Frontal Assault

16

Murdock stared into the trees where he heard the firefight. Too damn early. The Marines wouldn’t be there for another ten, fifteen minutes.

“DeWitt, talk to me,” he said on the Motorola.

“Busy, Skip. We nailed half of them, the rest came up shooting. These are well-trained troops. A little firefight right now. The Marines coming?”

“Talked to them, haven’t seen them. Ten minutes minimum.”

“No problem here other than time. Going to take ten to get rid of these guys. Don’t want any running back to the mother lode.”

“Roger that.”

Murdock tried to listen seaward. At last he heard the faint growl of the LCUs. How long would it take them? He touched the radio mike again.

“Marines, do you copy?”

“Roger, beach. Better reception. Arrive in six minutes.”

“Gently sloping beach here. Not sure how far you’ll get in. We have green light sticks. Found land mines here. Have three single-file paths cleared. No opposition for landing. Small firefight about half a mile inland. We have friendlies there.”

“Single file, beach? We can do that. Soon.”

Murdock and Jaybird could hear the motors now. It was growing lighter. Dawn was coming fast. The Marines should hit the beach just about at daylight. Both SEALs held green light sticks. They would bend them and break the seal and activate them the moment they could see the LCUs.

“Gunfire has tapered off inland,” Jaybird said. “Maybe the JG has it under control.”

Murdock nodded. He watched the water. At sea level you were supposed to be able to see seven miles before the curvature of the earth bent the land or water out of sight. The Marines had to be closer than seven miles.

Then he saw them, twin dark dots on the brightening waters.

“Got them,” Jaybird said. “Light sticks ain’t gonna be much good now that it’s light.”

“They can see them, and it’ll confirm they’re at the right spot. Let’s break the seals.”

Each of them held two of the green light sticks and started them glowing.

“Hey, we see your lights, beach. We’re on course. You have those cleared lanes marked for our boys?”

“Ready to go with three-by flags.”

Murdock waved Jaybird to one of the clear lanes, and he went to the other with its big marker flag. Single file meant it would take the Marines some time to get off the beach and into the woods. If they would run, that would be a help.

“Skip, looks like we’re about finished up here,” DeWitt said on the radio. “We stopped their vehicle and took down six or eight. But about that many vanished into the brush and must be making their way back to their people. Want us to track them?”

“No, JG. Hold there as a forward outpost. We’ll make damn sure the lead elements of the Marines know you’re there. They are just about ready to land.”

Murdock’s radio came on once more.

“Beach, ETA two minutes.”

They could see the 135-foot-long LSUs coming, their big defensive landing ramp straight up and charging for shore at ten knots. They were side by side. They corrected their angle a little, then charged head-on for shore.

The big landing craft nosed up on the beach, hit the sand with the bow in about two feet of water, and the big ramp splashed down. A wave of combat-clad Marines boiled out of the craft, splashed through the water, and thinned out into a single file, running smartly toward Murdock. He pointed to the flag and waved them forward.

“Straight up to the brush,” he bellowed. “Stay in line. Mines around here.”

He ran to the middle sign, and a line of Marines peeled off one of the LSUs and moved toward him. Then they had three files of combat Marines running across the beach and up to the brush. Murdock found a Marine captain and hailed him.

“Captain, Commander Murdock. I’ve got people up in front of you. Eleven SEALs who just put down an enemy patrol. Be sure your lead elements know they are there. I don’t want to lose any of my men to friendly fire.”

“They’ve been told, Commander. I’m Captain Browser. I’ll be with them. Heard you lost a man here to a mine.”

“Lost an arm, don’t know if he’ll make it or not. If you’re ready to go forward, my man and I will go with you. I want to be sure my lead men are safe up there.”

“Let’s go.”

They came to the lead elements of the Marines five minutes later. They had formed up and moved through the woods in squad formations with two scouts out front.

“DeWitt,” Murdock said on the Motorola. “The Marines have landed and are moving up to your rear. We’re friendly back here. Let’s hook up carefully.”

“That’s a roger. We can hear you coming. We’ll stay out of sight until you’re close enough to talk to. Any word on Adams?”

“No contact. Maybe the Marines have a SATCOM.”

The lead Marines worked ahead slowly, made contact with DeWitt, and then the rest of the SEALs were together. They formed one squad and worked ahead with the leathernecks.

They soon passed the shot-up jeep and six bodies. The scouts went slower then, moving from cover to cover. By the time they were inland a half mile, they found the house and small farm. Just over the low hill, the scouts reported that there was enemy activity.

“Looks like a company digging in, about six hundred yards ahead, Captain. Maybe eighty men.”

“Any vehicles?”

“None. Two bicycles for messengers.”

Murdock stood near Captain Browser and heard the radio report. The Marine looked at Murdock. “You have a .50- caliber sniper with you?”

“Affirmative.”

“Here’s what we’re going to do.”

Fifteen minutes later, the Marines were in position. Bradford lay in a brushy spot where he could see the Bahrainian rebels. He had been checking out the company for five minutes through his scope and at last had found the only officer with the group. He stayed in back of a large tree most of the time but came out now and then, evidently to issue orders.

Captain Browser bellied down beside Bradford. “Any time you’re ready, Bradford. You get in your shots and then it’s our turn.”

Bradford sighted in on the tree the Bahrainian officer used and waited. A full minute later, the officer stepped out from the tree and Bradford fired. He rammed the bolt back and forward and fired again.

The enemy officer was down. At once the Marines opened fire on the company from two sides, putting them in a crossfire. The rebels weathered the attack for three minutes, then began pulling back, running from the sparse cover into the deeper woods. The Marines ceased fire, formed up, and moved forward again.

The Marine scouts reported that the enemy had not regrouped. They were running and disorganized, charging back through a small village and onto a paved road. The scouts saw no other military units.

Murdock walked beside Captain Browser.

“Our mission is to move up this road and capture the airport at Manama. That’s the capital city. The airport is on this side. The other unit will come in from the other direction and take down the government buildings, including the army headquarters. We expected more opposition than this. I wonder where in hell are those ten thousand troops?”

“Let’s hope we don’t find them,” Murdock said.

Captain Browser grinned. “For SEALs, you guys make damn good infantry.”

“More than half of our work is done on land,” Murdock said. “We get frequent chances to develop our ground combat skills.”

“We’ll have to talk about that sometime.”

The captain’s radio spoke.

“Cap’n Browser, we’ve got a pocket up here with three machine guns and about twenty troops.”

“Hold it there. We’ll come up and take a look,” Browser said. The captain motioned to Murdock to follow him, and they hurried past the stopped troops to the front elements and then on fifty yards to the scout. They peered past some brush and saw the sun glint off metal two-thirds of the way up a small hill.

The scout motioned. “High ground and the MGs. We call in an air strike?”

“Can’t. The least damage to the place the better. Range?”

“A hundred and fifty.”

“Good range for some forty mikes,” Murdock said.

Captain Browser groaned. “Yeah, but our guys haven’t fired their forty mikes for six months.”

“We’ve got some guys who can lay an egg in a basket,” Murdock said. Shall I call them up?”

The captain hesitated. “Aw, hell. My job is to get past them fast and into that airport. Yeah, bring up your shooters.”

Murdock made a Motorola check and Jaybird, Lampedusa, and Franklin soon appeared right behind them. Murdock moved them ten yards apart and explained the mission.

“Alternate HE and WP. Free beer for a week for whoever drops the first egg in that machine gun hole.”

The SEALs judged the distance and began dropping in the 40mm grenades. The second WP hit near enough to spray the machine guns with flaming phosphorus. Three rounds later, Jaybird dropped an HE into the bunker.

Captain Browser grinned and motioned his men forward. There was no fire from the bunker.

Jaybird laughed as he walked along beside Murdock. “Damn but I’m getting thirsty already. I’d guess we have to wait for Coronado before I get my beer.”

“Good guess, Jaybird.”

Captain Browser came up beside Murdock. “Tell your men nice shooting back there. Glad you’re along. My best map shows a hike of about fifteen miles to our target, the airport. Not sure if that’s right. It also shows two small towns between the beach and our taxi strip. My orders were a little vague on the subject, but as I understand them, you and your men were to go with us.”

“Those were my orders, Captain,” Murdock said.

“Good. We might have some more special need for your men’s talents. We’ve been sitting on that ship too long. Our skills get a little rusty.”

They kept moving. They met little resistance. One quick firefight in front of them produced six bodies and one prisoner. It was over before the SEALs got there.

The country became more built up. Now there was a paved road and an occasional small car or truck. The civilians seemed to melt out of the way as they passed.

“Captain, we may have another problem. Could you take a look?” It was the Marine’s radio. The captain motioned to Murdock, and the two hurried three hundred yards to where the Marine scout lay in a small ditch. Down a slight rise, the buildings were closer together and houses extended back a hundred yards each way from the road.

In the middle of the road, five hundred yards out, sat an armored half-track. It showed a mounted weapon that the captain said was a .50-caliber MG, after checking it with his binoculars.

The scout pointed to the sides and down one connecting street. It looked like more than a hundred riflemen behind good cover.

“Yes, a small problem.”

“The fifty could take down that rig,” Murdock said. “We use it mostly for destroying hardware, vehicles, radar installations, and a chopper now and then. Want some help on it?”

“Take out the truck, we still have those eighty men down there.”

“Do the truck, then more of the forty-mikes. Your men must have thirty or forty under-barrel launchers. We have five. Throw in a couple of hundred rounds before they can scatter, and all you have to do is clean up.”

Captain Browser stared at the scene ahead as he thought about it. At last he nodded. “Okay, we move all the launchers up to within two hundred yards. We launch, and at the same time, your man blows that fifty and the truck into scrap metal. Let’s do it.”

When the riflemen and Murdock’s five SEALs were on line and ready to fire, Captain Browser gave Bradford a nod. The first fifty round caught the truck’s windshield and blew it out. Before any reaction came, Bradford’s second round drilled through the engine. The third hit the fuel tank, and the truck blew up in a huge gasoline fireball, spraying flaming gasoline and truck parts for fifty yards.

With the first .50-caliber round, the forty-mike rounds sailed into the air. About half were short, but enough hit inside the range of the infantry to kill and wound many. The rounds continued to rain down now with more on target. Some shooters lifted their range to catch those who ran to the rear to avoid the death from the sky.

The Marines had been using their M-16s as rifles, too, and blasted anything that moved below. Four minutes after the first round, Captain Browser called for cease-fire.

Ten or fifteen Bahrainian soldiers came out from solid cover and ran to the rear. Let them go, Murdock decided.

The 350 men moved out again with the SEALs. So far, Adams and Holt had been the only casualties.

Captain Browser came up with a man packing a SATCOM. “The force on Beach B ran into a whole shitpot full of trouble. Underwater obstacles ruptured the first LCU. Only half the men made it to shore. They hit ten or twelve mines before they detoured around the open sand and ran into a force of two hundred men who had them pinned down for three hours. Only now are they starting to move toward the capital.”

“We picked the right beach, Captain.”

“Yeah, but that puts them way behind schedule. We were supposed to have this wrapped up before nightfall.”

“Not now,” Murdock said. “Not if the B team was supposed to capture the army headquarters.”

“So, we take over the airport, leave a force there, and charge on into town eight miles away and do a frontal assault on the army’s GHQ?”

“I hope no frontal assault,” Murdock said. “It all depends on the situation…”

Captain Browser stopped him. “And the terrain. I took that same course at the academy. Hell, let’s take down the airport, then we worry about what to do next. Maybe the other battalion can move fast enough to get it done without help.”

“Wouldn’t count on it,” Murdock said.

They ran into no more trouble or even enemy snipers and came to the boundary fence to the airport just before 0900. Captain Browser and Murdock surveyed the airport from the roof of a small building near the fence. Lam and the Marine scout also studied the layout.

“Kid gloves in here,” Browser said. “We’re supposed to do as little damage as we can while we take over the airport, without getting ourselves killed.”

“No fifties into the control tower or into the military transports on the macadam,” Murdock said.

“Yeah. The tower and the administration offices are the primary targets. Also, we’ve learned there is a hangar being used for troop housing. Three targets. A hundred men for each one. I’ll split up the force and make assignments. Murdock, you come with my group. We’ll do the admin building.”

“Right. Captain, can your SATCOM contact your ship? I need to know how my wounded man is doing.”

The captain nodded and pointed Murdock at his radio operator.

The corporal made two calls on the box and gave the phone-type handset to Murdock.

“I’ve got sick bay for you, sir. They say your man is there. The doctor who treated him will be on in a minute.”