal name tags.”

“Let’s get moving,” Murdock said and the men scattered to their lockers to get in uniform.

Three thousand feet over the capital city of Nepal, Sergeant Chiang Pio adjusted his gear and eyed the jump light. The door of the big transport was open and he stood by it holding his first out man by the shoulder. They were the first troops into Nepal since the big bomb hit the town well to the north. Now their mission was to go in and capture the civilian airport at the nation’s capital, which then would be used for military supply by air. He had been surprised when the word came down that they would be attacking Nepal. He had always considered the tiny country a fly speck on the edge of China. A nonplayer in international politics. So why were they and Pakistan going in there with troops after dropping a nuclear bomb on one of the northern cities? It didn’t make much sense to Chiang, but he was a soldier and did as he was ordered.

Then Chiang didn’t have time to think about the mission or his family back in China. The light went from red to green and a horn sounded.

“Go, go, go,” Chiang shouted, as he gave the man a gentle push and he jumped out the door into the new light of dawn over Katmandu. Twenty-seven men left the door, then Chiang held up his hand stopping the next man as he made sure his own cord was attached to the sliding rail, then he jumped out into the suddenly chilly air. His chute jerked him severely as the wide straps jolted into his legs and shoulders, then the sudden pain eased as he saw the chute opening above him and his rate of descent slowed to a normal jump and he eyed the ground coming up at him. He had come out at the right time. Some of his men would land just before the border of the airport. He would be about fifty yards down the runway. He pulled the cord on the right side of his chute to dump some air and aim to the side of the concrete runway into the softer grass and bushes. He held his feet up a moment as the ground rushed up at him, then he dropped them and ran as he hit the ground. He overtook his chute and fell on it to collapse it, then jerked his harness off, grabbed his submachine gun from the straps on his side and shouted to two men he saw. They were from his platoon.

“Get the men over here,” he shouted. “We have the two sheds at the end of the runway to clear. Move it.”

The men scurried around finding more men, sending them to the sergeant. Soon he had twenty of his thirty men and they formed up in a line of skirmishers and rushed the two sheds fifty yards away. There were only two workmen there getting ready to check the night lighting system. Neither of them had weapons.

The one man in his platoon who spoke Napali had not joined the group yet. Chiang shouted in Chinese at the men to continue their work. Then he used his hands to show the men to go on working. At last they nodded and picked up their tools.

Chiang assembled his men and marched them toward his second objective, a guard building at the south entrance to the airport used mainly for maintenance trucks. He picked up the ten missing members of his platoon. One man had a broken leg. They left him on the edge of the runway with another man as a backup and double-timed toward the guard shack.

At three hundred yards they took their first enemy fire. It was short. They fired their long-range weapons and kept running forward.

At two hundred yards, Chiang directed his troops into a small ditch at the edge of the runway. He put his Ultimax machine gun on a gentle rise and had it open fire on the guard shack. Now he saw it was made of concrete blocks or bricks and had sand bags at two windows, but none at the third.

The 5.56mm rounds from the Ultimax slammed into the window and around a facing door. That slowed firing from inside. Chiang took the opportunity to send one squad around to the rear of the small building while the rest of the platoon fired at the shack with their type 86 rifles. They were good weapons, Chiang knew, firing 7.62mm rounds and could be fully automatic or single shot. All of his men used the 30-round magazine, and each carried six loaded magazines, giving each man 210 rounds without refilling magazines.

His first squad came up behind the building and fired into it, reducing the answering fire. A moment later a pole came out of the building with a white T-shirt attached.

Chiang smiled and ordered a cease-fire. The men ran forward and charged into the small building without firing another shot.

Chiang made sure the position was secure and that he had the four Nepal soldiers captured and bound. Then he called in to his company commander on his radio.

“Sir, Red Platoon of Red Company has secured our two objectives. Where do you need us?”

“Red Platoon, hold your position for five minutes, then charge forward toward the hangar at the south end of the field. Resistance there is heavy.”

“Right, hold five minutes.” He turned off the radio and put it back in the holder on his combat webbing. “Reload all magazines. We go into a tough fight in five minutes.”

The riflemen filled partly empty magazines. The two machine gunners put on new one hundred-round drums. Chiang checked his watch. He looked out the window at the building three hundred yards ahead. It was a hundred feet wide, he couldn’t tell how long. He saw no soldiers, but he could hear firing.

“Two squads to the left and two to the right. Let’s go on a sweep. Five yards apart. Move out.”

Chiang kept in the center of the four squads. Nobody faltered, all stayed on line. As soon as they took fire they all went prone and returned fire. He saw two machine guns firing from bunkers at the front and back corners of the building. When did they have time to build sand-bag bunkers at a civilian airport? Chiang wondered.

With hand signals he moved the farthest right squad into a ditch that ran toward the hangar. He told them to move up and get the machine gun in a cross-fire. He was too far away for his submachine gun, but he fired a dozen rounds anyway.

More hand signals told the two right squads to concentrate on the rear machine gun. Three hundred rounds poured into the position and a moment later it went quiet. The two right-hand squads jolted upright and ran for the target. The other two squads bore down on the front machine gun and cut down its firing.

A short time later, the far right squad laid down a barrage of rifle fire from the corner of the building and wiped out the machine gun at the other corner.

“Charge!” Chiang bellowed and the other two squads blasted forward, secured the corner and the machine gun placement. Then they could look into the hangar. Two large civilian jetliners sat there, but Chiang saw no soldiers. He frowned. He sent a scout into the building and waited. The man ran from one side of the huge building to the other, then came out at the far corner and gave the all-clear sign.

Chiang waved his men forward. They were halfway across the one-hundred-foot-wide building with the thirty-foot-high front folding doors, when three machine guns opened up on his platoon from inside the hangar. He and his men had no cover on the concrete floor and taxiway.

“Take cover,” Chiang shouted. He saw three of his men mowed down right in front of him before they could react to the weapons. Some of his men fired into the building, but they couldn’t see the hidden machine guns.

Five- and seven-round bursts chattered from the three positions. Chiang ran back the way they had come. The wall there was his only cover. He saw three more of his men charging for the wall. Two fell almost in front of him. He hurdled the bodies and dove forward, rolling once to get to the wall. He rolled again with bullets chipping concrete all around him. He rolled again and slithered around the wall into safety. Chiang stared at the carnage on the cold concrete floor in front of him. He had come in with twenty-eight men. Two more were back on the tarmac with the broken leg.

He counted men dead and dying in front of him. Tears seeped from his eyes. He saw two men lunge up and try to run. One dragged his right leg. A burst of five rounds hit him in the chest and leg and he went down and didn’t move. The other man almost made it to the wall and safety with two guns trained on him and two seven-round bursts plunged into his body jolting him into instant communication with his honorable ancestors.

Chiang wiped tears off his cheeks. He had four men with him, only four. The rest of them, twenty-four, lay on the hangar floor dead. He grabbed his radio.

“Captain Company Red, this is Red Platoon.” He waited but there was no response. He tried again: “Captain of Company Red, this is Red Platoon. We have trouble.”

A moment later the speaker came to life. “Yes, Red Platoon. Have you secured the south hangar?”

“No. We tried to capture the south hangar. My platoon was wiped out by hidden machine guns inside the hangar. We cleared it but missed them. I have five men left. The rest are dead. Instructions.”

“Take the hangar, Red Platoon. Surprising heavy resistance at other areas of the airport. Do the best you can. Grenades maybe.”

Chiang looked around the edge of the wall. He was low to the ground and practically invisible from anyone inside. He watched for five minutes. No sound came from the big building. Then he saw movement. One of the civilian airliners had a rear passenger access door open. He saw movement inside the shadows in the plane. That had to be one of the machine guns. He motioned for a rifle, set it on full auto and in one swift movement moved the rifle around the wall and drilled twenty rounds into the open airliner door. He jerked the rifle back as two machine guns fired at the wall, splintering it in a dozen places where he had been moments before.

Now he had more places to watch from. The hail of bullets stopped and he watched again. There were two more guns in there, but where? He figured he had silenced one of them. Again he watched the other areas of the big hangar. They had to have good fields of fire at almost all of the front of the building. That limited the spots they could hide. He narrowed down the possibilities, then watched them on a grid basis.

He sectioned the areas and concentrated on one of the squares at a time. The second time he came back to a square near the back of the building he saw that a doorway was opened more the second time around than the first. Yes, it would have the right field of fire. He reached for another rifle, made sure it had a full thirty-round magazine.

This time he barely nosed the muzzle around the wall, sighted in on the door and hosed it down with all thirty rounds in the weapon. The first burst of five rounds may have done the job. He drilled the rest of the magazine rounds into the door jolting it fully open. For a fraction of a second he saw the ugly muzzle of a machine gun there, then a round slammed it backward.

The third machine gun was later this time in firing, missing the tip of the rifle and the man firing it.

“Two down,” he told his men. One of the soldiers had vanished for a while, now he came back.

“Sergeant, there’s a back door down there near the rear. It’s locked, but I can shoot off the lock and roll in some grenades. Might catch somebody by surprise.”

“Do it when you hear me firing. I’ll try to distract them.”

Sergeant Chiang gave his man time to get to the other end of the hangar, then he pushed the weapon around the door and fired at the back of the hangar. He jerked the weapon back a second before the MG there fired again. Over the murderous sound of the weapon he heard two explosions. They were muffled and he hoped they were grenades. The machine gun stuttered, then stopped. A moment later he heard the flat barking sound of the infantryman’s rife. Then all was quiet.

Four minutes later he heard another grenade go off and more rifle fire. He looked around the wall and saw his soldier running across the hangar toward him.

“Hangar clear, Sergeant,” the soldier said. A door opened on the other airliner and a submachine gun stuttered. The soldier on the floor stopped in mid stride looking up in surprise at the Nepal soldier in the airplane who had killed him.

Sergeant Chiang bellowed in surprise and anger and stepped around the wall and fired fifteen rounds from his submachine gun at the man who stood in the airliner door. The Nepalese soldier shuddered as half the rounds punctured his chest. He dropped his weapon, turned halfway around and fell off the airliner to the concrete twelve feet below.

Chiang slumped to the floor and took out his radio. “Red Platoon to Red Captain. We have captured the south hangar. It’s secure. I’m down to four men. No more missions possible.”